What is On Jeffs' Mind

Happy New Year

Hard to believe that the first decade of the 2000′s are done, it sure went by fast. It just seems like yesterday that I was working New Years eve 2000 due to the Y2K bug/scare. I guess time can really fly.

Reflecting back on last year, not really sure what to make of it. Work as always was a real challenge, and probably accounted for the low points of the year for me, as it was hectic and high stress the whole year through. In the summer Tao Tao and I moved into house, so that was the biggest thing to happen to us. I am happy to be in the house, and very grateful for the experience to be behind us. For the most part it went alright, but moving really is never fun, so we are planning to stay here for a long time. Tao Tao’s mom also came to visit in the summer, so it was nice for her mom to see where she lives. At the end of summer was big for the family as well, and fortunately it all worked out very well.

Looking at my resolutions for last year, I did not have many, some I kept, others I did not. Like most say, making resolutions seem to be futile, as more often then not, they are never kept and dropped rather early. My friend Rick has a great Podcast on the subject, and some great ideas about making small corrections over big changes.

In looking forward to next year, I have a lot I would like to get done, primarily in that I would like to get to a point in my life where I am happy and content. Presently, I don’t feel that way, and it all has to do with how I deal with life. Like many have said, you really can’t change things around you, but you can change yourself, so I am going to set upon that journey and see where it takes me. I guess some could say that is a resolution, but with the ending of the year, it has given me a chance to reflect on my life.

I guess another goal I have is to finish my basement. I started painting the walls, and so far very happy with the colour. I have some carpet on order, but have not heard from the Carpet store since the order was placed. Hoping that the carpet arrived and they had forgot to call me. I am really excited for the basement to get done, as I want to be able to setup my collectibles, and display them the way I had always wanted. Once that is done, hopefully I will be able to get working on my collecting podcast again and model building. With the home renovations, I have sort of learned to just do it, I had been planning on painting for awhile now, but things always came up. I went, bought the paint, and started, and finished about half the basement. As part of my personal journey, need to learn to do, and not stand on the sideline thinking about doing things. This basement will be a great exercise in doing that.

All the best in 2010 to everyone

Tags: Basement renovations, Happy New Year, Moving, Rick Moyer, Take Him With You

The past few months I have been so busy with moving, I have had to put my geek habits to the side. I must admit it has been hard to do, and felt that I could only really watch from the sidelines. This weekend I did some work around the house getting things organized and unpacked, and I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I am hoping when fall comes, I might have a bit more time. That might sound odd as it is summer, but I haven’t really taken any vacation this year. I have some banked time from OT plus my regular Vacation days to use up in the 4th quarter.

This weekend was fairly productive. Tao tao and her mom went on a trip to Vancouver, so I have been home alone for most of the week. I did not get much done earlier in the week, as I had work to do. But the weekend I was able to get to some things. I setup my Stereo and got a lot of things cleared out my TV room, so it is nice to have everything setup now. I watched some DVD’s in the evenings, so started feeling more like I was home. On Saturday I set to work on getting my office organized. With a little bit of thought, I was able to get all my desks into the office, and be able to move around easily. There are still a few odd things left to do, but at least things are out of the way. My Dad came over today to help me with a problem with my Bathtub Faucet in the main bathroom. We thought it was going to be a big task, but in the end, it was just tightening a screw on the faucet know. Thanks to my Dad, I probably would have never figured it out and called a plumber.

In September and October I am going to start painting some rooms. The colours in the bedrooms are pretty dark, so I want to repaint them and brighten them up. I will have to think of a good colour for them.  I am bouncing some things around in my head, but most likely it will be something neutral and brighter. After I am done with the Bedrooms, I can set one up with all my clothes, and my bookshelves as well. My office I will need to paint as well, since it is a bright Yellow, but it is not to bad, but probably something I will wait until the Winter to paint.

The room that I am most anxious to get done is the basement. I have all my collectibles down there right now, but want to do some renovations so that I can expand it a bit. As well the there is a room down there with a chocolate brown colour, which I want to paint to a neutral color as well. Once I am don’t that, then I can get to work setting my collectibles up. I am really eager to do that, so to have to wait, it making it tough. I will go down stairs and try to visualize what it might look like and where things will go.

I am hoping soon that I can get back to more geeky type things I like to do. Such as working on my Websites, my podcasts and to start back with plastic models that I haven’t been able to do for the past few years. I see other people doing fun things, and I feel a bit frustrated that I can’t do those things as well. All I can do is enjoy what they are doing, and motivate myself to get the things I need done completed. The hardest part is done the moving, no things are starting to fall into place, so I should start seeing more time to pursue some other things I haven’t been able for awhile.

On Saturday, I bought myself a couple models as motivation. I have plenty of others as well, but I bought these to Battlestar Galactica models as a bit of a carrot to keep me inspired to get the renovations done.

Here are some Pictures I took this morning of my house. Hopefully over time I will have some more. The toy room will be the one I will want to get sone and pictures taken

Tags: Battlestar Galactica, Dad, Moving, Plumbing, Tao tao

The past few weeks I have been busy with packing and getting ready to move. As they say, you never really know how much stuff you have until you move. As I expected, I had a lot of toys and collectibles. I had actually sold a lot of my action figures, so the amount of carded figures is down from what I had. I must say I am happy about that, as Carded action figures are always the most difficult to move. The whole reason for keeping them carded is to keep them in the best possible condition, so if they get damaged, then the reason for keeping them carded is lost imho. It took a lot of effort as well to bag up all my loose action figures. I was surprised how many I had, I decided to bag them individually so that I would not loose any of the weapons and accessories. It took a long time, and I managed to fill a rather large tub with them. I can only really manage how long it will take to unpack them. The higher end collectibles take some time as well. Some were fast to pack up, others took time. I am hoping they make the move ok, and will make sure to move them myself personally.

I am working through the rest of the house as well, but finding harder to move around the house with all the boxes and bags I have piled up. I did manage to throw away a lot of items as well. Fortunately for me, I have never been one for clothes, so I can fit all my clothes into a few bags. My wife is a different story, but those are her clothes and I leave that to her . I am hopeful that I can get the loose ends finished up in the next few days. I take possession on Friday, so my Plan is to move some things over on the weekend, and then take them out of the bins, and bring back the bins for some other things. I have about 2 weeks to move, so at least I am not rushed and have to move everything in one go. I also have mover to move the furniture, so that will take a bit of the load off.

So I am hoping over the next few weeks, that everything goes well. It will be busy, as I work up until I get possession. Then I will be off for the week, but on the 24th, I will be going to the Rexall Indy race in Edmonton for 3 days, so I am hoping to have just about everything done by then. I am also trying to push back at work at any extra work until after I have finished my moving. So far it has been alright, but a few things have me worries, but if I don’t have time, I just don’t have time, and certainly move is my priority.

Tags: collectibles, Moving, Rexall Edmonton Indy