Jun
20
Heh heh heh, “swedish finish”
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June 20, 2006
To recap our 5-day stint at Bellevue’s charming Extended Stay Hotel, let us embrace my friend the bullet point:
• Number of blankets encrusted with human filth provided by hotel: 1
• Dollars charged for the “service” of having disgusting blanket removed and a non-crunchy blanket supplied, plus new towels: 10
• Number of towels provided by hotel after this “service” was performed: 0
• Resemblance of hotel clerk to ubiquitous Simpsons wage-slave: uncanny, down to the voice break (“I’ve gotta ask my manager, ma’am”)
• Number of times Riley bumped his head into various metal furniture trying to navigate the .001″ of floor space: several hundred
• Parts per million of contamination likely crawling on floor space: I don’t want to know I don’t want to know I don’t want to know
In summary:
We moved to a Silver Cloud Inn on Saturday, which in retrospect we should have done immediately after noticing our Extended Stay blanket had last been washed in 1987. The Silver Cloud offered a full suite with kitchenette, soft towels, two (!) televisions with HBO, a wide expanse of sparkling clean carpet for Riley to practice crawling on (he’s at this stage where he gets on his hands and knees and rocks back and forth, it is both weird and cute), and bed linens thankfully devoid of stains or pubic hairs.
(Much, much better.)
If you are visiting Bellevue and looking for a place to stay, and you’ve ruled out my house due to the spiders and rats and slimy-nosed Labs and all, I highly recommend the Silver Cloud Inn. If you are with a well-known NBC evening news show looking to do an exposé on hotels that charge $90 per night yet apparently do not employ actual cleaning personnel, I’d like to point you to the Extended Stay. Enter at your own risk, though.
All in all, we spent a full week away from the house while the flooring people worked and various things went wrong. First there was a horrific amount of staining revealed when the carpets were pulled up, probably from some kind of deadly mold that slithered over from the Extended Stay back in 1987, during that big blanket washing event. Boards had to be replaced, and instead of the “Natural” finish, we chose a stain to help cover up the damage. Everything took longer than expected, so instead of coming back on Thursday as we had planned, we did the majority of our move-in yesterday afternoon. And let me tell you, the only thing that’s even more awesome than moving every single piece of furniture out of the house is moving it back IN, with the added benefit of applying little felt doohickeys on the bottom of everything beforehand.
(BEFORE)
(AFTER) (Notice they managed to remove that nasty cat-shaped stain!)
The house looks great, except for one remaining problem: certain areas of the floor are now shiny – as if the floor is still wet, but it’s not. The contractors have scratched their heads and called manufacturers and no one can exactly figure out the Shiny Floor Issue, but they’re going to try and fix it today with an “alcohol wash” which probably means they’re going to sit around and have a beer while they count the piles of money we now owe them.
Hey, have I mentioned lately how tired of the remodel I am? Good thing we now have to replace all the baseboard trim in our entire house in addition to the remainder of the work in the bathroom, because we wouldn’t want the end to be in sight, or anything.
Random factoids about having your floors refinished:
• The sanding process will leave behind a thick layer of wood-dust on every object in your house and when you turn the blinds in your infant son’s room to darken it so he can sleep, you will dump a pile of dust directly onto his sweet, trusting face
• The same dust will make it painfully apparent you’ve been living with kind of, um, a SHITLOAD of cobwebs
• The clothes you left in the closet will forever smell of solvent, as though you got dressed and doused yourself head to toe with OFF! mosquito spray
• “Swedish finish” sounds totally pornerrific
In final news, an excited dog + hardwood floors = COMEDY GOLD.
Jun
13
Menudo!
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June 13, 2006
Updates here will be few and far between this week as my home computer is currently wrapped in a towel and sitting in the garage, but please visit that other blog where I’m, uh, sort of contractually obligated to post each weekday and maybe also pretend like I know who the hell Andrew Shue is.
(Melrose what? I never saw it, back then I was too busy being despondent and heaving great dissatisfied sighs and weeping gently for having been born both without fangs and with a skintone that darkened when exposed to sunlight rather than curling into unholy flames. O, the injustice of being a fervent teen gothic with a tan.)
Random:
• I hate living in a hotel, but I am so glad our floors are being done. The workers pulled up the carpet today and there was a thick whitish built-up residue in several places. JB asked what is was, and they said “Oh, you know. Dirt. Mold.” SHUDDER.
• I rented this and we watched it last Saturday night and about halfway through I turned to JB and said, “Um, I didn’t know it was going to be quite so…if you want to turn it off, just say.” And he said, “No, it’s fine. I’m just NEVER GOING TO BE THE SAME.” Watch it, if you dare. I guarantee you will never eat wontons again.
• We also watched the premiere of Deadwood on Sunday before moving the entertainment system into the kitchen (and wrapping it in towels!) and now I don’t need to contribute to the cussin’ jar because Deadwood done filled it up. Cocksucker!
• I sort of love this Infiniti FX SUV-thing. Like a lot. Sorry, Mini Cooper, I have a new car-crush.
• I fed Riley tiny bits of chicken recently and he ate it so eagerly and with this look of dawning wonder on his face and I was ridiculously thrilled and proud. Non-smushy food, first time. (Although sometimes when he opens his mouth with such impatient expectation I think not of adorable cheeping birds but of Alex in A Clockwork Orange, smacking his mouth open in the hospital bed while he’s being spoon-fed, which is to say, damn, kid, I am not your Minister of the Interior!)
• Three hardware products JB has been project managing were all announced today; I know firsthand that it’s pretty exciting to have something you’ve worked on start getting mentioned in the press (although there are some differences, like my company is usually reported on by Mac news sites while his company is, you know, on the front page of the Wall Street Journal) so I am quite proud of him. Even if he did make a big stink about taking Riley to daycare this morning instead of picking him up tonight because, and I quote, “This is deviating from the plan. You know I don’t like deviating from the plan.” JB, you are the most awesome stubborn hardass I know.
• The other day I gave myself a home pedicure, painted on a loud-ass red polish, stuck a little rhinestone sparkle “fashion nail accessory” on each of my big toes, and my feet now officially look better than the rest of me. I feel stupidly happy about this. Sure, I’ve got on a wrinkled shirt and my hair’s a mess, but I’m walking pretty, by god.
• Oh! I almost forgot, I overheard this at work today: “It’s like MySpace…but with dragons.” Heh. Geeeeeeks.
:::
Now is the time for the crazy links:
• Young FrankenSteve
• Walken Cowbell
• Animator/Animation cage match
• Diet Coke and Mentos
:::
Happy Tuesday. Have a good week! May your floors be mold-free and your toes a source of pleasure. (WHAT? Go away, fetish googlers.)
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