leaving all the furniture behind

Do you ever get tired of your belongings? I sure do. It's not that I want new versions of everything that I own - some of it I simply want gone. I don't want to clean it, and I don't want to pack it or move it when we relocate again. We routinely go through all of the boxes that we have in storage, and try to clean out anything that we no longer need and that has no sentimental value. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to just abandon all of our furniture when we sell the house. There are lots of old Victorians in town that are sold fully furnished. Primarily, this is because the streets downtown are extremely steep, and trying to get moving trucks in there is difficult and dangerous.

I've been thinking of doing lots of built-in furniture in our next home. This will allow us to get rid of lots of what we have now, and it will allow me to creatively use built-in furnishings in the overall house plan, to be strategically placed as dividing kneewalls and visual points of interest throughout the home. We have already come up with a plan to build a full wall of drawers and closet-like armoirs between the two kids' loft areas. The built-in will actually be the dividing wall between their space.

I've been toying with the idea of building some of these items out of rustic logs. We lost about a half dozen trees in the recent hurricane aftermath, and the trunks and branches are just begging to be cut-up, debarked, and reborn as something new. I've never been much of a carpenter in the past, but I never had the right tools, either. At least if I leave it with a rustic finish, I don't have to worry about making it look pristine and perfect. I can allow the character of the wood to dictate the design and final finish.

the problem with insurance is...

Hmmm...where to start? Or even better, where to end...if ever?

We're currently dealing with our homeowner's insurance company over a storm-related damage claim. As a result, I am a little annoyed at some of the service I am receiving. It took forever for the adjuster to call us, and then it took a week for him to inspect the damage and write up an estimate. All I want is for my home to look and function the same as it did before the storm. I'm not trying to rip anybody off, commit fraud, or make money off of the claim. The adjuster had no doubts that our claim is legitimate, but he's giving me enough pushback on exactly where their coverage ends.

So we're battling it out, pushing for a better resolution of our problems. I have been told that this is all part of the game that they play, and that it is very common. But if we don't get that resolution, what should we do? Switch insurance companies when this whole debacle is over? Doesn't the insurance company understand that by making us want to jump ship they are never going to get enough insurance premiums from us to pay for these repairs? Isn't it in their best interest to treat us well and retain us as customers?

Homeowner's insurance is tricky. You don't know what kind of support you're going to get until something bad happens. And unlike shopping for other types of insurance, it seems that there isn't as much variance in the premiums when you compare prices. If I'm trying to insure my car, I can do a quick auto insurance comparison and the differences between each insurance company are plain to see - quite black and white. Homeowners policies aren't as transparent, though, and I would suspect that agents will promise the world to get you to sign up. What I really dislike is when something happens to a car or home that you have coverage on, and your agent tries to convince you that filing a claim isn't in your best interest. They might suggest that your premium may go up, or that the insurance company "doesn't like it" when you take advantage of a certain type of coverage, such as auto glass. Personally, I think that is a load of crap. You pay for insurance so that you have coverage in the event of a loss. If you're not going to use it, why pay for it?

evan unmighty

After much prodding, I finally caved and picked up a copy of Evan Almighty from the local library. My mother was recently at our house for a visit and insisted that we simply must see it. In the movie, God asks Steve Carel (Evan) to build an ark, and starts to assemble animals from around the globe in Evan's suburban mcmansion neighborhood. When I heard the movie name, and that it starred Steve Carel, I told her that it must be a spin-off of the movie Bruce Almighty. She argued that it certainly wasn't. She was adamant - almost defensive. I don't know what the big deal was, but after seeing it, I don't understand how she could think that it wasn't a spin-off. We have the same character playing God (Morgan Freeman), and the main character Evan has just left his job as a news anchor (the same job he had in Bruce Almighty) to be a congressman. Even his co-anchor is the same actress. Geez.

Regardless, the movie stunk. Sure, it is "okay" for a family flick, but I found the humor to be trite, the plot too predictable, and overall Steve Carel wasn't that funny. It's also worth mentioning that the movie is over-the-top in its flagrant use of digital imaging and computer animation. I understand that a movie production crew isn't going to build a massive ark and fill it with a pair of each species of animal on earth, but certain scenes (like when the dam breaks) looked ridiculously contrived. I can understand why they're starting to make pseudo-realistic movies that are fully computer animated (think Beowulf). After all, real movies are filled with this stuff. But why stop there? Why not get rid of the real actors altogether and just use their voices? Oh, wait...that's already been done, too. Ever see The Mummy Returns with its CG-rendered Rock? Wasn't that Angelina Jolie in Beowulf?

