If I ever need to recreate desert conditions in a small enclosed room, I sure know how to do it now. Going inside my bathroom is not a very enjoyable experience. Besides having to navigate around two big pieces of equipment, it's hot, noisy, and dry in there. The dehumidifier is super powerful. Since there's almost no moisture in the air in my bathroom, static electricity builds up quite easily and in great amounts. How do I know? When I lift up the toilet seat cover alone(which is plastic), I can almost lift up the toilet seat at the same time because of the static charge between them. I can also hear the crackling of the charge. It's like I have a tesla coil on my toilet.

Friday morning is when I find out if these machines have done their job yet. I want those damn things out of here!

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So when I woke up this morning, the mushy patch of my bathroom ceiling hadn't grown in size which was a good thing. After getting dressed, I called the live-in building maintenance guy. He responded right away and I told him the problem. He said would come look at it right away.

Five minutes later, he was in my bathroom looking at my ceiling. After just an initial prod with his finger, he seemed to know what it was. He told me I wasn't the first guy in the building to have this. Apparently, the builders caulked and sealed everything that met up with the bathroom floor. That meant where the tub met the floor, where the walls met the floor, and where the vanity met the floor. The one thing they didn't seal up was around the toilet. Which meant that if any water got spilled around the toilet on the tile, it would seep right through the crack between the toilet and the floor and go straight down to the unit below. Why the builders decided not to spend the $2 of caulk to seal up the toilet is beyond me.

So that's what the maintenance guy said was happening. He told me he'd try to get a hold of the tenant upstairs to get him to stop putting water on the floor. I was then instructed to contact the property manager who would tell me what to do to get everything fixed. I phoned that guy right away but got his voicemail.

It took about an hour for him to call me back. When he did though, he set things into motion quite quickly. I was told that a restoration company would be in touch to help me with the water leakage. I didn't know how long they'd take to phone me but they called within half an hour which really impressed me.

It was noon by this time and they said could come by at 2pm. At 2pm on the dot, the guy arrived to take a look at the situation. He took down my info and then explained to me exactly what would happen. He was going to go back to his vehicle to retrieve two pieces of equipment: an industrial size blower and a heavy-duty dehumidifier. The blower would be directed at the spot on the ceiling. The equipment would need to be on and running 24 hours a day until Friday morning, at which time someone would come back to assess the situation again. Until then, I would need to keep all doors to my bathroom closed.

I was like, um ok. I then inquired about the possibility of using the bathroom. The dude said I could use it for sure and I could even turn off the blower in there. He strongly suggested that I keep the dehumidifier on at all times. So he set the whole thing up, turned on both machines and just took off.

I tell ya, it's like having a wind tunnel in your bathroom. Both machines are loud, especially the blower. After a few hours, it was at least 10 degrees Celsius warmer in my bathroom compared to the rest of my place. It super dry in there too, almost like the desert. Frankly, I think it's kinda overkill for the small size of the water leak. By 6pm, I touched the mushy patch and it was solid once again. I kept both machines on though.

Now all of this moo or moot if you prefer, if the guy upstairs doesn't get the word to stop pouring water on the floor near the toilet. Now since I can't get to the floor above me (I don't have access with my fob), I got the security guy to get me access. We went up to my upstairs neighbour about three times. Even though we could see there were lights on and apparently at TV on, no one answered. I finally gave up but not before sliding a note under the door explaining the situation. I left my name and number, asking him to call me.

Finally around 10pm, someone did call. He was very understanding. I was polite but was very clear that until the toilet got sealed, he was not to get any amount of water around the floor. I got his number via call display so now I can contact him again if need be.

So if you're interested in what my bathroom looks like right now, see below:




Even if the restoration company gives the ok on Friday, another contractor still has to come in and fix the ceiling drywall and repaint the whole thing. That means at least one more day away from work. What a stupid hassle!

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After I bought my apartment, I've at times wondered what would be the first thing that would need major repairing. Well, I don't have to wonder no more. To cut to the chase, there's a water leak in the ceiling above my toilet in the bathroom.

