7/30/12

Living Here Is Such a Hessel

After such a long stretch of Apartment Living in Austin, this new place is taking some adjustment. I don't hear horns or sirens or trucks on the freeway at night. I have no neighbors screaming in the parking lot or blasting loud NorteƱo from parked cars. No one seems to have any e-drums. When I walk the dog down my quiet street to the nature trail, I have to endure the cacophony of chirping birds and buzzing chicharras.

I can learn to live with that, but when it comes to maintenance, these bastards have gone too far.

At Summit Creek, you get a wild rush of adrenaline any time you place a maintenance request. Maybe they would come in two days. Maybe two weeks. Maybe never. When the most recent parolee new-hire arrives,  cloud of body odor billowing into your open apartment door, you have a fifty percent chance they will actually fix the issue in a satisfactory manner. You feel like you're living life on the edge.

At this place, the clean cut maintenance crew arrives with two days of placing the maintenance request. They look like they've bathed. They fix the problem. The first time around. Then, later that day, the apartment manager has the gall to give you a follow-up call to see if the issue is addressed to your satisfaction.

Not only that, but you know that move-in checklist they give you? The one where you mark every little ding and loose knob you can find so they don't snatch the deposit from your desperate fingers at move-out time? Most places drop it in the bottom of a drawer and make some benign, placatory remark as they shoo you out the door. Then they never look at it again. At this place, they create a maintenance request to cover everything you mark after discussing it with you in detail.

Then ensues the painful cycle of satisfactory maintenance and follow up calls.

Ainers mentioned she now feels like we are really demanding tenants. We are racked guilt because we have responsive apartment management. We can't live like this.

Illinois Ghost Adventures (part 2)

This weekend we visited the old Fischer Theater in Danville. Built in 1884, it functioned as an opera house and later as a cinema. It closed in 1982. Restoration began in the 1990s, but when a technician accidentally left his recording equipment running over night, he recorded strange noises. The Vermilion Heritage Foundation called in the Springfield Ghost Society. During an investigation, they encountered dark spectral figures.



The theater remains closed, allegedly due to rising utility and maintenance costs. Maybe this is true. Or maybe malicious spirits still stroll the darkened aisles of the old Fischer Theater.

I had to film and narrate this because Aine refused to get out of the car. She said filming on a city street embarrassed her. Maybe this is true. Or maybe she could feel the dark presence that inhabits the projector room of the old Fischer Theater.

You'll notice I make several long pauses while speaking and seem to forget what I was saying. It seemed like a long day and I felt tired. Maybe this is true. Or maybe my mind went fuzzy due to pernicious energy emanating from the old Fischer Theater.


7/28/12

Midway Upon Life's Journey

So, here's a tour of the new place. It's not as good as the old tour, but it will do. We just cleaned (mostly) and hung some pictures.

Look:


Also, I didn't get a shot of the wall over the kitchen island, so look:



Update 7/30/12
From Dad: "Correction to your tour.  The picture is of Al Capone, a famous/notorious Chicago businessman/gangster.  He was responsible for the St Valentines Day massacre and a few other Prohibition capers.  He died in San Quentin prison of syphillis.  You should have more respect for such a distinguished Illinois citizen."


7/26/12

Looking for Lincoln the Lawyer

Last night we went to Carle Park, one of the closely guarded secrets of the Urbana Park District. Indeed, the directions to the park run thus:

"Across from Urbana High School mumble mumble mumble..."

To find the park, you have to leave a twenty dollar bill with your cell phone number on it under one of the trash cans on the first floor of the Champaign County Courthouse. Within twenty four hours, you receive a text from an unlisted number that gives you a time and a place to meet the park director. He arrives in a trench coat with a floppy hat and scarf across his face. This causes a bit of alarm, given the heat index.

Then he says:

"Across from Urbana High School mumble mumble mumble..."

Indeed.

Urbana High School, built in 1914, has had some notable alumni, including Roger Ebert and Ludacris. This 98 year old building exhibits Tudor style architecture.


