Many Things
Today, I:
Had a long but productive day at work.
Found out that most of my investment accounts are only available to US residents, so I need to maintain a US address to be able to keep my IRAs and annuities. Much suck. You'd think this was a whole other country or something, eh? Suddenly I found myself doing a lot more serious contemplation than I'd intended (this early in the game, anyway) about moving my citizenship up here.
Walked to the Patterson SkyTrain station, rather than the Joyce station, involving a walk through Burnaby Central Park after dark, which was not the most wise decision I've ever made, but was at least a scenic one. Nothing bad happened, though I saw the largest dog I've ever encountered in my life. I thought it was going to eat me, but it really only wanted to poop in the grass.
Changed clothes into some comfy jeans at the hotel when I got back downtown. These jeans (Go on when I close my eyes? No, bad Heart joke. Nevermind.) These jeans are not clean, by the way. But after about 6 consecutive wearings with no washing in between, they're embarrassingly soft and comfortable.
Walked to the branch of my bank at Davie and something-or-other which is open until 8pm (as opposed to the two downtown branches nearby which close at 4:30pm and 6pm — I might have made it to the 6pm branch if I hadn't left my stuff in the hotel room). I deposited my final Texas unemployment check into my USD account. My bank account finally has more than $0 in it, even though they put a 15 day hold on the check. In front of me in line was a man who had what seemed to be a form of autism. He quacked like a duck, compulsively said "help" in an odd robotic voice, paced around a lot, and talked [loudly] to himself incessantly, mostly a mix-and-match of the phrases "Can we hurry up?" "I haven't got all day," "Redskins are playing, you know," "Gotta go, gotta go," and so on. The security guard at the bank asked him to calm things down a notch, and he seemed to try, but it primarily resulted in slightly lower volume with a much greater intensity of pacing.
Walked to the beach at English Bay. Strolled up and down the water at low tide, looking at all the scallop shell fragments on the sand, and peering out through the darkness at all the freighter ships floating in the bay. I surmised that there's not room in the harbour for them, so they wait in the bay instead. I tasted the seawater. It seems less salty than other places.
Walked up Denman Street trying to decide on some cheap-yet-tasty dinner.
Received a call from my landlord Jurgen asking if I wanted to check out the new floor in the apartment.
Grabbed a slice of pesto pizza from a corner shop, and hopped on the #5 Robson St bus across downtown to Seymour.
Ordered a latte at Starbucks while I waited for Jurgen to get there (he drives in from West Vancouver, which is across the Lions Gate Bridge from downtown, so sometimes it can take a while).
Looked at the apartment again. Ironically, it seems even smaller without any furniture in it. Just as cool though. The new terra-cotta colored polished concrete floor is very cool. The walls are being painted a light brown color. Tonight I also discovered that in addition to a thermostat (heat only — not much air conditioning in Canada) there's also a humidity adjustment, which automatically turns the bathroom vent on and off to maintain the specified indoor humidity percentage. It goes from 0% to 80%. I'd never seen anything like that.
My landlord is Swiss. The friendly concrete floor guy, as he told us tonight, is Slovakian. The cleaning woman coming by tomorrow to clean the whole place up is Russian. The building owner is Ukrainian. and is also the owner of the most well-known Ukrainian restaurant on Denman, which I'd passed by only a little while earlier. "Ve has a regular European zort of sing going on here, especially ze Eastern Europeans," said my Swiss landlord. Indeed.
Walked around my new neighborhood a bit. Asked the people waiting outside the Commodore Ballroom who was playing tonight, and found out there's a Death Cab for Cutie concert. A street musician nearby was playing and singing a soulful male version of "Hit Me Baby One More Time," to many laughs from the waiting concert crowd. I ducked into a nearby CD store and bought three CD's I'd wanted from the bargain bin for $3.99 apiece (I like this neighborhood).
Looked in a couple of Canadian shops on Robson for an old-style Canucks toque for Kelley (the hockey stick C logo, rather than the new sharky one). Saw some T-shirts with the old logo, but no hats yet. I'm thinking the sporting goods stores might be a better bet.
Stopped at Chapters Books for a little while. It's kind of like Borders or Barnes & Noble. On the walls of the atrium they have a mural of the names of hundreds of famous Canadian actors, authors, musicians, and public figures (Mike Myers, William Shatner, Dan Akroyd, Margaret Atwood, Peter Jennings, k.d.lang, etc), with a sign that says, "The World needs more Canada." Lately I believe it. I'm sort of developing some teary-eyed pride for my new home. I read a kids' book about Canada (found out BC's provincial flower is Dogwood and bird is . . . um, something), and was amused that the Canada History section in the kids' department is right next to the Hockey section. Go figure.
