For about the thirtieth day in a row, it’s been raining here in Baltimore. Since we’ve been in the new house, I think there’s been about a half-day of sunshine—and that was with about 80% humidity. Ugh. It kind of sucks going from central air to open windows and rain; you wind up sleeping in a bed that more closely resembles warm pea soup. Yeah, you say, boo-hoo, Bill; you could be a Marine in Afghanistan walking around in full combat gear, but the fact is, I’m not. My new house is about to float away down the Patapsco.
Last night I was finally able to get some work done in the house; I ran three new phone lines to the kitchen, living room, and dining room so that we don’t have to use the basement stairwell anymore. Halleleujah, amen. Next up is a quick upgrade to the dining room wiring; I’d like to run a grounded circuit to the plug where we have our printer, hub, and power strip so that we don’t fry the 1950’s era wire job.
In other geek news, it looks like Eudora has upgraded their client to version 6. I have mixed emotions about 5.1 (I basically have to use it because my email server requires a client that supports APOP) and the basic usability of the program, but the new spam filtering in the paid version is tempting. I’m going to wait for a few weeks and then see what the feedback sounds like.
Holy crap. I just found out that my high school orchestra teacher, the guy who taught me how to play bass violin, was arrested on charges of child abuse for molesting 6-year-old girls. For the love of God, that is screwed up.
NPR has an audio commentary by Jean Shepherd, the author and narrator of A Christmas Story, on his experience at the March on Washington forty years ago.
Yesterday Jen spent the entire day at the house unpacking boxes, washing dishes (yes, we have no dishwasher, one of the things besides CAC that I’ll miss about 620) and making the kitchen liveable. Luckily, the kitchen has a relatively fresh coat of white paint, so it’s sunny and bright in there. The fridge is a smaller apartment-type version, but it holds a remarkable amount of stuff, and it’s pretty new. Plus, it has an icemaker—something we didn’t have in either of our previous houses. It looks great in there so far.
Meanwhile, BG&E was at the house all day ripping out two fuse panels (one for the house and one for the doctor’s office) and consolidating them into one brand-new 220 panel, which makes me feel about a million times better. We had a wonderful fellow named Ben knee-deep in old wiring and 60’s-era Stab-Lok fuses (a competitor to the modern fuse system, long since defunct, and notoriously tempermental) until 8:30 last night. They’re coming back tonight to finish consolidating the meters and mark the panel (and they’ll need some serious help with that, let me tell you.)
As for the phone, the good doctor had four lines coming in to the house; we know that one was the house line, one was the fax, and the other two were business. There’s a mixture of four-prong Bell Systems era boxes, some new RJ-11 jacks, and other mystery equipment scattered around the house, as well as a couple of narrow steel telecom boxes for splitting off the lines in front and back. We had no dialtone in the house until I found the two most modern interface boxes and tried the fax line—naturally, the phone company activated the line used least in the house. So there’s phone service… in the basement. Verizon wants $90 for installation of the first jack and $50 for each additional; I’m going to visit the Home Depot and spend that $50 on some new jacks, 100′ of wire, and an analog phone, and try to get a dialtone in the kitchen tonight. DSL is due to be installed next week, so I have to make some arrangements to get a wire and plug to the dining room, where we’re temporarily setting up the office.
As for me, I’m feeling better about this thing than I was yesterday; there are still moments of outright panic (last night, on my way to the bathroom, the first conscious thought I had was, What the hell have I done?) but I find that when I think of each individual problem separately and not as a whole thundering herd of pain bearing down on us, it feels better. The house hasn’t fallen down yet, it’s in relatively good shape, and it was made well. It will wait for us to get to each issue, one at a time.
And I have to think of all the good things that have happened so far, all the omens pointing to a happy future, and all the bits of luck we’ve had so far—they are many, and appreciated. Great friends, lucky breaks, good neighbors, fantastic help, and small miracles.
In the three and a half years I’ve known Jen, I thought I knew a lot about her. This evening I found out that when she was eight, her mother bought her a copy of KISS’ Double Platinum—this is the same mother who sent her to Catholic school from fifth grade through High School. Go figure…
Basically every piece of furniture I own is broken down into its component parts and stacked in the living room; the boxes are marked and labeled, and the fragile stuff is (hopefully) organized so that it won’t get busted. Suddenly, the idea of moving has become a reality instead of an abstraction.
