The two oldest brothers at each other in a very big way last night. Cathy and I both had to intervene. Both young men very upset. Disturbing. Slept poorly and napped this afternoon, but not long enough. Now feel strung out.

New post on new notebook. Picture from igoogle. Friday! At last the weekend. Favourable news from England.

(Added later). On Sunday, as I was looking at photographs, the Dell computer froze. I took it to Honson's who are now in the Home hardware store across the street and Mr. Honson, who now speaks much better English, had it ready by Wednesday, I think. He complained that Dell hard drives are the worst and that it had just given in. He restored a funny version of Windows and we seem to have lost some stuff although he did back it up. He gave me a screw driver to open the old hard drive. As he said it would be, it is beautiful inside. I think sixteen of them in a grid behind glass would make a very satisfying art piece. The one I deconstructed, just like the alarm clock when I was five(!), sits in our glass fronted cupboard, Come to think of it one of those hideous Louis Quinze cabinets all wood and brass and glass filled with open hard drives would be hilarious.


First post sitting in bed with the new notebook and the new router installed by William.

On Monday I got a toothache above my right cuspidor, I think it is called. As we passed the university building I love designed by German architects, the ache spread to my whole mouth and then, in that order, to the right side of my chest going across to approximately where my heart is. After some indecision, I got off the streetcar at Bay and walked back towards the Toronto General Emergency where I was admitted a while back. by the time I got there, it had passed off and I turned around and went to Starbucks for breakfast.

I had quarrelled the night before,first in the supermarket and later in bed, but when I thought again that I might be dying, I could only regret that she would have that last image of me and that I would be sulking about something really quite unimportant compared to my permanent absence from her life at least.

Tuesday was, as usual, my favourite day of the week. I stopped off at the greenhouse in Allen Gardens on the way home, but could not find a gardener. I want to know the name of the plant in the North East corner of the park, on the left as I get off the street car, which will soon be mauve all over. It is very exotic and rare and I want to find out all about it as I did about the catalpa tree a few years ago.

I learned about the unabomer this afternoon on wikipedia. (Edited this the next day).

CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE











A good meal too long ago, in the mountains, in France.









And another a day later.

I saw my chiropaedist this morning and almost fixed my sore toe, napped and visited furniture shops with Catherine before a second breakfast sandwich at Starbucks. In the afternoon out to the new house with the children who liked it a lot. Home to watch Margot at the Wedding.

I crashed our desktop tonight so I now have the notebook at my desk wth a direct ethernet connection and a real mouse for the first time. The desktop is really tied up and i shall have to take it in to a shop to have it restored. It is way beyond my very limited scope, although I tried for about two hours.

Tomorrow we are all going to look at the new house.

Golly! this keyboard is smooth.

Another day at work. I took ET to Casey House in the rain a few weeks ago, maybe a month, maybe less. We talked and I may have written about it here. He obviously knew he was dying. But he died Sunday, way too soon. I won't be able to go to the funeral as I am training tomorrow. I offered to go with Tom, his councillor as I sometimes have in the past. He does not like the funerals so much, whereas I sometimes welcome the chance to grieve a little and ruminate on life and death a little.

I found some interesting reviews on attitudes to alcoholism on wikipedia this afternoon. It made me think of a furious argument I got into at the Henfield party, the summer before last about how to treat alcoholics. Neither of us gave an inch or won the argument, but it bothered me for some time and led up to my mini crisis at work. Now I think we were both right for the groups we work with

Toronto, Ontario M8W4Z5 Sold: 5/17/2008

Att/Row/Twnhouse Fronting On: E Rooms: 6+1
3-Storey Acreage: Bedrooms: 2+1
Washrooms: 3
Lot: 18X78 Feet
Lot Irre

Kitchens: 1
Fam Rm: Y
Basement: Finished

Fireplace/Stv: Y
Heat: Gas
Forced Air
CAC: Y


Laundry Lev:
Exterior: Brick

Drive: Private
GarType/Spaces: Built-In/1
Parking Spaces: 1
UFFI:
Pool: None
Zoning: Residential
Cable TV: Hydro:
Gas: Phone:
Water: Municipal
Water Supply:
Sewers: Sewers
Spec Desig: Unknown