I was taking a shower this evening after returning from my weekly jai alai game. After I was finished cleansing myself, I turned to move the shower curtain out of the way. It was then I noticed a weird discolouration on the bathroom ceiling above the toilet. I quickly dried myself and then applied my usual salves, ointments, and powders to my body. Once clothed, I went to the utility closet to get a step ladder.

I got up close to the part of the ceiling in question and gingered touched the part that looked the most affected. It was slightly moist to the touch. I then lightly poked at it with my index fingernail. The ceiling was mushy. It was so mushy that my fingernail left an indent in the ceiling. It was at this point I knew this was serious.

I'm keeping an eye out on it. I'm about to go to bed. I'm not sure if there's anything to be done tonight. The live-in building dude has hours of 8am to 5pm and I'm pretty sure he's in bed now. The professional building manager doesn't start until the morning as well. They have an emergency number but I'm not sure if this counts as an emergency. Water isn't dripping down just yet. I believe this could wait another six or seven hours until morning.

What I am worried about is how much work is this going to be to get everything repaired. I'm also concerned about who's going to pay for all of this! I'm almost certain I'm still under the new home warranty but I admit I haven't read all the clauses in that thing. Maybe this type of thing isn't covered. Perhaps I'm just being pessimistic but if I had to pay for all of this, that would suck big time.

Stayed tuned for further details.

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With the approach of the new hockey season, I am faced with a new question. Do I order new HD channels to watch the Canucks in high definition? Right now I have a sweet deal with Telus where I get one year free high speed Internet and their Telus TV service. With Telus TV, I get a bunch of standard definition channels and about sixteen super awesome high definition offerings. Unfortunately, I don't get any sports channels in high def. As it stands, the only Canucks I'd get in HD would be on CBC. If you look at the schedule here, that would be only two games a month.

Now if I get Sportsnet Pacific, I'd get way more games in HD. There are seven games alone in October that will be broadcast in glorious 720p. The crappy thing about getting the new channel is I can't pick SPac by itself, it has to come in Sports bundle. On top of that, they force me to get the standard definition pack just to allow me to pick up the high definition version of the channel. The SD sports pack is $6 and the HD version is $5. All told, that's $11 a month for seven sports channels in SD and four in HD.

I'm not sure if that's a good deal at the moment. Do I really want to see the Canucks that badly? Why can't I just get the one channel I want in HD?

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I had dinner at my parents' house this evening. When I came home, I was strolling through my apartment lobby when I decided to take the stairs up to my place. I'd never done that before even though it's something I've been meaning to do for a few weeks now. I prefer getting my physical exercise in a practical way. I've never liked just spining on a stationary bike or running on a treadmill. I liked getting fooled into partaking in exercise, for example chasing after a yellow ball on a court or having to walk around a lake to see a beautiful view. Taking the stairs to my apartment is practical in that if I want to get back home, I have to walk up these stairs.

It was the very first time I'd been in one of the two main stairwells in my apartment building. The first thing I noticed was that the stairwell was wide enough to be comfortable for single file but not practical for any more than that. It was tight and compact unlike some office towers I've been in where the stairwells were made to help transport lots of people quite quickly.

I made a point not to race up the stairs, since at the 28th floor, it wouldn't be a sprint. I took it at a moderate pace. I didn't start to feel the physical exertion until about the ninth floor. It was at this point my body realized this wasn't a walk in the park and that I was actually hauling my own ass up into the sky. This manifested itself in some burn in my legs and quicker breathing. I didn't stop though.

I just kept on trudging up those stairs. The best motivation was seeing those floor numbers increase little by little. Just like anything, a big problem is best solved by dividing it into little pieces. So I just took it floor by floor.

Soon enough, the magic number of 28 appeared at the top of the steps and I opened the door into freedom and my floor. By now, my legs felt ok but I was indeed breathing quickly. It took me approximately seven minutes to get from the lobby to my floor. It really wasn't that bad at all.

I'm hoping to do this more often, especially when coming home from work.

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