Here's how you know:
1. Two large towers flank the main entrance.
2. Tall, narrow windows.
3. The Tudor Arch - pointed like the Gothic Arch, only wider and flattened as though under great weight. Remember how fat Henry VIII was? If you see a pointed arch and it looks like he sat on it, you probably have a Tudor.

Across from Urbana High School (mumble mumble mumble), there's a narrow lightly wooded corridor that runs between residential houses. In this corridor stands Lincoln the Lawyer (aka Young Circuit Lawyer, aka Young Lincoln).


Lorado Taft sculpted Lincoln the Lawyer in 1927. Taft went to University of Illinois for his bachelor's and master's and, during the period he created Lincoln the Lawyer, he was one of the most famous sculptors in the US. He's best known for his fountains, but he has statues in Chicago, Washington D.C. and at the Gettysburg Battlefield.

This statue commemorates Lincoln's time as a circuit lawyer in the 8th Judicial Circuit from 1837-1848. He argued a number of cases at whatever County Courthouse was standing at the time.

I was fortunate enough to get a quick picture with him.


This Lincoln numbers 5 on our list of Visited Lincolns:
1. The Lincoln Head in West Side Park, Champaign (The one with the lucky nose.)
2. Lincoln Reading Something, Decatur (I looked, the page was blank.)
3. Indoor Lincoln, Decatur (The curator discouraged us from taking a picture of this one, apparently digital photography has a deleterious effect on bronze.)
4. Lincoln's First Speech, Decatur (On the corner of Main and Main, this made three of the alleged Decatur Five, I have a feeling the other two were hocked to pay for meth.)
5. Lincoln the Lawyer (see above)

Word on the Lincolnvine is that an hour or so south of here in Ashmore stands the Largest Lincoln Statue of All Time. Unfortunately, the campgrounds on which it stands were sold (we had this recession a few years back) and the statue is currently inaccessible. This information pretty much broke my heart. Also in Ashmore: the haunted Ashmore Estates, featured in an episode of Ghost Adventures. In Haunting Illinois by Mr. Michael Kleen, however, the Ashmore Estates only rank two out of four little ghosts (by contrast, Greenwood Cemetery received four out of four little ghosts).

Back to Carle Park. After you pass Lincoln the Lawyer, the corridor funnels you through a Spanish Style Pavilion (specifically Spanish Colonial Revival... I think) in front of Miller Garden.


Then the park opens out into the rest of its eight acres. Carle Park has the little known Hickman Tree Walk. Fifty of its two hundred and fifty (large and terrifying) trees are marked with numbers and plaques. You can obtain a Hickman Tree Walk Brochure which identifies each tree and has pictures of leaves and a map. But obtaining said brochure proves almost as daunting as finding the park. They don't post a PDF online. No, you have to call a number and request a brochure. Then they give you directions to the Urbana Park District Administrative Building (which is actually an old house in one of the parks that you must enter and wind your way to the back to find a living, breathing person). I delegated this responsibility to Aine. She came back with two brochures.

We didn't have time for the Hickman Tree Walk this go round, but plan to give it the time and detail it deserves in the future. The fifty trees are all native Illinois trees. This is the mother lode.

7/25/12

Three Dolla Get Me Sammich

Sunday we cruised around town and took pictures of some local sites. This place is silly with history, so this represents the tip of the iceberg. 

I wanted to get a picture of the Kirby Avenue sign. It shows you how many trees this town has. This could just as easily be about 90% of the street signs in town. Our new apartment is across Kirby from Hessel Park.


Now back to the old neighborhood. The old apartment sat about a block away from an insane asylum. It's called a behavioral health clinic, but we know what goes on in there. Straight jackets, electroshock therapy, trepanation. See how creepy it looks?


Just down Church Street from the old apartment and the insane asylum you find West Side Park. Champaign Urbana has 500 acres of dedicated park land within the city limits, giving it, according to some sources, one of the highest park land to developed land ratios in the nation. West Side Park covers 12.5 acres (Hessel Park across the street from our new apartment covers 26 acres) and has a band stand, several statues (including the Lincoln Statue whose nose I rubbed), benches, and crap for kids. City fathers originally zoned the land for the county courthouse, it spent some time as a public cow pasture, and in 1854 it became the first park in town.

