Act natural

( Friday, Aug. 16, 2002 3:48 pm )

>Philadelly diddly doo

PHONE PHONE INTERNET!!! Hooray!!! Scant minutes ago a trip to Radio Shack produced a 100 ft phone cord, giving me phone service in my room for the first time! Oh joyous, joyous. Yes, friends, I am in my new crib in Philadelphia. It's 800 degrees up here, we still don't have cable, my feet hurt, nothing works, I don't know where anything is: I really love it here, and that is not even a little bit sarcastic. I just wanted to point out that I just read all my usual diaries for the first time in a week, and it made me feel infinitely better. I didn't think I was so dependent on technology, but 5 days in the 19th century have taken their toll on me. It's seriously old school here. I had to LIGHT the gas oven the other day. Never done that before, I tell you.

Moving in Saturday was just back-breaking, heavy, sweaty. Both my parents and June's came along, which was very lucky. Our mothers seemed to spend an inordinate amount of the time "guarding the truck," but my father in particular was tireless in carrying the really heavy shiznit up the three flights. And he put our beds together too. And brought back the UHaul. I have to give him props for being the proper sort of father who will really do anything for his kids, will sacrifice at the drop of the hat. Of course, I try to make him stop, because it makes me feel very guilty when he's tired and unhappy because of me, but he honestly wants to. It's an interesting thing. I'm not the sort of girl who says "Daddy," but he really is the best.

Anyway, since then I've been sort of unpacking and acculturating, walking around the neighborhood and Center City, taking the tram, etc. It's been uniformly cloudless and 100 degrees everyday, so we just melt. We've had trouble getting a cable box put in because we have the top floor of a house rather than an apartment, so Juney and I watch scrambled Friends reruns every night on the only channel that comes in, and play Nintendo, and watch the two videos we rented over and over. We're going to South Street tonight.

So I have to say I like everything I've seen of the area so far, and I think I can handle it and everything, but so far it's been true that everything is a bit of a hassle. Phone, cable especically, but even in getting around, I always think I have the public transpo system figured out, and then suddenly I can't find the right bus stop or something. We're all the time walking an extra 10 blocks along white hot sidewalks. It looks almost like it could rain--I sure hope so.

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