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June 30, 2007
The Intrinsic Value of a Bike
How much is your bike worth? I paid $200 for mine. In a little shop in the Beach, Toronto called Recycle. They refurbish old bikes and sell them. I’m not sure if they’re still around. My bike has taken me many miles, and I have fond memories. Chis and I used to commute in Toronto to work. When we lived in the country north of Toronto, we biked the snowmobile trails on the weekends. In Vancouver, I biked from our home in Horseshoe Bay to downtown, a distance I can’t estimate now, but the hills doubled the distance easily. By the time I got home in the evening, I had just enough energy to take Quincy and Eddie down the stairs to the beach for a swim. And I sat on a big rock and watched Eddie swim around, and Quincy try to eat the bubbles on the surface of the water. His eyesight was not so good, so I can’t imagine what fascinated him about chasing the bubbles. I guess it was like a game.
Living on the Upper West Side has revealed a golden opportunity to commute again. My daily trek to check on the floor progress started out on the subway, and shortly gravitated to my bike. It is a wonderful journey up the Hudson River Trail, the highlight of which is the 79th Boat Basin. Over the past week, I have watched cruisers come and go, and most recently spotted a Platina sister sitting out on one of the moorings. Flying the French flag. There didn’t appear to be anyone on the boat for several days, and yesterday I noticed that the dinghy was in the water, and some towels were hanging out to dry. They had returned, and I imagined that they must be getting ready to head somewhere. Possibly north to New England. South into hurricane alley was a doubtful plan. We’ve been there.
But I digress. I bought a lock for my bike the other day. I lost the key for my old “D” lock. Besides, I doubt that the old lock would have done much to discourage a street savvy New York thief. I asked for the best. They must see me coming a mile away. $90. I cringed. I said “that’s more than my bike is worth”. The salesman looked at my bike, which he could tell I love because the frame is filthy and beaten up, but the gears and brakes are immaculate. He simply said “What if your bike was stolen? Then what would you do?”
Good point. My bike is one-of-a-kind. It’s worth a lot more to me than the $200 I paid for it. It has moved as many times as I have. I think I am ready to admit that I have an emotional attachment to my bike. Like I did with our boat.
$90 well spent, I say. And so far, nobody has tried to steal it. I don’t leave it out at night. I mean, in this city, that’s like stapling a c-note to your t-shirt. Nope, I carry it up the long, narrow, dimly-lit, steep staircase into our tiny, dimly-lit apartment.
Besides, a little goes a long way. The more time I spend on my bike and off public transportation, the smaller my carbon footprint.
Coming up… Is a bike a pedestrian or a car? And, hey ped, get the %^$& outta my way!
Posted by dave at 09:18 AM | Comments (0)
June 28, 2007
Day 9
These guys are going like gang busters! The bedroom is finished, and about half the living is done. It looks beautiful, and it feels like a hardwood floor when you walk on it. Yippee. I can't wait to move home.
Meanwhile, I checked on the dead cockroach in the lobby today. It's still dead.
Today was my first day commuting on my bike. I love my Rocky Mountain Fusion. I bought a kick-ass lock, and had a blast cycling up and down the Hudson River Trail. Honestly, I never thought I would see the day when I would ride my bike through the streets of Manhattan. It's surprising how easy it is. As long as I stay away from the street pirhana (aka cabs).
Posted by dave at 08:13 PM | Comments (0)
June 27, 2007
Cesaria Evora
We discovered Cesaria Evora while browsing CDs in the Virgin Record store on the Champs Elysee in Paris in 1996. We were there to run the marathon. We put on the headphones to listen to a track or two and instantly fell in love. She is from the Cape Verde Islands, off the west coast of Africa, which we sailed past in March 2005 on our way to the Caribbean from the Canary Islands.
She played Carnegie Hall last night to a sold-out crowd. She has performed in Toronto many times, but we have never been able to see her. I think we have every single one of her CDs, except for her latest one.
True to form, she performed barefoot. She was remarkable, and in broken English/ Portuguese, she introduced her 8 member band - two on drums, four on strings, one on piano, and one on sax. She said of herself "mi conductor". You just have to love her.
