2003-05-31

 

When Girl Scouts go bad. Coming back from the "new" house in El Cerrito to the "old" house in Oakland, we took I-80. There was a HUGE traffic jam at the pedestrian bridge that goes to the Berkeley Marina. Turns out there were some Girl Scouts advertising by holding up a big banner that read "Girl Scouts Go Places" and everyone had to slow down to look at it. Rubbernecker central. I'm thinking about complaining to the local Girl Scout Council. There was at least one "fender-bender" caused by it.

posted by bethanye 4:24:00 PM   

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2003-05-30

 

Update on the current house. Called the city of Oakland Zoning Information (Zoning Division-CEDA) at 238-3781. House is currently zoned as follows:

R-35: Special 1-Family Residential Zone

S-18: Mediated Residential Design Review Combining Zone: Any additions or alterations to the property (total structure size <3500sf w/ no variance) is subject to dispute by neighbors. If there is dispute, a mediator from the city will help decide the matter.

To find out about grandfathering, I can:
(1) obtain microfiche of original building permit -- what was it approved for? Check all later permits ot see if units were approved at counter of Zoning group (CEDA) @ 250 Frank Ogawa Square.
(2) order a 3-R for $119 from the city, but this takes 10 working days to receive. Cashier will provide 3-R (phone: 238-4774).

So, we'll see what I decide to do. You know what? This whole thing is ridiculous. There's no kitchen downstairs. Therefore, it isn't units. Therefore, the rental is illegal. That's all there is to it. No kitchen; no unit; no multiple leases. It's the responsibility of the landlord to ensure that the unit is legal. Period. Even if she pays her city business taxes.

posted by bethanye 12:49:00 PM   

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I think I'm going to cry. This should never have happened. They're going to just fuck it up. At least I can count on BBC America to get my fix of the original.

posted by bethanye 10:10:00 AM   

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2003-05-29

 

Evil, I will vanquish you yet! Suffice it to say that it's been an exhausting but particularly productive day working on The Evil. Thankfully. My brain is wiped. Time to go home.

posted by bethanye 5:17:00 PM   

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It's some sort of belching conspiracy. Every time I walk up behind a co-worker, they belch. It's happened four times today!!

posted by bethanye 1:33:00 PM   

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I had to get this dream down before I go to work. This morning -- between 6 and 7:30 AM -- I had another way freaky dream. This one, Chuck decided to try to make amends to Molly by organizing a surprise birthday party for her... in San Francisco. In the Haight (which I've not been to yet, so I'm sure it has no resemblence to the dream). At any rate, everyone shows up in this parking lot, except we didn't get called to go until 5 minutes before we had to go: "Molly needs you right now. Go to this address in SF." So I have my PJ's on, no bra, no shoes, and we head off. When we get there, there's 30 or so people in this parking lot, then Molly and JR show up and Molly's all weepy and happy that everyone's there. Then, it comes out that like everything that Chuck organizes, he never planned anything for all those people to actually do or anywhere for them to go. This makes for a somewhat antsy crowd after hugs all around. I was starving, so I convinced Stephen to take me to McDonald's (??) to get some breakfast, and many of the group including Molly came along. I went upstairs (?? I guess that's a SF McDonald's for you.) to tell Stevie what I wanted, and the counter lady started giving me shit about not wearing any shoes before she kicked me out. I went downstairs to the seating area where everyone else was, and Dale Dawson (late for the party) walked in. Hugs and greetings, then he showed me the "invitation" he had received. It was two "print-out" pages, including the large map that took up half of one page, explaining that it was Molly's birthday blah blah blah... I took Dale over to meet everyone, then I woke up.

Freaky, eh?

posted by bethanye 8:24:00 AM   

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2003-05-27

 

Ouch! Just read Molly's blog re: party, and laughed out loud when she pointed out that drunken JR had a sway of about 4 feet. Luckily, nothing was broken, right?

Lunch today at Rhea and Ti-Fred's house, on the deck, with pizza and beer. Also, it's so cozy warm that I'm having trouble staying awake at my desk. Perfect catnap weather. Luckily, the coffee has just started to kick in (heh, just in time for beer?).

We're getting movers, but we're going to self-pack. It will cost us a bit of money -- not too much, I hope -- but given that we don't have the stable of favors to call in like we used to, I think it's the best choice.

posted by bethanye 11:51:00 AM   

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2003-05-25

 

Whew! I'm glad that's over. The first Open House, that is. I must say that the house looks really good, though. A few interested parties, including one that might want to take both upstairs and downstars. This is a good thing.

posted by bethanye 4:31:00 PM   

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2003-05-24

 

Oh, one more thing before I go to bed. So that I never forget it: my favorite quote of the Dallas trip was from Peyton, Jake's best friend. She wanted me to do something with her, but her mom told her to eat her food. I said, "Your mom made the rules, and I follow the rules." Peyton's response:

"You don't look like a rule-follower to me!"

posted by bethanye 9:30:00 PM   

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Groan. Stevie's not feeling well. Open house is tomorrow afternoon, so we've been scurrying about tidying up the place to make it lovely. Well, as lovely as it can be with our crappy stuff in it.

I'm ready to just move and get it over with.

Spoke to landlord earlier, and mentioned my concerns about the rental being illegal. Landlord strongly disputes this, and says that "it was grandfathered"... but grandfathered as what? As Units? Because if so, then downstairs is an illegal unit -- it's missing a kitchen, for example. As a "secondary unit" then? If so, it's only legal to rent the secondary unit if the owner of the property also lives in the primary unit. Still, only one lease allowable. I know what I'm talking about; I've done my research. Well, all but that grandfathering thing. I wonder if that's public record stuff? Probably. I'll have to look into that.

