Got a new 5-head projection ceiling lamp from Ikea last night for $60 to replace my current 3-head one. Have been wanting to do this for quite a while since the ambient light wasn’t bright enough and I often found my eyes getting tired after work. I was thinking whether to get a floor lamp or a new ceiling lamp and ended up getting the ceiling lamp since I thought it would evenly give more light to the room. Got them installed today and my room is now nice and bright~

On the other hand, the guy that was suppose to pave my garden came here for just 5 minutes telling me that the stone I chose wasn’t in stock so I had to choose another one. He said he would send some guys to do the digging today in the afternoon but ended up didn’t show up….I’m starting to feel skeptical about this guy now, hopefully he’ll come tomorrow and get the work done.

Worked, ate (lunch: cookie, dinner: plain instant noodle with sausage, veggie, and an egg), played 15 minutes of Far Cry 2 that I downloaded, watched two episodes of Last Friends by Juri Ueno (my current fav Japanese actress, as well as Mao Inoue of course), edited some photos took at Shirakawa-go during the trip to Japan and uploaded them to Facebook, talked on the phone with Wendy….what else..that’s pretty much it. I’m feeling easily getting tired lately, not sure why. Oh, and I’m listening to Chopin’s Etudes Op. 10 and Op. 25….fell in love with them after listening to Op. 25 No. 4 that was played in Nodame Cantabile.

Here is the song:

 

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I was trying so hard to start digging up the soil for my garden after borrowing a shovel and a branch cutter from uncle Jason. I got all dressed up and ready to “work”, started digging up in the rain (not pouring) and thought that I could get something done at the end of the day. I spent about an hour and half, dug up about 1/10 of the project area, and realized something was wrong. The “bio degradable” garden waste bags that I bought from Canadian Tire weren’t strong enough to hold the soil after I got one of them filled up - it’s too heavy with all the moisture and rocks. I tried (without thinking too much) using 2 bags instead of one and see if it’ll be stronger…ended up tearing up one of them when I was trying to reposition the mess inside the semi-full bag. I soon realized that this is not going to work - the bags are simply too heavy and weak to carry around, not mentioning that I’ll have to carry them (maybe 15 bags or so) all the way to the disposal centre which is like 20 mininutes drive from my place. I gave up and took a shower, trying to think of what to do next.

I was thinking maybe I’ll just hire someone to do the messy work (I really didn’t plan to do so in the beginning since I like DIY stuff), so I hopped onto Chinesebuysell.com looking for gardeners and started calling a couple of them for a quote. Called a couple guys and two of them actually came over for free to have a look. I liked this vietnamese guy, very nice and seemed really eager to do the job, even though he could barely speak English. He quoted a price of $600 including the cost of the material (bricks). I did some math after he’s gone, to see how much it would cost if I were to do it myself… something like this:

Bricks/stones:

3.4 / sqft * 72 sqft * $1 ea = $244.8

Paving Sand & Paving Rocks:

Sand: $8.7ea * ~7 bags = $60.9

Stone: $9.2ea * ~7 bags = $64.4

Metal Edging:

$10.99/3ft = $3.7/ft, $3.7/ft * 17ft needed = $62.3

Landscape Fabric:

$20.99/pk

Home Depot delivery cost:

$70

Total:

$244.8 + $60.9 + $64.4 +$62.3 + $70 + $20.99 = $523.39

$523.39 * 112% (tax) = $586.2

I haven’t even factored in the cost to dump the soil, I think it’ll be around $100 to hire someone to dump them since I can’t do that with my tiny Smart car. It’s fairly apparent that I’m better off hire some professionals to do the job, consider the money I would otherwise have to spend, and my lack of experience…(and he won’t charge tax if I pay him cash~)

Nguyen (the guy I hired) will come and work on it next Wednesday. Hopefully it’ll be a nice day so that he can get everything done at the end of the day!