The opening act was The Bird and The Bee, an indie/ pop music duo from LA. I really got into their nerdy groove, but Chis thought they played too long. Have I said lately that he is four years' older than I? I especially liked Again and Again and Again and Again.
Posted by dave at 08:05 PM | Comments (0)
June 25, 2007
Day 7
The old floor is gone, and the plywood sub-floor is down.
And the dead cockroach in the lobby of our temp apt is still dead.
Posted by dave at 08:10 PM | Comments (0)
June 24, 2007
The Apartment
How best to describe our teeny weeny itsy bitsy temporary apartment.
It’s teeny weeny. It’s itsy bitsy.
The bedroom, at the opposite end of the apartment from the bathroom (?!), is wide enough to fit only a double bed, and two narrow side tables. There are two windows overlooking the courtyard. We had to peel the tape off the window to open it for some fresh air. At the end of the bed, on one side, is another window with an air conditioner. The knob is stripped, so we have to pinch it to turn it on. But the line doesn’t line up with anything so we have no idea what we turn it on to. And it randomly blows black bits into the room. At the end of the bed on the other wall is a tall bureau, on top of which is a huge TV. I think a TV in the bedroom is a huge and unnecessary luxury.
The living room/ dining room is small and dark. There is a sofa, facing an enormous TV, and a chair with no arms. In the dining part of the room is a small table with four chairs. And next to the table is a small desk. In our condo, the dining room table is my desk, so actually having a desk is a bit of spoil. The plaster in the corner behind the TV has been repaired for whatever reason, but not painted.
The kitchen is another thing altogether. A good kitchen is important to me. I can work with small, but not with bad. On Platina, our kitchen was small, but it functioned extremely well. Believe it or not, a small kitchen on a boat is a good thing, because cooking at sea is no small challenge. Wedging your posterior against the opposite counter can save you from stumbling with a sharp knife. In our first NY apartment on the Upper West Side, where we lasted only a week, it was a bar fridge, a sink, and a two-burner hot plate. The tiny round table doubled as the counter. In our second NY apartment in Midtown, our kitchen was a closet. Literally. Two of us could not fit. And I often used the top of the fridge as extra counter space. Our condo has a beautiful kitchen, which I enjoy using frequently. I have often said to Chis that it is too big.
The kitchen in this temporary apartment is better than our other two apartments, but nothing like the condo. The most fun is the neighbours. The kitchen window of our closest neighbour is about three feet from ours. We could trade recipes. They have pulled their blind down halfway, so all I ever see is below their torso. It’s an elderly couple, and they eat their meals at the same time everyday, and sit in the same place.
The kitchen sink is shallow, probably 5 inches deep, so that the dishwasher could fit underneath. The dishwasher is vintage, and I cannot find zero-phosphate dishwasher detergent up here, so I wash everything by hand. I ran the dishwasher once, and it sounded like an airplane taking off. The fridge runs non-stop. I think the seal is broken. There are about 3 feet of counter, which is enough to get a meal done. It’s the mouse poo on the counter that I can’t tolerate. And the teeth-marks in the butter.
The bathroom is fine. The toilet is tiny. I think it would be a challenge of trajectory for large person. The floors seem to have been finished several times, one on top of the other, because the tub is sunken about halfway into the floor.
There is no lift in the building, which is fine by me. The stairs are very steep, and the floors are like old hospital floors. I check periodically on the status of the dead cockroach at the front door. It’s still dead.
There is laundry and trash/recycling in the basement. I did laundry yesterday. I don’t think the dryer lint collector had been emptied in months. Next to the laundry machines are a series of rodent and insect traps. “Sweet Banana” says one. Beneath which it says “Do not touch rodents or insects in trap”.
Day 5. 25 days to go.
Posted by dave at 10:40 AM | Comments (0)
June 22, 2007
Day 3, Living Room
My level of disgust with the developer, ElAd Properties, has reached an all-time high. I didn't think it was possible.
We knew the concrete floor, to which they glued (not nailed) the hardwood floor, was not level. Not level? In front of the bathroom doors, they actually skimmed concrete to raise the floor so that it would be at the same level as the tile floor in the bathrooms. They made an unlevel floor more unlevel. In some places, the concrete has cracked considerably, and in many places, the adhesive had not cured. When our contractor pulled up the old floor, some of the concrete came with it! Unbelievable.
