an undone calm

A Finished Product

Anne — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 03:29:01 +0000

While normally I’m pretty good about finishing projects that I start, my knitting projects seem to suffer the most from lack of sustaining enthusiasm. This sweater took me 8 months or so to complete, but I would argue that no one can be expected to knit wool sweaters in the summer so those months don’t really count.

At any rate, Rufus’ mom is a Princeton grad and her birthday was just before Halloween so I finished this up for a well-timed and coordinated gift. Apparently it’s getting rave reviews at the office.

Second Best

Anne — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 15:03:56 +0000

My standard fall back playlist on my ipod/itunes is the Top 100 Most Played smart playlist that comes standard with iTunes. It’s music I enjoy, obviously, and it has enough of a mix of moods and genres that I can always find something I like. The problem is though, that the more I listen to that playlist, the farther and farther away those tracks become (in play count) from the rest of my library. Which then renders the list pretty static (read: boring).

New solution… the “after top 100″ playlist.

Basically it’s the same structure as the Top 100 (playcount > 0 and selected by most often played), but you add the exclusion of the Top 100 playlist. I increased the item number to 250 to give it more variety. Over time, listening to this list will eventually shift the songs up into the Top 100, bringing some of those songs down. Alternating the two lists should keep the groups near each other play count-wise. Might need a third tier playlist also, with exclusions of the two previous playlists eventually.

FLORing

Anne — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:27:34 +0000

I ordered a bunch of FLOR samples to help me decide about the rug for the living room. The final rug choice turned out pretty well (I think) and today I put those samples to good use… Cat litter mat and a door mat!

Wood Grain Contact Paper

Anne — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 21:42:05 +0000

Remember how I was bored with my light-colored wood veneer shelving units? Well, my family talked me out of my crazy idea to paint them and a few hours of Apartment Therapy browsing gave me the idea to cover the shelves with wood-grain contact paper.

Before:

After:

The contact paper is the “Maron Dark” color and available at DesignYourWall. It’s a bit more user-friendly than regular contact paper because it isn’t super sticky. It sticks well to the furniture once you’ve got it where you want it, but if it accidentally gets positioned wrong or folds back on itself you don’t have to start over again. I chose not to do the inner supports because I was hoping to eventually find either a contrasting color or an interesting pattern to cover those elements. Covering the shelves was relatively tedious and required a modest amount of patience, attention to detail, and x-acto knife skill. At $65 for a 49 foot roll it’s eminently more affordable than buying new shelves.

Cat in a box

Anne — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 20:53:51 +0000

Cheddar likes the Gap, Inc. brands too.

Moving…

Anne — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 05:06:17 +0000

The financial collapse here in New York has finally affected me… My landlord is selling the apartment. So for the third time in 28 months, I’ll be moving. With any luck I’ll find a no-fee apartment, but not without a fair amount of frustration I expect. The Manhattan rental market is a beast like no other it seems.

1. It is fair game to completely misrepresent an apartment in the listings. For example, a 2 bedroom listing is probably a 1 bedroom that they expect someone to live in the common room. The brokers like to call these “flex 2″ or “convertible 2″ apartments. Today a broker told me that the apartment had a “roomy” living space after the “flex” wall went up. I pressed him further… 9ft x 9ft. Ha!

2. A certain percentage of the listings are fake and just designed to get you to call the broker.

3. When you do go view an apartment the broker will tell you that you must make a split-second decision and that it will go THAT DAY! They will throw in phrases like, “you are never going to find this much space at this low price”.

4. You can expect to pay first, last, security, and some type of fee. So for your average overpriced 1 bedroom for $2500/month that would be $12,000 up front if you have a broker and $7,500 if you don’t.

5. All right enough bitching. I’ll find somewhere to live somehow. As a parting feature I would like you to examine the floorplan below. This is an apartment that is for sale (not rent) for $350,000 with a monthly maintenance fee of $780. It appears that the shower is in the kitchen. Hahahahahaa….. Love it.

Wee Ones

Anne — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 03:19:39 +0000

Back to back trips to Buy Buy Baby and Babies ‘R Us this week to find an extra tall baby gate to contain my frisky feline had me thinking about babies. I expect that as the marriage count among my friends is continuing to increase, steadily behind it will come the baby count. Eeeek. Babies.

Until recently, I used to say that the only thing I knew for sure that I wanted to happen in my life was to have children. Not that I wanted these children any time before my mid-thirties, but I knew I wanted them. Maybe it’s me just readjusting my life plan based upon a realistic expectation of fruition but now I’m not so sure. I mean, certainly I think I still want to have children, but now I’m beginning to consider that it could NOT happen and I could also be okay with that. For example, I don’t think I want children enough to consider having them without a partner. I hate to make my life decision about having children contingent upon the (seemingly impossible) feat of finding a partner, but I also can’t really fathom the workload of a single parent. Having children seems hard enough with two parents. Also, there’s a degree of selfishness that I think you get accustomed to being alone and I can see now how sacrificing that needs to be a clear choice. Last but not least, seeing all of that horrendous baby crap really grated on my sense of aesthetics.

Cheddar is doing a fine job fulfilling my hypothetical evolutionary need to nurture.

Scratch that

Anne — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 03:04:42 +0000

New plan for household revitalization that doesn’t involve spending as much $$: DIY. I’m going to paint the laminate shelving unit that I hate. I realized I don’t actually hate the unit itself. I hate moving it (and have vowed to never do so again) and I dislike the light wood.

So, after some Apartment Therapy and Ikea Hacker research it appears I can paint it even though they are maple or birch veneers. Now in an ideal world I’d be able to stain it a deep dark almost black chocolate color, but I’m pretty sure I can’t stain those veneers. So paint, in a high gloss blackish chocolate, will have to do. I think the darkness will contrast nicely with the brushed metal supports. Luckily I can do test spots on the back supports. My cursory research suggests the steps are sand paper, vacuum/clean, numerous coats of paint. It doesn’t need to last forever so that’s my plan for my first attempt at DIY. The living room is now void of table and chairs so there’s plenty of room for my project after I get back from Iceland.

Did I mention I was going to Iceland on Friday? Ten blissful days of cool rainy (read: ideal) weather in a Scandinavian country. V. excited.

Furniture Fun

Anne — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 22:17:19 +0000

I’m itching to buy furniture again. I sold my table and chairs because we never used them, and now I’m contemplating a pair of chairs. While Ikea appeals to my wallet, I’m lusting after this chair from Room & Board…

Naturally, I wouldn’t order it in that color. I’ll give you one guess which color I’d go with…

I’m not quite sure about the ottoman situation. Is one enough? Or maybe a non-matching ottoman that’s large enough to be shared? That’s trickier.

Then, I also need to replace the eating area in a more convenient size and location so that we might actually use it. I like this table idea (also from Room & Board).

It’s narrow enough (30″) that it could just go up against the wall with 3 chairs, but you could pull it out and add a fourth chair if you needed to. Or even do two chairs on the long side. I’d prefer the walnut top, but at $400 less, I think I’d go with the plain glass top.

Then I also have to get chairs. Eeesh. Maybe Ikea chairs will do. At $19.99, this Stefan chair could be hard to beat.

So, 2 chairs, 1 ottoman, table, 4 dining chairs = $2366 + tax + shipping. The chairs are the bulk of that though. More debating required.

The Battle of Vera Bradley

Anne — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 11:22:40 +0000

This video is sort of long and sort of boring, but it’s a good sample of what Cheddar and Sushi do all day long. On this day they were fighting over who got to sit inside my Vera Bradley duffel bag (which for some reason, they both love).