I guess I am an early bird this time around. I upgraded to WordPress 2.6 only three days after it was released. Let’s hope there are no major security holes in this release.
Normally, I wait a few weeks, preferably till the x.1 release comes out. However, I liked the revision feature, so I made the jump.
A month from today, the buyer of our condo will take possession. That’s pretty darn soon. 
On the other hand, we’ll be moving out of the condo even sooner! Moving day is August 2. That’s three weeks and a few days. We are — sort of — trying to take advantage of the long weekend. We’ll “lose” one day of it due to the move, but there will still be two more days off after that. Days to relax and chill out. Besides, August 2 already counts as “mid month” as far as mover’s rates go, which is always good.
We’ll be staying Downtown for the following not-quite two months (till September 27). That’s when it’ll be time to move to our new house in New Westminster!
Exciting times and a “first” for either one of us. Brigette’s first time living Downtown and a first for both of us living in our own house, on property that we actually own.
Time for a change. The theme stayed the same (Gemini-Plus), but the blog colours and the photo up top changed.
I took the previous picture showing the Downtown skyline from Stanley Park in May 2002. Yep, that was quite a while ago. The new picture, showing Downtown Vancouver from Locarno Beach, is, indeed, brand new (taken on June 15, 2008), as evidenced by the presence of the Shangri-La Vancouver 
.
Everybody is writing about Rogers and their ridiculous iPhone plans these days. I will, too, but with the slight twist of comparing Roger’s plans to the plans available in Austria rather than the US.
The situation in Austria is different in the sense that the iPhone is offered by two cell phone providers: T-Mobile and One. That alone makes it more difficult for the individual provider to be as stupid as Rogers.
As of today, XE.com reports an exchange rate of $1.60 for €1, which makes things a little more expensive than they would have been even a month ago, compared to the Canadian Dollar.
T-Mobile:
Phone: €49 (8 GB), €99 (16 GB)
Contract duration: 24 months (changes to other iPhone plans allowed)
One-time activation fee: €49
Classic plan: €39/month: €0.25 per SMS, 1000 combined airtime minutes (mobile + landline in Austria)
Supreme plan: €55/month: 1000 SMS included, 1000 airtime minutes for each of the following categories T-Mobile, landline, other mobile carriers, voice mail (that’s 4000 minutes total)
Incoming calls: unlimited
Data plan: 3 GB of traffic included in the above
Data overage: €0.10/MB
One:
Phone: €149 (8 GB), €229 (16 GB)
Contract duration: 24 months (no changes allowed)
One-time activation fee: €0
Monthly fee: €10 for (Sep. ‘08 till Dec. ‘08), then €25
Airtime: 1000 minutes (all of Austria, cell and landline)
Incoming calls: unlimited
Data plan: €14/month for 100 SMS and 3 GB of traffic
Data overage: couldn’t find any information
Bottom line:
Not the greatest, but certainly more affordable than Rogers. From T-Mobile, you can purchase an iPhone for $158 ($79+$79), sign a 2-year contract and pay a monthly fee of $63, and that gives you more than Rogers: $199 for the phone and $115/month for the plan, locked in for 36 months. If you go over your bandwidth limit, it can still get expensive, but not as expensive as Rogers.
At the end of the day, I don’t think I’ll ever get the philosophy behind Roger’s iPhone plans. It’s the be sneaky, screw the customer over, take advantage of our monopoly, hope the customer runs past their bandwidth limit so we can charge even more approach. Customers are going to realize that (and they already have), and they’ll be rightfully pissed because of it. Rogers could have had a instead. Had they offered reasonable prices, they wouldn’t have been able to handle the stampede of eager customers, making good money in the process and not alienating their current and future clients. But no, they need to be stupid morons and try to make money the blunt (rub-it-in-our-face-we-are-the-monopoly) and sneaky (we-hope-you-exceed-your-bandwidth) way. I hope they get what they deserve, i. e. barely any iPhone sales. That’d be fun. 
Would I, personally, be getting an iPhone if we had plans like the one offered by AT&T? Yes, absolutely. How about the T-Mobile or One plans from Austria? Maybe. Not sure. It’s on the verge, but still manageable enough that it could, realistically, be a yes. And with Roger’s plan? Hell, NO!
This is starting to get lame. Here we are, trying to look at temporary accommodation for August and September, and it doesn’t seem to want to work out.
