Life update, nutshell included

February 15th, 2008

A few random things going on in my life:

Apartment & Junk

I always thought that getting a bigger apartment would give me more freedom, however as it turns out it’s greatly reduced what I do with it. There are small, predefined areas where I spend most of my time- my desk, the couch in front of the TV, the kitchen and the bedroom, and everything else is just… unused space. I’ve done a little experimenting, and realized I could very happily live on the second floor, barring showers and kitchen use. It really is too big for one person, meaning I should seriously look into getting a roommate or find a smaller place when the lease is up, assuming I can find one that can accommodate Couchzilla. Even so, I have a lot of junk I need to get rid of, which will only add more Empty.

This echoes back to a project I did back in 2nd Year Architecture Studio: My dream house. The project for me was an exploration of minimalism, the absolute minimum amount of space that I myself would need to live comfortably. It came out to about 600 ft^2, laid out in a 20′x20′ cabin with a half-balcony floor. Now I wonder… does my goal of buying a house in the next 2 years make any kind of sense? My idle inquiries so far haven’t found anything with less than 1200 ft^2, and as I now know that is far too much room for me. True- should I ever want to share a house with someone I know my minimalist shack would quickly get claustrophobic, but even that’s an argument to stay as a renter and keep my flexibility. Then of course there’s the crazy idea of building my own house, and design it to be expanded upon. Or I could live in a trailer.

Note to self: Mortgage assistance is a good benefit to provide to employees in a field with high turnover and frequent relocation: Owning property is a significant barrier to moving elsewhere.

Running

I have shin splints in my left leg… in fact I’ve had it for a few weeks now and it’s been steadily getting worse. Between dance and running I’ve certainly not given my legs any time to rest, so the slightest injury (I think it may have been a blister I had a few weeks ago) would have led to a noticeable favoring of one leg over the other, meaning an irregular foot strike and presto: I’m on my way to a stress fracture.

This is annoying in that I just started a fairly aggressive training program to culminate in April with the Cap City Half Marathon, and while I don’t think this’ll derail me (I’m hoping 4-5 days of rest will let my body repair itself) picking the program back up will be quite challenging.

In other news, while I didn’t qualify for this last round of bonuses, I did get a nice little gift card, which I might be dropping into a Garmin 405.

Dancing

I’ve been doing a lot of soul searching regarding all my dancing recently. I do enjoy it, but the fulfillment I used to receive from it has been… well, somewhat diminished recently. I attribute this to a large extent to my entering the Ballroom scene: As my previous post mentions I’m not at all a fan of places that pretend to be one thing and really are another, and when’s all said and done they cater to the instructors and the studio owners, not to the students. I love to dance: It shouldn’t cost me an arm and a leg.

Even so I’m going to see this out: I’ve got lessons through July, and I might even compete in August. But after that I’m going to dance for fun, for passion, and because I love the attention .

Random Social Groups

There’s a German-speaking meetup here in Columbus at least once a month, and frankly I’d like to talk my mother tongue again. The next get-together’s tomorrow night, and I’m… mostly looking forward to it. We’ll see if anything major comes of it, but I’m hoping I don’t have to do anything more than show up, drink beer and speak German. In a similar vein I’m going to let my Mensa membership expire, because I’ve never done anything with it and most everyone I’ve met there has been insufferably arrogant. Yes, let’s sit around a table and talk about how big our brains are, that sounds like FUN%.

I’ve noticed that I’m starting to build a circle of friends outside of work. This has been… kind of awesome, actually, because I’m not actively trying to do it- it’s just happening. Give me three, four years and I’ll be just as attached to Columbus as I was to Pittsburgh.

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