Update #10

Two weeks until the wedding!

The Bad News: It's August. Where's the summer going?

The Good News: We're looking to have a great turnout at the wedding. We have yet to receive a no response.

The Great News: Alicia was admitted to the New York State Bar on Wednesday. She's a licensed attorney now. Read about it on her blog!

What I've been thinking about: Not much besides Mathematics. It must be something to do with my 6am wakeup time, but I've just been kinda zoning out. Studying has been occurring. Teaching has occurred. But that's most of what's occurred this last week or two.

Thus far, the hardest part of teaching has been motivating them. It's a quiet class and the students aren't doing terribly well. So every day, I struggle to get them involved and excited.

What I've Enjoyed: Really liked the AMC series Breaking Bad. It's about a high school chemistry teacher diagnosed with lung cancer. He decides he wants to actually make some money and live, so he begins cooking methamphetamines (crystal meth to you and I). Of course, he is intimately familiar with all the chemistry involved, so he's creating the purest meth available. It's always fun watching someone do something they're really good at. I also enjoy the thought that academic study can give you one hell of a leg up in anything you'd like...even the drug trade.

What's the most bizarre is that the chemistry teacher is played by the dad from Malcom in the Middle. I can't believe that's the same actor. He's fantastic. Really, really good.

Be warned, it's a dark show. It doesn't tread lightly on heavy issues such as death and morality. It has some humor and it's impossible to not route for the meth cooker.

New Art

I received such positive comments after my apartment tour, I thought I'd ride that wave a bit longer with some more pictures of the new apartment.

Just as we started working on the apartment back in June, the Renegade Craft Festival came to town. It's an annual market that features creative people from all over the country. Mostly, its a marketplace for t-shirts, bags, jewelery, et cetera. But we had a new apartment to fill, so I kept my eye out for some art. It was an expensive day.

The following is some of the art we purchased that day. All of it is hanging somewhere in the apartment. I'm hoping it'll let you get a better feel for the apartment. But I'm going to take the museum stance and suggest that art is best without commentary. Enjoy!

(Note: If you are the copyright owner of these works and would like it removed, feel free to let me know at jhinra (at) gmail.com).

Thank you!

I've been getting a lot of messages from people thanking me for the Apartment Tour. Glad you liked it! It was my pleasure, honestly. Thanks for all the kind words.

I'm starting my July teaching appointment Wednesday. Flying to Minnesota soon. Getting married in just over a month! Hope everything's going just as well with you.

Update #9

The Bad News: Trouble with the neighbors. This building went from being empty in June to being filled with families in July. Three new tenants, all with kids. I'd say the kids are under the age of 10.

As a result, we've been getting it from several fronts. Music plays, though not at strange hours. The hallways are crowded with stuff from people moving in. Kids scream while running through the hallways.

The worst part is that our garden has taken a beating. Poor Alicia lost some flowers this weekend when someone (a kid?) decided to pull them out and replant an entire pot in it's place. They took some of our hanging pots and hung them from a tree that couldn't handle the weight. They left food out, bringing a large amount of ants. Our candles were stolen. Perhaps the worst offense, though, is that they picked our biggest tomato.

We've adopted a zero tolerence policy about the flowers now. We refuse to watch and see if they do it again. Everything of value to us has been moved upstairs. Our fire escape is crowded with flowers, the tomato plants, etc. We even took our nice chair upstairs.

Since the new neighbors don't speak english, we can't explain why we're upset. Hopefully, our actions will speak loud enough. The garden doesn't look awful, but it certainly isn't as pretty now.

The Good News: Our Xbox has returned. In June, it stopped working. The problem is pretty widespread, it's called the "Red Ring of Death." That's because the Xbox doesn't turn on, but simply displays 3 red lights on the front.

The problem is caused by inadaquate cooling. Not enough air flow goes through the Xbox, and it over heats. Heat is very bad for electronics, so when the processor gets too hot it just never work the same again.

The "Red Ring of Death" is so widespread that Microsoft has a 3 year extended warranty to cover this problem alone. When our Xbox stopped working, Microsoft paid for shipping both ways and fixed the problem. Sure, we lost two weeks, but we gained a working Xbox free of charge.


The Great News: Life is great. I'm getting married soon to a woman I am still happy with even after four years of being with her. The apartment is exactly how I want it. I've managed to have a very content summer so far, and it is only half over. Both Alicia and I are employed. The kitties are happy and healthy.

And my biggest problems involve neighbor kids. No serious complaints here.


