"How I Spent My Summer Vacation (The Boring Middle-aged Married Homeowner Version)"

Alternate title for this post: the bathroom renovation from hell. Two weeks, including a full two days with a heat gun just removing the old, ugly, cheap vinyl peal-and-stick flooring the previous owners had slapped down and the linoleum beneath that, then five days prepping the floor, laying the natural stone tile, and fixing what I'd screwed up, misc time replacing and re-painting the trim, then a day and a half playing plumber to replace some old shut-off valves and supply lines.

But it does look great:



My wife indeed has the whole "vision" thing going on and her taste is impeccable and I'm not going to block HGTV like I swore I would do in the middle of all this. In fact, as much of a pain that it was to do this job - and it really only took so long because most of the time I was either being very careful doing something I'd never done before or fixing something I had screwed up because I had never done it before - the bad parts of it when I swore to myself I would never undertake such a big job again are fading from my memory in light of the completed project, and I'm confident I can do the other bathroom just as well and in a lot less time. But my wife says we can wait until next summer for that.

Best discovery during this process? Lowe's offers a 10% discount for veterans ALL THE TIME! But they seem incapable of registering you AS a veteran and I had to keep showing them a copy of my DD214 so I'm debating just getting it tattoed on my chest:


(NOTE: Stunt chest used, not author's actual body.)


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Happy Independence Day!

Our holiday decorations for the peeing boy statue this year made him look more like "Little Mr. Stars and Striped Riding Hood":



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June 2009 Netflix Summary

After starting this last month, I, of course, have to do this every month. Here's my Netflix activity for June:

June 2009 Netflix Summary	Arrived at Home	Received at Netflix	Days at Home	Monthly Average Days at Home	Cost Per Movie
Eagle Eye	06/02	06/05	3
Hard Eight	06/02	06/04	2
Labou	06/03	06/04	1
Rounders	06/06	06/10	4
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946)	06/06	06/15	9
You Can't Take it With You	06/06	06/09	3
Crazy Love	06/10	06/12	2
Goodbye, Columbus	06/11	06/15	4
25th Hour	06/13	6/22	9
Defiance	06/16	6/23	7
David and Lisa	06/16	6/22	6
Secretary	06/23	06/30	7
Thumbsucker	06/23	06/30	7
Powder Blue	06/24	06/30	6
				5.0	$1.32

My Netflix queue basically breaks down into a few categories based on why I'm watching them: stuff I'm just getting around to seeing, whether recent mildly-intriguing recent releases (Eagle Eye, Powder Blue), stuff I've encountered while flipping channels on TV and I want to see the whole movie (You Can't Take it With You, David and Lisa), and stuff I'm genuinely interested in seeing and for which I thank God that Netflix exists (Crazy Love, Hard Eight). Whatever the reason, I think I'm equally surprised and dissapointed whatever reason I'm watching a movie. David and Lisa was mildly intriguing when I saw part of it on TCM, but turned out to be one of the best old movies I've seen in a while (Keir Dullea is great, and Janet Margolin playing opposite him is also amazing - a great "nuthouse" movie). And for the first half of "The Postman Always Rings Twice" I was puzzled about why this seemingly-rountine noir intrigue was so reknowned, but then after ther great mid-point courtroom sequence (which should be mandatory for trial practice courses!), the movie really hits high gear and I agree it one of the classics. Goodby Columbus was alright - think a Jewish "The Graduate" - and Ali MacGraw os gorgeous, but its one like so many films of the late sixties and early seventies that doesn't really hold up.
The best surprise this month was Powder Blue - I thought it was just a gritty urban angst drama centered around the strip club where Jessica Biel's character works (she got most of the press for this movie as far as I can tell), but it was much, much more than that. A very sweet, very real movie that carefully veers just this side of being cheesy, but movies like this are why I endure watching a wide variety of movies I don't know a lot about (I really want the hours spent watching Thumbsucker and Eagle Eye back).

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