Bad Blogger

Wow, so the last time I updated this thing was back before we even moved...damn!

So we moved in at the end of June.  Thanks to our friends Rachel, Sheena, and Chris, we managed to get the whole thing done in two days, without having to miss any work!  Yay! 

The first month, we spent most of our time unpacking and getting settled in.

The second month, we decided that Big House + 2 People + 2 Kitties = Too Much Free Space.  So, naturally, we adopted two other kitties.  My friend Kendall found them after they'd been THROWN OUT on a horse farm.  She was rescued them after she heard the trash can meowing.  Poor dolls.

Cabot is the black one.  Mogwai is the Tortie.  She's very much like a Gremlin (one who has routinely been fed after midnight, at least) so it's a very fitting name.  Cabot was named after Cabot black Ink.  It's funny, from the beginning their little personalities were so different.  Cabot is just the sweetest little guy ever - he reminds me of a stuffed animal in that you can move him around or pose him and he'll just stay put and chill out.  Mogwai is high energy, and while she's sweet now, for the first two months she was horribly scratchy and bitey.  Fortunately she's learned that she likes pets, and she only gets pets if she doesn't bite people. 

So far, we couldn't be happier with the house.  Two bad things - the top step of the stairs is starting to sag a bit, and the furnace busted on the first subzero weekend of the year!  Go figure!

Last week we had our first dinner party.  It was a great night, it truly was.  Two of our friends from about an hour away came over....and then, due to the snowstorm, they couldn't leave until thursday!  Sunday-thursday, man!  We watched so many movies, and while we might not have roommates again for a long time, it was a pretty interesting experience, that's for sure!

Ahh, I love that couch.  We bought it from a friend (we're SLOWLY adding more and more "grown up" furniture...as we go) and he promised me that it was the most comfy thing ever.  Truly, he did not lie.  I could sleep on it (and honestly, sometimes I'm so comfy that I DO THIS) and I looove curling up there after a crazy day at work!

This will save our relationmarriageship

So, what's a girl to do when she's fallen in love with a guy that seems to be damned near perfect for her.

Except....

He loves heavy metal.  And he likes it loud.  And while I do like some metal...it's not the same bands that he likes.  If i never hear Lamb Of God or Arch Enemy or Children of Bodom or Behemoth again, I will be a happy happy lady.

For the last two years, the solution has been "industrial earplugs" or "really good headphones" or "just leaving the house".

When we were looking for a house to purchase, one of the major things we were looking for was SPACE.  Space for him, space for me, space for kitties.  God knows I love 'em all but sometimes, distance, even if it is just being across the house from him, does make the heart grow fonder.

And then I found this house.

With a front porch that is made for me - I love reading in a comfy chair while nosily peering around to see what the neighbors are doing.

But better yet, there's a sunroom.  That's rigiht, ladies and gents....NO MORE HEAVY METAL UNLESS I WANT TO HEAR IT!

*YAY!*

Tales of false teeth, and the surround sound scream

Apartment living, and why it had to end:

When Josh and I first started dating, in April 2008, we were both very uncomfortable with our living situations.

I'd recently been dumped by someone I was planning on moving out west with - I wasn't so much attached to the idea of moving *with* him, but I did want to move. Needless to say, the breakup ended those plans.

So I moved back in with my dad. My dad owns a house in the town I grew up in...at that time, my brothers, Greg and Graham, were living with him, too. It was very much a manly man house - not a lot of cooking, or dishwashing, or cleaning in general. Plus, there was a family of spiders living in my bedroom. SPIDERS.

Josh was living with his best friend's cousin. While he was a very nice guy, they just didn't mesh well for the most part.

So two months into our relationship, we decide to move into the only apartment building in the area that had vacancies. WHEEEE!

And things were great for awhile. I mean, sure, our ceiling leaked whenever it rained. The there was a huge crack in the ceiling/outside wall...that maybe indicated that the structure wasn't as safe as we hoped, but hey, my dad's house had SPIDERS. Scary, mean spiders that probably climbed in my ears, nose, and mouth while I was sleeping.

