Final leg…

The turnover dates are near and it’s the final push to wrap up the inspections. One is in the bag and two to go. Furniture is going in and the completed product is visible even to the amateur. The next stop is going to be one place or another.

…

The Franke sinks for the duplex have arrived and I have a load of materials I bought to take back the next trip home. The Jotoba planks will be ordered after I’m home for more than 2 days and they’ll go in my living room. I’m trying to decide if I want to stick with solar tubes or add two skylights to the North unit. The solar tubes are incredible and I’m surprised I don’t see them everywhere. With the skylights I can watch the trees – yeah, I know there are more important things to do but simple pleasures are worth consideration.

Mars out

Very funny…

A woman left a note in the door of my duplex. She thinks it is cute and wants to rent it. The note was written on a scrap torn from a cigarette package. I laughed out loud and saved it.

I don’t think so, Pamela. I don’t rent to smokers.

Smoking involves a certain level of detachment from reality and most smokers I know think they are in good health, not addicts, entitled and special. If you consider the propensity for incremental suicide, stinking clothes and breath and wasting time, for starters, then I agree they are special. In addition to being special you can add the constant litter and active porch junkie addict mentality and so on. I worked in a high-rise office and in the course of an average day the smokers from one office spent up to 1.5 hours a day tending to their addiction. I seriously doubt this time is factored into their flex day. Here it is at least three times a day: round up the fellow junkies for the elevator ride down, walk over to the elevator in the parking garage and go up to the designated smoking area, smoke a cigarette (why not two, it took so-ooo much effort to get here and I deserve it because I’m special), finish the smoke, talk, ride the elevator down in the parking garage, take the elevator back up to the office and commiserate about the suffering you must endure as a smoker (I had to listen to one of these pathetic whining conversations on the elevator)… Poor things.

The standards/target market for the duplex is long term renter with professional background, my comfort and resale. Like the last multi-unit property I was involved with at any given moment I will be an occupant in any one of the units so there is a base level of comfort, efficiency and ease of maintenance included in all remodels. I have detail drawings of new built-in cabinetry including breakfast nook/booth, storage/shelving, bookcases and entertainment center. The damn thing is I’m still in LA and there is no time off from July 6 thru Aug 15. Want to trade jobs?? Actually, my eyes are wide open and have been since August ‘07 and I made a personal commitment last fall to finish this project regardless (unlike some). A lot is going to happen in the next 4 weeks.

The other day I watched the rain roll in while releasing a ghost and trimming loose ends (beneficiary changes, threw away a Continental Airline voucher from an aborted trip last August and sent a memoriam to a foreign land).

Mars out.

It doesn’t matter…

when you have no control, no power, no effect on the outcome. You reach into the sublime or go nuts.

A great example is a storm. You can make plans or not but your wishes have no relevance to the storm except how you choose to deal with the result. You can do nothing and watch it come. You can tell others in your house “we should leave now” but there is no guarantee that they will listen. Actually, odds are most people will not act until it is too late.

The foolish escape as they are being lashed by the gale and think their plan to not act on warnings was sound. Some do nothing and blame others while ignoring the simple fact acting early with the information you have on the table would have made their life much easier.

…

I read in the NYT today about credit card debt:

“Eliminating negative feelings about indebtedness was the idea behind MasterCard’s “Priceless” campaign, the work of McCann-Erickson Worldwide Advertising, which came out in 1997.

One of the tricks in the credit card business is that people have an inherent guilt with spending,” Jonathan B. Cranin, executive vice president and deputy creative director at the agency, said when the commercials began. “What you want is to have people feel good about their purchases.”

What Mr. Cranin refers to as “inherent guilt” is actually the thread of personal responsibility which needs to be cut by the knife of delusion many choose after buying into the ad agency hype.

It is a choice folks make every day.

Priceless.

Mars out.

Welcome…

I must take time to welcome new readers. Apparently, there are two servers and several workstations (IP addresses) in central Texas where half a dozen or so people have found HOURS to scan my blog during the business day. You must be self-employed and I hope you are entertained…

Get back to work.

Mars out.