No wonder I could bounce on the floor.
In apartment 3H down the hall, the builder is busy shimming the floor getting ready to put down the plywood subfloor. Shimming, in this case, means a lattice of 2x4s!!! Almost 6" difference between the inside wall and the outside wall. Do they not realize the amount of moisture that will be trapped in this space below the floor? When they walk on it, it will sound like a theatre stage.
This builder cuts corners all over the place, and it confirms for us once again that we made the right decision to do our floors with our own contractor.
Posted by dave at 02:22 PM | Comments (0)
Day 3, Master Bedroom
Late yesterday afternoon, I went to check on the progress of our floors. It looked like a torpedo had exploded in the place. They had tidied up a bit before I took this photo this morning.
In the middle of the floor, you can see a small round blotch of whiter concrete. This concrete came up with the old floor when it was removed, and left about a 3/4" deep hole. No wonder I could hear crunching under my feet when I walked on the floor.
Posted by dave at 02:19 PM | Comments (0)
June 20, 2007
10 Moves, 11 Years
1 Leuty Ave to Balsam Ave (1996).
2 Balsam Ave to Vancouver (1999).
3 Vancouver to the Schoolhouse (2001).
4 The Schoolhouse to Storage in Toronto and to Platina in France (2004).
5 Platina to Storage in Fort Lauderdale and to New York (2006).
6 New York Hilton to Studio Apartment (2006).
7 Studio Apartment to Midtown Apartment (2006).
8 Midtown Apartment and Storage in Toronto to New York Condo (2007).
9 New York Condo to Storage and to Temporary Apartment (2007).
10 Temporary Apartment and Storage to New York Condo (July 2007).
Yesterday was a long, tedious and tiring day. Moving is never very much fun. It exposes the cable bill that mysteriously disappeared, the dust elephants, and the fringes of one’s stamina.
Stamina is defined as “strength of physical constitution; power to endure disease, fatigue, privation, etc”. It is also defined as the plural of stamen, “the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower, usually consisting of a filament and an anther”.
The closest synonym to “stamina” is “endurance”. I actually think they are very different things. Endurance, to me, is like a bank account. You can increase the balance in your endurance account through training. You withdrawal by running a race. You train your body to persevere. Some days, the bank just isn’t open for business. And some days, you yearn to visit. Stamina, to me, is what you need when the bank is closed, or the balance in your account is zero. It’s what keeps you going when there’s just nothing left. Endurance is the contribution of the body to the equation. Stamina is the contribution of the mind.
My endurance carried me from 5:30 yesterday morning, to almost 8:30 last night. By the time I fell asleep last night, I felt neither the power to endure fatigue, nor did I feel like a filament or anther. The bank account was empty, and my brain went on pause. I slept through a phone call from brother-in-law, Ian, whose flight from Laguardia to Toronto was cancelled. I discovered the message this morning, too late to aid the stranded traveler.
I hustled down to the apartment this morning to meet the flooring guys. They got started right away, and by 11am they were making good progress ripping out the old floor. I looked around at our empty space, and realized that we made the right decision. The floors really are awful. I know, I know, I can be a little dramatic sometimes, and I tend to exaggerate a little. But these floors are pretty bad. And with the place empty, it really showed.
It has taken us 6 months, during which we got nowhere with the developer. They took forever to own up to their responsibility, then made a ridiculous proposal to fix the problem, and then took forever to respond to our questions. We’re on the right path now. Our stamina and endurance have paid off.
Posted by dave at 05:58 PM | Comments (0)
June 19, 2007
What Song are You Humming?
Well, our bags are packed
We're ready to go
They're standing there
Outside the do' ...
And the movers arrive at 9. The art (what few pieces we had put up) is down off the walls, the closets are empty, and the kitchen is clean. Who knew that two people could generate such dust elephants in six short months?
There has been a barage of emails from the contractor, covering off all the last minute details.
And even though nobody has been in the apartment on the UWS since Friday, we cannot get the keys until 4pm. Why do I think I'll have some time to kill this afternoon? I know, yoga!
