I Return... Again?

Hello my friends, I have returned again (though im guessing you didn’t even notice I was gone (except for Alex cuz hes the only one that calls me any more :( )) Anyway, yes, I went camping at a place whos name I forgot (though looking at a map of Oregon, its next to a town that’s as far south and west you can go before you hit California) this means nearly 400 miles from home (about 8 hrs each way with a lunch and a gas stop).

So, it was me, dad, mom, 2 sisters, and a dog, along with camping stuff, crammed into the Sienna and all pretty much wanting to kill each other by the time we get there. Camping was fun, though it was not worth the trip for the short time and the mosquitoes seemed to be around from 5pm to 9 or 10 am.

I Have Returned

Ahh, home sweet home! Nothing like it. We got back yesterday around 8:30 pm, just as the sun was setting. It was really beautiful. Not that Montréal wasn’t amazing. The only bad things about Montréal were the fact that everybody smoked, the drivers were crazy, and the elevators at our hotel had some major issues. Other than that, from its old quarter complete with cobblestone streets and 300 year old buildings to the heart of downtown with its skyscrapers sitting atop miles of underground sidewalks and shopping malls, Montréal was a really beautiful city.

I kept a journal over the last 10 or so days of exactly what has been going down. Tragically however, I didn’t have a computer to type it on so its all written and needing to be transcribed. So, with a little time, it will all be there. You can get there either by clicking the link above, the link in my links panel, or going to www.tenmontreal.blogspot.com

I Am Leaving You, My Friends

well, I am here on the penultimate night I will be sleeping in my bed before I depart crazy early Saturday morning to Montréal. Yesterday, I sold my PowerMac for $1700 so I could by myself a laptop (a happy MacBook to be precise). So I sit here typing on my sisters old Snow iMac which im sure you have all come to know and love in our schools computer labs. Not quite as blazing fast as the PowerMac was, but it’ll do until I get my MacBook.

Tragically, I was hoping I would be able to get the MacBook by tomorrow so that I could use it to post while in Montréal but I didn’t, so I’ll have to use that bloody thing called... (Oh yeah, paper) and transcribe it all when I get back. UGH! Not looking forward to that. Anyway, that’s all for now. I’ll post again when I get back in 11 or 12 days. Until then,

Il sera très chaud au Montréal donc mes rêves seront de retourner ici! Au revoir mes amis et je t’aime!

Living Room

The living room has been coming along nicely. I spent all of today taking these ugly red and white subway tiles off of the fireplace. Before I got started I was counting on it all being really easy, but of course, it wasn’t. Those tiles were on so tight, I ended up breaking one of the ends off the chisel about ¼ of the way though. Many hours, one broken chisel and a very sore wrist later, the last tile came off, and I would say it looks much better now (even without the new tiles)

Next, we have the catch up pictures from previous posts. The pictures show the 3-step process of the betterment of our living room and entryway.

We started by taking the ugly wallpaper off (not show) to expose the original 100-year-old plaster walls (as shown in the first stage). Then a coat of white primer. Finally, 2 coats of “Devine Straw” courtesy of the Miller Paint Co.

Good weekend

Yesterday was a good day to be a Saturday. Started out by heading over to Alex’s nice and early and ended up sitting on his couch quietly playing with his new phone until he awoke. After a sitting around and swimming for a while, we headed off to taco bell for a late lunch. Sadly, I was dropped off at the farm after lunch so he could go gallivanting around at Lindsay’s. But it was all good, cuz after I got home and ate dinner, mom, dad, Berkeley and I went to see pirates of the Caribbean 2: dead mans chest. That was pretty good, tough didn’t leave you with a good sense of an ending (possibly to keep you waiting for the next one). Now there is a scene after all the credits roll, but its about 10 seconds long and has no real bearing on anything (unlike the post credit scene in X-Men 3) So if your willing to wait the 10-15 minutes for the credits to roll, its cute I guess…

Anyway, we now have the first coat of paint on in the living room. I shall post pics if I ever get around to getting them on my computer. Until then

An Incontinent Truth Reviewed

Last night, I went to go and see Al Gore’s Movie, An Incontinent Truth. I thought, overall, the movie was really well made, informative, and inspiring. This, along with the documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car” (which has not yet been released in Portland) should be on everybody’s summer movie list.

www.climatecrisis.net
www.whokilledtheelectriccarmovie.com

Remodel

The last couple of days, we (my self, little sister, and dad) have embarked on a voyage to make our living room beautiful. As you can see by the wonderful pictures, we crammed everything from our living room into our dining room. Our goal is to rid ourselves of the ugly rice paper, as well as the approximately 7 or 8 layers of wallpaper underneath, as well as replace the ugly fireplace tile. All of this before we depart on our one week journey to Montreal on the 14th.

So far the plastic has gone up and all the paper has come off. Tomorrow shall see the final patching of all the holes in the plaster (there were a lot of holes from a hundred years of people hanging pictures) and hopefully the first coat of sealant (so that the paint will better stick to the plaster)