Left to right : My rig as it was at The Old Place (six months of my life I can't wait to get some distance from), said rig around the same time the next day, and My Entire Life for the early part of march.

The rig-as-it-was shot isn't entirely accurate - the scanner sat on some kind of heavy-ass moderately portable table-and-chairs thing up until a few days before the shot was taken. It now rests on a milk crate and is positioned so I can scan big stuff (read : everything, as I draw on 11x14 and scan on 8x11) by moving it across the bed, instead of rotating it.

  

The new place is still a work in progress, and probably will be for awhile. Hell, I still don't have internet - which these days is a lot like not having electricity, clean underwear, or teeth. I do have this, however:

And that's more than awesome enough to make up for the temporary lack of a home line, I think.

Three day weekend. Woo!

Verizon, brain trust that they are, somehow failed to do the work they were supposed to do yesterday. Whatever it is they need to do, they have to do it before Covad can swing by to give me DSL Without Telephone. The next time Verizon feels like coming by to do the work is the 27th.

Three day weekend without internet. Crap!

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Update, 20090323.09:12 : The honeymoon is over. Friday through 10pm Sunday evening was fantastic (excluding the hangover I got from barhopping with Xopher.tm). Then my upstairs neighbor came home with company, turned his gangster rap up to airport levels, and proceeded to be a complete and total asshole for the rest of the night. Where "the rest of the night" is turning it down from "hear it clearly*" to "hear the bass clearly" after knocking on his door at 00:15 monday,** then continuing with the THUMPA THUMPA THUMPA THUMPA THUMPA until some point after I passed out, which was around 02:30.

His "excuse" for this behavior is that Monday is his only day off. I get that. What I do not understand is how or why he feels this gives him the Divine Right to blast his shitty music at nightclub levels at 11pm on a Sunday night, urinate off of the second floor balcony, and carry on like Bloomfield is a cul-de-sac on the South Side.***

As I was promised Quiet by the property manager, and Quiet is why I took the place, and Quiet is what I had until last night, and I'm here for a year... if this happens again, the situation will be Dealt With. Somehow.

That aside, an altogether fine and enjoyable weekend.

* Of which I recognized Tom Petty at one point, and The Beastie Boys at another. The rest was a mix of hip-hop and loud obnoxious whooping and stomping around like the place is a race track for pony players. When it comes to noise violations, I actually prefer hip-hop. I don't know the artists, I don't know the lyrics. If it's music I've heard, then my brain has a funky habit of filling in what I can't hear. And in a situation like this, "can't hear" is preferable to "filling in."

** During this conversation, he had the temerity to say that the thirty minutes or so of me and Xopher.tm being obnoxious friday night had "kept him up." This after I let him roll at Maximum Motherfucking Volume for over two hours without saying anything about it.

*** If you want to be seriously obnoxious, South Side is the place to do it. All of the residents between 12th and 23rd are either deaf or busy being very loud very late themselves, so it's not like anyone is going to notice or care.

Last update : 20090310.16:21

Craigslisters contacted: 8

Replies: 5
- Replies that smell funny : 1
- Appointments made : 4
-- Places not looked at due to communications snafu : 1
-- Places looked at : 3
--- Places lost out on : 1
--- Places that will get back to me : 1 (did, best move-in date moved back)
--- Credit check / rental applications filled out : 1
--- CCRAs paid for & delivered : 1

Credit check passed, lease filled out, checks written, utilities switched over (my name is now in the Equitable Gas system - ew, ew, ew!). One to three weeks for internet, move-in scheduled for Wednesday night, giving my Thursday in full to get everything set up, fully vet the plumbing, etceteras.

Oh yeah - it's in Bloomfield. The place won't win any awards but it's more space than I need... and only marginally more expensive than my full wad of rent and utilities when I was at Carey Way.

Further bulletins as events warrant, of course.

Looked at a place in Oakland on Friday. Too small to fit my equipment and my bed - I'd have to pick one.

Looked at a spot on the slopes today. It's fantastic - but I'm in a pool of candidates and will be advised of the decision no later than the 8th.

And about a half an hour ago, the owner of the current building stopped by to say he's turning off the water soon, and changing the locks tomorrow.

Hello, urgency!

Update, 20090302.12:08 : I'm living in a kitchen. I brought my bed, my clothes, and my laptop. Everything else I own, it turns out, fits exactly into my storage locker.

The kitchen is understood by all parties to be temporary.

The spot I looked at on Sunday re-listed later that night. Reading between the lines, I spent a nasty Monday of coming up empty on CL and other internet channels. And I found out this morning that the place I looked at in Oakland has already been snapped up... so being willing to live without my futon frame is a moot point.

The search has now expanded from "South Side and Oakland" to "Anything one bus from Oakland, except Carrick.*"

* I've lived in Carrick and exclude it for good reason. This includes anything on Arlington, as their idea of being "on the busline" is a 51a that runs about as often as STS service to the space station. The primary sticking point for South Side is I know the major bus routes and can do the hunter/gatherer thing without hassle. Moving to a new neighborhood means finding a new grocery store, etc.