C94809526 - Unpacking.
"I think I've found the problem."
After a few surgical movements deep inside the unit, the giant maintenance man pulled a charred, black, crumbling mass out from the depths of the air conditioner. A blade-shaped piece jutting off to one side was the only thing left to indicate that this mass was once a fan.
He stood up with the debris in hand and a quizzical look on his face. "Has anybody checked this out before?"
"We've only been living here for three days," my lady replied.
He nodded and took a closer look at the remains.
"I guess that explains all the boxes."
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Move-In Day had its complications. There was a point where we thought we lost the cat. There was a point where we thought we lost her father (and, more importantly, our bed). We spent all day Saturday sorting and packing and moving her stuff, and now the rooms can be identified by the arrangement of boxes across their floors.
And this was only for her stuff. Mine's coming this weekend.
It doesn't help that I will be the one providing most of our carry-over furniture. It feels kind of like college again - right now, we have four chairs and bed, with various combinations of boxes making up the rest of the furniture.
The transition to having a roommate has been very smooth so far. Both the lady and I are still wrapped up in both the newness of the experience and the excitement of having the other nearby. Everything is still in flux, and we're in a holding pattern while we wait for it all to settle down. I kind of wish that she had an LJ of her own right now - I'd really love to read her take on this. (Hint, hint, hon.)
Punky has not had it so easy. She spooked as soon as we started moving the bed, and she didn't take well to being shoved bodily into a pet-carrier. She spent the next day and a half cowering under the bed, but eventually she dropped the grudge and is now back in form. She can now be found either begging for food or laid out on some flat surface nearby.
The work schedule has filled up in the last two days. Back to the Wasteland tomorrow for a mercifully short two-day stint, followed by safety training on Tuesday ("Let's imagine that your toast is jammed in the toaster, and all you've got is a butterknife..."), followed by a quickie trip down to kimbyrle's country next Wednesday (how about dinner?), followed by installation at the nearby cakewalk job starting the following Monday. I'm sure there will be more to come.
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The area we're now living in, which I will cleverly dub "The Northside", is considered the wealthy part of the city - mostly just a white-bread suburb that exploded when several corporate headquarters moved to the area. It's been tempting to take some potshots at the faux surrounding the money, but, to be honest, that's both cliche and unfair. As with everyone, they are only people, living life to the best of their paycheck - no need to be mean-spirited.
There are some situations, though, you just can't pass up.
My old apartment was located just north of the city's Spanish ghetto, in a very urban, working-class, racially-diverse neighborhood. The real trashy "ghetto" complex was just down the street. All of those stereotypes you encounter about "living in the 'hood" - the dealer on the corner, the pick-up b-ball games, the tricked-out cars from the '70s with spinners and stereos worth more than the vehicle - they were up close and personal on a daily basis.
The lady and I spent yesterday evening shopping for apartment stuff, winding our way through lanes of Beamers and Escalades on our way from one upscale superstore to another. As we were heading back to our car at one store, a familiar thumping began to fill the air. Our heads turned in unison, and conversation stopped when we found the source. Like a train wreck, you couldn't tear your gaze away from the low-riding white '70s Lincoln slowly cruising through the Walmart parking lot, the cranked-up crunk rattling the pavement with every snap of the kick-drum.
And driving this ghetto hyperbole was a skinny, blonde white boy wearing a wife beater and gold chains, laying down in the driver's seat, one hand on the steering wheel, nodding his head to the beat of the mobile earthquake, intent on showing off the fruits of his middle-class upbringing.
It was a moment every black comic dreams about. Some moments just need a Chris Rock.