Anyways. In the last few months, we've run into a new phenomenon in this building - "surround sound screaming".
You see, my neighbors apparently have some relationship problems - and I don't mean one neighbor, I mean ALL of them.

Our next door neighbor, it's a strange situation. He is married, but moved here to continue his education. So he rented this apartment, and his wife was staying in their actual home.

Turns out this is an elaborate attempt on his behalf to leave her. The last six months have been filled with so many days of him screaming over the phone, throwing things, telling MaryLou over and over again that she just needs to LISTEN! That's all he says - she must be very wordy, because all I ever hear him say is "Listen maryl--NO LISTEN TO ME M---SERIOUSLY LISTEN TO ME MARYLOU!"

And then there's the across the hall neighbors. The first time I met these charming individuals, whose names I do not actually know, his opening line was this: "I GOT STABBED IN THE HEART".

Oh, okay. After looking at his chest to make sure he didn't mean...he'd just gotten stabbed in the heart, I inquired as to what had happened.

His first wife, and the mother of his children (she still has custody of them, and there's always people trying to serve him with papers for a court case for child support) stabbed him in the heart.

No other details. Okay.

His current wife if 20 years older than him. Personally, I do not care. However, he tells me this every bloody time I see him.

One of the problems with her being 20 years older than him....she has a problem with his 37 year old ass sitting around all day watching anime, and never leaving the house.

These folks make a daily trip to the garbages in the building, to look for liquor bottles that they can return.

Another one of his opening lines was "Heh you can probably smell that we had ribs for dinner" (I couldn't) "They were delicious...fall off the bone, ya know? They have to be for this one (points at wife) since her teeth come out as soon as she gets home".

ORLY?

So, that was the beginning of the end of apartment living. Tales of false teeth, and the surround sound screaming.

The Crazies

Now that blogger seems to be in working order, I figured that the next post on my list would be to actually introduce myself, and my partner in crime.

Me:
My name is Lindsay. I'm a 27 year old female, working at a small (family) business - we deal with IT management and networking - basically handling the IT stuff for businesses that are too small to hire their own IT manager but big enough that they damned well need someone dedicated! I grew up just downriver from here, in Corunna, Ontario. We have lots of chemical refineries, and lots of water around here.

Things I like:
- Martinis (gin, dirty, three olives and you'd best keep the ice far away from my glass, pls)
- The kitties (they're the best, even though Edison did wake me by divebombing the bed this morning)
- Reading (I'll read damned near anything)
- Knitting (Oh woe is me, most of my supplies have been packed already!)
- Textile arts in general. I've been spinning yarn since I was in my early 20s, and loooove working with dye. I'm hoping to make a big, felted carpet for our sunroom!
- Seafood (Ideal first date - martinis and mussels, man)
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- Cooking - I love experimenting with recipes, and for a former vegetarian, I sure do love meat. If it wasn't for nasty old real life getting in the way, I'd probably be a butcher.

Things I do not like:
- Cleaning
- Baking (I cannot properly measure things for the life of me, and never ever learn that this is, in fact, important when baking)
- Talking on the phone (which I have to do frequently at work!)
- Those uncomfortable meetings with friends from long ago. You *know* what's up in their life thanks to your facebook creeping abilities, but do not know whether to mention those things or not. So I just end up being awkward and generally weird.
- Honestly there's not a whole hell of a lot that I seriously dislike.

My manfriend, Joshua:

I'm at that age where I'm not sure if I call him my boyfriend, my partner, or (gag) my common law husband. So, we'll go with manfriend, because it makes me laugh.

Josh is 28 years old. We met in grade 9, at the Lambton Central Collegiate Vocational Institute (fancypants name for our high school). He was dating a friend of mine - he was perfectly pretentious about his artwork, looked down on people who didn't read the classics, and lets face it, was kind of douchey in general. However, we hit it off right away, and maintained a friendship throughout high school. We were both crazily attracted to each other but never wanted to ruin our friendship.