# Room Level Dimensions (ft)
1 Living Main 19.09 x 8.53 Open Concept Gas Fireplace Hardwood Floor
2 Dining Main 19.09 x 16.11 Open Concept Hardwood Floor
3 Kitchen Main 16.21 x 9.61 Eat-In Kitchen W/O To Patio Breakfast Bar
4 Master 2nd 14.73 x 12.80 His/Hers Closets French Doors Broadloom
5 Family 2nd 16.37 x 9.19 Gas Fireplace Open Concept
6 Br 3rd 12.60 x 12.73 4 Pc Ensuite W/O To Balcony W/I Closet
7 Br Bsmt 13.78 x 9.19 Closet 2 Pc Bath Access To Garage

Executive 3 Storey Freehold Townhome On Private Road In Trendy Lakeshore Village. Close To All Amenities,Hwy 427 & Qew. Homes & Garden Decor, 1829 Sq Ft! Spacious & Well Laid Out. Loft Bedroom With Ensuite & Walk-Out To Balcony. Two Gas Fireplaces, Hardwood & Ceramic Floors. Professionally Landscaped & Charming Courtyard Garden. 2 Parking Spots.
Gas Burner&Equipment,Cac,Refrigerator,Stove,Microwave,Dishwasher,Washer,Dryer,Elf,Potlights,Broadloom W/Laid,Window Coverings,Stained Glass,Garage Door Opener&2 Remotes,Wine Fridge (180 Bottles).Exclude:Blinds On Mbr French Doors,Hwt Rental

Don't know what we'll do with the wine cooler!

Goldman Sachs, New Jersey

Pfeiffer State Park

Motu HaHa à Raivavae

Looks like we've got it. Approved for a mortgage today at 4%. Very nervous that all of us won't each have our own spaces although at 1800 square feet, there is lots of space. Excited.

It is sometime since I have written and a lot of water has passed under our bridge.

Sunday we saw seven or eight houses in South Etobicoke and Mimico, sometimes in light rain.

Monday we made an offer on Heintzman, stuck to our price and were outbidded by twenty seven thousand dollars. They must really have wanted it as there were still some essential repairs very obvious on our second viewing.

Leeanne continued to impress us.

We were sad to lose it as we had gotten to like the area a lot and even enjoyed the low rumble of slow freight trains at the top of the street. By then, we were exhausted and somewhat discouraged. Cathy had also been looking at rentals and realised how lucky we had been here to pay so little for three and a half bedrooms.

Tuesday we stayed home and I spent the whole evening picking properties from The East end MLS listings and pinning them on Google Earth. Three of them had already sold.

Cathy picked a house in Etobicoke and I met her last night at Islington station in the rain to see it and others in the area and some in the East End.

We had agreed that we would rather have less, finished and ready to move into, than more, which we would have to fix up. Cathy felt we could afford more than we had at first calculated and was encouraged by her boss to do that. Of course the more you invest, the more you profit (if there is one) when you sell.

That first home was modern, roomy and rather cooky as I called it. We fell in love. I suggested we offer a thousand more than their asking price, but Leeanne said, no, offer low and wait for them to drop their price, we agreed we could at least rise to what we had offered on Heintzman.

They refused our lower offer and countered one thousand over what Leanne had said would be their counter offer. We jumped ten thousand and they still refused dropping six below asking. This was more than we had envisioned, we could have offered two more but decided to meet their three thousand increase on our second offer. We were quite tired sitting for long stretches in the car in the rain.

The whole thing is conditional to getting the financing in place by an extension to next week,(Monday is a holiday).

We were excited and apprehensive. Our life will change a lot and so will Matthew and William's. Even David will not be round the corner anymore. It will take me a long time to get to work, but I have already been lightly offered a ride in and a co-worker told me the train and bus and subway route, which would be faster, would only cost another 120 a month.

I'm going to be a commuter and live in the burbs. And at sixty two I'm a first time home buyer.

Incidentally, they had listed previously sixteen thousand higher. Nevertheless I know we paid a bit high compared to other sales on the street, but, "what is a few thousand over twenty five years", we said to ourselves.

They have just finished watching "There Will be Blood" upstairs. And so to bed.....




I spelled her name right, but the street is "Heintzman".