Half-dozen people on the open house list, so hopefully someone will like it enough to take it. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

On a lighter note, hopefully the nice people at Forrest's have finished with my bassoon. I should get it back next week if so, though I won't have any time to play until after we move.

What the hell am I going to do with the cats tomorrow during the Open House? I guess we'll put them in their carriers out on the deck. I can't think of anything else to do with 'em. Because the landlord has "suggested" that we have more Open Houses during the week, I'm definitely open to suggestions on the cat situation.

Mmm... the new house has a washer-dryer. It's the little things, you know? Speaking of little, it also has the tiniest oven I've ever seen in a kitchen. We're talking "easy-bake" size here. So, no big turkeys for us, I guess.

posted by bethanye 9:20:00 PM   

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2003-05-21

 

But first, these headlines: I almost forgot to include an update about our living situation. The landlord is now not expecting us to hold the sublet lease, but is expecting us to facilitate finding a new tenant. That's just fine with me. There's an open house on Sunday from 2-4, and someone who already has given an application from the ad on CraigsList.org, so maybe he'll come through. I spoke to the Fair Housing Board about the legality of the unit, and they confirmed that it's an illegal rental configuration (as I suspected after Karen and James's house-buying ordeal in El Cerrito). I need to tell our landlord about that one, because I don't think that it's knowingly an illegal unit (if that makes any sense).

posted by bethanye 4:59:00 PM   

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Didn't make it to the musical, but it's been an eventful trip nonetheless... I'm sitting on Molly and JR's couch, finishing off a fudgcicle -- YUM! -- and uploading pictures to my iDisk. It crashed my PB once, so we'll see how it goes this time. Big plans this evening consist of a second viewing of Matrix Reloaded and a trip to the airport, where we'll stay in a hotel this evening. Then the return trip tomorrow around noon, barring any major terrorist or weather delays.

posted by bethanye 4:45:00 PM   

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2003-05-13

 

Yup, we're moving. However, instead of allowing us to break our lease, as originally discussed, our current landlord is "allowing us to sublet." Which I think is bullshit, given that the people who left before we did (including Jacquie) were not required to perform a short-term sublet. Not acceptable at all. I'm going to give the downstairs neighbor first dibs, and if he wants to lease our section we'll go in on it with him for a discount. Otherwise, it's going to turn into a fight, and I don't want a fight. Well, maybe not a fight. But I'm not willing to do a sublet at all -- period. I'll pay rent and leave it vacant before I do that.

posted by bethanye 10:38:00 AM   

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2003-05-12

 

Fingers crossed... I hope we get the house we applied for. It's a rental in El Cerrito, but it's roughly 65% larger than where we are now, not including the garage or the basement. It has laundry. The kitchen isn't as nice, but it's plenty big enough for our stuff. And it's private. That's a huge deal after a year of essentially having zero privacy. Additionally, the landlady may be willing to sell it to us in a few years, provided we're still interested and she's still interested. I'm not doing anything on the house front until Stevie has his B.A. -- which puts us out to 2007. Fine with me. I could do with several years of stability and saving money. So much has changed over the past year! I'm ready to settle down.

posted by bethanye 9:56:00 AM   

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2003-05-05

 

Oh, good! My friend Jamie saw the premiere of Finding Nemo on Friday, and he assures me that the turtles are fabulous. And heroic. Oh, and the rest of the film is wonderful as well. But a turtle goddess has to have her priorities straight!

We're planning on seeing X2 on Thursday evening -- hopefully it won't be too crowded. It's shaping up to be a busy week: book club on Wednesday, hair salon Wednesday afternoon. There's a contingent going to see A Mighty Wind on Tuesday, but I don't see how I'm going to make that one. Greg's birthday on Friday -- got to send a card. Dad's 50th birthday on Sunday, which is also Mother's Day... Something for Dad, something for Shirley. I need to get with it! Next Friday we go back to Dallas for a week, too, so we need to get things organized for that trip.

Whew!

posted by bethanye 9:51:00 AM   

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2003-05-02

 

Nothing like that Friday afternoon latte... Because I can stay up as late as I want, and sleep in tomorrow!! Yum!

We're going to see Identity tonight, but if we weren't... The Pacific Film Archive is showing a series of Martial arts films this month. We're going to miss tonight, but maybe we'll hit one tomorrow. I'm all ready for some Hong Kong films, particularly the Shaolin-focused ones. We saw The Eye at the San Francisco International Film Festival last weekend. It was excellent. Creepy, suspenseful, with subtle but lovely effects. Rumor was that "a major studio" has picked it up for remake casting Tom Cruise as the protagonist. Considering that the protagonist of the original is a young woman, I'm sure things will just go downhill from there during the adaptation process.

I've also managed to waste lots of time lately playing Primal. Time to be impressed -- I'm on the final level, and I've played it all by myself! No cheating, no handing the controls over to Stevie when the fighting starts. I'm so impressed. Unfortunately, that means I haven't put any time into reading the "J-Lo and Hitesh: The Machine Book Club" selection of the month, Motherless Brooklyn. I have to finish it by Wednesday -- ACK!!

Well, off for more work on The Evil, which is doing a little bit of my bidding as of late. Then movie tonight, maybe movie tomorrow, and LOTS of reading!

posted by bethanye 3:24:00 PM   

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2003-05-01

 

Bassooner the better. New bassoon arrived today. I'm freaking thrilled -- in an ultra-dorky way.

posted by bethanye 10:59:00 AM   

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