Walked northwest up Robson looking for the second half of my dinner. Desired a beer or two. Read lots of menus.
Looked in a shop that specializes in fossils, minerals, and carvings from British Columbia. Saw lots of things that lots of my friends would like, but I'm sort of poor right now. This may be a Tiny Tim sort of Christmas, so if anyone even gets a goose, they'd better be damn happy about it.
Couldn't resist the temptation, and went back to the Japanese curry bar (Copper Onion) for dinner. Had a very tasty mushroom curry and a beer for $10. Can't beat that with a stick. The two Japanese girls working there flirted with me like crazy. I love this town. They forgot to give me my free Pocky this time, but that's okay. I realized that this and the Cafe Crepe earn the reputation of being the only places in Vancouver so far which have had more than one visit from me. Both are spectacular food for less than $10. Come visit me and I'll hook you up.
Walked back toward the hotel along Alberni. Stopped in the liquor store. Realized, with some joy, that not only are Cuban cigars legal here (which I still haven't tried, being pretty summarily a nonsmoker these days), but also absinthe. The absinthe was too expensive on my current budget ($85 for the bottle), but I'll have to keep it in mind for the future. I bought a $10 (even) bottle of Spanish tempranillo, and headed back to the apartment. There's a 10 cent deposit on bottles here, by the way. People were bringing their empty beer bottles back to the liquor store by the case. There was also a little flock of prostitutes there, along with some guys straight out of Strange Brew, which made for some interesting people-watching, all things considered. Yes, Canadian prostitutes say "You like a good time, eh?" Sad but true.
Got back to the hotel and went online and registered with BC Hydro for my electric at the new apartment. Discovered that not only is 99% of power in BC pollution-free hydro-electric power from various dams in the province, but it's cheap too — about 6 cents per kWh. Compare to about 12 cents USD per kWh in Dallas, for petroleum based power, and it's really exciting — less than half as much for cleaner electricity.
I also browsed the Shaw cable plans online too, but the various options are really confusing, especially since I don't know what half the channels are about. It sucks that Discovery and History are premium channels here. I'll probably hold off on cable for a little while, since I don't watch that much TV anyway, but it sure would be nice to at least have Teletoon (which is also a premium channel)
Had a long but productive day at work.
Found out that most of my investment accounts are only available to US residents, so I need to maintain a US address to be able to keep my IRAs and annuities. Much suck. You'd think this was a whole other country or something, eh? Suddenly I found myself doing a lot more serious contemplation than I'd intended (this early in the game, anyway) about moving my citizenship up here.
Walked to the Patterson SkyTrain station, rather than the Joyce station, involving a walk through Burnaby Central Park after dark, which was not the most wise decision I've ever made, but was at least a scenic one. Nothing bad happened, though I saw the largest dog I've ever encountered in my life. I thought it was going to eat me, but it really only wanted to poop in the grass.
Changed clothes into some comfy jeans at the hotel when I got back downtown. These jeans (Go on when I close my eyes? No, bad Heart joke. Nevermind.) These jeans are not clean, by the way. But after about 6 consecutive wearings with no washing in between, they're embarrassingly soft and comfortable.
Walked to the branch of my bank at Davie and something-or-other which is open until 8pm (as opposed to the two downtown branches nearby which close at 4:30pm and 6pm — I might have made it to the 6pm branch if I hadn't left my stuff in the hotel room). I deposited my final Texas unemployment check into my USD account. My bank account finally has more than $0 in it, even though they put a 15 day hold on the check. In front of me in line was a man who had what seemed to be a form of autism. He quacked like a duck, compulsively said "help" in an odd robotic voice, paced around a lot, and talked [loudly] to himself incessantly, mostly a mix-and-match of the phrases "Can we hurry up?" "I haven't got all day," "Redskins are playing, you know," "Gotta go, gotta go," and so on. The security guard at the bank asked him to calm things down a notch, and he seemed to try, but it primarily resulted in slightly lower volume with a much greater intensity of pacing.
Walked to the beach at English Bay. Strolled up and down the water at low tide, looking at all the scallop shell fragments on the sand, and peering out through the darkness at all the freighter ships floating in the bay. I surmised that there's not room in the harbour for them, so they wait in the bay instead. I tasted the seawater. It seems less salty than other places.
Walked up Denman Street trying to decide on some cheap-yet-tasty dinner.
Received a call from my landlord Jurgen asking if I wanted to check out the new floor in the apartment.
