Hello smile

I'm Siobhan Curran/Kisa Naumova, and this is my weblog. I tend to write about stuff like crossdressing, Macs, code, cats, wine and Second Life, but in general it's just an ongoing conversation about all sorts of stuff. If you'd like to know a little bit more about what this all is, I recommend starting on this page which has a little bit of info on who I am, and what I'm trying to do — or you could dive into my five years worth of archives if you like.

Otherwise, feel free to close this box and explore...

Annoyances #12,884

People who press both the up and down buttons on a lift thinking that it will make it come quicker, when all it does is slow down everyone else who actually know how to use lifts properly. *pah*

That annoys me as much as the people who press the pelican crossing button repeatedly in the anticipation that it will speed up the appearance of the green man.

Selina Morse

In NYC, there are a few traffic lights that have the same thing: except they're not connected to anything. (They used to be, but the city disconnected them). The NY Times asked people at the crossings if they thought they did something, and sure enough: people asserted that it made the light change faster. Even after they were told that the buttons weren't connected!

(And the elevators (sorry) that I hate the most are the ones where you punch in your floor number, and then wait a couple of days for the computer to deliver one that's going to your floor. And the ones in Lord & Taylor in Manhattan. Press the button, and the elevator at the far end of the corridor open... With not quite enough time to get there.)

Carolyn Ann

I once read that after calling a lift, people wait an average of 7 seconds if before pressing the button again (repeatedly).

Pretty much every time I've been waiting for a lift on my own since then, this springs to the front of my mind and I end up inwardly timing how long it takes someone to come forward and re-press the button. Both the act of re-pressing the button AND my inability to stop timing how long it takes someone to do really, really gets on my nerves.

GillyK

It's the people who stop the lift doors from closing because they're chatting to someone/waiting for someone that irritate me more I must say...

Loz

Can I just add to this with something else that happened today?

I was stood on the 2nd floor, waiting for the lift which for some reason seemed to be spending a stoopid amount of time on the 3rd floor.

Above me, I could hear the sound of people laughing, chattering, and saying things like "Keep it open, I'll only be a minute".

Then, when it finally came down to us, the same voices (accompanied by carporeal bodies by now) all walked out of the lift together, laughing...

...meaning (I presumed) that I'd stood there for at least three minutes waiting for ten people to use the lift to come down one floor.

I was livid :angry:

Not livid enough to say anything (natch), just livid :wink:

Just out of interest, how many floors were you going down? or is that beside the point :wink:

bekibartlett

I was going up five. And besides, I Am Very Important™ :wink:

Money, Sex, And Houses

Rather predicably, I suppose, I woke up at half past four this morning.

I say "predictably" because I'd knocked back a cheap bottle of red all by myself the night before after a couple of days off the stuff, and so had that annoying 4.30am hangover tiredness that doesn't let you get back to sleep in a great hurry.

At one point — in the hour before I dropped off again — I actually fired up my laptop with the intent of writing a post titled just the same as this one. But I got as far as adjusting the brightness of the screen before I realised that was a daft idea.¹

As much as I'd like to go into great depths about the dreams that I had after I finally managed to get back to sleep (Mountains! Floods! Restaurants! Trains! Karl Largerfeld!), I can't remember them anymore — and some of them were a bit rude.

So I'll just mention that three things kept runnig through my head:

The ability of my brain to do complex mathematical sums involving large amounts of money at 4.30am never ceases to amaze me. Neither does its ability to run over the same sums over and over again, despite always coming up with the same result.
I'm rapidly turning into a House Bore™. This — I guess, to some people — is infinitely more appealing than the current Second Life Bore™ that I might have turned into of late, and potentially even more interesting than the Trannie Bore™ that I've been for years.

I'm finding it very hard to have a conversation with anyone at the moment, without launching into a full-scale deconstruction of whatever house I've just seen — and, for further proof of this — can I just say that I saw a serious possibility this afternoon, and I'm thinking about making an offer
I don't know why — and sorry for descending into the gutter for a moment — but I was so fucking horny. Had I been at home, I would have (*ahem*) "taken steps", but I wasn't — so I didn't. This is another reason I need to move to Leeds.

See? House Bore™ Even sex is an excuse to talk about moving...

¹ First person to comment that something being "a daft idea" has never stopped me before, gets a slap

Well? Tell us about the house then!

bekibartlett

Really?

OK :smile: End terrace — and peculiarly shaped like a triangle giving about 50% more space than the rest of the terrace.

THe location seemed really nice. OK, so it was next to a laundry company — and from talking to the guy on the gate I learned that they have trucks going in and out from 7am to 9pm — but I can live with that.

Inside, it was so big :blink: It had four double rooms — massive rooms, a stunning kitchen, a basement — I've never had a basement in my life before — and it was all just so lovely.

OK, so there's a weird kind of rendering on the outside, and it has (apologies in advance) ghastly uPVC faux-leaded double glazing — but they're easily dealt with.

It's just that I can actually see myself living there — I'd knock the two bedrooms together in the attic to make a seriously good one, I'd make the basement my 'server farm' (as it were), I'd strip out all of the wallpaper and paint everything white (natch) and I'd use the spare rooms to put-up people who come visit us to lecture.

Ack, look. I loved it. It's everything I'm looking for — and the price of it would mean that I'd be paying less each month.

I'm going to go back with M to get a second opinion — and I realise that there are others in that area that I should probably look at — but dammit I'm in a much better mood than after I tiptoed my way around that shithole on Wednesday.

:smile:

Reading about all this house hunting, is making me homesick for the north. I can just about picture the sort of houses you are looking at, and I'm fairly sure I know the areas you are looking in.

Beware of the basement though, they can be damp. Rendering is for life unfortunately. Eee I'm getting nostalgic.

Jane

Rendering is for life unfortunately.

You just watch me, outside with a scraper trying to find a bit to pick off :wink:

I don't want to pee on your parade, but here's a couple of things to bear in mind:

Cellars tend to be damp, and moisture + 'puters = bad idea (as Jane just pointed out).

If it's very cheap there's probably a reason.

Rendering can hide a multitude of sins.

So, whatever you do, don't skimp on the survey.

Alli' Cat'

Well I think it sounds great!! I'm quite jealous. :smile:

bekibartlett

I'd agree with Alli, don't get too excited. When my wife and I would go to look at a house I would go to fail it. I look for cracks in the foundation and sign of water damage, sheetrooks great for giving away a leak, if you know what to look for. I also have a outlet tester to check the wiring and look at the fusebox. Also look for plumbing accesses so you can see the pipes if they exsist. Take a good look at the roof, esp if you can't see the rafters. I found the realestate agents I worked with were nice, but couldn't build a house to save their lives and were showing us houses with real issues, but I doubt they knew it. It took a couple of years but we found a great townhouse.

Amanda

A triangular house! Groovy! (Racks brain for mental map of Lancaster trying to place it...)

looby

Racks brain for mental map of Lancaster trying to place it...

/me reminds Looby about the whole "Moving to Leeds" thing...

peculiarly shaped like a triangle

Like a triangle but not in fact triangular; that is peculiar.

Looby: a couple of years ago I looked at one a couple of streets back from the Gregson. Needed work, and the shape would have been a bugger to furnish. Big and triangular, good; small and triangular, bad.

NRT

Strip off the wallpaper and paint everything white. Easy to tell you are a newbie when it comes to the house moving game. Wallpaper hides all sorts of nasties. Please oh please get a decent survey done or the next xyz years of diary entries will be cursing the day you clapped eyes on the property

Kylie

*pfft*