On the western front

Drove back out to western mass, as classes start on Monday. I'll do my best to keep up on new posts, but it will be a busy semester..

I'm all moved back into my house, "Crapshack DeLuxe," and so far (that's to say, in the few days I've been back), it has been fully operational.

When I tell people it shares a wall with an auto body shop, this is what I mean. That's us on the right, and Norm's Auto Body on the left. The noise really isn't as bad as one might expect, but the paint fumes are pretty bad in the middle of the day.

Our super (5th story down) finally replaced a crucial broken part in our furnace, and we now not only have consistent heat, but we lose the "ambiance smog" in the house to boot. Double score!

He did steal my wire stripper though. Hmm.

It would be hard to fully convey the feel of the place, but I'll do my best with some highlights.

First, this is out range. It's a GE unit from the 70s, in a most 70s of greens. I honestly think it quite fetching.

The house is full of electrical outlets, RJ45 jacks, and coaxial connection points, most of which are non-functional detritus of the building's many repurposings.

Lore says it was a dentist's office, an administrative office, an Indian burial ground, and a set used in D3: The Mighty Ducks. Goldberg!

Speaking of electrical outlets, this is the functional set in my room. Note that wire (pointed to in green). I've deduced that what I have here is basically a half-assed three prong grounding adapter, as that's the ground wire, just hanging out on the carpet. Safety first.

It's not all bad though, as the place did come with a free bald tire in the laundry room. As a 205/75R14, it can make for challenging games of "put the tire on a chair and throw a football through it."

This is our display case (nothing on display...yet), this is our recessed TV area (that almost fits my TV), these are our lockers, and check it out, the bikes get their own room. Neat.

My roommate Dan got a new car, and we all went out to have it inspected, but as it's a VW, some bitz were on the fritz and it needs some parts ordered.

We stopped by the Hadley Wal-Mart for notebooks and Goldfish, general existence essentials, and got some sandwiches.

I know it was in a Wal-Mart, but thanks to this poster at the Subway, I really felt like I was in Manhaπan.

For this post's clip, this is a crash test conducted by Dekra in the early 90s (possibly late 80s), that I feel is entirely unnecessary.



Just saying, the outcome seems kind of predictable.