the bearded coverup

When I was about 19, I got a job at an insurance company. It was the first job that I ever had that allowed me to grow facial hair. My previous places of employment expected me to clean shaven as can be. So I took advantage of it. I started by growing a goatee. Then I added sideburns, a beard, and eventually a mustache. It's been more than ten years and I still wear my beard and mustache. One of the things that I really like about having facial hair is that it actually can be used a cover-up. I had a scar on my lower jar from where a mole was removed when I was a kid. That scar now hides beneath my beard. When I first grew facial hair, I was still dealing with the plague of teenage acne, and the beard and mustache went a long way at helping me to conceal my problems. Granted, there are all kinds of new lotions and potions, pills and treatments for acne. But when I was a kid all we had was stuff that burned your skin, like this gooey stuff called retinae and some painful dry ice treatments. Yikes!

kids clothing - the ultimate expensive disposable

Our kids seem to burn through clothes in a few months, if we're lucky. You would think that the small amount of fabric would mean that clothes are proportionally cheaper than their adult sized counterparts. Unfortunately, that isn't the case. My kids haven't gotten old enough to start demanding name brands yet, but I am dreading the day. I hope that my kids instead get bit by the thrift store bug, and pick up the funky fabrics of yesterday to invent their own wardrobe. That's what I started doing by the age of 16, since my mother had no clue how I wanted to dress.

For our kids, I am fortunate that my wife knows how to sew. She has savhttp://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=33669414
Blogger: The Occasional Editorialist - Create Posted us tons of money over the years by custom sewing clothing and bedding that would have cost us much more if we had purchased it in a retail store. When we my children were infants, she sewed all of their crib bedding and even some matching curtains for the nursery room. She even made the little crib "bumper" to go around the bed.

When I was a kid, my grandmother was our source for custom sewed garments - she would make shorts, pants, and dresses for the grandkids. Heck, she even made me some of those long shorts called "jams". (It was the 80s, after all!) My wife now carries that torch, and she will likely save us tons of cash over the years on children's clothing. That beats paying full price for clothing that is only going to be worn for a month or two before being outgrown.

the effects of reverse pyschology on karma

Karma is a funny thing. Some people believe that doing good for others results in good things happening for you. Others think it is all coincidence. I'm not really sure what to think, but I have noticed something strange recently. Have you ever noticed that certain things in your life don't happen the way that you want them to until you quit pushing so hard?

Take my marriage, for example. I dated lots of girls before meeting my wife, and with every one of them I was so hung up on finding the "right girl" for me and having a "serious" relationship. As a result, every one failed miserably. I met my wife on the rebound, wasn't really looking for "the one". I even tried to ignore the fact that she seemed so perfect and that there was a special feeling there that I had never felt before. I didn't want to get "serious" this time. After our third or fourth date, she told me that she felt it, too. We've been married very happily for twelve years now. So much for the "rebound".

Fast forward to today. As a self-employed web designer, I have been struggling the last two years. I was putting forth a lot of effort, and was really determined to impress new clients. Business trickled in, and I kept having to find other generic jobs in business to pay the bills. While I like the idea of having several streams of income, I'm tired of wearing so many hats. I was getting ready to give up on the web design thing altogether when I suddenly picked up a promising client. His project turned out to only be a 4 hour job, and I almost dismissed him altogether. When I did the work, I wasn't very enthusiastic about it because I didn't think it would result to much later on. I know that I should treat every client the same regardless of how much they are spending, and I usually do, but I sometimes get tired of dealing with people who want the cheapest solution that money can buy. How did I get to be that discount guy?

Strangely enough, this client has started to refer tons of work to me. While his own project was meager at best, the work he has been sending my way is four to five times as profitable. So I guess the theory of "reverse psychology" can sometimes work on more than just three-year-old.

why wear white?

One of the things that I have been having trouble keeping clean is all of the white trim around our home. We were lucky enough to have oak cabinets, but the painted white trim around all the windows and doors gets filthy, and is difficult to clean. We have the six-panel white doors, too. Outside, we have white trim around the house and at the soffits, etc. It's a little bit like wearing white clothes - they look great at first, but as soon as you wear them outside you irreparably damage them in some way. Either you get a stain, or you sit on something, and your crisp white appearance is never the same. Sure, you could bleach the heck out of them, but then you damage the integrity of the cloth little by little. Houses are the same way. I can keep power washing over and over again, until eventually the paint starts to peel and it is ready for another coat - a coat of paint that it wouldn't have needed if I wasn't power-washing it so often. What a pain!

unexpected elance side-effect

I was ready to completely give up on Elance. Every time I bid on a job, I was underbid by some company in India willing to do web design for $7 an hour. It was getting really frustrating. I finally picked up a small job amounting to very little work, but it was a start. Luckily for me, this one little job has since been referring other work to me like crazy! And best of all, the referrals don't have to go through the Elance system, so I don't have to worry about them taking their "cut" out of the money I make. Pretty cool and definitely unexpected.

So while this blessing has more to do with the generosity of that first customer, and my good impression on him, I guess I have to admit that it would never have happened if I hadn't signed up with Elance. In that respect, I suppose one could say that Elance works as a good springboard for finding long-term work and referrals.