On Wednesday, we had an appointment at 6pm to see a condo one block east of Beatty, between Georgia and Dunsmuir (in those new high rises above Costco). The guy owning it asked us to call him when we were on our way. We did, but it turned out that (a) his phone went to voice mail and (b) that his voice mail was full. So, we couldn’t get in touch with him, nor could we leave him a message. His buzzer went to the same, full mail box, as well. The guy didn’t show up either, even though we had already agreed to meet there at 6pm (it hadn’t been an issue getting a hold of him earlier in the day). Eventually we left and went for dinner. Thankfully, there was at least yummy sushi to be had after this experience, otherwise I would have trekked from Burnaby to Downtown for no reason whatsoever.
The second installment of this story happened this morning. Another appointment, originally set up for 1pm, but then moved to 10am for our convenience. 977 Mainland. We got there five minutes early, waited for the owner. Nobody showed up. We phoned the owner. It went straight to voice mail. No ringing. At least the mail box was not full and we could leave a message. Not that that did us any good. 20 minutes and a second message later, we left. Can you say déjà vu?
And the “best” thing of all: guy #1 did not reply to the e-mail sent to him after the fact, and guy #2 did not phone back despite having received two voice mails and clearly being aware that he stood us up.
What is it with people?! Obviously, they are not very eager to rent out their places. And these things go between $2000 and $2500/month! What really pisses me off, though, is that there’s probably enough demand, that they don’t have to take appointments seriously. They can afford to be asses. If they manage to remember every 5th appointment they make and actually show up, it probably results in a signed deal, which is good enough for them and that’s all they care about.
It’s been almost a week — yes, I am slow updating the blog — since we got the good news from our real estate agent. Our first buyer (see previous post) removed her conditions, which means that our place is now officially SOLD!!!!. That is Cool StuffTM, because it’s one less thing for us to worry about. Yay! She even wants some of our old furniture, which we wanted to get rid of anyway, so that’s an added bonus.
Now we have to find a temporary place (likely Downtown) for us and the Kitteh. We’ll look at one apartment tomorrow and at another one on Saturday. Should be exciting times. Luckily, even though we are moving twice, we only have to pack and unpack once. So we won’t have to repeat the nastiest part of moving two times in a row.
The new owner of our condo wants to take possession on August 9, so we are planning on renting our temporary place at the beginning of August and move some time between August 1 and August 9.
We’ll be there till the end of September. We get our house on September 26, which means that we’ll be moving in, most likely, between September 27 and September 30.
…means exciting times. But also stressful and anxious times. Currently, we are going through the latter. It’s also a bit like playing poker. With a lot of money.
We got another offer today and just put in a counter. Unlike the first offer (the seller just walked away in the end before even an inspection was conducted), this time asking price and offer are quite far apart (and our asking price is already lower). Our realtor is confident, though, that there is room on the buyer’s side to better their offer. We’re sure hoping so.
Now it’s the waiting game. And that’s the most stressful part. Sitting there, waiting, not being able to do anything anymore. Just hoping.
Another showing is scheduled for tomorrow. We’ll see how that goes.
I didn’t mean to post another weather related rant, but this fact deserves mentioning. Yellowknife in the North West Territories (Canada’s “Great White North”) is actually warmer and sunnier than Vancouver, BC.
Vancouver
Current Conditions: Light Rain, 11 °C
Observed at: Vancouver Int’l Airport
Date: 10:00 AM PDT Monday 9 June 2008
Yellowknife
Current Conditions: Partly Cloudy, 16 °C
Observed at: Yellowknife Airport
Date: 11:00 AM MDT Monday 9 June 2008
Two weeks ago, when we got home from our vacation, I thought summer (or late spring at the very least) had finally arrived. Particularly, since it was so hot the weekend we got back.
Fortunately it cooled off a bit soon thereafter, because that weekend was a little too “warm” for my liking. However, it’s been gradually getting worse and worse ever since. There were a few nice, sunny, warm days, but now it’s back to daily highs of 12°C and rain. — And it’s supposed to stay like that for the whole week.
To be fair, the weather last weekend was good, and it doesn’t look too bad for the next one, either.
However, I can’t help but wonder: when, just when will it turn nice for more than a day or two in a row? The weather we are having right now is suitable for October or February, not June.
And no, I am not asking for 35°C heat or anything even close to that.
…and with lots of time to spare. That’s nice. We’ll go for lunch in an hour, hang out in the lounge for a bit and then take the shuttle bus to Kowloon train station. Then, onto the Airport Express and to the airport.
The only thing neither one of us is looking forward to is spending 13 hours on a plane. Yuck! But at least we got decent seats this time, or so we think. Window and isle (no middle seat).
