what's he building in there?

--my building is under serious construction. landlady put out a note saying they're updating the whole electrical system, in order to "accommodate our electronic equipment," but i didn't buy it. turns out she's installing heat pumps & central air, which i assume the ancient system couldn't handle. not all at once, just as people leave. a third of the building is empty right now, so it seemed like a good time to start. i'm assuming that will mean she no longer will be paying for the heat, which is the only way i can believe it. my current plans involve signing a new lease this summer (though who knows), so theoretically it won't apply to me soon. she mentioned that if i'm the last holdout, she might pay me to move into one of the other apartments temporarily so she could convert mine, but i've heard that before (about the water damage in the 2nd bedroom from isabel). just as surprising, i learned that the twits on the 1st floor, who i think are the ones who'd been calling the cops whenever the guys downstairs get noisy (the cops thing=a big pet peeve of mine) actually broke their lease and moved out over the heating issues we had last month. yeah, it was cold, but it's not like the landlady & repair people weren't out here constantly trying to resolve it. good thing those girls weren't here the last couple winters. notwithstanding the week w/o any heat, this is the warmest winter in this building in the 4 (5?) years i've been here. so, it's going to be damn noisy around here the next couple weeks. just as well, because i need to pick up more shifts at work. i now owe $$ to yet another institution of higher learning, so i'm not taking classes, which means my student loans require payment. (how am i going to pay those and pay off JSR at the same time? likely answer=i'm not. but that ain't gonna fly.) on top of that, my next vacation is shaping up to be more expensive than i planned, and it also will likely squash my idea of going to the carribean for my birthday. it seems that the CW tribute in NYC is not, as i assumed, going to be the liveliest of the set... also, the car i'm theoretically buying in NY will not be ready for me to pick it up by then... finally, EE can't make it to the NYC tribute, and it feels weird to go to one of them without her, given our history... she's pushing for austin, and CW's brother says that one will be the best. my family will be miffed if i go to texas without seeing any of them, but given the size of texas, that would involve a lot more money than just flying straight (haha, from richmond? as if) there and staying with EE's brother. my folks will understand-- i just spent two weeks with them a few months ago, and they have an idea how crazy i was about chris, but if any of my other relatives find out i was there... ah well. i suppose it's possible that february will be a lucrative month, but it's not likely, other than V-day. the austin vs NYC theory came directly on the heels of the news that i am now the holder of a line of credit, my first in many years. i applied for two credit cards and shockingly got both of them. tiny limits of course, but one of them has enough room to buy a plane ticket, even out of overpriced richmond. (the other one is still high enough to fly me out of a reasonably priced city.) i suppose i could have refused the 2nd one, once i was approved for the first, but i'd already put my netflix on the first (hence, having used it, i'd already have to pay the annual fee), and the 2nd had the higher limit and lower fee. weird, since the bank that gave it to me was one i owed to before, and wrote off in the BK. now all i have to do is get a checking account, so i can pay my bills at 3 am or whenever, rather than dealing with the money order nonsense. methinks the checking is going to be harder than the credit (counterintuitive, yes, but credit reporting issues are very strange), but i hope i'm wrong. yesterday i finally finished the DVD project that i started back in december. the videos had been almost finished-- edited, burned, mostly labelled-- but i still wanted to make covers etc. naturally, i ran into problems with that, too, but it's finally resolved, and all but one are in sealed packages waiting to be mailed as soon as the PO opens. also edited a CW show to send out to people. loving my new burner, which has made most of this possible! the light scribe technology has a ways to go to be truly impressive, but in the meantime, it's pretty cool. if only it didn't take half an hour to make a label, i'd use it for everything. my next splurge purchase will be digital camera (finally)... i've been planning to buy one for ages, and came close while i was in texas, but now that i have credit and can shop for a better deal online, it'll be soon. (plus, the theoretically impending austin trip makes me want one even more.) thinking about this canon... anyone have any thoughts/comments? i'm looking for: small, optical zoom (not just digital), at least 3mp, pref under $150. and no proprietary crap, like "uses only x-brand memory" etc. screw that.