August 2004

I should probably update on a few things.

First of all, Marcy has a job! She’ll be teaching in the Ajax area beginning next week. We’re both very excited. Marcy describes the whole whirlwind of events that happened Thursday and Friday here.

We were planning on going to Ohio last weekend to be with my dad on his birthday but instead we spent it here and Toronto looking for a place to live. We were intending on vacating our apartment November 1st anyway and this turn of events solidified our intentions and also gave us a direction to move to (always important). Friday Marcy scoured the renting resources around Toronto and came up with a sizable list of places to investigate. We called a few of them Saturday morning and booked appointments. The first place we went to see was depressing to say the least. It wasn’t very clean and the view from the balcony was particularly bad – we could see an abandoned mall. The balcony had pigeon netting on it and an exposed I-beam on the side. Not exactly encouraging. On top of that, it was expensive considering the space we would have.

The second place was far more encouraging (this was the one we eventually took). The rental agent was very nice and showed us two units. The building had a “rent 1 bedroom, get the 2nd free” deal which may seem odd at first glance. Basically they’re offering $110 off the rental cost. There are two buildings, each 28 stories tall but there are only 8 units per floor so it’s not a sardine can. The first unit was nice – 2 bedrooms, living room, kitchen, bathroom, closet space but the second unit was what really struck us. It’s huge! Approximately 1100 square feet, it has a living area, separate dining area, kitchen, walk-in closet, 2 bedrooms, bathroom and a 20′ balcony across the front. It’s an absolutely enormous place particularly when you compare it with our current living area which is at maximum 450 square feet. The building includes utilities and they’re giving us a free parking spot and so in total we’ll only be spending a couple of hundred dollars more than here in Kitchener. If you want, you can see pictures of the new place here though it’s a lot of open, white space right now.

The third appointment we ended up skipping because it was one of the sketchiest places I’ve ever seen. Ed would call it “dodgy”. There was garbage on the balconies, some rather unsavoury characters hanging out in the parking lot and the building itself was falling apart. Compared to the previous place it seemed like a dump so we decided to drive on to our last appointment.

This was on Avenue Road right across from the private girl’s school. There were about 20 2-story buildings that were built in the 1950s or ’60s. They were very nice – real hardwood, lots of space and a really quaint kitchen. The downsides were that it would be quite a bit more expensive. We’ll maybe move to something like this next year after we’re a bit more established.

After that we visited Hilary’s place for a little while and after haggling with her neighbour after she boxed our car in (a real pleasant character) we headed home. Sunday however we headed back to Toronto with our completed application and a cheque as deposit on the larger unit. We’re going back tonight with the rest of the paperwork and with any luck we’ll have our apartment by Friday. I’m pretty excited – we move in October 1st which does mean that I’ll be commuting back to Kitchener everyday but it’s not that far, maybe an hour with traffic and/or weather right now. It’s also not very far to Marcy’s school – 35 minutes is what we timed on Sunday and since we’ll both be going against traffic both in the morning and afternoon it should not a bit less of a headache to get around. We spent Sunday afternoon visiting with the people that Marcy will be staying with during the month of September. They’re very nice and they have a newborn baby boy which Marcy will probably fawn over all month.

So it seems like everything is falling into place. Marcy and I went back-to-school shopping yesterday and let me tell you – it’s not that much different shopping with a teacher as it is with a student. We have new pens, stickers, pencils, crayons, ruler, stapler, pencil sharpener and a poster of the Canadian Prime Ministers. Ok, so that last one might be unique to teachers and maybe Marcy was more excited than the average student would be to go back to school but it still felt similar.

The weekend is going to be a busy one – I’m taking Friday off (assuming I get the approval) to go and pick up Marcy’s car in Belleville. We’ll drop the car off in Whitby Friday and then come back to Kitchener. My parents are coming up Sunday so we’ll go out for dinner with them and then Monday morning we’re moving Ian into residence at the University (crossing fingers this year goes well) and then in the afternoon Marcy and I will go to Whitby and I’ll drive back Tuesday morning.

I’m so happy for Marcy. She’s going to be an amazing teacher.