and yes, on saturday there was yet another accident in or street, now almost in front of our house, we were just walking inside when there was a loud BANG (but not as loud as on wednesday). again the police was there very fast. with every accident, also a fire truck (but this, and previous time there were even 2) and an ambulance comes (i actually wanted a pic with all the cars there, but right at that moment my battery was of course empty). the ambulance barely stopped and then left again: it was not needed. also the large fire truck was not needed at all, and the smaller just was cleaning the street (but left the remnants on the street! instead of really removing it). all these trucks did cause a small traffic jam, but luckily not another accident.
another traffic sign. here blinds are crossing.... while walking there on wednesday, we suddenly heard a loud BANG, and then nothing... at the crossing medford/school street 2 cars collided. i actually saw the car, but it all went so fast... both were total loss. the front of one car, a jeep, was totally damaged and some fluid was running out quickly. none of the drivers seemed hurt, but i can imagine it could have been very bad. many people heard the loud bang and came out to see what was going on. and the police arrived soooo quickly! within 5 minutes they were there. then a huge firetruck came as well as an ambulance (both not needed, fortunately). but by then we were home already.. no fun in watching an accident scene...
sitting on the couch, around 11 in the evening. saturday. suddenly a lot of music outside; and yes, there they are again: the bikers. with lots of lights.. one with a discoball (see pic). the bikes look weird.. with very high handlebars. it seems they are gathering at the house with the sign "egobama is a liar" (see post "nice neighbour"). last saturday they met up there around noon, and we heard them again around midnight! were they biking that long? first time i kind of saw them, i thought i was imagining it; it was on the same evening as when a car toppled upside down. but just now i did some googling, and yes, it is a "bike gang", called SCUL (subversive choppers urban legion). according to a blog i just found (they are not easy to find on the net!), they are a non-profit, artistic, bicycling nerd gang based in Somerville. their missions are every saturday, when they head off from a secret base (our street, apparently!) on their ships (i.e. bikes), and the "fleet's flag ship" is responsible for the loud music. the bikers are called "pilots" and us, the normal people, are "civilians". isnt that just veeerrrryyyyy weird?
a perfect home ofcourse also needs a pet. there used to live 5 dogs in this house (2 in this apartment, which are sleeping every night on the outer sides of their owner's queen bed; yes, with the owners in the middle, but thats just an unbelievable detail), and all are/were happily shitting in the small garden around the house (yegh! every so often the upstairs girl is running down, throwing her dog in the garden until hes done so she can run up again).
as told before, to get somewhere, we need to take the bus first. what i do not understand here, is that the bus stop is merely a sign for the bus to stop. and, ah yes, it says which bus number stops there and what its final destination is. but a schedule? o no, that you will not find... and thus you can never just pass a busstop and think: ah, lets check whether a bus might come in 5 mins.. and depending on that, either walk on or wait for it.... grr....
without bikes (or a car) everything takes soooo much time... i really do miss my bike. but i am afraid to bike here. maybe in the neighbourhood would be fine, but to work, no way, far too crowded and the cars so big and so little space on the bad road with all its holes.. but it means we really walk a huge amount. weekends are far more busy and tiring than work, at the moment. today for example we first walked to Market Basket (favorite supermarket), in total that takes like an hour. then we walked to Porter square in Cambridge (i like that area a lot, nice shops etc), then we walked to the house of a colleague of tim, who celebrated getting her PhD (that was nice), and then we had to walk back home again. i think at least 2 hours of walking today, and yesterday no less. worst is, usually we walk with so much stuff we buy here and there and everywhere.... :)
across the street, they have this sign in the garden. it is under a big american flag, which is illuminated during the night....
Our house has 5 apartments, 4 trashbins, and 1 recycle bin (for paper, glass and plastic). the latter nobody uses except us. the other bins are actively filled, but nobody every puts out the trash on tuesday-night. so far, only tim did it, and otherwise it did not happen.... yegh....
due to an excess of space (never thought i would be able to say that, ever!!), we currently have a room that solely serves as laundry room.... as you can see here.. :) ok, in the walk-in closet (that is a little too small for my taste), are my clean clothes.
this is the basement. here we can do our laundry (2 dollars, to be paid in quarters so we are always saving these). in the netherlands, one wash takes 2 hours approximately, here it takes less than 15 minutes! how can anything become clean in this short amount of time? besides, the machine is so unfriendly to your clothes.. im afraid everything will be ruined soon.....
our "second" living room. here still filled with suitcases.. we rented a car for the weekend and got some stuff to fill the rooms with... :) (maybe later some pics of that!). the shops are sooooo enormous here. bigger than big. we thus walked a lot the past 2 days. now at least we have some nice, own stuff (including our own suction mouth.... ;) but thats something to be explained another day as well.
this is the first livingroom... as you see, there is only 1 couch, and nothing else. then there is also a second livingroom, which is connected to the first by suite-doors (dont know how you call these doors). there are big windows. we are on ground level, and this room is facing the main street; the busstop is right in front of the house...