Then, I'll load the huge duffel bag, two backpacks, multiple canvas bags, napsack, drycleaning, and a few groceries into a taxi, and hurl my way up to 86th Street. I'm sure that the driver will help me in the door with everything. Then, three long flights of stairs up to the apartment.
Then, an ice cold beer.
This all sounds vaguely familiar.
Posted by dave at 08:39 AM | Comments (0)
June 15, 2007
Bye, bye shitty floors
Well, here we go.
Last week, we decided that we couldn’t trust the developer, ElAd Properties, to fix the floors in our apartment properly. The responses to our questions showed such a lack of commitment and concern for the quality of the finished product. I mean, if they couldn't get it right the first time, then denied anything was wrong, then agreed something was terribly wrong, the couldn't convince us they could make it right, why should we expect they could do this?
I called a flooring contractor whose work I have seen, and who has been to see our shitty floors. He came by the apartment on Tuesday, and he will start ripping out our shitty floors on Wednesday.
Next call, the movers. Everything has to go into storage for a month. They will be here Tuesday morning at 9.
Next call, brokers. I guess we need a place to live. I dashed around the city today and looked at some really lovely (ie. really expensive) places, and some really dodgy (ie. cheap) apartments. In the end, I chose a kinda dodgy, kinda lovely one-bedroom apartment on the Upper West Side (West 86th and Columbus). Good location for running in Central Park, and close to a Bikram yoga studio at Columbus and West 72nd Street. But man, it’s up there. No more walking to work for Chis.
Ehhh, it’s only for a month.
It will only take them three weeks to rip out the shitty floor, screw down plywood, then nail down the new floor. Afterwards, we will paint the place, and finish everything beautifully before we move back in.
While this is the last thing I imagined we’d be doing, having bought brand new construction, I am actually looking forward to it.
I mean, who wants to make the furniture bounce by simply walking on the floor?
Posted by dave at 07:18 PM | Comments (0)
June 12, 2007
Weekend in Fog City
Chis had to be in San Francisco this week for business, so we decided to go ahead and enjoy a weekend in one of our favourite cities. I went early Friday morning, and arrived in time to make it to Funky Door for a yoga class. Chis arrived shortly before 8 and we met at the W Hotel before heading to Chaya Brasserie for dinner. Chaya has a wonderful view of the Bay Bridge.
Saturday morning, I hoofed it off to Funky Door’s Nob Hill studio for a morning yoga class, and met Chis in Union Square. We dropped a few things back at the hotel, and headed down Market Street to the Ferry Building. We caught the ferry to Tiburon, and had some lunch at Sam’s Café overlooking the little harbour and marina. It reminded us of Snug Cove on Bowen Island in Howe Sound, just west of Vancouver.
Chis was fighting a serious cold, and had been coughing so much that he pulled a muscle in his lower back. We got back to the hotel around 6pm, and he had a bath and fell sound asleep. Awake long enough for a bite of dinner, he fell back asleep and didn’t wake until Sunday morning when I returned with lattes, fresh fruit and pastries. I left him with the Sunday New York Times and hiked it back to Nob Hill for more yoga. After a quick shower at the hotel, we had brunch down at the Ferry Building on the patio at a wonderful place called Market Bar. We walked down to Fisherman’s Wharf, which was really sad to see what had become of such an historic spot. We walked back toward the hotel through Chinatown, stopped for a glass of Viognier in the blazing sunshine at Café de la Presse, and returned to the hotel around 5. We grabbed our bags and hopped in a cab to the Sofitel in San Mateo, much closer to the office.
I woke at 5am Monday, and was out the door at 6 to catch my 8am flight. Chis went to the office. My flight left on time, and we even landed at JFK on time, but we had to wait for ground traffic to clear before we could get to the gate. It was very late by the time I got home in New York.
Chis flies home tonight on the red-eye.
Posted by dave at 03:55 PM | Comments (0)
June 05, 2007
Hooked?
I was first introduced to Bikram (hot) yoga in Vancouver in 2003 by our extended family member, She Mulligan. I liked it, and tried to convince He Mulligan, a fellow distance runner, to give it a try. He would have none of it. We were living at the Schoolhouse at the time, an hour north of Toronto, where Bikram studios, never mind yoga studios of any kind, were non-existent.
