Dive Check List

Because I haven't dove in a while, I thought I would create a universal scuba diving resource and checklist as a reminder of the myriad of things I need to bring, plan, do.

Gear List



Map Directions

Fun for Fun's Sake

I recently had a conversation with a coworker, and I realized that I hadn't had fun for fun's sake in a very long time. My fiance and I never seem to go anywhere for long weekends anymore. This recent Thanksgiving was the first in a while when I haven't actually gone anywhere. "Working on the house is fun, but it is fun that is focussed towards something constructive. What about having fun for no reason?" My coworker poised this question, and it took me aback. What do I do for fun's sake? I couldn't think of anything, really. Here is a list of fun things that I think I do for no apparent reason:

(1) Read
(2) Watch movies
(3) Soak in the hot tub
(4) Window shop
(5) Yoga
(6) Soak in the sun
(7) Instant messaging with friends
(8) Painting
(9) Blogging
(10) Cafe society

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is one of the best Thanksgivings ever! Our house is completely wrapped up in polyethylene drop cloths. There is dust from all of our sanding everywhere. No family or friends to be seen. The kitchen has the wonderful smell of turkey and herbs. This has got to be the strangest, and best thanksgivings ever. I am not being sarcastic, really! Or maybe it's the wine talking.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

The Vote is In

The vote is in. Seems like most people prefer #3 but with modifications. Your comments:

M.F. says:

Torn between 2 and 3. Personally my aesthetic is for more space between items, less freestanding decoraction (such as plants). However if 3 does not come across as crowded in the amount of space that you have available, it could work as well.

Re the size of the rug, I have heard conflicting opinions about how big a rug should be. One of the constant rules of thumb is that any piece of furniture on a rug should have all its feet on the rug: no front feet of sofa on the rug while back feet are not on the rug action. I don't know if that works for you, doesn't work for you, etc., but I mention it in case it's useful.

Lastly for now: do I understand that in each arrangement the furniture is basically arranged to facilitate focus on the entertainment center (TV and whatever)? You may want to play around with putting the TV against a shorter wall, like the one that turns up as the opposite wall to where the Swedish fireplace goes, to avoid arranging your living space around the TV. That's probably the best piece of advice that the interior designer whom I paid $300 actually had for me several months ago. To make it work in my apartment I would have attached a flat-panel TV to the wall or put a very skinny/slight table under it if I could not get on the wall. Minimizing the number of inches from the wall that your TV protrudes can make it more like a painting that hangs, which can be focused upon or not, than like a big statue in the corner, which draws a lot of attention. Living rooms should be organized to facilitate conversation, said my interior designer, not home theatre entertainment.

C.Y. says:

I like your concept #2. #2 makes the room roomier by a large
carpet. It feels you can accomondate a big group doing different activies
in the same room. One watches TV while the other reads. I like the
closeness between a reader and bookshelf.

C.M. Says:

Concept 2 -- It does seem like a rectangular, so might not feel very cozy.

Concept 3 -- I like this layout, however, I would prefer the bookshelf close to thereclining chair, for convenience. Also, looks like the bookshelf might come inthe way when you enter the living room.

Concept 1 -- I like this the best... The bookself is in the corner, next to the recliningchair. So you can easily grab a book and relax on the reclining chair. Also,the entrance to the living room seem spacious. The runner will make it lookinviting.

M.H. says:

I like number 3... Make sure the recliner has lot of room so it can sit up or recline.

J.M. says:

I like option 1, because I would like to lounge under the lamp and read the books from the nearby bookshelf. It does kind of have the fireplace blocked off though.

A.C. says:

I think 3 is the best. Fireplaces should have open space so that you can cuddle up with a blanket. Besides putting a large chair by there closes off the warm space.

G.G. says:

Maybe a bit cluttered? A thought to pull the sofa back so you have more access to the chairs, sofa, & TV....

B.B. says:

I'll vote for #3 but what do I know about interior decorating!