One of the suburban homes was very nice and so spacious with so many real closets. I would like it as I could bus to the end of the subway line and presumably get a seat on the train. Also under our transport system it would not cost me anymore than the relatively short distance I now travel.

It would be more of an imposition on the children, but my reasoning is that it will encourage them to move out and set up their own places which I look forward to. Also the house would not so often be invaded by guests.





There is a hill nearby, made of garbage, on which people ski and snowboard, even with its own monte pente.

There is a park across the road for the darn dog and heavy occupation fees keep everything tidy, snow clear and in good order. Very attractive in a different way from anything we have ever known.

Our idea so far is to make a higher offer on Heintzman which opens on the 12th and if that fails a lower offer on Bloor West which has been on the market for 44 days.

We Still like Leeanne a lot. She has a husband, whom she refers to as her boyfriend and with whom she works and five, five children. She plays hockey.

Houses, houses, houses. We saw six yesterday and narrowed our choice down to one on Heinzman opposite a Tibetan Buddhist center. Will I see this later from that house or have it as a distant memory of a house we could not get? Today we see two more in the suburbs, because I am interested to see how much more space we would get for the same bi-weekly carrying costs. I like, we like our agent Leeanne very much. I think I spelled her name wrongly.

This morning a quarter of an hour before my work time had even started I was chosen to wash a man who had shit down both legs. When he was changed he did this again, I washed him again and changed him and he did it yet again. This time I pulled him unwillingly (on both our parts) into diapers. He was not a nice man. The reason I get chosen for this work is that, having changed babies, feces don't make me physically sick, but the task is impressive especially when repeated three times. Towards the end of my day I was asked to take a man shopping. He walked about as slowly as a human being can progress down a street without keeping still. Nevertheless, thinking that I had never walked on Dundas Street so slowly, I realised it was a beautiful day and that buildings actually looked more interesting than usual as they revealed themselves inch by inch. That song "My Eyes are wide open", by John Lennon popped into my mind as a tune, before I realised what I was humming to myself. I left work another quarter of an hour late.

This evenning we chose seven houses to look at over the next three days. William hates all of them.

So now, tonight, I am writing on my notebook while watching TV in our living room. I am stealing a signal from some unthinking neighbour who has not puta lock on his, or her, router.

Today we got pre-approved for a sizable mortgage.

I pushed JS all the way to the hospital and back. He has a small very low wheelchair so that from my height it was rather back breaking, but a pleasure to get to know him a little.

I feel such affection for these dying men. A real joyous tenderness comes over me. I am well paid, but the work is also very rewarding sometimes in this way. Admittedly, at other times, I succumb to a sort of elitist attitude of being fed up with them that they have not been able to live their lives differently. These are the angel and devil that sit on either shoulder.

My favourite sister.

Well, another week-end is almost over.

Today I slept a good deal first in bed and then in a bath.

We learned that we will have to vacate our house by August. Something of a shock, but also a relief as we have been talking of leaving for some time and now that we are being forced, we won't have to pay for many of the repairs some of which we felt liable for. Our landlady will redo the whole house to give it to her niece who is to have a baby here. We are looking for another rental until we can afford to buy outside the city for our retirement. William and Matthew want to stay with us and neither wants to have to pay rent.

Gareth's birthday is today, so he will be retired soon. I left him a message in France.

Saturday we watched Hugh laurie in a British TV series, quite funny, but I was disappointed as I though it was a movie.

Today I watched the Celestine Prophesy, which followed the book fairly closely, but was not very good, although not terrible. I enjoyed the book a lot more. He does discover something with his fingers similar to what I found in the wine room while my eyes were open but I was clearly still asleep. Perhaps some people can relax themselves into such a state from a wakeful state. I can't.

In the evening yesterday, I went out to return Goya's Ghosts. It had rained all day. As I came out of Queen Video the setting sun had come out and shined brightly on all the wet cars with the still dark grey sky behind in the East. Very beautiful, especially with the curve in College Street there, which threw some houses into shadow and others in bright, clear light. I felt that I did not need to take a photograph, although it would have been a good one, because it was so clearly imprinted on my mind.

I also picked up medicine at Shoppers and flirted with my eyes at an attractive middle aged woman. I will miss living in this Portuguese and Italian neighbourhood if we have to move far away.