Eseme's Den

What's that you say, Mr. Oil Change? My car is making a strange noise because it is leaking Power Steering Fluid? The same fluid I asked your shop to check last time and you said it was OK, even though I was hearing this noise?

And what happens if I drive to Maine? Oh, the steering might freeze up. Great.

What's that you say, Mr. Car Repair Shop (which sold me the car)? You're out of loaners? Come back at 1:00, and maybe spend the rest of the afternoon at your shop instead of packing?

This blows. I'll probably be out the repair bill, since odds are this is another hose that is not covered by the warrenty I got. Lovely.

And I spent the morning running some quick errands, and now the afternoon at the car shop. I'm now a full day behind schedule on packing.

*screams*

I know people are curious about my first week of work. And I will post about that, under some sort of friends-lock... at some point.

Right now I've just completed an unsuccessful search for my hammer. It has to be somewhere with my good screwdriver... and I can't find it anywhere. Possibly it is still in the Panther's Lair, and I can retrieve it in the future. Which doesn't help me now, when I want to assemble two bookcases which will have cardboard that gets nailed to the back of them.

I'm going to have to buy another hammer, because I just can't sit here with this many boxes much longer. The local hardware store is going out of business (the owner is retiring) so I can get one at something like half off. But still, buying another hammer is silly.

I've been hemorrhaging money, trying to either replace things I couldn't take out of the apartment in Buffalo (like bookcases) or get new things that I need in this apartment due to space issues (storage thing for the bathroom because it is half the size of the one I had in Buffalo, and a fake closet unit so I can store costuming stuff).

*sigh* I just feel like I'm not getting anything accomplished here, and there will always be boxes.

The drive yesterday sucked. We were up at 8:00, and left the hotel around 9:30. Then chipped ice of the vehicles for half an hour. We arrived in Sidney around 2:00 - the drive was long and slow and icy and scary. We got to see a jack-knifed tractor trailer on 88 (thankfully it was southbound and we were northbound). The trailer was still going southbound. The cab was going northbound right next to it on the edge of a steep embankment. The driver was very lucky not to have gone over and rolled. As it was the local police looked to have no idea how to get it off the edge. It continued to rain as we unloaded the U-Haul trailer.

All the stuff is in the apartment. I just need to excavate. Dad says it is sort of like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom...

One thing I really need to find is the hardware that holds together the futon I slept on in Buffalo. My parents gave me another one, so I've got that set up for my bed. But it would be nice to have a sofa-like thing int he living room, plus lissa_dora might want to sleep on it when she visits. I'll still have my nifty fold-out chair, but I like to give guests options. And I can't find that hardware- not int he "Useful Stuff" box, and not in a few other bags and boxes that have screws and other hardware. I know it will turn up, along with the screwdriver I use to assemble to futon, but I'm not sure WHEN it will show up. Dad recons I have a month of unpacking ahead of me...

The kitchen is mostly done though- just need to go buy food for the fridge and pantry shelf. The tea shelf is rather full, as is the mug shelf. I have obvious priorities.

Today I hope to get most of my clothes situated- which will involve moving closet-organizer stuff around.

I plan to try and get my TV and bunny ears set up too. It would be nice to watch the Superbowl at home so as not to meet any rabid Giants fans. But Fox is channel 40 around here, and bunny ears are often not that good at getting high-numbered channels.

I'm getting internet at my lovely local library, who were nice enough to let me work in someone's office (it was that or the reference desk as all the other computers are reserved- and I don't start work until Monday).

No more internet for me until after work on Monday.

Moving is like an abyss, but without cookies. Hence the icon.

Moving sucks. The current game plan:

I work today. I may get a few more boxes packed. This is my last day of work.

Monday I pack. I madly pack. All must be packed.

Tuesday Dad acquires a U-Haul trailer. And we load it up with the stuff here in Maine. This includes some furniture which I either bough from the L.L. Bean employee store, or was handed down from my parents or grandparents.

Wednesday Dad and I drive to Small Town, New York. I'm not saying where that is in a public post- do not tell the internet where you are. We unload the trailer as fast as we can and try and drive to Syracuse by 8:00 or 9:00 PM to sleep.

Thursday we drive from Syracuse to Buffalo and all my stuff in storage. We work very hard to get it all packed up, so that I don't have to pay for another day of storage (this would be the 31st of January). Then we drive to Rochester to get stuff from the Panther's closet. He will now have a closet again. Then we go to a hotel and sleep.

