Call from the school board

How interesting the school board to choose my birthday, too give me a call. The reason: to offer me an board interview! LOL. I couldn’t believe it. I already have a job the board. I suppose I should be happy they called me, but as a teacher who has been working for a year already, calling this late in the summer is a bit of an insult. Last year, I was called in March! Maybe my skills have slipped a bit over my year of teaching.

Montreal

Anthony has asked me to go to PRIDE in Montreal with him over the long weekend! I can’t wait to go. I’m quite excited about it to be going to just relax after my course. I’ll take it as my mini vacation before getting back into work mode in the middle of August, as I prepare for my new class.

AQs

As my summer course is coming to an end, i think i have changed my mind about in-class courses vs. online courses. I have found the less amount of reading quite nice. Typically, online courses consists of reading of one chapter a day, with written responses to other students in the class. In class course has been less reading overall, but lots of group work. Although i’m not a big fan of the tangents we get on in class, the sharing time of different ideas have been very nice. I’ve learned some great ideas just from those sessions.

People who I thought i would work well with turned out to be not quite very good people to work with. Oh well... only 3 more days left of this thing.

Condo Drama: BE GONE!

Ok, so the condo drama is over for now. Today, mom and i went down to the developer to sign the papers to get the undermounted sink for the unit. Apparently there is a very quick turn around on picking the finishes. They actually only had 40 days to get every suite done in two buildings. I understand the timing issues, but minor changes... come on!

Over the weekend, Mom and i went to see other condo developments near home. What I have concluded from our adventures from the four sites we looked at are as follows:

1. Major developers in suburbia don’t really care about the finishes as much. Pretty much all basic features included are quite boring.

2. Independent developers tend to be more in touch with style and design. I suppose that is because they are selling a more modern building.

3. Major developers who build in suburbia and downtown really tailor to the cliental. The stuff uptown was quite gross, but the finishes in downtown condos were quite classy and up to date. I think people who buy in suburbia generally don’t care for granite countertops and undermount sinks like me. Which is just fine, because i don’t plan on living in suburbia anyway.

We actually found a unit that is has a very similar layout as the suite i will be living in. The best part of this is that we can look at how they placed furniture...we got some good ideas to play with. I won’t get to pick out things until I actually see the space anyway... but the ideas are just flowing now.

Condo Dilemma!

After having the option to pick finishes for the condo, and the drama around the cost, I suggested that we really should have an under mounted sink with the granite countertops. I thought of this after talking with Peter who is a contractor for home construction. He suggested that it wasn’t worth the trouble to do change a surface mounted sink to an under mounted sink. The only problem is that we had already picked the finishes on Monday, and we decided we wanted the under mounted sink on Wednesday. We called the developer and they told us that it was too late to make any changes. I thought it was quite ridiculous since we only picked the finishes on Monday, and there is no reasonable reason why people can’t make an addition. After all, we are giving them more money for this upgraded sink. They haven’t even gotten every suite’s orders yet, but they refuse to let us make one change. It would be totally different if we changed our mind after a month, or right before the suite was delivered, but 2 days!! Give me a break!

Condo Finishes

We went to pick the finishes to the condo today. I had put a lot of thought into the colour selection and the options. The only problem we ran into is that fact that the designer made some suggestions and other changes that increased the price higher than expected. My mother actually had a bit of a hissy fit after she saw the price. It was higher than my original estimates as well, but not totally out of control, in my mind at least. In the end, the only way I was able to convince mom it was ok, only after I offered to pay for the upgrades myself. Her argument was that the upgrades would be a waste of money and they wouldn’t add to the overall value of the unit when being sold. I disagreed, because I have to live there! It would be much better to enjoy your surroundings than to live in a slum you weren’t happy with. By the end of the design session, she was happy with the choices made. The condo feels very rich and warm, unlike the standard packages that were offered. The granite counter tops and the bathroom wall tiles cost the most of the entire project, but in my mind, they are both worth every cent! The only regret is not ordering the under mounted sink. I didn’t mention it because of the cost, and my mother’s reaction, but thinking about it more, I wish I ordered it anyway.