I got the mortgage for my condo in May of 2003. I chose Bank of Montreal for it, partly because I had been accidentally accumulating FirstHome Dollars with my MasterCard for the past nine years. What this meant was that I could cash out those dollars if I got a mortgage with Bank of Montreal when I purchased my first home. Over the years I accumulated over 3500 points. However, when I asked about it, I was told that I could only use up to 2500 points, and then only for 2.5% of my mortgage. Since I had a large influx of capital when I got my condo, I didn’t need a large mortgage. Certainly not the $100,000+ that would need to max out the FirstHome dollars. So I could only get cash in 1850 points. And the other points will never be usable by me, because I will never have a first home again.
Anyway, Bank of Montreal had completely forgotten how to handle FirstHome dollars. It was a promotion from nearly a decade ago. So it’s taken them nine months to figure out how to get me my money. I got it today.
If I was an interesting person, I would blow it on something (Drugs, beer, fast and loose women). But I am a boring person. It’s going to go into RRSPs, which I’ve been neglecting in my goal of killing this mortgage as quickly as possible. I’m hoping to get myself to a lower tax bracket and get a refund which I can direct into the mortgage.
Or possible a vacation to a sunny place. I haven’t had a vacation in a long time… But then I would be an interesting person, and not a boring one. Decisions, decisions.
Anyway, today there was a wine and cheese party in the lobby so that we can get to know the neighbors. There are a lot of runners in this building. There was Jim and Brenda at the party. Jim is one of the few people who can actually wear an IronMan watch and not be lying. Brenda has run seven marathons. I run in a faster group than her, but I’ve never run a marathon. (Just a half-marathon last February.) A girl named Sheena is trying to run further distances too. I think her problem is that she is running too fast. If you can’t talk while you are running, you’re going too fast. I’ve also seen one or two other runners outside of parties. Anyway, it was nice to meet some of the people I barely ever see in the halls. I was able to put a name (Danielle) to the top of head I see on the balcony two floors below me. I talked to a cute girl who was there for awhile (Amanda). She has a boyfriend, but I don’t have the self-confidence to ask someone out, so that really doesn’t matter.
The party went later than I expected. So afterward I had to scramble to finish more D&D stuff for the new character in the campaign. I’m staying up later than I would like. (And yet I am still updating this journal.)
It was my mother’s birthday today. She’s going to go see Return of the King to celebrate. I hope she likes it, but that’s like saying “I hope the sun rises tomorrow.” Hope implies a chance of it not happening.