What I've been thinking about: Security. After our next door neighbor was robbed (nothing serious... he left the window unlocked and the thief only stole small electronics) and my father's email account was hacked, I've been trying to be more conscious of it.

Alicia and I were just invited to join Google Voice. The service gives us a new phone number (for free!) and gives us total control over it. We can block people who we don't want calling us, we can access our voicemail on the internet, and we can direct where we'd like the phone number to ring (cell phone, office, etc.). In terms of security, it means no one could trace this number to any specific location in the world. Thus, I feel free to mention that my new number is 347-987-1337. If someone weird on the internet started calling me, I could just block their number!

Other security measures we're thinking about:

- A P.O. Box: Then we could receive mail without giving out our address. They'd accept packages for us, too!
- A Safety Deposit box: Just incase we did have someone break into our apartment, it'd be nice to know our valuables are safe.
- A camera for the garden: The garden is where we're most vulnerable. It'd be nice to catch someone sneaking around back there, or better yet, determine who ruins our flowers next time!

Don't get me wrong, Alicia and I aren't afraid of living here. I guess life is just so good, I'd hate for someone to ruin it.


What I've enjoyed: There's been a lot, so here's a quick list:

- Pulling out the Playstation 2 in Xbox 360's absence.
- Not running the air conditioning now that we have enough windows to allow fans to do their work.
- 1 vs. 100 on Xbox Live. It's a trivia game show that plays live every Friday and Saturday night. You can actually win prizes!
- Finishing the South Park Memorial Day Weekend Marathon. It almost took two months, but we watched all 12 seasons of South Park.
- Alicia has a job. It's indescribable how happy she is.
- Verizon DSL. It's been much more reliable than Time Warner Cable. I will never go back to Time Warner Cable.
- Sleeping in. Starting Wednesday, it'll be over. But I've enjoyed it all summer.

Apartment Renovations

I know it's July, and we started in June. Lazy? Maybe. But here's what we accomplished:

1) Painting the walls. Alicia and I had to cover up cheap, peeling paint. Worse yet, the color was awful. It took two coats of primer and two coats of paint to get the walls looking good. If you're doing the math, that's 4 coats of paint for three rooms, which comes to 12 coats of paint. It still hurts to think about. And I haven't even mentioned painting the ceilings. But, the finished job is worth all the effort.

In the bedroom, we picked a turquoise. It paired well with my pictures of scuba diving, and complemented the Hopen furniture. Here's the best picture I could get that shows it:



In the kitchen, we painted orange. If you know Alicia, you know she likes, nay, loves orange. Plus, the black bookcase and black drawer would look great. Here's a picture that best captures the orange:



The living room color is the most complicated. It seems to change color depending on the light. Right now, it's dusk and we've just turned on the lights. The wall color is practically green. In full daylight, it looks closer to a mustard yellow. But, in most photos, the wall looks tan. Here's a picture that tries to capture the color:



Ugg, that picture above still doesn't look great. You'll just have to come to New York and experience it yourself!

2) Floors: As you can see in this picture taken before we started working, the floors sucked.



It isn't obvious, because the couch I'm working on is covering LARGE spots of blackened floor. But if you look closely at the floor at the bottom of the picture, you can see what I mean.

Here's the new floor:



It is the 69 cents per sqft flooring from Ikea, of course. You know, the stuff they put on the stairs and advertise that thousands of people walk on it every day. It is click laminate flooring. Here's a close view of the grain.



All fake, of course. It feels great though. There is no area of this apartment that I'm afraid to eat off of at this point. No, I don't plan on eating off the floor... but with flooring this new, I could.

For more about my work laying the flooring, check out Alicia's Blog.

3) Lighting: Here's the biggie:



Before we moved in, Alicia and I would sit in the garden looking up at this apartment at night. We'd say, "Wow, their kitchen looks awful. The light looks like it's from a scary movie." The light I replaced was a circular florescent bulb that flickered. It gave off a gross white sterile light. It was simply gross.

But those Ikea track lights do the trick. The kitchen feels fantastic, and the lights only cost $15.00 (on sale from $50!).

I added this light to the entryway:



I even installed a remote switch next to the door. The main advantage here is that the light switch for the main light is behind the big black bookcase. With the light above hanging in the entry way, we can turn the light on as soon as we get home.



Of course I had to mention the globe lights above. They are a silly way to light an apartment, but the look cool. Plus, I'm young. I can do this now.

Lastly, there's the hanging light above the dining table:



We picked this lamp specifically for how well it would match the dining table. I don't care what you think... I love it.

