Mortaine’s Blog

This time for :

And I have to tell you all that The Ashley is The Coolest.

This is the eight journal entry today. I won’t make a ninth. Yet.

I’m hosting the January Meetup in San Jose! If you’re in the area, come to the meetup! January 28!!!

Penn caved in.

I am so disappointed, I could cry. I think if he’d read the article by the guy whose 7-month pregnant wife was molested at the airport, he might have fought harder.

I bought a tuna salad sandwich from the lunch truck.

I need to remember not to buy things off the truck.

I’m going to Starbucks to buy a PB and apple sandwich. There is no way that foul-smelling thing is crossing my lips.

I think I’m going to have to stop reading my friends page when I’m at work. There were something like three rather explicit entries by friends, un-cut (or partially cut) on my friends page today. Since these go through the work server before coming to my desktop, I’m probably going to have to stop reading them or start filtering them out when I’m here. Either that, or my friends could use the <lj-cut> tag to hide the entirety of their work-inappropriate entries, but I’m not going to ask them to do that (not the way I get militant about spoilers, anyway). I want to read them, just not when I’m here, so I hope they don’t remove me from their filters. Perhaps I’ll make a second account and ask my friends to friend that account for the naughty bits.

Back at work today. It’s a little odd coming back after two weeks, but okay.

I called a bunch of deck repair/maintenance places this morning to see if I can schedule an estimate. Oh, lordy that’s going to cost. But whatever– it Has To Be Done. I also called a carpenter to arrange an appointment to look at the soon-to-be-a-hole-but-isn’t-yet in the outside wall of the vacant apartment.

There are a lot of deck maintenance things we have to do this week, mostly de-algaeing the patio and deck on the vacant apartment, looking to repair the deck on the occupied one, replacing the broken board in the vacant apartment, and re-sealing the decks on it. Repairing the board and resealing the decks are things we can do ourselves, fortunately, so they only cost as much as deck resealer (which we might still have leftover from last time) and a plank of wood for the replacement. At least, I hope that’s all it will cost.

I also need to remember to touch up the paint in the living room and do whatever cleaning needs to be done. The former tenant is so wonderful– I think the bathroom is actually cleaner than when she moved in. She’s amazing.

Everyone I show this apartment to is impressed. In part, that’s because I emphasize the outside, and find ways to spin the weaknesses into strengths. Like the electric oven. Sure, it’s electric, but it’s a double oven. You don’t realize in the microwave age how valuable that is until you try to cook a lasagne and garlic bread at the same time. Or the second bedroom. It doesn’t have a fourth wall or a door. I tell potential applicants that we considered closing it off, but it would make the whole area so claustrophobic, that we’ve decided not to. And then I show them the huge closet in that room, so they don’t feel quite so weird about it.

And then I take them out onto the deck. There’s nothing bad about that deck, no weaknesses, and the view is gorgeous. I show them the yard, then the deck, and that pretty much has their interest running at 110%.

If we replace the carpet with something a little lighter, this apartment would be golden. It would rent for what we’re asking, no problem.

When we repair the deck on the other side, we won’t be able to ask more, but we wouldn’t feel compelled to lower the rent, and we’ll probably keep our tenant longer.