West Side Park feature of the day: Memorial flagpole for fallen police officers and firefighters.


On the opposite corner from West Side Park is the Church after which Church Street was named. Built in the 1860s, the First United Methodist Church of Champaign is a good example of the Gothic Revival style.


On the same block as the Methodist Church, you see the Springer Cultural Center. Originally built as the 1904 Champaign Post Office in the Renaissance Revival style, it's now home to a community outreach program.


Moving East into downtown Champaign, the art deco City Building stands out against the skyline. It opened in 1937, a WPA project, and originally housed the Police and Fire departments. It has since become a symbol of Champaign, featured on post cards and the city logo.


Past downtown you'll find the Cattle Bank, built in 1858. It spent some time as Heimlicher's Drug Store, but now houses the Champaign County Historical Museum. We have not gone yet, but plan to do so soon.


We drove all the way over into Urbana to get a picture of the County Courthouse. It's a bit more grandiose than the standard small town courthouse back in Texas. You can find a long history of different courthouses built on this same site and how many times Lincoln visited each of them. The current tower dates back to the 1860s and has been struck by lightening four times. County officials added much of the rest of the building in the early 1900s and gave the facade a makeover in the early 2000s.


Outside of the courthouse they've built a veteran's memorial. Illinois loves its veterans. The first US veteran's organization started in Decatur. The Grand Army of the Republic (they were called) dedicated the site we visited at Greenwood Cemetery.


The bus makes a stop next to the courthouse. Here, a worthy citizen of Urbana informed me that, were I to bestow on him a largess of three dollars, his newfound purchasing power would grant him access to a delicious locally made sandwich. With regret I admitted that I carried no cash tender.

On the block behind the courthouse, we saw the old Lincoln Hotel. Built in 1924 in the Tudor style (technically it's a mixed Tudor/Gothic, whatever the hell that means, but it looks mostly Tudor to me), it used to be a fancy old hotel. It's totally defunct now with vegetation growing from cracks in the parking lot. In the 1960s, someone had the bright idea of building an enclosed shopping mall around and connected to the hotel. Still in partial operation, it's the second oldest mall in the US (Aine looked this up on her computer phone: the oldest mall in the US was built in Providence, Rhode Island).



From the parking lot of the Lincoln Hotel, I snapped a shot of the bell tower of the First United Methodist Church of Urbana. Even though it's also Gothic Revival, don't get it confused with the First United Methodist Church of Champaign. They sit two and a half miles apart.



Across Main Street from the courthouse, we saw this sign. It don't know what it means, but it looks ominous. 


In downtown Urbana (a block west of the massive courthouse), we got a picture of the Cinema Cafe, a coffee shop. Mr. Busey named it Busey's Hall when he built it in 1870. He intended using it as a bank, but it made more money as an opera house featuring vaudeville acts and live performances. In 1915, to keep up with the times, a new owner transformed it into Princess Cinema to show moving pictures. The art deco facade you see here was added during a make over in 1934.



I couldn't find anything historic about Crane Alley. It's just an awesome bar where all the cool kids go to get a beer. They have a beer club I joined, mostly to keep up with the aforementioned cool kids. For every twenty different beers (you can't drink the same beer twice) you drink, you get a prize. After the first twenty, you get a mug. Sixteen beers to go.




I wanted to get a picture of this. Way south of downtown on Windsor Road. Built in 1979. It's Masonic Lodge No. 157. Or Centennial Lodge No. 747. Or Western Star Lodge No. 240. Or maybe all three because they meet on different days. Not sure which one to join.


And this is just down Windsor from the MultiLodge.


7/24/12

You Taste Like Sunshine Dust

So, we're all in the new place and the time seemed ripe to begin chronicling the local neighborhood arboriculture. The task of sorting out the elms, oaks, and conifers daunts the hell out of me, so I've started with the easy trees. 

