Badtux the Snarky Penguin

In a time of chimpanzees, I was a penguin.

Religious fundamentalists are motivated by the sneaking suspicion that someone, somewhere, is having fun -- and that this must be stopped.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Yay! I got the house!

The property manager for the house I looked at yesterday called me back this morning and said I was the winner in the rental sweepstakes. My lease starts on May 1. So if I don't post much for the next couple of weeks, it's because I'm packing everything up so I can weigh anchor and move my iceberg over to the new digs, yippee, moving is SUCH fun! Anyhow, I'm going to be 1 mile from Santana Row, 3/4 mile from Safeway in the other direction, 1 1/2 mile from downtown Willow Glen, and 2 1/2 miles from the Pruneyard and downtown Campbell, and 3 blocks from Stevens Creek Blvd and tons of shops and stores and restaurants. It's 1 mile from the Los Gatos Creek bikeway, 2 blocks from a great Korean restaurant, 1 mile from the light rail station, one BLOCK from one bus line that goes to the downtown San Jose bus station, two blocks from two other bus lines that go to downtown San Jose, one block from the I280 freeway, 3/4 mile from the CA17/I880 freeway, 3/4 mile from a local motorcycle accessory shop, ... location, location, location, baybee!

I hope she didn't think I was laughing at her when she called me this morning. She's a late-middle-aged Asian grandmother, and she was giving me advice. Like, "You should buy a house! I saw your credit and income, you can afford one, why rent?" And "You need to advertise your lease at your current apartment on Craigslist, you will rent it right away! Why pay money for the rest of that lease when you can get someone to take it over? You're wasting money!" The reason I was laughing was because late-middle-aged Asian grandmothers are always giving me advice, all the way back to my college sweetie, a Chinese girl whose grandmother was always giving me advice, and even the waitress at the Chinese restaurant down the street and the haircutter who cuts my hair are always giving me advice. Maybe they just think penguin-Americans are such cute and befuddled-looking beings that they will just wander out in traffic and get killed if they do not have a Chinese grandmother to watch out for them. Whatever it is, I find it hilarious that, even in my advanced age, they're still giving me well-meaning and sincere advice, even if it has absolutely nothing to do with why they're interacting with me or even if it's not necessarily in their own financial best interest (hmm, if I bought a house, I couldn't be renting one from her, could I?).

-- Badtux the Well-housed Penguin

PS - I've been checking out the restaurants near my new place. YUMMM!!! This penguin shall have no problem at all maintaining his pleasing rotundity!

Labels: life, navel-gazing

Posted by: BadTux / 4/19/2007 01:18:00 PM

Comments:

Outstanding! Congratulations are in order.
# posted by TheCultureGhost : 19/4/07 2:27 PM

Yahoo! New digs, more restaurants, and someone who will nag you into taking care of yourself. Congratulations!
# posted by Share Cropper : 19/4/07 4:35 PM

Dorothy never trusted anyone five years her junior to be grown up. So I always had advice from her -- needed or not.
Your Chinese Grans are much the same: viewing a world in which few -- their elders-- are wise.
I feel your pain in moving and wish you much joy in the result.
--ml
# posted by Martin Langeland : 19/4/07 5:37 PM

I own my own property (free and clear), fuck renting, renting is for people that are bad at math. Fuck landlords also. Fuck moving also, I'll be here until I die or have to go to a care center to pinch the nurses on the ass.

Get a grip, eat to live, don't live to eat.
# posted by BBC : 19/4/07 5:55 PM

Given that the median price of a house here in San Jose is around $750,000, BBC, I don't think there's any danger of me owning a house here free and clear anytime soon. Besides, I already own a house. It may be 2,000 miles away from here, but I own it free and clear. Maybe one of these days I'll even get to live in it again (it's on the old family land in Louisiana and I currently have it rented out to relatives)...

Hopefully Kim is not going to be nagging me too much, Sharecropper!

It will be nice to not have paper-thin apartment walls between me and my neighbors. As I noted recently, my next door neighbors are engaging in very hot and sweaty and athletic sex, complete with squeaking and thumping of bed frame, shouts of ecstacy, the works. While I am glad for their joy, I really prefer to sleep.

- Badtux the Bleary-eyed Penguin
# posted by BadTux : 19/4/07 6:20 PM

Hooray! I see more walking in your future which will help with the gas costs.

The last time I shared a thin wall with people having sex was in college- my room was wedged between the showers and a couple of screamers. We used to post signs on their door, "Federal Aviation regulations require all sounds above 100 db be registered so they do not affect local flight patterns." And I would sometimes blast the first few bars of "Guns in the Sky" by INXS, which consists of a lot of grunting. They took it well- I could hear the giggling.
# posted by georg : 20/4/07 3:37 AM

Congrats on la casa, Badtux!

Dunno if I'll ever be a homeowner; Noo Yawk prices are way steep. Which is okay, because I like apartments and apartment buildings.
# posted by The Truffle : 21/4/07 11:29 AM

Honor Roll

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More to follow, after I finish cursing SOB chickenhawks and get my breath back...

"Keep fighting for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce." -- Molly Ivins, 1944-2007

"The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."

-- Plato

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