This weekend, I’m driving north to the old homestead, deep in the Land Of Classic Rock, to attend the wedding of my best friend from High School. There’s a reason I live down here in Baltimore, five hours, $6 and three bridges away from the town I graduated High School in; my experience in that town was sort of a grab-bag of good and bad. It wasn’t until I was about 25 that I figured out the art of re-inventing myself, so my entrance into that town at eighth grade was a rocky one. One of the things that got me through was the group of friends I made my sophomore year, including the guy who’s getting married. It should be a bittersweet experience, and one I’m only partially looking forward to—I’m not sure who’s going to be there, how they’re doing, or what they’ll say. I missed my 10-year reunion (no great loss—I doubt I would have gone anyway) so I’m not up to date on what’s been happening, but I’m wondering if some people have grown up. I’m also wondering if I should take Jen up to my old house to take a look; it’s not often you get to see an impound lot in the middle of the woods. (My dad bought a repossession business in 1984, prompting our move to New York. To answer your questions, no, it’s nothing like the movie, yes, I got pretty handy at picking locks, and yes, Harry Dean Stanton is the mack daddy.)
Queer Eye For The Straight Guy could convince me to hook up basic cable again when we move. Todd taped an episode for me, and it is hilarious. And holy Mother of God, did I want to smash this dude’s girlfriend in the head with a brick.
Salon has an interesting writeup on the SCO-Linux-IBM legal wrangling (ad-sponsored); from my relatively uninformed position, it sounds like a version of those “get legal” software-piracy scams, on a larger scale, or the old Unisys .GIF debate. I remember this not so fondly, as I was in the middle of developing a site when the client requested we switch out all the .GIF files with .JPG’s after watching a report on CNN. That was loads of fun. And the site looked like shite.
Album of the Day: The magnificent Learning to Crawl, by The Pretenders. Time The Avenger has been on repeat all afternoon. Also: The New Pornographers. Rockin’ good stuff.
3:55 pm. Oh, god, I’m crashing. I was up at 6 to pick up Jen to take to the airport, and I had a cup of coffee at the house and then (stupidly) another from Starbuck’s. Plus a cheese danish. Now I’m sliding off the edge of the desk into unconsciousness. Something only…MORE SUGAR will be able to stop! Time for a Three Musketeers bar. Which was made, by the way, across the highway (NJ 517) from my old house in Hackettstown, NJ.
I’ve been wanting to move out of the city for some time now. I’ve been here for twelve years, since the first Bush administration, and I’m ready for a change of scenery.
I’ve been increasingly unhappy with the city experience over the last couple of years; minor gripes with the amount of space in my house have grown to include things like an intense hatred for the police helicopters hovering over the bedroom each night; the endlessly repeating song coming from the ice cream truck (yeah, it’s cute the first time, but just wait until the frickin thing crawls down your street at 2 mph), and the kids walking down the street who FEEL THE NEED TO YELL ALL THE TIME. I’d like to actually have a lawn, some trees, a garage, and a house with windows on all four sides. And now that life is getting serious, I’d like us to live in a place where the schools are public and good.
That being said, I drove out to Finksburg to look at a house listed online. On paper, it sounded good: Built in 1900, four bedrooms and three and a half baths, an acre of land, fireplaces, central air. I drove, and I drove, and I drove. I wound up out in farm country, following single-lane roads through rolling countryside, until I found the house.
The house wasn’t what we were hoping for, at least in my opinion—the neighboring house is stuck right up on one side of this place, and it’s a plumber’s office, with the attendant vans parked outside. The area is surrounded by farmland, and the distance to any main highway is far. The first live being I saw after getting out of the car was a Holstein cow. But that’s not what spooked me.
I got scared when I began thinking about the changes about to take place in our lives—both Jen and I have lived in the same place for years. We’re used to our routines, we’re used to our habits; we have a relationship with our surroundings and our neighborhoods that’s easy and comfortable. Need a good cup of coffee? I’ve got you covered. Need a valve job? We know the guy. Looking for a great dinner? Jen can point you to several within a ten minute drive of her house.