Said friendship didn't last beyond high school. Fast forward to 2008, he's 26 and I'm 25 and I'm trolling internet dating sites, looking around for someone mildly interesting, when goshdarnit, someone messages me asking if I'm a certain Lindsay that he knew in high school. Sure enough, I was, and that fella was Josh.

Fast forward two years later, we've bought our first home, mostly because we feel that the kitties need more space. Yes, we are those people.

Apartment living was getting too tight for us, overall. That's another post.

Josh is a pipefitter by trade, and a photographer by education. He's my favourite artist (and I ain't just saying that because he pays me to), and has a great eye for decorating (this will come in helpful).

I'd love to end this with a photo of us, but believe it or not, there aren't any!

Introducing the Scienkittehs - Tesla and Edison

I wish there was a way to explain to my kitties that we're moving soon! The living room has become a playground of boxes and stacks of books, which they seem to like. I'm so excited for them to have more space so they can run around and frolic and lay about in the window sills.

We are very lucky to have friends who don't even question why we're more excited about the kitties having space than us having space.
Both kitties were adopted from the Humane Society. Josh and I adopted Tesla in November of 2008, and Edison in May 2009. Tesla is huge - he's the longest kitty I've ever met, but he's a gentle giant who is so patient and loving. Edison is very outgoing, he likes to do silly things like dive bomb the bed from the top of the closet door (usually while I'm in the bed). Tesla loves to stand on the dining room table (barring anything that would cause them harm, we let our kitties do pretty much whatever they want - Josh calls them free range) and head butt peoples faces. It's the only time he'll demand attention, but if you pick him up, he's got nonstop purrs, and he'll put his front paws on your face and look into your eyes while he purrs at you. I don't know what that means, but it's pretty damned adorable. He's got such a serious face. Edison is a tiny little hellraiser who likes to jump into the bath with me, and he loves going out on his leash - so many new things to smell! Little Edweirdo loves having his face scritched, and loves playing around. Tesla is too smart for his own good, he figures out games too quickly and gets bored!

When we move we're going to be bringing another kitty with us - I'm 99% sure she's a stray, but I've been feeding/caring for her for the last year or so. She's the sweetest kitty, all she wants is a warm lap to cuddle in, and a nice big bowl of food, but so far, she hasn't had much luck with that. The house we purchased has a detached sunroom, so she will be living there until we can get her checked out by the vet. I haven't named her, because I still have to canvas the neighborhood once more just to make sure I'm not stealing someone's pet!

After the whirlwind of purchasing our first home, I thought it would be nice to record the moving in process and the following renovations on blogger.

We've been renting for most of our adult lives - and after realizing that our apartment was actually costing more than a mortgage, we decided to take the plunge. Honestly, apartment living has never really been for us - we're both private people who don't enjoy the fact that every one of our neighbors can hear our arguments, smell what we're eating for dinner (and frequently comment on it) and know the ins and outs of when we leave/get home/how many bags of groceries/beer/whatever we are bringing in. And seriously, I think that the "surround sound screaming" of our neighbors is taking a strain on my own relationship. It's hard to listen to someone yell at their wife on the phone for hours upon hours, without starting to feel a little cranky yourself.

At any rate; after casually browsing around some real estate sites, partially out of curiously, but halfway hoping to find something that caught my eye, I found our house on sarnia.kijiji.ca. I think this benefited us greatly, we developed a relationship with Karen, the woman we bought the house from, and she's been able to tell us all of the little ins and outs of the house. I mean, she even wrote us a little note to tell us to remember to keep the front window open next summer because the smell of lilacs will fill the house. Bless ya, Karen!

Anyways - we were fortunate to have enough saved for a downpayment - it's not usual to spontaneously purchase a house, I suppose, but as I've said, this apartment building is just Too Much For Us. Thanks to the help of Josh's father, Jim (their family motto is "don't ask me how, but I did it") we were able to get all of the paperwork, mortgage, downpayment, and lawyer straightened out.

We take possession on June 30th, 2010. We're planning on having a party that weekend - it's Canada Day weekend, and a lot of our friends are back in town...plus, we just wanna have a party.

Our first home renovation will be renovating the countertops in the kitchen.