Merry Christmas!

Well, not exactly a White Christmas here in Vancouver, more like a wet one. It's pretty gloomy outside, but the Christmas lights are lighting up the fog just fine.

I talked with lots of relatives today, brother, sister, mother, cousins, uncles, aunts...it feels good to know that there are others like me out there. Now, that might be a little frightening for the rest of the world, but every homie needs a hood.

Merry Christmas to all my family and friends!

Floss. Every day. I implore you.

I've been having some intermittent tooth pain in my remaining large lower molar lately (lost the other one about 5 years ago), so I went to the dentist today for a look-see.

The result? I need a root canal sooner than later, followed by a cap a few weeks after that.

Great. Just great.

A short explanation about me and dentists: mutual hate.

My introduction to the world of dentistry was Dr. Patterson, a crooked bastard that drilled and filled 8 of my teeth when I was a kid. More than likely, none of them were required.

A class action suit was brought against that tooth butcher after about 50 families compared records and found that he was doing an awful lot of unnecessary work. He lost the suit and I think some of his assistants ratted him out during the trial.

He was subsequently charged criminally and lost his license to practice dentistry.

Needless to say, I hate dentists.

Well, now I need a couple thousand dollars worth of work done, which I can hardly afford at this moment. No medical or dental coverage to offset the cost, either.

Maybe I should try this instead.

Drunk, happy or both?

Here I am at the Alibi Room, a bar/restaurant nestled between Gastown and Railtown, last Saturday night.

While celebrating a friend's birthday, I enjoyed quite a few ounces of aqua vitae, or 'the water of life'. Hence the look on my face.

A fun time was had by all. Perhaps I'll get the star treatment on my birthday. Psst: It's January 4th.

More pictures from the evening:
The honoured guest
Sans double chin
Cozy couple
Smile for the camera
Enjoy the party
Happy Birthday

Gersham is all about drunken enjoyment with a touch of evil.

Finally!

Well, we finally got the lease faxed to us, and we are just hours away from securing our first office. Aside from other associated costs like insurance, a phone system, ADSL, etc., we are pretty much there.

Now I can do some real work.

Everybody's working for the weekend...

You know I'm getting loopy when I start quoting Loverboy. It's been another busy week, and it isn't about to slow down. It's another working weekend.

Right now, the TV is on and the Canucks are pounding the San Jose Sharks, which is good and bad.

• Good: They're winning
• Bad: It's boring when they're 4 goals ahead

I think I'm going to buy one of those Hospital Lottery tickets...I think London Drugs is open late.

Wish me luck.

My friend Jeff lost his job yesterday. He was a Sales Rep for an Advertising company.

Anyone got a job for Jeff? Email him.

Inching along, ever so slowly

Okay, here's the latest: we went to our Realtor's office today and signed the final offer. We initialed all the sections that were changed and paid up our extra month of deposit.

After that, we discussed the "what if's" surrounding the contract. Basically, it is about a 90% done deal right now, but we could run into roadblocks from the Landlord or the Tenant. As of today, they both have 5 business days to review and/or reject the offer sheet.

So, that means that we should see the lease next Thursday or Friday. Once the ink dries on that, the place is ours!

For everyone who reads this blog: thanks for continuing to read throughout this long, somewhat boring office space rant.

As Bartles and Jaymes used to say: "We thank you for your support"

Dumb Laws in California

Apparently, in Chico, California, the law states:

"...Detonating a nuclear device within the city limits results in a $500 fine. "

Pay your bills on time. Trust me.

Good news: It looks like our lease will go through, our office is almost a reality!

Bad news: Because our credit rating isn't all that great, we have to sign off two months damage deposit AND the first month's rent. Unlike residential rental agreements that can only request a maximum of half a months rent, commercial landlords can set the damage deposit amount at whatever they want.

So, tomorrow we go sign the lease, write another cheque (for the additional month of damage deposit) and then wait.

More waiting. Why? The landlord has 5 days to offer the contract up for refusal by the current tenant. During that time, the tenant may opt to continue with their lease, meaning we'd be out of luck.

Considering the tenant has already given notice and appears to already have a new office, it seems likely that they won't exercise that option. I hope.

Another week of waiting. What a hassle.

If our credit had been better, we would have been at the 'right of refusal' stage almost a week ago.

Remember: Pay your bills!

Tick tock...tick tock...tick tock...

We've been waiting on the Realtor since Friday afternoon, and he keeps telling us that we'll hear something 'any time now'.

The waiting is starting to drive me nuts!

It would kill me to have to go back out to look at all those places we saw over the last month. Especially knowing how nice this office is.

I have no idea what the hold-up is, and I'm worried that it'll be some little technicality that'll have us in lease-land-limbo for another week or two.

Here's hoping our Realtor is doing his job and keeping on top of all the issues.

A legal entity.

That's what my company is, as of tomorrow or the next day. We, through our lawyer, reserved our company name here in BC, and completed the Articles of Incorporation. We're fast-tracking the entire process, so we should have the papers signed, sealed and delivered by Friday.

This is so great! We'll be an honest-to-goodness company by the end of this week.

As for our place of work, we are still waiting to hear from the management company about our credit application, and hence, our lease. I can't believe it could take this long, it's a simple look-up from the credit agencies.

We should know by the end of today or tomorrow morning. I really hope we get this place. It's very nice.

Oh oh. Speed bump.

I got a call from my Realtor today. It seems that my company didn't fare well during the credit review. Not that we have bad credit, just that we have no credit at all.

So, I had to call the other Realtor (the one responsible for the listing), who was quite stern with me on the phone. I think she was somewhat upset that everything hadn't gone smoothly, probably worried about her commission.

I was instructed to give details about our personal credit to the management company and they'd take it from there. We called and gave the details for Peter and Terry (they just wanted two) and let it go from there.

That should be good enough, my credit isn't all that great...Terry and Peter were much more responsible in their youth.

I'll let you know how it goes on Monday.