Friday- well, we might end up getting stuff from the Panther on this day, depending on how loading the U-Haul went the day before. We then drive back to Small Town. We unload as much as we can. I would love to return the trailer to U-Haul on this day, so we pay for one less day of use. That may or may not work out.

Saturday we either keep unloading the trailer, or start arraigning my apartment. By this point it will be a sea of boxes and unassembled futons. Dad will have to leave sometime around 1:00 PM as he has an early-morning appointment in Massachusetts on Sunday. This is when I would have liked Time Warner to show up and turn on my cable and internet, but they don't do house calls on weekends (so I've decided to give them less money in return for less service).

Sunday I will try and listen to the Superbowl on the radio while I unpack. My parents are Patriots fans, living in Maine and all. My mom is a bigger fan than I knew- Dad bought her a Patriots sweatshirt and she wears it while she watches games. I find that a little alarming... Anyway, this really matters to her, so I want to know what's going on. I'd rather not go to a sports bar or something deep in Giants country and root for the Patriots. Sounds hazardous to my life. Besides, this way I can unpack at the same time!

I start work Monday.

People reading this in Rochester or Buffalo might think: "Hey, she'll be in town. We could have dinner with her or something." That's a great thought. But I'll be insanely busy, and will likely be moving stuff until after dinnertime, then sleeping and getting up at hours my father considers morning and I really don't. Plus all this fun will be happening at the worst possible time of the month for me to be doing heavy lifting. So I'll be frazzled, snippy, and possibly screaming at times. Plus, we might not even have time, given the schedule we will be working on. Sorry!

I hope to make it to Rochester for SimCon, but I may not have any vacation time then, so I can't be sure at this point. I do know I will have a small housewarming party later in February, consisting of me and lissa_dora. Hey, I said small! This will be kind of odd for me.

I don't get visitors. When I lived at RIT, I had people other than me in my apartment about twice in the year I lived there. When I lived in my first off-campus apartment I had visitors more often, but tended to weird them out by being a hostess. I'd try and have nice food and stuff to do- for them it wasn't an occasion but it was for me since no one ever came in my place and saw my stuff. But I had people other than me in my apartment maybe ten times out of that year.

Visitors were common at Frank and Suzzanne's place, but they were generally in the public areas of the house, not my little room. I dated a viking who turned out to be smarmy- he saw my room but almost no one else did. I had no visitors while I lived in Buffalo at all, with the exception of one weekend when the Panther came and by then the apartment was such a mess that he was kind of alarmed. "Can't move, stuff might eat me." Well yes, but when you live in a place where no one else has been for over a year, you get in the habit of leaving piles of stuff lying about because it is easier than cleaning up and no one else will see. And since I was only in that Buffalo apartment for about half the week anyway, I wasn't really living there myself.

So, a new apartment, and a visitor who has never seen any of my belongings. My inner hostess is channeling Martha Stewart and trying to decorate, thinking about what china I have and do I have wine glasses, planning some sort of menu, and trying to make me nervous a month in advance. I'm trying to shove her in a box. We'll see if that works. Someday I'd really like people dropping by to be a normal thing as opposed to an occasion.

I have an apartment!

The hotel I was at was a bit sucky in a few key areas. The one computer available to guests to browse the internet was broken, they were unable to deliver a newspaper to my room on any of the three mornings I was there, and their cleaning staff was unable to follow their "save water, wash fewer towels" policy.

But aside from the hotel, everything else was great. Ruby passed her state inspection with flying colors (Yay! No big car bills!).

I got an apartment. There are two complexes in town, but they only had 2-bedroom apartments. I don't really have enough stuff for a two bedroom, plus I want to save money on rent and pay off loans and debt. So while I made an appointment to look at those (there were hints that a 1-bedroom might become available) I also made nine other appointments to look at privately owned apartments.

I ended up at the complex first, due to scheduling. And they did have a 1-bedroom available. It was in my price range, and I loved the "all utilities except electric included" policy (only one other place could offer that, and it was a studio cottage right next to some train tracks). I also enjoy the convenience of having an easy-to-reach maintenance staff.

So I had them run my application and credit check (I have a really sweet credit rating, apparently) and looked at one other place while they did that. It was horrific and scary. I jumped at the chance to sign a lease with the complex, and canceled my other appointments.

I took pictures. They are in the only gallery here: http://pics.livejournal.com/eseme/ and are locked down so random people can't see where I live.