Jan
28
new house pics
Filed under house, pics at 3:17 pm | Leave a Comment
Many of you faithful followers of this blog have been clamoring for pictures of the new house. In order to keep all 3 of you happy I’ve uploaded some quick pictures of the new place. Some were clearly taken prior to us moving in, but hopefully it still gives you a feel for the place.
Jan
21
a few of my least favorite things
Filed under house at 5:31 pm | Leave a Comment
I’ve come to learn that when moving into a house, (ir)regardless of its condition, there is an initial onslaught of things that need fixing, removing, upgrading, or installing. I refer to all of these types of tasks as “home improvement.” I’m not a big fan of home improvement.
Doing home improvement involves things I’ve typically never learned, and always includes actions my body was never meant to do. I have a great appreciation for people that are trained and gifted to do home repair. (You know who you are, Tim.) No matter the task, I feel physically and emotionally drained afterward.
We’ve now lived in our new house for a week, and it’s been a tiring but productive one. Here are the home improvement items we’ve already accomplished:
* installed 4 new blinds in family room windows
* attached and fixed dryer exhaust vent
* installed new shower head
* installed new smoke and CO detectors
* repositioned dishwasher
* replaced a billion lightbulbs (yes, I’m putting that on the list)
* installed new towel hooks
And I still have all my major appendages attached. I think it’s time to call it a week.
Jan
19
the (f)utility in moving
Filed under house, moving at 8:52 pm | 2 Comments
They say moving is one of the most stressful things a person can do in life. I think that’s partially because it involves working with utility companies. Some highlights this time around:
(1) The water company charges a $20 administration fee for switching the name on the account from the old owners to us, and tacks on a $60 deposit. They hold on to that $60 deposit until sometime after we close our account with them someday.
(2) The gas company has a $31 initiation charge.
(3) The electric company has a $15 connection fee.
It’s interesting to see how they all find creative terms for those 2 minutes they spend slapping your name on an account. Then there are the utilities where we actually have a choice of providers:
(4) We’ve been using Vonage for our phone service for a while now. They were a joy to have during the move. We were able to continue using our old phone number by simply hooking up our Vonage router to my brother’s network once we arrived. We kept that same number until we knew for sure where we would be purchasing a house. At that point I had a 10 minute phone call with them wherein they activated a new number for us with the local area code, and pointed our old number at it so both would work for a time while we transition to the new. By the time I hung up from that call, the new number was already active and routing to us.
(5) While we technically had a choice of who to use for Internet connectivity, the DSL route scared me because our house is 20,000 feet from the CO (and 15,000 feet is supposed to be the limit for DSL). I’m surprised Verizon even offered the service at that distance. So, we once again joined the ranks of Comcast customers. I must admit I enjoyed the 2 year hiatus, and wish I could have returned to Speakeasy. (Speakeasy has some of the best customer service I’ve ever experienced, not just with technology providers, but of any company.)
Ordering service from Comcast turned out to be a chore, probably involving a total of 3 hours on the phone with who knows how many different people and departments. I ordered the service through comcastoffers.com, as they got us a free cable modem, $125 cash back, and 6 months of service at $19.99. I just kept telling myself all the money we are saving was worth the headache of ordering. Today I got our first monthly invoice, and there are two incorrect charges. I wish I could say I’m surprised.
As for the service, Comcast says they provide up to 6 Mbps down. Even so, I was pleased to run some tests in excess of 5 Mbps this weekend (using a speed test). Have no fear, however: after two days of service, we had our first outage on Monday night lasting about 2 hours. Comcastic! Hopefully it’s not too much longer until Verizon provides FiOS in our area. Rumors are swirling about that it might be sometime in 2007.