SimoDoodle

I have finished my little blogging sabbatical and, if anybody is interested, I have relocated to http://www.hiyo.org/simodoodle.

That is all.

I think I'm done with this blog. I'm just saying the same things over and over again.

Thanks for reading, whoever's out there. I'll probably pop up on hiyo.org again later.

Cheers!

Not having a lot of money has made money a primary interest of mine in recent months. But I remember the days, not so way back, when I had a pocket full of my parents' cash and the entire summer to run around Toronto, spending it.

Oh the places I would go.

I was interested in all sorts of interesting things. Arts, food, culture, technology . . .

Now I find myself in a strange state of mind. I find myself disinterested, for one reason or another, in most of those things.

That is to say, the wannabe-fanboy inside of me is in some kind of coma.

I don't really know what happened. Somewhere along the line I stopped spending money on music and comic books and video games and all that stuff.

Is it simply because I'm more stingy with my own cash? Or has something grander happened? Have I . . . grown up?

It's a little discerning, because I almost feel like I don't even know myself any more, since I decided to become a cook.

Which actually isn't too different from before. But now I don't have as many distractions.

There is a point, I think, where one goes from trudging through the workweek to plowing through it. I'm pretty sure that turning point is of vital importance in today's society, where the great majority of people are required to do essentially the same things over and over again to get paid.

It seems to be a combination of some kind of psychological immune reaction and physical adaptation to labour, where time starts to pass more quickly and the things about one's occupation that used to cause wear and tear become mere passing annoyances, or sometimes even fade into oblivion entirely.

Hump day is a good indicator of whether or not this point has been reached. If you are still aware of hump days -- Wednesdays or the mid-workweek for those of you in non-Monday-to-Friday professions -- then you are likely counting down the hours before you can go home, which implies that your occupation is not nearly engaging enough to allow time to fly by your sense of temporal perception.

Consequently, life kinda sucks for those 40 (maybe plus) hours a week you might be stuck wherever you're working.

Sometimes, however, you get to that point where you wake up on Monday and go home on Friday with seemingly no stopping in between. Work may not become effortless -- indeed, in these situations it's probably more exhausting -- but it's not the mind-numbing torture that comes with clock-watching.

Chances are that if you are in this kind of position, you've hit that sweet spot where you're familiar enough with your job that you're not lost and worrying about every moment, but you're also not so used to it that it bores you.

Of course, that feeling rarely lasts. People get sick of things; that's just the way we seem to operate.

Nevertheless, here's to hitting that mark. Because we can all use a bit of peace of mind, no matter how fleeting it may turn out to be.

I've been thinking a bit about mortgages recently, and the idea of building equity. I find it quite engaging.

While getting a mortgage on a place doesn't necessarily tie you down fiscally to one particular location, I think I personally would probably see it as a definite psychological or emotional gesture of commitment. That is to say, I probably wouldn't want to start my mortgage payments on a place in Toronto and sell it after three years because I want to run off to South America or something like that.

Certainly, I wouldn't mind establishing a home base in Toronto. I actually like Toronto, even though it wouldn't be as exciting as running off to some foreign country and starting my life there.

But even building up the money for a down payment is a pretty big project these days. With housing prices for condominiums being what they are in the T-Dot, a reasonable location (downtown or with easy access to the subway) would require at the very least a down payment of $50,000. That would mean, in my case, years of scurrying away money from measly salaries in order to merely get to the point where I have to pay off the rest of a $250,000 mortgage.

And that's the cheap stuff.

It would mean that I would have to spend a lot of time scrimping, which I guess is not too far outside my usual frugal habits. Though I'd probably have the time to travel because I probably wouldn't even have the money to afford the down payment on one until I hit my 30's, I might not be able to justify spending thousands of dollars on plane tickets and accommodation that could be going to a savings account or GIC and building toward a mortgage.

