No rent for all of the month of February = SIGH.
Increased strata = SIGH.
No rent + Increased strata = UNBELIEVABLE SIGH!
Screw you LJ Hooker.
Mar 072012
Jun 082011
This sigh is an ultimate mega super sigh to the extreme. My strata is already a whopping $495.95 per quarter, for a 1 bedroom apartment in a complex with nothing except a lift as an amenity. Now I have a notice that it will be increased by another $400 to $470 per quarter!!
This increase in strata will take my quarterly fees up to $900 – $970 for the next 5 years. The reason for this massive hike (almost doubling) is that the building needs to undergo extensive defect remediation. The builder, who is dodge to the extreme, has basically declared bankruptcy and cannot fund the repairs. Despite, of course, the building still being new enough to fall under “builders’ warranty”. Pretty frustrated at the good money down the drain. It is time to sigh.
Dec 012010
People have asked, yes they have, why I haven’t sighed recently. It’s because of being very busy and tired. All this is due to the usual root cause of sighs. So I won’t say too much more about that, except sigh.
But I have just got my new lego set!!!!!!!
It’s the motorised lego version. I’m really looking forward to assembling the lot when I get the time. Hopefully over a weekend soon. Thanks Salsa.
Also sigh super sigh, Xmas parties scratched due to bad publicity fears.
Nov 162010
This sigh has been a couple of months in the making.
First let’s talk about the silver bullet. I really liked this car, it got me everywhere I wanted to go, was minimum fuss in terms of maintenance and most of all, cheap running costs. It was super fuel efficient and what it lacked in power, it made up for in sheer awesomeness and gusto. But alas, time ran out on this workhorse, after hail damage caused by parents leaving it outside because they wanted to get it clean, and too many kilometres driven, the curtains had to fall on silver bullet (aka Hyundai Excel sports edition). So we traded it in for a new car. This was a few months back now, but I’ve finally gotten around to blogging about it.
Here are a couple of pics of silver bullet’s swan song:
That’s me behind the wheels
That’s the last photo before we drove silver bullet to trade it in for Silver Bullet v2
So now I’m the half owner of silver bullet v2, aka Hyundai Getz. It’s a nice enough car, and I quite like Hyundai. But I don’t know, it doesn’t feel as comfortable as silver bullet, but I guess it’s a whole lot zippier.
The other sigh is the amount of spiders and cockroaches in my apartment. Even after 3 Mortein bombs, they are still prevalent. Everyday I kill at least 2 cockroaches or spiders. We do have bait everywhere in the apartment and they are meant to lure cockroaches, poison them but leave them alive long enough for them return to their nests for them to spread the poison to their comrades. So let’s see if their numbers decrease over time. Also we are yet to deploy external deterrents or defenses on the balcony. I do have a sneaking suspicion that all the curry cooking in our apartment building is luring those insects in.
You may be wondering why all the sighs Y? Is this a particularly bad period? Well the website is called “Ultimate Sigh” so obviously the content will be skewed towards sighs. It’s a selection bias designed from the start.
Nov 082010
Despite some torrential style rain that fell on me and my stuff, I’m glad to say that I made it to Homebush (west side aiii) without too many hiccups and only a couple of things needed to dry.
SIGHS:
-
The whole apartment building is like some sort of shitty sponge or PMSing chick: retains water like noone’s business. The garbage room had a few mm deep of water around cos it’s in the basement and drainage sucks.
For some reason there’s water dripping from the ceiling of my balcony like it’s forming a stalactite even when it’s sunshine out for a while. - Dumbarse power, antenna and phone outlets or socket: they are placed in the stupidest positions and never in logical places as well as being rare. As a result, I’ve ended up with lots of extension cables, power boards and absurdly long cables in an apartment that is super tiny.
- Bad ADSL2 SNR: this is related to the above. Out of the 2 phone sockets available, only 1 works. I think the line wiring is super dodge. I’m getting extremely low SNR values, just about enough to hold a sync but not by much. Expect unexpected downtime. This has also forced me to run a massively long line cable to my modem. The whole building is apparently wired in a similar shitty maner. From what some residents have said, the hallway lights can’t be turned off lest TV antennas get no reception. I have never heard of that before.
I’ll put up some pics of the creative wiring soon.
Nov 052010
Sep 012010
We’ve started work on the apartment now. Grey/blue feature walls, new carpet and some new furniture. Rui and I aren’t overly talented DIY-type people. But I’ve oddly enjoyed painting with him.
I think we compliment each other well. He paints with the big roller, I have my baby roller and small brush. I have finesse, he has strength.
Whilst it has been disappointing that there is still no clear winner from the election….the campaign itself has been particularly useful for our house renovations. Julia Gillard bunting has helped to save our tiles from being spluttered with paint.
When calling around for quotes to carpet our little bedroom, I came to realise just how small it was. I told the guy it was roughly 4 square metres to which he told me that is the smallest bedroom in all of Australia.
Aug 232010
Aug 182010
Just a few sighs here and there. A really conniving boss, work team without management and talk of a mass exodus, people saying everyone has to look out for themselves and mortgages and apartment furnishings, rennovations and the lot; are all making the yman feeling unhappy and fed up. Where is my dream of no hassle chillage? Seems like everytime I achieve something that means I can just come home after work and relax and not have to do anything or be concerned about stuff, the goal posts move. It’s always about progress, got to do this, got to do that. Well as in Office Space, if I had millions of dollars, I’d do jack all.
Jul 122010
Warning: this is not a post about sighing…rather anticipation.
Anticipation…or more precisely sublime anticipation
To me anticipation is the moment before the milestone moments occur. They are the moments before the anxiety, worry and what ifs…set in when a decision has been made/an opportunity is seized/a chance taken.
To me, these are the moments I live for….when dreams can be dreamt, ideas can be made, plans can be hatched and when I am at my most excitable.
Certainly, as things unfold there are bound to be disappoints and expectations broken…however, in those moments before reality hits….it is sublime anticipation.
And to Rui….today is the sweetest of anticipations.