I’m not scared to join households with my fiancee. (I’m not afraid to use the word fiancee, either.) I’m not scared to start an adult life with her, to arrange joint accounts and save for retirement and think about marriage plans and buy stuff for babies. I’m looking forward to it, in fact.
I’m concerned about all the unknowns that go along with buying a house. I’m afraid of redneck neighbors, termites, radon, tornados, decreasing property value, indian burial sites, eminent domain, locust infestation…
We are at the edge of a wide chasm, Jen and I, and we’re about to jump together. Knowing that makes me feel better, but I’m still worried about the unknowns.
I posted pictures from the NY trip this afternoon. Tractors, type, barns and boats. Big fun, people.
My (incomplete) artist suggestions for Apple to include in the iTunes Store:
- The Pogues
- Dismemberment Plan
- The New Pornographers
- The White Stripes
- Sigur Ros (was up there, but is now gone)
- The Rolling Stones
Song of the Day: Go With The Flow, Queens of the Stone Age. Rawwwwk!
ring, 5.21.03
Update: Here is a link to some pictures from our trip.
It’s Official. Last Sunday (the 18th), I took Jen to the airport, where we boarded a plane bound for Charlotte. Originally, the destination was a secret, but after the dipshit ticketing lady asked Jen three times if she was going to Savannah, I broke down and gave her a copy of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil for the plane ride. Switching planes, We landed that afternoon in a light rain and took a taxi to our bed and breakfast, the Eliza Thompson House, which sits squarely in the middle of the city’s historic district. Exhausted from our travelling (and the bum-rush through the Charlotte terminal to our second plane), we were content to turn on cable and lay in bed. Until the thunderstorm came and began knocking out the power. (at one point, during the Simpsons, the power went out for a minute, then came back up as Krusty the Clown said, “Ugggghh… that’s better,” and then went out for good.) We walked down to the parlor where candles had been lit and enjoyed our after-dinner coffee and dessert with the other guests.
The next morning, we put on our walking shoes and had a light breakfast in the courtyard of the hotel. Then, we set out into the city to explore the sights. Savannah’s historic district is laid out in a grid, with picturesque squares in repeating patterns throughout. We wandered through the damp streets, stopping in the cemetery to shoot pictures of the Revolutionary War-era headstones. In the downtown district, we stopped and took pictures of lots of architectural and typographical subjects (the geek designers in us coming out. Who else has a whole series of digital pictures of the old Woolworth’s tiled floor entrance, “Because we liked the typeface?” That would be us.) as well as the riverfront and cotton exchange. After lunch we met up with a tour guide to look at the gardens in the city, and then changed for dinner.
The 17 Hundred and 90 is a ground-level restaurant in the foot of another inn, and it is furnished in early-american style with captain’s chairs on a hard stone floor. (caution: the number for this restaurant is misprinted in the Fodor’s guide and will ring at Il Pasticcio.) We were seated in front of the piano player, who cheesed the appetizer up with a dual piano-synthesizer attack. Dinner was started with oysters Rockefeller and a bottle of Cabernet and got better from there. After the main course was served, the piano player calmed down and moved into standards, playing a selection of Porter and Gerswhin (we requested Someone To Watch Over Me) and the room got fuller and quieter.
After dessert, we strolled back towards the hotel through the foggy city, enjoying the quiet cozy atmosphere. As we got to the center of Madison square, I stopped Jen and asked her if she loved me. After telling me she did, she asked me what I was asking her. I got down on my knee and pulled the ring from my pocket, and asked her to be my wife. Giggling, she said yes, and we held each other long and tight. As I slipped the ring on her finger, the church bells struck ten, and we just about skipped back to the hotel.