This first specimen, though not a tree, excited me. I hadn't seen any of these in years until I took Cranklebob on a walk down the nature trail behind our apartments. The apartment manager said the trail ran for a mile. By a mile, I think he meant half a mile.

Bulrushes. Cattails. Typha latifolia. Apparently, you can eat any part of this plant, though experts advise cooking and skinning the rhizome. The rest is fine raw. According to the Internets, Cattails grow in every county of every state in the Continental US. Oh, well.


This next one, the Eastern Redbud (Cercis canadensis), also grows in Texas and most of the Eastern US. In the spring, they bloom pink to purple flowers and the leaves turn dark red in the fall. I'm looking forward to seeing that. Right now the branches are covered in seed pods. Not as pretty. Also, both the flowers and seeds are edible.


Several of this next tree grow down our street. At first I thought they were gigantic, mutant Mimosas. Which filled me with loathing. Mimosas are the only trees I hate more than Crape Myrtles. Sure, they're pretty from a distance, but try living under one.

I toyed around with the idea of either Kentucky Coffee Tree or Tree of Heaven, both common in Illinois, according to Ms. Kershaw. However, the tree currently has neither flowers nor fruits (which rules out Mutant Mimosa and Tree of Heaven) so I only have the leaves to use for identification. They're pinnately compound, by the way, which means each leaf is divided into small distinct leaflets, giving the tree an almost impressionistic quality from a distance. The leaves look too small for a Coffee Tree, so now I'm going with Thornless Honey Locust (Gleditsia triacanthos inermis). We'll know for sure in the fall when the fruit develops.


The Honey Locust is popular as an ornamental tree in this area, it tolerates poor soil and urban conditions, and it's a fast growing, hardy tree. The extracts help with arthritis and maybe cancer. The Native Americans used the pulp to make beer.


It's true, you can find the Honey Locust in Texas as well. So on to some Illinois only trees. Aine called this one the Salad Fingers Tree before we looked into it because it reminded her of the protagonist of the popular web cartoon.

See?


This tree, the Catalpa (Catalpa speciosa), has heart-shaped leaves that look sort of like caladiums (only dark green), incredible white flowers (well, only in the spring), and long bean pod fruits. Originally, arborists named this tree after the Catawba Indian tribe. A botantist in the 1800s named Scopoli had a little too much Honey Locust Beer one night and spelled the name incorrectly on some important document. Ever since, we've called the tree Catalpa instead of Catawba.

Also, the wood works well for guitarmakers.


And this is a Crabapple. Two types of Crabapples grow in this area: Sweet Crabapple (Malus coronaria) and Siberian Crabapple (Malus baccata). The ones growing on our street look more like the Siberian Crabapples in Ms. Kershaw's book.


Interesting Fact: Crabapples are the same Genus as grocery store apples (Malus domestica) and those, along with all other pomaceous trees, are in the same family as the Rose.

Interesting Subfact: Schnucks, our poorly named local grocery chain, the HEB of Central Illinois, does indeed stock their shelves with my favorite pome, the tart yet oh-so-sweet Jazz Apple (Malus satchmos). Life here just might be bearable after all...

7/23/12

Cornography

So, we took a trip down Curtis road. It runs east to west just south of town. It lies about three miles due south  of downtown Champaign. We shot this as an example of what you'll find three miles from town in any direction.


7/18/12

Flora and Fauna Encounters

So, like Texas, this strange, new world has both Fireflies (good ol' Photinus pyralis) and American Robins which have the scientific name Turdus migratorius. I'm not making this up.

Mr. Bojangles (Cranklebobbius mcgillicuttius) saw fireflies for the first time the other night. Formal approval pending.

Outside the old apartment grows a large shrub/small tree which I thought had square stems at first glance. It actually has four equidistant fins that grow the length of new stems. The older branches look rough and woody. It has opposite leaves that are ovate and serrated with pinnate veins. Below are pictures of the leaves and stems.




One last time: Turdus migratorious. Heh.

