Cleaning up the house - literally!

I am a bit afraid that two of my most relevant pieces this week (the diatribe about Translink's decision-making process and the upcoming climate-change related events here in Vancouver) will disappear into oblivion if I keep writing these "light content" posts but I've been wanting to say this for a few days now. So here it goes (and apologies to those who will waste 3 minutes of their time in reading this post!)

Last night, I completely cleaned up my apartment. As in, I sat down, went through the piles of papers that had accumulated in my living room, on my bed, on my kitchen table and on my (rather small) desk. You'll see, I live in a REALLY tiny apartment (to see a layout of what my apartment looks like and be a bit frightened about how much I crammed in less than 500 square feet, click here).
(when decorating apartments in Vancouver, you have to deal with VERY limited spaces).

Anyhow, I digress... Given the very small amount of space I have in my apartment, I really have to keep it rather clean and organized. So, I got rid of a few items (donated to Triage, a non-governmental organization that provides emergency services to homeless and low-income people, but I'll blog about that later) and organized all my files (yet again). You'd be surprised to see my apartment now. It looks almost immaculate.

On the cleaning up the house side of things, I should also mention that I've decided to be more financially conscious. So, the number of restaurant reviews will probably decrease in 2008 (unless I find a REALLY good new job and make enough money to actually dine out as much as I did in the past). Admittedly, all the dining out I did in 2007 has allowed me to have a very clear panoramic view of the restaurant scene in Vancouver and surrounding cities, and I've managed to find some very good cheap eats.

Cleaning up the house also meant reviving a few friendships that were dormant in 2007, and looking forward to spending some good times in 2008. It also means that I have to make a conscious effort to keep my apartment in good condition so that I can feel comfortable both spending more time here and inviting friends over. As J very clearly said, I take pride in being able to invite friends and entertain guests, so I should keep it up.

And while we are at the topic of beauty, I leave you with a photo of the scenery as you would see it from the Rose Garden at UBC. Now, you can understand one of the reasons why I am so happy in this city! (by the way, I have to find a way to upload my photos to Flickr so that people can use them with attribution) - but too busy to do that today! - thanks to Nomade Moderne for the suggestion though).