t
o
n
y
a
n
g
'
s
 
w
e
b
l
o
g


in the morning i had blog brunch at christopher's in porter square with sooz and shannon, along with some new faces, christine (applied math college student), rick (scifi writer with a job), and some woman whom i didn't quite catch her name. i had the french toast with fruits, blueberries stuffed inside of triangular french toast along with melons, grapes, and strawberries with some home fries on the side and a container of maple syrup. i ate about half before i was full, taking home the rest. nobody wanted their bacon (is everyone health conscious?) so shannon had a plate full of bacon strips all to herself. we had a good seat, near windows that looked out onto the streets where we saw people leaving a yoga class. we knew they were coming out from yoga because everyone carried a trendy rolled up yoga mat. there were quite a few yoga men, and we made fun of them as they walked by, oblivious to our taunts.

i walked back to the house and took a shower before starting work. i'm beginning to really fall in love with my bathroom. i naturally love my kitchen, because of all the recent lighting additions, but the bathroom is the only place in the house that's remotely furnished. i've hit upon a "leaf" theme to my bathroom: leaf patterned shower curtains, leaf patterned bathroom rug, and even the back of the toilet seat cover has leaf patterns. the vanity light above the mirror reminds me of either a flower or the sun, which goes well with the leaf theme. the walls are currently pink, but i intend to go with a soft green color when i repaint the walls. despite the fact that the hot water knob for the shower turns in the wrong direction, despite the awkwardly cantilevered showerhead pipe, i think it's a good shower. just the right amount of water pressure, just the right temperature of hot water, and with the bathroom window at the showerhead end of the tub, morning showers will be naturally illuminated. i'm also glad i decided to go with frosted windows in the bathroom for an additional $40. it allows light in but still keeps the bathroom private. the bathroom is currently the only private room in the house (if you don't count the guest bedroom with its makeshift curtain clipped into the window sash). i'm thankful the bathroom does have a window: i saw a few bathrooms during my house hunting phase that didn't have windows, and they all seemed very claustrophobic. the window's also good for ventilation, for both odor and moisture.

after a refreshing shower, i hooked up the ibook and checked my e-mail in the living room, sitting on the fold-out mattress chair, soaking in the new emptiness of the place. on a suggestion mentioned by sooz, i pointed my itunes to an 80's internet radio station and cranked out some sweet tunes through the tinny internal ibook speakers. i took some time to re-evaluate the colors i will eventually be painting the rooms in:

living room, bathroompotpourri green 2029-50
(benjamin moore color code)
foyer, hallway, adjacent closetssweet orange 2017-40
kitchensalsa 2009-20
bedrooms, bedroom closetlittle boy blue 2061-60

four colors with white ceilings and white everything that's wood. eggshell finish for most of the walls and ceilings, with semi-gloss finish for everything in the bathroom, along with trims, baseboards, wainscoating, window frames, door frames, and doors. i might decide to add another color into the mix, like maybe making the guest bedroom a violet color. i wanted sweet orange as the color you see when you first come in because i feel it's a welcoming color. immediately thereafter you see the living room in potpourri green, a calming color. from the living room looking down the short hallway into the kitchen you'd see salsa red. the kitchen walls will have the strongest color because i think the deeper color will anchor the kitchen as the center of the house (the rest of the place is painted in shades of pastel) and also because the kitchen is the most illuminated room in the house and can get away with a darker color.

i spent the rest of the day stripping paint from the doorway going from the hallway into the kitchen. although i had the music on, i couldn't hear it over the heat gun fan noise (think dangerous blowdryer). despite all the hard work, i only managed to finish half of the doorway. i'm going to bring my speakers tomorrow, hopefully i can get some better sounds so i can actually hear those sweet 80's music. some people use the motivational powers of caffeine to get them through the day. i have my 80's music. nothing like hearing that favorite song to really get you pumped for work. in between heatgunning i heard some kim wilde, some human league, some animotion, some glenn fry.

around 4pm alex wong showed up at my doorstep. once again, he parked down by the porter exchange and then scootered his way to my place, despite the fact that there were ample parking up and down my street. being that today was sunday, you don't even need a visitor's parking permit (not that you'd need one anyway on my street, i park there all the time without a permit and i haven't gotten ticketed once). he came, i showed him the progress on the house since his last visit, and made no visible signs of being impressed, even after giving him the recessed light show or the matching toilet seat cover. that's one tough customer! but i think it takes another fellow homeowner to really fully appreciate home renovation work. i could care less about home improvement prior to june 19th, but now it's all i think about it.

since suhan's going back to taiwan next thursday, my parents decided to take him out to dinner, my sister and i invited as well of course. we went to the victoria seafood restaurant down by boston universiy. great food, terrible service. it was really crowded when we got there and they told us it'd be a 30-45 minute wait. an hour later and numerous inquiries asking them what was the delay, we finally got our table. inside the restaurant all i could think about was the fact that the restaurant used 6" recessed lights with black baffles, a 5 bulb frosted inverted blue cone pendant (one of the bulbs didn't work), tracked accent lights (halogen light bulbs), and double dished sconces on the walls. ahhh! the food was very delicious, made even more so by the fact that were had to wait so long to get a table. the clientele were mostly chinese (we sat next to this obnoxiously loud table of chinese mainlanders), and i think maybe the fact that the menu was printed entirely in chinese had something to do with it (i'm sure an english version must exist as well). everytime a waiter came by we'd ask him for some water and everytime they promised but never delivered. finally when we were almost all done with our meal did they bring the water, the serving waiter sheepishly saying, "we ran out of glasses." when we left, i saw my mother figuring out the tip, something like a little bit more than 10%.