Update 7/19:
This is a Winged Elm (Ulmus alata), also known as a Corked Elm or a Wahoo Elm. That's right. Endemic to the southeastern and south-central US, they can be inavsive and difficult to eradicate. The wood, since it's flexible and resists splitting, is used to make rocking chairs, hockey sticks, and twine.

7/16/12

Happy One Month!


So, we've been married for a whole month today and living in Illinois for one week. I haven't noticed a difference in married life vs. being engaged, but the differences between Austin and Champaign are striking.

Here are some examples:

In Austin, you can buy beer in a Target. In Champaign, you can't buy beer in a Target, but you can buy liquor at the grocery store.

In Austin, rent is figured for two people per bedroom. In Champaign, it's figured for one person per bedroom. You have two people living in a one bedroom apartment and the rent increases.

Austin is a dog friendly town. In Champaign, there are no dog friendly apartments.

Let me tell you a story:

This apartment building used to be owned by Barr Real Estate. They allowed dogs under certain circumstances and were generally lenient about their no dog policy. This spring, University Group bought the property from Barr Real Estate.

We moved up here and spent the first week unpacking and getting our lives back in order, planning to go discuss lease stuff (adding me, adding an additional pet, etc.) this week. Saturday, Chuck, the burnout hippie maintenance man, stopped me. Chuck, according to his story, lost his job as maintenance man when the property sold, but was rehired by University Group. It's his job to keep the place clean, do the yardwork, and make sure people are following the rules: pets, noise, parking, etc.

He said, you're not supposed to have dogs here without permission from University Group. He said there are other dogs in the complex, but you have to get them to add special permission to your lease. I have to go up to the office on Monday and I'll talk to them.

Figuring it was best to head Cheech off at the pass, we went that day to discuss the lease. They were too busy to discuss the situation, so we went back for a meeting today.

I learned these interesting tidbits:

1. Chuck doesn't work for University Group. He's just a crazy old bastard that sweeps the front walk and spies on neighbors for free.

2. There are no exceptions to the No Dog policy. In fact, they told us, since there are rumors of other dogs on the property, we're going today to do a unit by unit sweep to look for unauthorized pets.

3. Honesty is not the best policy.

4. We have to look for a new place to live as soon as possible and find someone to watch our dog until we find a place. Since dog friendly apartments are very nearly nonexistent in this town, we have to find a house or a duplex. However, there don't seem to be any in decent parts of town. Most of the ones we've found are either strictly Section 8, Section 8 friendly, or not Section 8, but in neighborhoods I don't feel safe driving through.

So that's our One Month Anniversary present from University Group. My foes I do repute them, every one. Me cago en la leche de sus madres.

7/14/12

Illinois Ghost Adventures (part 1)


The Greenwood Cemetery in Macon County, is purported to be one of the most active paranormal locations in Central Illinois. Ainers and I went to verify the hauntings for ourselves.


Originally an Indian burial ground, the city of Decatur used this site for a cemetery when it was founded in the 1820s. Among the restive spirits are those of Confederate soldiers who were dumped in a mass grave on their way to a Union POW camp. Later, Union soldiers killed in battle were buried on top of the hill that covered the mass grave. Still later, the hill collapsed under a heavy rain, mixing the bodies of Confederate and Union soldiers. Efforts were made to rebury the remains, but locals believe those disturbed spirits still walk the cemetery at night.


The Greenwood Bride, a woman that wanders the cemetery at night dressed in her wedding gown, ghostly funeral processions, and spectral globes of light are just some of the many apparitions believed to haunt Greenwood Cemetery.

For a complete history of Greenwood:
http://www.haunteddecatur.com/greenwood.html

Ainers and I arrived at Greenwood just before a storm, a gray sky loomed overhead and thunder pealed in the distance. The gloomy ambiance seemed perfect for our first Illinois Ghost Adventure. We perused the gravestones, some almost two hundred years old and some as recent as the 1980s, mixed in together.



We also visited the Civil War memorial where the remains of both Union and Confederate dead have been interred.


Aine shot video footage while I attempted to capture some EVPs on a recording device. But it was mid-day. The spirits must have been resting, so we gathered no evidence of paranormal activity. However, the place felt creepy. So that has to count for something.


