back, still alive

Amsterdam was great. The way the storied past meets the efficiency of the future in an idyllic Dutch setting is out of this world. Jonas and I spent a great deal of time exploring the cultural heritage of the city...

As for the after-hours, well, here I've got some recollectin' to do. One thing for certain: if you happen to talk to Jonas, and he mentions the following words: "red light", "dominatrix", or "Homomonument", demand photographic evidence.

ams

Contrary to laws of nature and common sense, I made it to Amsterdam. This morning, things were looking bleak - I wasn't sure how I would meet Jonas, since Susan's internet connection on which our last-minute travel arrangements depended unexpectedly cut out. Seeing how Jonas was the only party which knew where he would be and which hotel we would stay in, I was a liiitle worried. But, things are looking up. I found an internet cafe, and shall now proceed to Hotel Luxer, where JK claims to have booked an ultra-cheap and ultra-nice room. We shall see!

paris on strike

Hopefully, the transport strike will be over soon. There are good things and bad things about it - on the bright side, all the trains and buses are free; unfortunately, they come rarely or not at all. During the rush hour, metro trains are chock full of people even before they reach the downtown, so on every station the same scene happens - people already packed like sardines on the train try to reason with the people on the platform, saying that there is no room. Sometimes those waiting refuse to listen, and try to inject themselves - which often leads to hilarity when the doors try to close.

There are thousands of scooters on the road, and they seem to be the way to go when the streets get jammed up. Along with the scooters, something else is challenging the tiny French cars: odd-looking Velib bikes. They can be rented at automated stations all over the city, and cost very little to use. The reason they look a little strange, sort of like a throwback to the 50s-style cruisers, is because they use non-standard parts to make stealing them less appealing. All in all, a great system, only I haven't been able to use it yet 'cause I need a subscription.

penniless in paris

The rest of our trip to Paris was surprisingly uneventful. Even though we had to walk from Gare du Nord because of the transport strike, we made it home. Susan ran off to work, and I geared up for my own Parisian adventure. First thing I needed was some cash.

I found an ATM that Sue directed me to, but the machine kept spitting out my card - why, I'm not sure, as the message was (naturally) in French. Well, I thought, I'd just have to rely on another plastic friend. I browsed around for a grocery store that accepted credit cards (there were none), contemplated writing a check in euros (bad idea), and then found a pizza store that claimed to accept American Express.

Through a combination of hand gestures and broken French (that I tend to mix liberally with Spanish, a language that I've studied just as unsuccessfully in high school), I ordered a pizza plus one slice (to make it over the required minimum). All my linguistic struggles lead to no nutritional outcome, as the credit card machine refused to accept any of my cards. D'oh.

Yes, the thought of panhandling for euros has crossed my mind.

I was able to find food and withdraw cash a little later, but I must say that this battle for necessities definitely put some things in perspective...

homeless in london

"I bet you can't wait to blog about this," said Susan as we rounded another corner in a red double-decker bus that we really didn't need to take. She was 100% right. As we've learned, even a flawless travel plan can bring an element of surprise into your life.

The first few legs of our trip were an exercise in perfection. I had no problems getting on my Virgin flight, and by the time I finished watching "Knocked Up" and Family Guy, we were almost over Heathrow. Concerned about my luggage, I chose to pay extra for the express train - and, to my surprise, got to a station withing walking distance from my hotel in about 15 minutes. The hotel was very decent by European standards, and best of all, I met Susan at a time and place that we picked beforehand.

Even though the weather was fairly dreary, we still got to have a boatload of fun. We thought that we saw all there was to see during our first trip - and, boy, were we wrong. The museum blitzkrieg (Tate Modern, Museum of Natural History, V&A) was enough to culturalize us for months to come, but somehow the highlight of our trip became a visit to Harrod's, a huuuge and hugely famous department store. We spent hours looking at things that our measly US dollars were no good for. You see, British prices are the same as American, if you ignore the fact that the tags are printed in pounds. Having to multiply everything by two made me feel very, very poor.

This feeling only foreshadowed what was yet to come. Susan had to work on Monday, so, in a very Stan-esque move, she bought train tickets for the first Monday train across the Channel that was scheduled to depart at 5:20AM. No problem, we thought - we'll just stay late at some pub, and then show up a little early for the train. Peace of cake.

The reality reared its ugly head early, when we realized that our luggage would be a great impediment to our movements. Seeing that our biggest bag had all the dimensions and maneuverability of a small coffin, we decided to take a late tube train to the St. Pancreas terminal and camp out there for the night. Up until 11PM, we were golden. One of the station shops was open, and we even got to sample some organic beer, which as mighty fine.

Even though the station was completely exposed to outside air, didn't have a waiting area, and was officially closed, we were completely OK minding our own business on one of the hallway chairs. As the temperature plummeted to near-freezing, we tried to bundle up the best we could, at which point the station security determined that we looked homeless enough to be escorted out.

We regrouped at a soon-to-be-closed Burger King, and reviewed our situation:
- we have four hours to kill
- outside there's nothing but freezing rain
- paying for a hotel to stay for four hours is dumb - plus, is there a hotel nearby?
- the tube is closed
- our closest friends are hundreds of miles away

As we started off in an indeterminate direction, I noticed a bum sprawled out on a sidewalk, protected from rain by a ledge above. For a moment, I contemplated joining him, before fate gave us a sign - a bus station sign that indicated that some buses ran 24 hours. Hmmm! Sitting on a warm bus seemed like a good short-term solution.

We took bus #205 all the way to its last stop at Paddington, got off, and tried to convince a clerk at the Hilton to let us chill for a while. No luck. I remembered from before that Paddington had a waiting area, so we marched there - and found it just as exposed to the outside air as St. Pancreas. At this point, we were happy just to have a roof over our heads, so Susan unpacked her sleeping bag and drifted off to sleep, and I decided to catch up on some reading.