4) Garden:



Do you see all that grass? I grew that. From seed. Yup. All those pots? Alicia grew those.

We've done much, much more to this apartment, from the art to the technology wiring. But these are the major improvements to the apartment.

New Apartment Tour

Hello! Today's the day Alicia and I finished cleaning and took some pictures. Delays were caused by a lost camera, non-working internet connection, and mostly a big mess. But! Let's start the tour! Above each picture will be a description of what you're seeing.


Here's a picture of the front door. This is one floor above our previous apartment.




As we enter the kitchen, you might notice the size difference. The new apartment isn't actually bigger than the old place down stairs, but all the main rooms have had their size expanded. We lost a second bedroom, but we gained a much bigger kitchen.



Here's the kitchen in it's full glory. The big black bookcase now functions as our kitchen storage. All our plates and random knick-knacks are stored in the black cubbies. The sink is hiding to the right of the fridge, the bathroom to the left.



Ah ha! Here's the sink. One thing that's shocked us about the kitchen is how much storage space we haven't used yet. Downstairs, we packed every square inch with our kitchen supplies. Up here, you can see that the second shelf above the sink is practically empty.



Here's one of our windows leading to the bathroom. You can see the fire escape through it. It's kinda a pain in the butt to get through the window and sit out on the fire escape, but it's extremely nice once you're out there.



Our bathroom is relatively small, but it no longer resembles a hallway. One can turn around, get dressed, and many other things people tend to do in a bathroom. The sink was added at our request. The man who put it in actually had to tear out the wall and floor to run new pipes. The black tile is brand new, as when he went to repair the tile, it wasn't possible to match the old yellow tile.

The flooring was laid down by me. It's vinyl flooring that came in a roll. I slowly trimmed it down using a utility knife, then glued it down to the cement and tile underneath. Alicia went around the edge with caulk, finishing the job. I also built that wooden structure you see next to the toilet. It covers a bunch of ugly pipes and provides a shelf. I built it out of wood left by the previous tenants. It's actually the wooden slabs that hold up an Ikea bed. Lastly, we bought the mirror/shelf at Ikea. It was on sale, and looks awesome!



We're turning around and heading towards the living room now.



But first, here's a shot of the front door. It's the new home of the whiteboard and pin board. I should mention that the Taco Bell dog on the shelf in the wall is on temporary display. We still haven't decided what should go in those shelves.



Through the doorway now, you can see the left side of the room. I'm extremely proud of this area of the apartment. In our previous unit, we never had any spread out space. To make ourselves feel better, we tried to keep this room as quiet as we could. Hopefully, we'll keep the dining table empty: it looks so good that way.



Here's a look up. The white globes on the left are from Ikea (of course). Before moving in, this room had the worst lighting in the apartment. When it got dark, the one ceiling light just couldn't handle making the room filled with light. Those globes do the trick.
The black shelves on the right aren't new, but are a good home for display items we never need to touch. The wall of art is still a work in progress. Someday, we'll have that ceiling filled. The hope is that it contrasts all the other nearly blank walls in the room.



Here's a look back at the kitchen. You can see my old coffee table is still the entertainment center. There just isn't room for a big coffee table in Brooklyn. But Jeeves and the Poang chair from Ikea make a great couple.



Through to the bedroom now. The closet on the left holds almost all our storage junk. It's really crammed full.



Here's Leela on the bed. She spends a good 22 hours out of the day on that bed. One of the biggest perks of moving to this apartment is that the bed doesn't need to be against the wall. The room is actually wide enough to allow access to the bed from both sides. The bedroom is actually the biggest room in the apartment.



Ikea has almost exclusively furnished this bedroom. The bed matches the two Hopen wardropes, which matches the Hopen Dresser. We even have the two Hopen sidetables for the bed. I don't think I've ever been so coordinated in my life. The wardropes are actually 100% great, as this bedroom has no closet. I suppose we'd have to use the closet in the hallway.



Here's the newest addition to our furniture. They are bookcases (guess from where) holding every book we own. We would have preferred the orange chair next to the book cases, but the desk needed somewhere to live. The living room felt way to comfortable to stuff a desk into, so we opted to have a bedroom/office. Having giant bookcases to hold all of Alicia's books has always been a dream for her, so she has been ecstatic about them.



Well, that's the end of the tour. But what tour of the Glaser/Copeland apartment would be complete without pictures of the kitties?

Here's Leela, our newest cat:



This is Livia being camera shy:



Thanks for coming on the tour. Y'all come back real soon, ya hear?