Looking for Lincoln


Today we drove through a thunderstorm to reach Decatur, Illinois, famed as the first Illinois home of President Lincoln. We visited the Macon County History Museum and Prairie Village which has a large collection of historical artifacts from Lincoln's time in Illinois, the Victorian era, and World War II. They even have one of a set of three chairs that used to belong to Lincoln. Apparently, Springfield also has a large Lincoln museum (along with Lincoln's tomb) and we detected a slight animosity, a hint of contention, festering between the two cities. Both claim to have a greater stake in the pursuit of Lincolnalia. 

Behind the Macon county facility, they had several small buildings from the territorial period, including the Lincoln Courthouse, an old log building that served as the county courthouse. Lincoln argued his first cases as a lawyer in this courthouse.



Another Decatur claim to fame: Decatur ranks third behind Washington D.C. and Springfield in the Most Lincoln Statues. There are five.



We found the most notable of these five, the statue in Lincoln Square, on the corner of Main Street and Main Street. I'm serious. Main Street and Main Street. We have photographic evidence of this anomaly.



This statue marks the site of Lincoln's first political speech. Story goes: Lincoln dropped his plow and walked to the edge of his field one day to extol to a randomly congregated group of Maconites the virtues of Whigdom.



We then spent some time wandering around downtown Decatur, or Soy City as several signs proclaim. We passed a large processing plant for, we assume, soy beans. A smell like green beans and frying oil hung over the town. Most of the town was equal parts wildly historic and depressingly squalid. Walking around downtown one was filled with two competing emotions: wonder at the old architecture and general ancientness of many of the buildings and fear of getting shanked at any moment.

We stopped into a local cafe for some coffee, then headed out to historic Greenwood Cemetery, a resting place for hundreds of Civil War soldiers.



Before leaving town, we stopped into Krekel's Kustard, an establishment dating back to 1949, for a world famous Krekel Burger. The place looked like a dive and a gang of fifteen year old boys with marine cuts manned the helm, but the burger was good.

Sated, we headed back to Champaign.

7/13/12

G Unit

So we made a quick video tour of the apartment now that it's no longer a disaster area. Enjoy.



Lucky Schnoz


Illinoyances love them some Lincoln. Here in the Land of Lincoln, Ol' Honest Abe has achieved Buddha status. However, according to local lore, it's not his belly you rub.

It started in Springfield, Lincoln's final resting place. Caretakers keep the nose on the bronze head in front of the tomb meticulously polished. Tourists, passersby, and weary pilgrims rub the shiny nose for good luck.

Which is funny. Lincoln said:
"I am now the most miserable man living. If what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth."

His wife was nuts, he lost a child while in office, then he got shot in the head. The Greeks didn't mind making Buddhas of their miserable heroes (look at Oedipus), so why should it bother us?

Springfield's a long drive from Champaign, but luckily, there are lesser shrines of equal Nasal Auspiciousness. A bust of Lincoln in Lincoln Hall on the Illinois Campus also has a nose shiny from collegiate luck siphoning.

Lincoln Hall is closed this time of year. Not to worry. Down the street from my apartment, somewhere in West Side Park, stands a bust of Young Lincoln. An aspiring Illinoyance myself, I figured I should get some Schnoz Luck my first week. So last night, under the light of a Waning Buck Moon, I rubbed Young Lincoln's nose.



Everything's going well so far.

(Note: This monster park also boasts a wide variety of Trees of Illinois and looks a promising site for some future Arborista Adventures.)

7/12/12

They're really called Suckers!

I thumbed through my Trees of Illinois book as I sat outside, enjoying my morning coffee. I feel fairly confident about the Sugar Elms, but I'm beside myself about the Eastern White Pine. I'm just not sure. While perusing the lengthy and informative introduction (hoping to hone my arboreal skills), I came across this picture. Forgive the cell phone pic, I still haven't found the camera after the move:



AT&T Update!