As I slowly neared hypothermia, a homeless lady provided some entertainment by snatching a stack of my magazines, and claiming that they were from her library. Although I was quite sure that I was not one of her patrons, there wasn't much I could do. At that point, I felt a little more compassionate than I normally would, as a few more hours in that cold would've driven me just as demented as she was.

off we go

I'm off to Paris for two weeks to spend some quality time with Susan. But, first I need to make it to London, locate our hotel, then traverse the Channel together - and then meet Sunny and maybe Jonas in some European capital. Fun.

house buying, part 2

A couple of months ago, I started listing all the steps required in buying the house. At this point, we got our P&S signed - that means that we had to take off yet another day from work, drive heck-knows-where, and sign a million copies of the same form that specifies what it is that we're buying. The form, among other things, will list what appliances are staying, and when the closing date will be. Believe me, you're gonna need at least a month until you can close...

1. At this point, you should have your mortgage broker lined up, and he should have told you what kind of a mortgage you can expect. There are two kinds of mortgages: fixed and adjustable-rate. Adjustable-rate mortgages (ARM's) look good on paper, since the monthly payment will be lower to start with. But, their rates reset after a given number of years (1-5, usually), and if you rate goes up - so does your monthly payment. So, go with the fixed rate. It seems that the majority of the country did not listen to this simple advice, and that's why people are foreclosing left and right.


2. Check out the mortgage rates. They're about as easy to predict as the weather, but there are sites out there that try to do just that. If you're getting really into it, you can take a look at the historic trends, and breathe a sigh of relief - back in the early 80's, rates were as high as 18%. Nowadays, you can expect something closer to 6.5% - which is still a lot. Pretend that you can find a house for $100,000 - if you finance 100% of the purchase at 6.5%, you'll be paying the bank $6500 a year just for the privilege of borrowing their money. Ouch.


3. Check if your parents or somebody else you know is loaded. Steal their money. No, no, kidding - but, you can actually borrow money from them, and set up a "private" mortgage. Or, if the other party trusts you enough, they can accept the money as a gift (which is better for the giver as far as taxes go), and then you'll pay them back later - you can sign a promissory note to make sure that they get their money back if something happens to you.


4. Now you have to figure out the downpayment situation. If you can scrap together 20% of the purchase price, you're good - that means that you don't have to pay PMI (Private Mortgage Insurance), a special penalty for those who can't. Otherwise, another option is a piggy-back loan - you would take the first loan for the 80% of the purchase price, and then the second for the remaining 20%, at a higher rate.


5. If possible, arrange it such that the downpayment money has been sitting in your account for at least two months. Otherwise, you have to explain to the bank where you got it. Avoid the Bank of America trap that my friends fell into - they were promised one rate, when their account was flush with dough, but as soon as they put down their deposit, their balance dipped - and BofA claimed they were no longer eligible for the rate that they were initially quoted.


6. At this point, you can lock in the rate. Talk this over with your broker - a good one can offer you to re-lock for free when closing draws near, in case the rates fall.


7. Now your mortgage broker is ready to send you the loan application - the biggest pile of paper you'll ever see. It will have estimated fees - you're not gonna know the exact number until the day of closing. Make sure you're not paying an arm and a leg - those fees can add up to thousands. Speaking about arms, I twisted my loan broker's until he came up with a pretty good deal - we'd sign up for a line of credit (even though we didn't need it), and he'd make sure that all the fees added up to less than $1800.


8. In case your brain fluid is boiling, don't even keep on reading. Home equity line of credit (HELOC) is a way to borrow against equity, or the difference between what your home is worth and what you owe on it. You still have to pay the bank a percentage (usually adjustable-rate) on what you borrow, but it definitely beats getting into credit card debt. 'Cause there's nothing good about credit card debt, let me tell ya.


9. With the loan application, you have to submit a boatload of papers - W2's for the past two years, bank statements for the past two months, and a whole lot more. Individually, they're not too bad, but finding and copying them might take a while.


10. While all of this is going on, make sure that your loan guy is talking to your lawyer, and that your real estate agent is in touch with the seller's agent. At times, it will seem like you're orchestrating a dunce show.


11. Don't forget that you also have to figure out what to do with the place where you live now, and pack up your belongings. Finally, you're ready to close.

What happens next? Stay tuned for the next installment...

that's how you debate

turf war

Damn them squirrels!



Just when I thought the battle was won, I heard their signature scratching around the air conditioner in the master bedroom. I knew there were some smaller holes in the siding around there, so I hauled my butt up the ladder, and covered up the holes with some plywood.



Almost immediately, another hole showed up to the right of the board that I put up. I saw that the squirrels weren't messing around, so I put up two more boards, thus adding to the rustic look of my house. Game over, I thought.



The squirrels thought otherwise. This morning, I woke up around 6AM to the sound of bushy-tailed bastards gnawing at the wood. Sure enough, they made another entrance to what they feel is their home:

Clearly, it was time to escalate the hostilities. Following a friend's advice, I crushed up some moth balls, and started pouring the smelly powder into the hole...


Right there, hanging on for dear life 20 feet above the driveway, and smelling like an old lady's closet, I thought to myself, maybe humans and squirrels can coexist?


Or maybe I need to invest in a BB gun.

this conversation bought to you by Skype

Stan: ... so I had the guy put on a chimney cap. I guess Santa is not coming in through that this year.



Susan: Oh! I thought he wasn't coming 'cause your people killed him.

less holes

Finally, I got around to a much-needed repair - fixing huge holes in the front of my house. The holes were so big that some devious squirrel made a huge nest inside one of them. How the previous owners allowed that to happen, I have no idea.

So, here come the before and after: