Howdy Neighbor !

I have really neglected my blog for a while. We have been too busy with the boat, which is definitely stepping up our social life. It's so amazing how many new friends you get when you have a cool toy like that!

Anyway, I am propped up in bed with a glass of wine and feeling very inspired to write, from watching "Marley and Me" last night with Lori, a new girlfriend who I was introduced to through my boss, on Facebook. That's a story for another blog, but Lori and I went to see this comedy about life with a dog who misbehaves. It strangely reminded me of life with Slim. Between laughing and crying, (Lori and I balled like a couple of women at the wailing wall, at the end of the movie), I was encouraged and inspired to continue our blog, by watching Owen Wilson, playing the husband, who is a reporter writing a weekly column.

So many things happen daily and I keep thinking "I must write that down" but life takes over and when it comes time to write, I've forgotten what I wanted to say. The comfy new bed (yes, we finally found a bed) and the 7 pillows in my back, help my creativity flow (or maybe it's the wine?)

Aric bought this under-carriage contraption of a mechanical lift from Ikea, which lifts part of the mattress up to a "sitting, leaning, reading" position. He was too cheap to get the remote control version so one has to squeeze the hand and arm way down between the mattress and bed frame, quickly, to avoid the blood circulation getting cut off, in order to lift the contraption up a few gears...kind of like a hotel pool lounge chair, only with an 8 inch thick, hard and stiff mattress on top. I refuse to use it and am perfectly happy with my multiple pillows. Once the damn thing is up, you have to get out of bed to stick your arm down and get the lever to bring it down!
And when you lay there with it raised, it feels like a hospital bed. I'm waiting for the nurse to come in any minute to take my vitals. The TV mounted on the wall is missing though!

We get new neighbors this weekend. Apparently I scared away the previous "almost moved in" tenants, because these people are not the same as the ones we met a month ago who "were moving in". We almost had Egyptian neighbors, which culturally would have been very interesting, was it not for the wife acting hysterical in the hallway. Our security guy told us "that lady is totally crazy" in his wonderful Indian accent; she proceeded to clear out all large planters and pots from their pool area and put them out for the trash collection. Among them I found my potting soil and various garden materials for our flower pots. This was stored in the common area between our pool rooms on the roof, and she just disposed of it all. Off to the building office I marched and a few days later our doorbell rang. The crazy lady was outside apologizing for her wrong-doings. Perhaps it was my facial expression, or maybe Slim, sniffing her feet while she stuttered through her apology, but after that we never saw them again. A month later we meet our new neighbors, a couple from Minnesota....how cool is that? Bart and Carrie - so far they seem really nice. Can't say I'm terribly unhappy about the crazy Egyptian lady not showing up.

Bart and Carrie are moving into a building soap opera. Granted every house or apartment has its faults and things that need maintenance. This building has apparently never been properly outfitted with correct incoming voltage or AMP or whatever it is that runs A/C and lighting. It's supposed to be a “state of the art, intelligent” building, from a credible real estate developer (Trident) partnering with Pacific Control, who makes the entire IT system that controls everything in our apartment....lights, A/C, curtains, doorbell, security system, CCTV cameras on the roof and in the living room in case we want to remotely access our system online to check on Slim....it's so intelligent I wonder why it doesn't cook, clean and does the laundry.

Since we moved in (in December) we have never been able to get the control panel to work. The first 3 weeks the lights in the kitchen and dining room were on 24/7. They fixed that, but then blew the rest of the lights so 16 halogen bulbs needed to be replaced. That got fixed, but then the water heater stopped working. They fixed that and the camera (even though we don't use the spy cam) and then the A/C stopped working. You get the idea....fix one thing and another problem arises. Every event has Trident blaming Pacific Control and vice versa. And every fix has a charge for this, that and the other.

We finally met more tenants (it so happens that 3 other people here also work for Cisco) who told us they have the same problems...to my delight, as I was getting worried I was the ultimate building witch. It seems other people have problems with the lighting and their A/C. We have created an email alias and now I can read everything about other people’s misery. One guy on the 10th floor says he has “disco lights” every time he turns on his living room, they keep flashing. Several tenants report burning smells and lights malfunction – that happened to us last week. The wires lay across the halogen bulbs and eventually melt. Such a safe environment. So the time has come to write a joint letter to the management and get a consolidated outside maintenance contractor to service all of us. That decision came quickly after Aric had an argument (read: yelling fit) with the Pacific Control man who came to fix Aidan’s A/C fan. It sounds like a jet taking off at O’Hare. He was the one who blew the doorbell circuit last week when he came to fix the lights but denied all wrong doing. Aric finally had enough of the blame game and constant charges for adapters, transformers and thermostats. After nearly having a coronary and terrible high blood pressure, we still await the fan fix but the doorbell works! Can’t be too upset though, at least we have a roof over our heads.

This weekend has us trekking to Umm Al Quwain, the Emirate to the North, for a couple of days boating, camping and frolicking in the sun. That’s a story for the next blog. Have a great weekend all.