SansPoint

I, my associate Mr. Mike (of 30 Minutes…), and fellow associate Rob have been looking for a place to live after this semester ends. It’s been a tricky job: we need to find a place that fits our modest budget^[1], that’s reasonably close to campus, or at least effective transportation to campus, and in an area where we won’t become part of the rising number of murders in Philadelphia. This has been more of a problem than one might think. The three of us are barely employed, and attempts to find housing through legitimate and semi-legitimate sources^[2] have left us with a number of failed leads, and a lot of frustration, compounded by conflicting work schedules leaving parts of us unable to gather to see places as a trio.

We have managed to get appointments to see two locations, both in North Philadelphia. The first, a tiny, tiny, tiny 3 bedroom rowhouse near LaSalle University for $900 was snatched from beneath us before we could even fill out paperwork. Between that, and the next, we attempted to schedule appointments, had one realtor pull out on showing us a house, another simply hang up when I mentioned we were Temple students, and several not even bother to return calls. Friday, though, we seem to have found a place.

For the appointment, I was joined by Mr. Mike, and we traveled not too far from campus in a passable neighborhood occupied by mostly elderly black people. The place was a four bedroom apartment converted from the top two floors of a three story rowhouse, almost finished being renovated. It had new windows, fresh paint, a new kitchen, and – best of all – cost $850 a month. Plus, it was two minutes, by foot from a new PathMark supermarket^[3], a short walk from a new laundromat and shopping center, and stupidly close to public transit options like the R8 Regional Rail and the Broad St. Subway.

I did some breakdowns of the rent. There are two larger bedrooms, and two smaller bedrooms. If we divide rent according to room size, and our potential fourth flakes out, that splits the rent into two people paying $300 for the larger rooms, and $250 for the smaller room^[4]. If the fourth joins in, then we’re talking $225 for the large rooms, and $200 for the smaller rooms. Either way, with our current job-status, we shouldn’t have any problem affording rent.

Of course, this is all pending a credit check, and some other formalities, but the deposit (two month’s rent, or $1700) is available when needed. We still need to hear from our fourth, but whether he’s in or out, we could easily afford living there, and it’ll be ready to move in by the time Mr. Mike and I are forced to flee from our dormitories. I’m hoping it works out.

1. okay, nearly non-existant budget ↩
2. i.e. craigslist ↩
3. I’m not a fan of PathMark, having worked for them and getting screwed, but it’s better than nothing. ↩
4. the fourth could either be rented out later, or used as a studio space or something. Who knows? ↩

Me: Tell her you were trying to save a baby carriage.
Esme: Full of kittens!
Izzy: Nuns.
Me: Kittens who belong to nuns!
Camden: Kittens who are nuns!

Thank you.

• A Neverlate Seven-day Alarm Clock.
• A large number of books.
• Two large Moleskine cahier notebooks
• A CD-ROM from my World History Textbook
• A Tootsie Roll coin bank.
• An Ikea desk lamp.
• The center of an LP of Whipped Cream & Other Delights by Herb Alpert’s Tijuana Brass
• A pair of Sennheiser HD-202 headphones.
• A telephone headset
• A set of JBL Creature II speakers.
• Two Spindles of CD-Rs.
• A Sudoku page-a-day calendar.
• A Brother P-Touch labelmaker.
• GameBoy and GameBoy Advance games
• Post-It flags
• A staple remover
• A really bright LED light
• An old Swingline stapler
• A large coffee cup filled with pens, pencils, a pair of needlenose pliers, scissors, and the like.
• Replacement leads for my mechanical penclis.
• Silver Sharpies.
• An electric pencil sharpener
• Scotch tape.
• Scotch puffy double-sided tape
• A large glue stick
• Fingernail clippers, toenail clippers, and a nail file.
• A cheap-ass pedometer.
• A hat cleaning sponge
• A ceramic figure of the Buddha
• Three SEPTA tokens
• A small box of small paperclips
• A Zippo
• Concert ticket stubs: Thomas Dolby (2), Devo, Polysics
• A cordless phone with base station.
• A Mark Mothersbaugh action figure
• Cell phone charger
• An iBook G4
• A large, unlined Moleskine
• My cell phone
• A pocket lined Moleskine reporter
• A Swiss Army wristwatch with a broken band
• My wallet
• An eyeglass cleaning cloth
• A pocket lined Moleskine
• Two hair elastics
• A black twist-tie
• A tin of Altoids.
• A 19″ Dell LCD monitor
• iPod headphones
• Rubber iPod sheath
• A pen
• Mac mini with 250GB LaCie external mini Companion hard drive
• Hairbrush
• Black iPod video 30GB in dock
• 7-port USB hub from Staples
• Lots of cables
• Speed Stick deodorant
• Apple pro keyboard
• 1GB Samsung Cruzer Titanium on keyring, with keys on carabiner
• Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer
• Mousepad with built-in gel wristrest.
• Power strip and a large number of power adapters for electronic devices