Grabbed a slice of pesto pizza from a corner shop, and hopped on the #5 Robson St bus across downtown to Seymour.
Ordered a latte at Starbucks while I waited for Jurgen to get there (he drives in from West Vancouver, which is across the Lions Gate Bridge from downtown, so sometimes it can take a while).
Looked at the apartment again. Ironically, it seems even smaller without any furniture in it. Just as cool though. The new terra-cotta colored polished concrete floor is very cool. The walls are being painted a light brown color. Tonight I also discovered that in addition to a thermostat (heat only — not much air conditioning in Canada) there's also a humidity adjustment, which automatically turns the bathroom vent on and off to maintain the specified indoor humidity percentage. It goes from 0% to 80%. I'd never seen anything like that.
My landlord is Swiss. The friendly concrete floor guy, as he told us tonight, is Slovakian. The cleaning woman coming by tomorrow to clean the whole place up is Russian. The building owner is Ukrainian. and is also the owner of the most well-known Ukrainian restaurant on Denman, which I'd passed by only a little while earlier. "Ve has a regular European zort of sing going on here, especially ze Eastern Europeans," said my Swiss landlord. Indeed.
Walked around my new neighborhood a bit. Asked the people waiting outside the Commodore Ballroom who was playing tonight, and found out there's a Death Cab for Cutie concert. A street musician nearby was playing and singing a soulful male version of "Hit Me Baby One More Time," to many laughs from the waiting concert crowd. I ducked into a nearby CD store and bought three CD's I'd wanted from the bargain bin for $3.99 apiece (I like this neighborhood).
Looked in a couple of Canadian shops on Robson for an old-style Canucks toque for Kelley (the hockey stick C logo, rather than the new sharky one). Saw some T-shirts with the old logo, but no hats yet. I'm thinking the sporting goods stores might be a better bet.
Stopped at Chapters Books for a little while. It's kind of like Borders or Barnes & Noble. On the walls of the atrium they have a mural of the names of hundreds of famous Canadian actors, authors, musicians, and public figures (Mike Myers, William Shatner, Dan Akroyd, Margaret Atwood, Peter Jennings, k.d.lang, etc), with a sign that says, "The World needs more Canada." Lately I believe it. I'm sort of developing some teary-eyed pride for my new home. I read a kids' book about Canada (found out BC's provincial flower is Dogwood and bird is . . . um, something), and was amused that the Canada History section in the kids' department is right next to the Hockey section. Go figure.
Walked northwest up Robson looking for the second half of my dinner. Desired a beer or two. Read lots of menus.
Looked in a shop that specializes in fossils, minerals, and carvings from British Columbia. Saw lots of things that lots of my friends would like, but I'm sort of poor right now. This may be a Tiny Tim sort of Christmas, so if anyone even gets a goose, they'd better be damn happy about it.
Couldn't resist the temptation, and went back to the Japanese curry bar (Copper Onion) for dinner. Had a very tasty mushroom curry and a beer for $10. Can't beat that with a stick. The two Japanese girls working there flirted with me like crazy. I love this town. They forgot to give me my free Pocky this time, but that's okay. I realized that this and the Cafe Crepe earn the reputation of being the only places in Vancouver so far which have had more than one visit from me. Both are spectacular food for less than $10. Come visit me and I'll hook you up.
Walked back toward the hotel along Alberni. Stopped in the liquor store. Realized, with some joy, that not only are Cuban cigars legal here (which I still haven't tried, being pretty summarily a nonsmoker these days), but also absinthe. The absinthe was too expensive on my current budget ($85 for the bottle), but I'll have to keep it in mind for the future. I bought a $10 (even) bottle of Spanish tempranillo, and headed back to the apartment. There's a 10 cent deposit on bottles here, by the way. People were bringing their empty beer bottles back to the liquor store by the case. There was also a little flock of prostitutes there, along with some guys straight out of Strange Brew, which made for some interesting people-watching, all things considered. Yes, Canadian prostitutes say "You like a good time, eh?" Sad but true.
Got back to the hotel and went online and registered with BC Hydro for my electric at the new apartment. Discovered that not only is 99% of power in BC pollution-free hydro-electric power from various dams in the province, but it's cheap too — about 6 cents per kWh. Compare to about 12 cents USD per kWh in Dallas, for petroleum based power, and it's really exciting — less than half as much for cleaner electricity.
I also browsed the Shaw cable plans online too, but the various options are really confusing, especially since I don't know what half the channels are about. It sucks that Discovery and History are premium channels here. I'll probably hold off on cable for a little while, since I don't watch that much TV anyway, but it sure would be nice to at least have Teletoon (which is also a premium channel)