Spiffing up the old apartment

Because I signed a new lease, my apartment management has been so kind as to install some lovely new stuff. A new microhood (microwave/exhaust hood combination, if you weren't familiar with the term), and new light fixtures. I had a list of improvements to choose from, including being allowed to paint an accent wall in the living- or bedroom and new kitchen countertops and sink. I went with the microhood because my current microwave has to be about twenty years old and is probably leaking microwaves that are poisoning my brain. Undoubtedly it is so. The light fixtures are no big deal to me, but the examples they showed me were pretty.

Actually, the installation hasn't been completed yet. I came home yesterday afternoon to find an electrician wiring a new outlet and drilling a series of alarmingly perfect circles in the ceiling. The microwave should be installed sometime today, hopefully not too early in the day so I can get the hell out while they do the work. Don't know when the light fixtures will be done, maybe today as well.

The new stuff will surely class up the joint, making my hodgepodge of furniture, bare walls, and cluttered tables look even more unsightly in comparison. I can live with that, or I can take this opportunity to improve the conditions even more. Eh, I can live with it the way it is now. But a friend of mine recently did some fairly significant redecorating and of course I thought, hey, I could do that. Then again, why spend the money when I have enough stuff already? I'm of two minds about the whole thing. I'm of two minds about most things.

Instead of considering what color scheme I have and whether I would like a different one, I'd rather expound on How Our Chosen Settings/Environments Affect Us. This has been a matter of some tension between my mom and me in the past. She contends I would be much happier with tidiness and rational ordering of my possesions. I have disagreed vehemently since I was four (when I was four, I knew my own mind; what happened to that certainty?). I don't want a total mess, but my idea of what constitutes a total mess is very different from other people's, I know. I have to be honest and say, if I didn't have people over every so often to inspire me to shift around or discard most of the clutter before they arrive, my home might be more of a miserable hovel than some people might already find it to be.

Colors also affect me. I never pick bold colors for things I will see everyday (unless it is a particularly good bargain) because I figure I will grow sick unto death from looking at it every day. Rose print in the kitchen? Bright purple flokati rug? Check and check, mistake and mistake. Not terrible mistakes though. I like to feel cozy and safe at home. My computer desk is sort of in a little triangle, between a nice squashy chair, an old gramophone cabinet and an unadorned wall. It's a little pod of space that is nice to sit in even when I'm not using the computer, even though there are more comfortable chairs (nice squashy chairs) very very near.