6 or so months ago, I went to work early and got some extra work done, and then took a few minutes for the NIN pre-sale for their Barclays Center performance. I had tried to get tickets to the “last NIN tour” couple of years ago, but utterly failed at every pre-sale and on-sale. I remember trying for days at the sweepstakes Trent held over Twitter. I was pretty devastated. So when they announced another tour (How to Destroy Angels not going to cut it for you, right?), I WAS ON THAT SHIT.

Everything was SO frustrating. During the first pre-sale, the site failed for me. I totally got into nerd-rage mode and complained to the webmaster. They responded to people like me by holding another pre-sale. So, again, I was sure to be available at that time. However, this time… my credit card and debit card kept failing. My bank introduced some weird validation service that I never had to do before on the day of the pre-sale and I just couldn’t buy these tickets. I was so upset that I called my then not-yet-husband to basically screech at him, “GIVE ME YOUR CREDIT CARD!!!! MUST BUY!” He was like, “WHAT’S GOING ON.. AHHH! DON’T EAT ME.”

Fortunately, I still found decent seats (not on the ground, but in section 12 – seated). I bought the tickets. And all was right with the world. We went to Portland, we came back, and then we attended this event.

It was really great. I loved that they played the old hits and as soon as I heard “Terrible Lie,” I was swaying and singing with the rest of them. They did a great light show (my husband identified the light show as something similar to Daft Punk’s pyramid light show work) that really worked for their new album. And their new album is kind of awesome. I really like this direction. And they still scratch that NIN itch. Once you listen, you definitely know Trent Reznor created this sound. (I’m kind of a horrible fan and didn’t really listen to their new album until a day before the concert. I forgot all about it.)

The concert was also kind of funny, because looking around, the demographic is notably a lot older. I felt this way at the last Tori Amos concert, as well. In fact, I felt like I was in the low range of the median.

On another note, maybe because I still feel loyalties to MSG, but I couldn’t get on board with the Barclays Center. I felt really far away from the stage, since I was almost directly center of the whole concert (I was farthest away from the stage on the ground). The angle kind of bothered me. Otherwise, it’s all so fancy looking.

Are you catching them this tour?

We just got back from Oregon. I was visiting my in-laws and we helped out with their master bathroom makeover.

I had hoped that we would have time to put in the shower tray, walls, and tile the ceiling while we were there. However, we just didn’t have the time to do all that. We were all a little too ambitious. That being said, we did manage to see the fruits of our labor when tiling their bathroom floors. This was one of my first remodeling jobs like this. (In my Brooklyn rental, re-decorating means hammering nails into the walls and hanging things. Maybe I might move a bookcase or two.)

I have to admit that I’ve never been handy, but I’ve been crafty. There is just so much people can and are willing to do for a rental in NYC. There isn’t too much point to changing an apartment, other than the color. I’ve certainly never put a back splash in or anything like that. I love to visit blogs like centasational girl. Her blog was what inspired me to attempt to make our current headboard. I love home makerovers. So I really had fun with this smaller project. It was nice to see the end result of at least one thing.

As you can see, they picked out longer gray tiles. They recently had the floor beneath that redone.

Now that I’ve finished it, I told Ryan that we should have laid the tiles down and glued thinly any tiles that are raised. This way, we can use that as a starting point to level with the mortar. Shoulda Woulda, right? So, we started laying down the files that we did not need to cut. It took a short afternoon and we were done.

Next, we wanted to make patterns of the corner tiles. It was harder, but I started out making a couple of tile sized patterns (for the larger corner pieces). I laid them down on the floor like a tile to mimic the space and how the edges should slope.

This part was surprisingly time intensive, since I wanted to get it right. We couldn’t risk having tiles cut into patterns that don’t fit. For the most part we were pretty successful. We had a few doozies, where we couldn’t use the dry cutter (that traces with a scratch and cuts the tile), because we didn’t have enough of tile to put pressure on the piece. We had to go back and use a fresh tile on a wet saw. There were other tiles that we had to free style the corners on the wet saw, since the tile wouldn’t fit on the dry saw. That was loud, but fun. We had a muffler for the sound, and I used in-earbuds to muffle the sound. There was one pesky piece that kept shifting due to the flooring. We had to chip away at the plaster to get that piece to sit level.

Finally we grouted. That was pretty satisfying and went quickly. Unfortunately, once it dried a bit and we were cleaning, we saw some places where we missed some grout. Some was wiped away by the water. So we waited until it dried a bit and re grouted. Then, you seal and you are done. (The picture below was before the floor was sealed.)