Living Room Arrangement Ideas

We are currently turning the house upside down prepping for painting. However, during a break, I found this nifty furniture arrangement tool on the EQ3 furniture website. It's called the Icovia Space Planner and it is very simple to use, and you can place EQ3 furniture, or generic furniture, in any way you like in a room of your specification. However, you do have to login to the EQ3 website to access it.

Currently the area near the wall opposite to our fireplace is empty, and is a big eyesore. Calie, our interior decorator told us that we should try to highlight it, not ignore it. The following are a few ideas on how we could fill this empty space.

There are some constants in all three concepts. The following furniture is in each concept, furniture that we already have:
-EQ3 James rocking chair (see below)
-EQ3 Stella sofa
-Coffee table
-Swedish fireplace (see previous blog)
In the above concept (Concept #1), I've placed a chaise at a diagonal, accompanied by the iconic EQ3 'Cast' floor lamp (see below). This lamp would illuminate this dark corner and would also illuminate reading that can be done on this chair. We need a bookshelving solution, so I chose to place bookshelves in the upper right corner.

In my second concept (Concept #2, below), I've again placed bookshelving in the upper right corner. The differences are that the area rug is very large, and that I've chosen to place a small swivel armchair near the fireplace (perhaps similar to EQ3's 'Commander' chair. I like this concept the least due to the extreme rectangularity of this concept.

In my third, and favorite concept (Concept #3, below), Ive placed a tall potted plant, a floor lamp, and the EQ3 'Crush' divan chair (see below) near the opposite wall. The bookshelving I've placed against the bottom wall.

This is my favorite concept because the previously ignored space opposite the fireplace looks artfully put together. If a bold piece of art was placed on the far right wall, it could look like a store front window. This concept looks the least symmetrical, and the least rectangular of the concepts. I like the use of the round carpet to set the reading area apart from the TV area. The below side table is what I would use in this corner.

Macho Things I Want to Do

Since I'm on a "macho" streak, I wanted to make a list of the macho things I've always wanted to try. I don't know too many girls who can lay claim to wanting to do these things, at least heterosexual women such as myself. Well, maybe one. My friend, Valerie, who is twice as macho, and is more charged with adrenaline than anyone I know. She prides herself in being a "mangina", owns a Ducati motorcycle, likes to spearfish, and is a hard-core scuba diver. She is also very pretty, which is really surprising combined with her gung-ho personality. OK, here's my macho to-do list:

(1) Own a gun - for my self-protection, of course, but also because it is bad-ass to own a gun
(2) Learn Krav Maga, an Israeli street fighting martial art - of all of the martial arts, I think this one is one of the most lethal
(3) Set off explosives - not for destroying property, but purely for cathartic reasons
(4) Learn how to handle my car expertly - my car (a Mini Cooper) is built for superb handling, and I would like to know where its limits are
(5) Learn how to ride a motorcycle - this I unfortunately tried and failed miserably at. I had even got a motorcycle (Kawasaki Ninja 250) picked out for myself, but got kicked out of class before I could become a terror on the roads
(6) Do pull-ups (see previous post)
(7) Be a good machinist - this was a previous goal of mine, and I was on the verge of being 'apprenticed' by the machinists at work. But I really don't want to do this anymore, because I would rather pay someone else to do this, leaving me to do more design:)

Some observations on being a "macho girl":

• This tendency seems stronger in Asian women than in Caucasian women. Or perhaps this is just a relic of being in the Silicon Valley, where there are more Asian women than Caucasian women.
• Society these days encourages women to explore their masculine side, and men to explore their feminine side. My fiance for one, is not ashamed of what can be considered as his feminine interests. He enjoys tending to orchids, cooking, and pruning bonsai trees. His focused interest on these traditinally unmasculine hobbies is perhaps one of the things that attracted me to him.
• For better of for worse, society has seen women foray further and further into male domain. Women have gained enthusiasm for sports, since the advent of Title IX. They've also been more masculine in their sexual aggression, as expressed by this NY Times article on "Macho Girls". But I have not yet read about a growing movement of women wanting to fire guns, or outman men in the weight-room. I guess we "macho" women are still ahead of the curve.