When we decided to move to New York last year, I suggested to Chis that we give the yoga a try. One class and he was hooked.
Just moments before we left to catch a recent flight to Toronto, I peeled off an email to DP saying that we would love to catch he and his stunning, gorgeous, drop-dead hummmalicious wife, AJ, for brunch after yoga. In fact, why not come to yoga. We left before he responded that he just might meet us there. Sure enough, he did. He’s hooked.
Last night, I took our good friend, Tobes, to his first class. I neglected to fill him in on the details, like that it’s 90 minutes. After the class, he said “Geeez, some of my dates don’t last that long”. He’s not hooked.
I am hooked. Oh, so hooked. Here’s a few stats to explain just how hooked I am:
1 number of double classes plus a 5-mile run
4 number of inches lost on my waist
7 number of litres of water I consume each day
8 number of double classes since March 1
9 maximum number of classes in a week
30 number of pounds lost (approximately)
32 maximum number of classes in a month
57 maximum number of classes in 60 days
80 maximum number of classes in 90 days
123 total number of classes since January 1
Posted by dave at 07:36 PM | Comments (0)
June 03, 2007
Blue Planet Run
I spotted a two-page ad in the New York Times this week about something called the Blue Planet Run. The ad was clearly paid for by the sponsor of the run, Dow Chemical. Chis says the ad probably cost Dow about $130,000.
The thing is, there was no URL for the Blue Planet Run's website, no phone number, and it didn't even say that the run was starting on that very day at the United Nations Plaza here in New York.
The purpose of the journey is to raise money and awareness for the 1.1 billion people in the world living without clean water, 2.2 million of whom die each year. 20 runners each run 10 miles each day. They will cover 15,200 miles, 16 countries over 95 days. It's a brilliant idea. They are on their way to Boston, where they will fly to Shannon, Ireland later this week.
Cool.
Now, if I can only figure out why a chemical company is sponsoring a clean water event? Guilty conscience? Do they have a chemical that cleans the water? Do they have technology to clean the water? I went to Dow's website the first thing that caught my eye was some agreement they signed on a coal-to-chemicals project. Hmmm...
Posted by dave at 03:08 PM | Comments (0)
Saturday in the City
It seems that New York is currently laden with impressionist/ expressionist art. At the Metropolitan Museum of Art, an exhibition of the collection of Stephen and Sterling Clark, rivalrous brothers who went separate ways and collected very different bits of art. At the Wildenstein Gallery on East 64th Street, a collection of some 60 works by Monet, pulled together for the first time. And at the Neue Gallery on Fifth Avenue at 86th Street, a collection of works by Van Gogh and his influence on Austrian and German art.
We started at the Wildenstein, which had a queue down the street. I dislike queues at the best of times, but standing in the blazing hot humid sunshine was going to put me over the edge. We passed, favouring a late Friday night excursion instead. We moved on to the Neue Gallery. Van Gogh is one of my favourite painters, and several of my favourite works by him, including “The Bedroom”, 1888 were on display. Most interesting about the exhibition was the obvious influence that his style had on artists like Egon Shiele, Kirchner, Klimnt, and even Kandinsky.
We walked past the hordes of tourists at the Met, and considered climbing the steps to see the Clark Brothers collection, but by now it was almost five and we had tickets to see Momix at the Joyce Theatre at 8. We passed on the Met for another day, and walked south through Central Park and stopped in at a favourite watering hole in Midtown.
After a very quick bite of dinner at home, and a splash of cologne to freshen up, we walked over to the Joyce Theatre. Chis is not a big fan of modern dance, but it has always been something I enjoy immensely. He loved it. The show opened with a 30-foot tall puppet towering above the dancer connected to it by a series of wires and poles, none of which you could see because of the black suit and amazing lighting. This was followed by a series of short shows depicting wonderful displays of strength, physical beauty and flexibility. Really a spectacular show. Definitely worth seeing if you have a chance.
Tropical Depression Barry approaches later this afternoon, with predictions of heavy rain. Hopefully enough rain to rinse the garbage and dog pee smell out of the city. Summer in New York. Gotta love it!
Posted by dave at 09:10 AM | Comments (0)