APARTMENT!

[bee_york]

We signed an apartment! It (seems) clean! It's concrete! It has a balcony! It has a view! It's in the McGill Ghetto! I GET TO STAY IN MY FAVOURITE NEIGHBOURHOOD!!! It's 2 streets away, on Jeanne-Mance. We're even CLOSER to St-Laurent street, omg.
The view is awesome. We're on the 3rd floor. We can see the mountain and Parc Avenue! Also, it's a corner apartment, so we only have a neighbour on one side.

It's very small, and Mike is a bit down about that. I told him that for our price range and the neighbourhood we want, it's what we have to get used to. I told him we could move out to NDG or CDN if he wants and we could get a MUCH bigger place for a much lower price, but luckily he wants to stay in the downtown/Plateau area, and thank the GODS 'cause even though I'd be willing to move further if he really wanted to, I'd have a really, really hard time moving away from downtown. Now that I live here, I can't go back! lol. I don't mind living in tiny places, so I hope he gets used to it. As I pointed out to him, when we live in Japan, our place will be even smaller. And then when we finally get to NYC, our place will be even smaller than THAT. (Then again, I'm 5'1. I guess I shouldn't expect everyone else to be as comfortable in tiny apartments as I am. ;P)
Anyway, I'm excited that I get to stay in my favourite part of Montreal, at least for the next year. I was so worried I'd have to leave this neighbourhood. I can rest assured that I'll remain in walking distance of shopping, festivals, tams, and damn well EVERYTHING, at least for the next 12 months. And I don't have the stress of looking for apartments anymore! Whoo! That's one stress of my back right now. Many many stresses remain, but at least that's one less. :D

Comments

[its-ender.livejournal.com]

congrats, peace of mind at least eh?
now get to packing lol

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

Yeah seriously!! Haha. Sort of. I have a problem; we have to be out of here August 31st, but we can only move in to the new place on September 1st. I haven't figured out how to deal with this yet. Hmmmmmmmmm.

[urbangeo.livejournal.com]

Is it bigger than you're current place at least?

I also don't think your landlord can legally expect you to move out before September 1. You can probably just tell "tough shit".

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

It's not bigger than our current place (in fact, the bedroom is even smaller) but it's got a FULL kitchenette and SUNLIGHT so it's allll good (in MY eyes, anyway). I can't wait to actually be able to judge the weather by simply looking out my window! lol

Unfortunately, I think she CAN expect us to move out before September 1st, as our lease ends on August 31st. :(

[dzuunmod.livejournal.com]

Worst-case scenario - maybe rent a truck overnight and stay in a hotel?

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

Well we wouldn't spend money on a hotel; I can think of a ton of places we could stay overnight, but renting a truck instead of movers could be an idea. We could keep everything in the truck overnight--I didn't think of that! Thanks for the idea. :D

[dzuunmod.livejournal.com]

You're right - I'm thinking of myself in Whitehorse, and how we only have a few people we could ask to stay overnight with. But you guys would have lots of options!

Another possibility to consider is these pod moving things (http://www.pods.com/) that I've seen around. Do you know about them? A company will drop off a big container to your current place and give you, say, a week to pack it up. Then they pick it up and move it to the new place. There are lots of companies that do this, and I bet at least some of them would be willing to store it at their warehouse or whatever, overnight.

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

That is soooooo frakking cool, Josh! Thanks for the advice & info. You rock <3

[dzuunmod.livejournal.com]

Glad to help! It's about time that all the moving experience I have has come in handy. :p

I googled "pod moving montreal" when I was looking for a link to give you, but no local hits came up. But, I know that there are companies in Montreal that do this, because I came across them when I was moving from CDN to the Plateau. If you asked in the Montreal community or something, I'm sure you'd get some ideas!

[dzuunmod.livejournal.com]

How big is the building? Are there any cool little things about the apartment itself that you like?

Also, maybe a dumb question: what part of town are you working in next school year?

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

The building is maybe a bit smaller than our building in Verdun. As for the apartment itself, I love the view and the fact it has windows I can look out of (not like where I am now) and a balcony (again, not like I have now).

I don't know where I'll be working next year. I have to wait until the school administration opens in the last couple of weeks in August and send out my CVs to all the leftover openings all the other teachers didn't want. If that doesn't work, I'll have to wait until the school year starts and wait for someone to get pregnant and leave an opening for me.
The first few years of being a teacher are really hard. :/

[dzuunmod.livejournal.com]

Oh, I understand. I have friends who've gone through it. :(

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

Although it's quite unfair of me to say "the first few years of *being a teacher* are really hard". The first few years of just about ANY career are really hard unless you just happen to be lucky!

[oo-maya-oo.livejournal.com]

If I'm not in Rio on the 31st and you guys rent a truck overnight, you're welcome to stay at my place! :D

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

Aw, that's really sweet of you to offer! Then again, when are you NOT sweet?;)

RIO! <3

[lostsailors.livejournal.com]

AND it sounds like you are above people so maybe less annoying upstairs neighbors!

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

Well, we're going to be in the middle (on the 3rd floor) so we'll have people above us, but the building is concrete, so hopefully we won't hear them too much. Even if we do, it's the McGill Ghetto, so it's going to be young people anyway, not crazy annoying fussy old people. ;) We have people who live above us right now where we are, but we don't hear them too much 'cause of the concrete.

[bee-york.livejournal.com]

Oh, and to clarify, lol: the McGill Ghetto is a section of downtown Montreal that's almost entirely made up of students. It's called the McGill Ghetto because it's around McGill campus. I don't know why it's called the Ghetto though, because it's NOT cheap to live here at ALL--in fact, it's the most expensive part of town I've ever lived in! But anyway, yeah, there's some context. ;)
Most people on my LJ live here in Montreal so sometimes I take that for granted and talk about places as if EVERYONE knows what I'm talking about. Sorry about that! :/