The next day we awoke to sunny skies, in spite of the weather channel, which was claiming it would rain all week. A delicious pecan waffle at Clary’s was followed by a second day of exploring, where we stopped to take pictures of Madison square and collect four-leaf clover from the garden under the statue to press in the book. (Good luck charms never hurt.) We then realized the guy on the statue was being depicted in the midst of his heroic death attempting to rescue the regimental flag during the Revolutionary War. Romantic choice, Bill. Continuing southward, we followed the Fodor’s guide through a tour of the sites from the novel, and strolled through Forsyth park to the fountain.
That evening, we made reservations at the Pink House, and arrived early for a drink in the tavern in the basement, where a sweating Tony Siragusa lookalike twinkled another piano. Upstairs in the mansion, we were seated next to a magnificent fireplace in the southern room, where we dined on grouper stuffed with crab and a twin lobster tail in a sherry wine and cream sauce. We sat for a half hour and reviewed the day, reminding ourselves that we were engaged. Following dinner was a slice of Jack Daniels pecan pie and a flourless chocolate torte with coffee.
Early for our ghost tour, we returned to the tavern for a glass of Bailey’s over ice and enjoyed the fire in the corner. Gathering in Reynolds Square with four other couples, we followed the guide, an excitable lad named Sam, on a half-baked tour through the northeast section of town. Sam fancied himself a paranormal investigator and decided to orate on the different classes of hauntings, which was dull and boring, but he did have a bizarre lecture style which involved holding his right hand in front of him like a claw (and making Jen and I laugh.) Because we ended the tour right back in front of the Pink House (which was one of the haunted sites on the tour), we stopped in the tavern for another drink before returning home. There we met a really nice guy named Mike, agreeing that Omar Sharif in Doctor Zhivago was a tall drink of water, and talking about the city. He also got to be the first person we told about our engagement. Thanks for the good wishes, Mike.
Wednesday’s flight was scheduled for the early afternoon, so we packed our things and walked down Jones street to Mrs. Wilkes’ for lunch, where the good people of Savannah line up outside to wait for a table to open up. The food is served boarding house style, with twelve people at a table passing bowls of low-country Southern food around to each other. Jen was in a blissful state, reliving childhood with each bite of fried chicken, black-eyed peas, collard greens, macaroni and cheese, butter beans, biscuits (with sorghum), and sweet iced tea. I’m not listing everything here, but I couldn’t find enough room on my plate to fit everything, and it was all so good I filled up quickly. For dessert, they brought a choice of either peaches and cream or banana cream pie, and we found room to fit it.
On our way out, we bought the cookbook and grudgingly made our way back to the hotel to wait for our cab. As we dorve out of the city, we held hands in the back seat and reflected on our stay in the city, one of the best vacations I’ve ever had, and one of the most romantic places I can think of.
Note: This account was delayed a week to preserve the element of surprise for our families, who we told this weekend. Many thanks go to the good people of Savannah, the ladies at Heirloom Jewelry, and all our friends who kept the secret quiet (“I can tell you when we’re leaving, but not where or what we’re doing.”) Pictures will be posted directly.
So I was looking through some weblogs on my lunchbreak and stumbled over a fansite for a Canadian band I always loved back in the day, one my buddy Pat turned me on to our freshman year of college: The Pursuit Of Happiness. There’s a ton of info on there about Moe and the gals; even better, there’s an MP3 archive of live shows from the mid-90’s. Interesting trivia: right after producing the beautiful Skylarking with XTC, Todd Rundgren was paired up with TPOH to produce Love Junk—two of my favorite albums.
Salon has an article on the new Matrix sequels and the change in atmosphere since the first movie was released, back in 1999. Yeah, I’d have to say things are much different now.
Cleansing, Part Two: One of the drawbacks to owning a house in the city is the hassle of parking your car two blocks away from your house. Growing up in the ‘burbs, we were always blessed with houses where the driveways were long and wide, and you could leave your car wide open with the radio on for the afternoon while you emptied the back seat of all the fast-food wrappers, gym socks, and soda cans you had been lugging around. Nowadays, by the time I get home, the last thing I want to do is pull up out in front of the house and clean out the Tortoise. Therefore, the trunk of my car has resembled the floor of a crack den. Today I backed up to the Dumpster behind my office and took ten minutes to sort through the debris:
- Fifteen bungie cords, in various conditions
- Two teal bath towels inherited from my Mom, used to clean car parts
- Two homemade speaker cabinets with 6×9 Infinity drivers pinched from a repo car in ’88 (dumped)
- Various cans of car-resuscitation fluid (starter, brake, oil, etc.)