Yesterday I got the 64th email from AT&T. It sounded very excited. It said my installation day was coming soon and gave me the information I needed about the installation, and told me a technician would come to my house between 8am and 8pm. I responded  that the email was in error, I had already cancelled the order. I assumed the email was generated by some complex AT&T algorithm and that it signified nothing.

Then I got a call this morning. The very nice lady said she received the email. She said she couldn't find any record of cancellation for the U-Verse order. Then she wanted a lengthy description of my discontent with AT&T service. She told me she couldn't actually cancel the order for me, but she could connect me with someone who could. On hold. Scratchy 80s Jazz. A Ms. Cook answered and cancelled my U-Verse order with a cheerful celerity. What about the phone, I asked. Ms. Cook couldn't cancel the phone, only the U-Verse, but she could connect me to someone who could. On hold. Classical Music. Forty five second loop. Some guy answered: It's a wonderful day at AT&T, how can I assist you? Super. He was able to verify that my home phone order had indeed been cancelled. So we're squared away on the AT&T. I think.

7/11/12

The trees are all the wrong size here...



They are large and terrifying. Not a single live oak, ashe juniper, or loblolly in sight. In fact, most of the flora and fauna of this strange land look alien and bizarre. I bought a book: Trees of Illinois by Ms. Linda Kershaw. I feel fairly certain we have two Sugar Elms and one White Pine growing near our balcony. I'll try to learn the local trees and post pictures soon. 

As soon as we get our lives in order. The apartment currently looks like Galveston after the 1900 storm.



Aine and I picked up another book during our latest trek to Barnes and Noble. Haunting Illinois: A Tourist's Guide to the Weird & Wild Places of the Prairie State by Mr. Michael Kleen. Hopefully, I'll have something to report on this soon.

I intend for this blog to be a rough sketch of the adventures of a Texas boy among the Illinoiances and Corn Fields. This next bit, though, isn't specific to Illinois: it's of a more universal nature, but still pertinent to the move.

We wanted to set up super duper high speed internet so Aine could watch reruns of Dawson's Creek on Netflix Streaming while I move PDFs around all day. We chose AT&T because they are a good, old-fashioned American company like Coca Cola or Ford and we're as patriotic as the next couple. Also, we already had cell phones with AT&T (formerly Cingular, formerly Houston Wireless) and thought it would be swell to have everything on one bill. Little did we suspect, it was all bullshit.

The timeline runs thusly:

1. We spend some time online, choosing the perfect build-your-own-bundle-phone-and-internet-package for us. We place the order and sit back satisfied that we have made positive changes in our lives. We choose Self Installation so we wouldn't have to wait during a twelve hour window for some mouth breather to come and plug the cord into the wall for us.

2. I get an email informing me that the technician would come to sometime between 8am and 8pm on July 5th to install the phone for us. I get an additional email offering condolences that, for reasons too clandestine to explain over insecure connections, we would not be able to combine the bills. We would receive one for cell phones and a second for home phone and internet.

3. I call AT&T. Let me tell you about calling AT&T. You spend fifteen minutes entering your account information into a touch tone phone and navigating verbal menus so they can decide the best way to service you. Then you hold for an additional twenty minutes. The best hold music they can find is a forty five second loop. You start to get twitchy. The government should contract to AT&T to interrogate detainees at Guantanamo. When you finally hear a human voice again, they ask you for your account information and how can we help you today. You give them the information (again) and explain in explicit detail the nature of your query. They decide they can't help you and maybe they should transfer you to a different department. Twenty more minutes on hold. Forty five second loop. Twitches. The second department answers the phone. They ask you for your account information and how can we help you today.

4. The guy tells me the bills can't be combined because the cell phones and home phone/internet are based in two different regions. Fine. He says a technician has to come out for the home phone because he just has to, you know? That's the way it's done. Also, the internet can't be activated until after the technician has personally tested our phone lines. Fine. He assures me the technician will come sometime between 8am and 8pm on July 6th. I tell him we would be on the road and he moved the date back to the 9th with Internet set to be activated (and the $100 dollar internet box to be delivered on) the 12th. Fine.