Macho Throwdown - Pull Up Contest

Some coworkers and I are organizing a pull-up contest for April. A pull-up is where you hold onto a bar, knuckles facing in, and pull your whole body weight upwards until your chin is level with the bar. We haven't figured out the format of the competition, or the prizes yet, but so far there is a lot of enthusiasm. There are tons of coworkers wanting to get involved, including at least one other female coworker other than myself. Also, my female weight-lifting instructor at my gym, who does 100 pull-ups/day could probably best all of the guys participating. She is also going to participate. Another words, this is going to be a macho throwdown designed for girls to beat the guys.

As for me, my personal goal is to do at minimum one pull up, with my stretch goal to do three pull-ups. I can not do one as yet.

Some of the muscles utilized for a pull-up:
Latissimus Dorsi
Brachialis
Brachioradialis
Biceps Brachii
Teres Major
Deltoid muscle
Infraspinatus
Teres Minor
Rhomboids
Levator Scapulae
Trapezius Lower
Trapezius Middle
Pectoralis Minor

Drysuit Ordered!

After a year of deprivation, I'm finally getting my drysuit. I promised myself I wasn't going to get one until I had achieved certain things at work, and got rewarded for doing it. Well, I finished what I set out to achieve, but did NOT get rewarded for it. Instead, I saw other people around me get rewarded for accomplishing less.

My friend told me, why not get the drysuit, because in your heart you know you should have been rewarded. I was feeling pretty beat down lately, culminating in an outburst last week that was more uncontrolled and more crazy than I've had in many years. I decided something had to change. I decided I had been depriving myself too much. This whole year, I had set things aside in anticipation of my reward. The reward never happened.

Anyways, on Friday I talked to Richard at DiveTank. He quoted me a CLXse Select for $1400, including undergarment, rockboots, hood, and gloves. This is an excellent deal not beaten by any local store due to the volume that goes through DiveTank nationwide.

To be precise, however, the CLXse Select is NOT a fully customized suit, but a suit selected from 16 women's sizes. But, they can shorten the legs on these suits easily without extra cost, which is one of my main concerns regarding ordering a stock size. I forwarded them my measurements to see which Women's size is best suited for me, so we'll see what they say on Monday.

Color Scheme

I am excited to present the color scheme for our apartment. We met our interior decorator, Calie Anderson, through a coworker of mine. She is quitting her job as a graphics designer to embark on a new career as interior designer. Her blog is nohealookbook.blogspot.com.

To fill new readers on the details, my fiance and I have been debating which color to paint our apartment. We were at an impasse, and decided to consult someone with better taste than us to choose for us. We hired Calie to figure out what we should paint our walls. I think we got a lot more from Calie than what we originally scoped for the job, which is great. Not only did we get our color scheme, but we also got specific Benjamin Moore color formulations, AND we got furniture ideas, designer tidbits, and even furniture layouts.

Hallway Mood Board

Hallways
For our hallways (see above for mood board), we will be painting one wall Benjamin Moore "Tequila Lime Green" (2028-30), and the rest of the walls "Feather Gray" (2127-60). Some ideas for artwork to place in the hallways are shown above.

Living Area Mood Board

Living Area
For our living/dining area (see above for mood board), the style is mod to fit with our red Swedish fireplace. As you can see, the color theme is red, green and gray, with mod lucite furnishings, green and red accents and geometric style furnishing.

Accent Wall Idea

Calie even came up with some accent wall ideas (see above). She thought that we were ignoring one of our walls in our living area (she was right), and thought that a nice graphic would liven up the area some. She knew that we like to go on bike rides, so she thought of a cute tandem bike graphic.

Kitchen Mood Board

Above is the moodboard for the kitchen. Once again the lime green and gray colors predominate. I like the idea of the gray slate floors.

Guest Bed Room Mood Board

Our interior designer suggested the above for the guest bed room. Simple white and black colors with modern chairs. I wanted to have a blackboard wall somewhere in the house, and this seemed to be a good place for it.