- Several sheets of paper from the MVA warning me that my car is suspended for a broken taillight (gotta get that worked out.)
- One fire extinguisher reading “empty”; it lied, ’cause that white stuff shot about twenty feet
- One rusty, broken umbrella (dumped)
- Two Slim Jims—not the food-product kind, the Grand Theft Auto kind (hidden)
- One plastic go-cup (dumped)
- A fleece blanket from Mom, for the day when the car plunges off a snowy cliff and I am pinned in the wreckage; nevermind that it will be locked in the trunk
- The plastic safety panel from the top of my radiator
- Two ancient highway flares, dangerous and waiting to burst into flame directly over my gas tank
- A $12 set of standard Popular Mechanics ratchets (like I’m gonna leave the Snap-Ons in the trunk, are you kidding?)
Last night I went through my four-drawer file cabinet in the basement. Exciting, right? Well, if you’re anything like me, you keep the most bizarre epherma for the most inane reasons imaginable. And that tendency seems to get worse if it has anything to do with art or technology. You can learn a lot about me by what I threw away this morning:
- Two spare Mac disk drives
- A copy of Adobe Illustrator 5.5 on floppy disk
- The original 700 MB disk from my 7100
- Roughly 200 blank and filled 3.5MB floppy disks
- ATM reciepts from 1995, 1996, and 1997 (separated by year in envelopes)
- 15 issues of MacWorld from 1999-2001
- An LP of Donny Osmond’s Disco Train
- An LP of XTC’s Skylarking
- 50+ assorted B/W prints from college (embarassing, mostly)
- Five linoleum cuts dating back to college
- Three years of collected illustration clippings (other folks’, as reference)
- Four 500MB external SCSI hard drives (going to Goodwill)
- One SCSI scanner (also going to Goodwill)
- 20+ RAM chips, totaling about 10MB, dating back to my Mac IIcx
- Assorted illustration, design, and web client files from 1997-2000
- 20+ Print sample books from three years ago
- A copy of WordPerfect for the Mac, version 2.0, from 1994 (four floppies)
- Two boxes filled with business cards from jobs I had in 1996 and 1999
Naturally, because I am a geek, I backed up all the floppies that had good stuff on them to CD before I pitched them. I found copies of the promos I built in 1996 to get illustration work, funny sound samples from my sister, old writing from a class I took at Hopkins in 1997, and about a billion different extentions, updaters, and utilities.
So I’ve been using X-acto knives since I was about fourteen or so. My Dad got me into balsa wood airplanes by giving me a Spad biplane kit, his fifties vintage X-acto set and a stern lecture on how to handle knives—this was not long after slicing my thumb open with a dull Swiss Army knife attempting to earn a merit badge for the Cub Scouts. I’ve cut thousands of sheets of paper, probably been through at least five 100-count boxes of replacement blades, and made four airplanes since that hot July afternoon in 1985. So you would think I’d know not to stick myself with a number 10 blade as deeply and as quickly as I did this morning. Apply pressure, jump in the car, sign in to the ER and wait. After a few shots of Lidocaine, the young attending sewed up the wide gash with five deft stitches, gave me a pressure bandage, and stuck me with a tetanus shot in the arm.
If I think real hard, I can count a few recent stitches for a crooked laceration on my knee, some in the back of my head when I was six and fell on the big rock in the backyard, and some for a deep cut on my elbow. I don’t count all the times I should have been stitched up—the wide gash under my eye from crashing into my friend Steve playing volleyball (we were seventeen, sucking down beers at my friend Jon’s house on the back lawn, his mom was in Israel, and we had three days of co-ed summer bliss ahead—there was NO way I was screwing that up); the long, deep gash on my forearm from sliding my bike down a wet crosswalk on the way to work in ’95; and several puncture wounds during the long summer years of contracting after college. Tetanus? Feh.
Huh. I just realized that I posted the same picture twice. Sorry folks.