5. In the meantime, I get 27 different emails from AT&T about my new services.

6. The night of the 8th. I get a phone call from a strange number. Hi, he says, I'm from AT&T with an issue on your order. Give me your account information and four digit pin so I can tell you what the issue is. I say, hells nah, bro, you called me. You'll get my personal information when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers. He says fine, call back at our 1800 number.

7. I call AT&T. See #3.

8. The girl tells me the due date on our service request has been set to December 31, 2036 and is that correct. No, I say, can you fix it? She says, yes. Super, I say, the guy for the phone is coming out tomorrow and the box and internet are Thursday? She says, yes. Awesome blossom.

9. Monday the 9th. I get up before 8am, ready for a technician to install my phone line. And I wait. And I wait. By 6:30pm, the aforementioned technician still hasn't arrived. I call AT&T. See #3. Twitches.

10. I ask the young lady that finally answers, is the guy still coming or what? She says, no. I say, no? She says, no. She says, it looks like the request for phone service was cancelled on the 5th. I say, what can you do about it? She says, nothing, I'm in Santa Fe, New Mexico. You'll have to call tomorrow. Thanks.

11. Tuesday the 10th. I check the (now) 42 emails from AT&T regarding my new services. Nothing about cancelled phone. I did get a shipping confirmation for my $100 box that I need to hook up internet. Complete with UPS tracking number. Intrigued, I go to UPS to track the package. Delivered. July 5th. To somewhere in Savoy, Illinois.

12. I call AT&T. See #3. Full body twitches.

13. The fourth person I speak to works for Sales. He is happy to resend the $100 box. He'll just fix the problem of the address and all will be well. Super. Can you help me with this phone issue? No, that's Customer Service. I'll connect you. He hangs up on me.

13. I call AT&T again. See #3. Writhing on the floor.

14. The second person I speak to is very sorry to hear about my difficulties and wants to make everything right. He can reinstate my phone request and send someone out on Wednesday between 8am and 8pm. Fantastic. Where are you sending the aforementioned technician, I ask. Savoy, he says. I'm not in Savoy: the guy in Sales said he fixed the address. No, he says, it looks like the guy in Sales only changed the shipping address, not the service request address. Can you fix it? I ask. No, he says, I'll have to transfer you to Sales. And they can fix it? I ask. No, he says, they will have to completely cancel all your orders and create new orders for phone and internet, let me transfer you.

15. On hold for 15 minutes. Forty five second loop. Calm and lucid.

16. The girl that answers actually sounds hurt when I tell her I want to cancel all services.

7/9/12

She Played Tambourine with a Silver Jingle


...played as I crossed over the Missouri border. At least, I felt sure I had entered Missouri. The American Family Radio station that carried me through Northeastern Oklahoma had long since faded and the highways had letters for names instead of numbers. As a Texan, I'm deeply suspicious of borders not clearly marked with a body of water. 

Getting out of Oklahoma turned out to be an awkward situation. Despite the recent advances in modern technology, the turnpike toll booths had woefully obsolete equipment. You can buy Google Glasses but you can't pay at a toll booth with a check card. The old man working that booth said he'd take care of it. Said do something nice for someone today. So when we arrived in Champaign, I carried all the heavy boxes and gave Ainers the light ones. I thought that was pretty nice of me.

Eastern Missouri doesn't have much going on besides the most beautiful wooded rolling hills I've ever seen. Like Loop 360 without all the mansions. And bigger hills. And lasting for hours instead of 15 minutes. After you cross over the Mississippi River into Illinois, the terrain flattens almost immediately. And stays flat for the rest of the drive. At least Illinois has some proper borders.

Mark Twain said:
"The river below St. Louis has been described time and again, and it is the least interesting part. One can sit on the pilot-house for a few hours and watch the low shores, the ungainly trees and the democratic buzzards, and then one might as well go to bed."

That's the part of the Mississippi we crossed. I didn't get to see much of Ol' Man River, though, occupied by maintaining a visual on the speeding Yaris weaving through traffic.

After passing several thousand acres of standing corn, we arrived home in Champaign, Illinois. Then we unloaded the truck for two hours in triple digit heat.