There's also the issue of living at home with my parents, which would pretty much be the biggest psychological bitch-slap for me since . . . well, since I realized that I would have to come back from New Brunswick with my tail between my legs and live with my parents again. Extending my stay at home would be a huge financial boon, since I would save on rent and just about every other living expense imaginable.

. . . but yeah. Ugh.

It isn't, however, like I don't have some advantages. I have enough of my own furniture collected from all my years in university and my time in New Brunswick so that if I do move, I don't have to pay much in terms of furnishings. I'm pretty good with making cheap meals at this point, and often utilities are included in the rent I'd be paying while I build up my down payment nest egg. Plus, if I move along the subway line, I could save a bundle on gas.

I'm pretty good at the skimpy living thing. I like to drink, but I don't rely on it as a social lubricant. I'm a pretty disciplined shopper and I try to only shop at places that offer loyalty rewards. I don't have any loans to pay off, other than my credit card, which I keep under control. And I'm pretty environmentally conscious, so that helps.

It'll be a squeeze, though. Nobody earns much in their early years in the industry I've chosen. Now that I've finally solved the career question, I have to figure out how to fit a home and lifestyle into that equation.

It never ends.

Not that I'm complaining.

Today as I pulled out of my driveway I discovered that the new rabbit that I had seen hopping around my neighborhood in recent sunny months had been reduced to a flattened, bloody sheet of rodent on the pavement in front of my neighbor's house.

If my neighborhood was a person, I'd probably have said something to it like, "See? This is why you can't own anything nice."

Rest in peace, flattened bunny. I hope you enjoyed your stay . . . sorry it had to end this way.

Not sharks, apparently. At least, not on land.

The latest entry on Gilbert "Hibachi" Arenas' blog has a pretty entertaining bit near the end on what constitutes a "shark attack." I would be remiss if I didn't share.

One of my favourite things to do when I have some free time is to streamline.

As I proceed through life, I invariably pick up bits and pieces of material debris, like burrs sticking to pants after a walk through a burr-y field (that's right).

So every so often I grab some garbage bags and shopping bags and go through my possessions, rooting out the junk, recyclables and stuff I have to keep despite the fact that I never use them or even look at them.

Part of what makes this experience so interesting is that you kind of get a sense that you're evolving as a person, yet still firmly rooted in some of the same memories and values. Every time I throw away some souvenir trinket or decide that I'll probably never be interested in a certain book, it feels like movement, but every time I hold on to something, it feels consistent. It's a time for self-reflection, looking back on all the crap you've accumulated and deciding on a case-by-case basis if each item is still relevant to who you are at that moment.

The main thing, for me, however, is simply the act of sloughing: to trim off excess and get on with things. I am no pack rat. I hate carrying around extra baggage when I don't have to.

My ideal is to only ever own things that I use or might have to use, but I will likely never achieve that ultimate goal. My personality and circumstances will change, and I will accumulate useless things (or things that eventually become useless) -- there is no avoiding that. The best I can do, I think, is to make smart decisions where it concerns my purchases, to take care of the things I do own, and to remain diligent in filtering out superfluous shit.

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Post-Post Notes:

Does anybody want a small poker set, as yet unused? I have no problem keeping it, so I'll put it up for sale at $7.50. I'd say $10 but it has an ugly Humber Students' Federation logo on it.

I also have a crappy but usable basketball and some pee-wee sized baseball bats and hockey sticks that I'll give away for free to anybody who wants them. If you're in Toronto and I know who you are, I'll even deliver them, outside of rush hours.

When did Dell computers become so friggin' cheap? My notebook ran me just under $2000. Now newer, more colourful compys are selling for $500! I'm thinking of buying a few to give away and presents and to keep just in case I lose one.

Just kidding. I'm poor.

HSBC almost got me with their five per cent interest rate savings account deal, until I read that it's only until October, after which it returns to 3.5%. Nice try.

I saw a brief segment on the Weather Network about re-usable fabric softener sheets. That's something I could totally get into. Apparently the disposable stuff has skin irritants, which might save me some grief where it concerns my eczema.