Read Part 1

Well, we hit the local RadioShack and bought the battery we thought we needed for the iMac DV. I say “thought” because we got the damn thing back and put it in only to find the same symptoms as before.

Desperate, I hooked up my iBook to the network and posted on Apple’s discussion forums. Verdict: the damn thing is FUBAR.

Fortunately, my friend had accidentally^[1] bought another iMac from eBay which he has not paid for yet. Though that one is a bit lower in specs (400Mhz G3 versus 500Mhz G3), it does at least come with OS X 10.3 Panther, and should get the job done.

Still, I can’t help but feel a little frustrated.

1. or possibly by serendipity ↩

It was supposed to be a simple procedure. A friend of mine just bought an old iMac DV, one of the second generation models with the translucent indigo blue case and slot-loading CD drive, off eBay. It came stripped: no operating system, no software, nada. I was to be called in to help him set it up. I figured, what the hell, and acquired OS 9, and OS X 10.4 CDs, then went into Center City to help him buy a keyboard, mouse, USB hub, and other useful things.

We return to his dorm room, take the iMac out of its box, brush off the remaining styrofoam pellets, remove it from its plastic bag, and plug it in. As soon as it has power, the darn thing makes a sort of fuzzy, static noise, very faint. We’re not sure what’s causing it, but go full-speed ahead, and press the power button. The static noise gets louder, and it makes some other noises, but aside from that, nothing happens. I figure something’s wrong with the PMU, so take out my pen, jab it against the button on the side where the ports are, and wait.

No dice.

Eventually, with my pen still jammed against the PMU button, the power button lights up, flashes several times, and passes out. All the while, the machine is grunting away, trying vainly to start up. The monitor tries to come on, the speakers occasionally pop, the drives spin up and spin right back down. It can’t even get to the point where you hear the startup chime. So, I whip out my iBook G4, and decide to go searching Apple’s website and the rest of the web for solutions to our problem.

Of course, Temple University’s dorms lack wireless. Fine, we’d bought a network cable in the interim, and I plug that in. Still no luck, as I have to register the iBook with Temple to get internet access. My friend logs in to the Temple server, I run their configuration program, and get told that internet access will be up for my iBook in the hour. At this point, I seriously begin regretting my choice of college.

About a half-hour later, and more prodding the PMU and Reset buttons, I finally get online with the iBook. My searching had suggested that the problem may be the logic board battery, and so, we place the machine on the desk, screen down, and start to open it using my Swiss Army Knife. It is not an easy task, since a number of the screws are placed in little crevices where the blunt tip of my screwdriver/wirestripper/can opener blade can go. Eventually, we manage to break into the seedy underbelly of this iMac, and our quarry, a purple 3.6V lithium battery is easily removed.

We can’t be sure it’s dead, but thankfully my friend had a multimeter on hand. Sadly, the multimeter had no battery, and to put a battery in, we needed a screwdriver smaller than the bit on my knife. He runs out to RiteAid for an eyeglass repair kit^[1], and I prod at the computer a bit more. When he returns, we check the battery, and the damn thing couldn’t be more dead if it were buried by the light of a full moon. It’s never good to see “-0.01″ on a multimeter.

Sadly, by this point, the nearby RadioShack^[2] is closed. We admit surrender, for now, and close the computer back up. After class on Monday, we’re going to get a replacement battery, and see what happens. Wish us luck.

1. the battery for the multimeter was borrowed from his radio ↩
2. aka “RadioShit” or “Rat Shack” ↩