Berg and Bean clean the floor...
And don't look now, but another Hollins fringe character is due at the house on Friday. Neil, like my own initial move here, is fleeing a relationship and its associated residency abroad.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
hollins takeover
Berg and Bean clean the floor...
And don't look now, but another Hollins fringe character is due at the house on Friday. Neil, like my own initial move here, is fleeing a relationship and its associated residency abroad.
falcon runs
Our tradition to members on their last nights is to close out this dive on 53rd. (First time I went, a man tried to sell me used nail clippers for a dollar.) This is Jingru's party.
summer porch habit
"Oh no, this sound-activated electricity generating instrument is completely safe, BJ, completely safe."
Friday, August 1, 2008
socialist chore check-in
"I find it interesting that the housemate most supportive of socialist systems is the precise example of why they fail." - Megan, on the Red who missed his chore multiple weeks
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Friday, May 23, 2008
top 50 words about the co-op?
I love tag clouds, and I love Haymarket. Therefore I've generated a tag cloud based on word frequency in this blog about Haymarket, infrequently though it is I write. These three sentences and names are excluded.
'em although around asked board co-op community conversation cooks dinner discuss door email enough ever everyone food friend german haymarket house kitchen life living meals monkey morning mrs musical nelson night paper people plan play projects really returned room someone story sunday term think told visit week woman work years
created at TagCrowd.com
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
the doorway
Last night our side basement door mysteriously got too big for its frame. We're not talking the swollen effect of humidity, I mean by a quarter inch side-to-side it wouldn't close, when a few hours earlier it had been fine. The frame seemed completely tight and connected even though it had changed size.
I wondered if there had been another earthquake, and Allie worried whether the house had shifted so dramatically in an hour and it meant we shouldn't stay in it. Corrigan suggested this was beyond his physics knowledge, that it indicated a gap in the time-space continuum. We looked at the little foyer structure over the stairs and between 5 of us could not identify which dodgy details had always been there unnoticed until we got suspicious, and what might look different. (This was all after 10:30 at night so the light was against us.)
Then I thought, "Wonder if Andrew Cone's moving crew hauling random furniture in and out of our driveway where he'd "stored" it has anything to do with this?"
I called Ben and asked, did you hit the entryway alcove doorframe with a large piece of furniture, or, say, Andrew's truck?
There was silence.
"Because the door doesn't close anymore," I prodded.
"Um, yeah, there was something," Ben said. "When we couldn't start Andrew's truck, two of us were pushing it out of the driveway, and the drivers' side door was open and it hit the east side of the entryway. But that was only the strength of two people pushing."
And the weight of a truck, Allie pointed out when I relayed the news.
So I decided to take a piece of lumber and hold it against the east side of the door frame, and hit it with a sledgehammer. The frame jumped a bit. Several knocks later - probably much appreciated by sleeping neighbors - the door was able to close.
I was glad to have the seemingly instinctual knowledge to use a piece of lumber to distribute the power of the sledge hammer, and somewhat disconcerted that 1. our entryway can shift on its foundation like that 2. someone ran a car into the house and didn't check for damage. (I made Ben promise to change his policy next time.)
That's Haymarket: The house is out of square; was it an earthquake, or Andrew Cone?
I wondered if there had been another earthquake, and Allie worried whether the house had shifted so dramatically in an hour and it meant we shouldn't stay in it. Corrigan suggested this was beyond his physics knowledge, that it indicated a gap in the time-space continuum. We looked at the little foyer structure over the stairs and between 5 of us could not identify which dodgy details had always been there unnoticed until we got suspicious, and what might look different. (This was all after 10:30 at night so the light was against us.)
Then I thought, "Wonder if Andrew Cone's moving crew hauling random furniture in and out of our driveway where he'd "stored" it has anything to do with this?"
I called Ben and asked, did you hit the entryway alcove doorframe with a large piece of furniture, or, say, Andrew's truck?
There was silence.
"Because the door doesn't close anymore," I prodded.
"Um, yeah, there was something," Ben said. "When we couldn't start Andrew's truck, two of us were pushing it out of the driveway, and the drivers' side door was open and it hit the east side of the entryway. But that was only the strength of two people pushing."
And the weight of a truck, Allie pointed out when I relayed the news.
So I decided to take a piece of lumber and hold it against the east side of the door frame, and hit it with a sledgehammer. The frame jumped a bit. Several knocks later - probably much appreciated by sleeping neighbors - the door was able to close.
I was glad to have the seemingly instinctual knowledge to use a piece of lumber to distribute the power of the sledge hammer, and somewhat disconcerted that 1. our entryway can shift on its foundation like that 2. someone ran a car into the house and didn't check for damage. (I made Ben promise to change his policy next time.)
That's Haymarket: The house is out of square; was it an earthquake, or Andrew Cone?
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
heart of fertilizer
Corrigan, Sophia T and I were toiling in the soil on the sunshiny Sunday. Frequently the promoter of using mulch (since I am the weeder otherwise) I eyed the lawn of the neighboring apartment building. A shave was due and the nitrogen rich grass clippings would make our veggies happy.
When the short frenchman walked his dog back to the apartment gate, I called out, "Hello! What do you guys do with your lawn clippings?"
"What do I look like?" he snarled. "The janiteur?"
"Um, no, I just thought maybe, well I thought you looked informed about landscaping..."
He didn't even hold my gaze during my reply, just marched on.
Admittedly I had made a mistake, for I really thought he was the caretaker of the property. But his answer smelled worse than fancy cheese, and I wished I could retort to his needless rudeness in witty and fluent french.
All I could think of was "couers d'merde" which I hoped meant "heart of shit" but presumably a made-up insult would accomplish neither witty vengeance nor linguistic competence, and certainly not a useful reply like, "The landscaper mows on Saturdays, you might ask him."
When the short frenchman walked his dog back to the apartment gate, I called out, "Hello! What do you guys do with your lawn clippings?"
"What do I look like?" he snarled. "The janiteur?"
"Um, no, I just thought maybe, well I thought you looked informed about landscaping..."
He didn't even hold my gaze during my reply, just marched on.
Admittedly I had made a mistake, for I really thought he was the caretaker of the property. But his answer smelled worse than fancy cheese, and I wished I could retort to his needless rudeness in witty and fluent french.
All I could think of was "couers d'merde" which I hoped meant "heart of shit" but presumably a made-up insult would accomplish neither witty vengeance nor linguistic competence, and certainly not a useful reply like, "The landscaper mows on Saturdays, you might ask him."
Friday, April 18, 2008
earthquake
There was an earthquake last night.
A 5.2 on the Richter scale.
I vaguely woke up, roused to semi-consciousness, and quickly returned to sleep after wondering what my housemates were up to in our basement.
That is co-op life: you get awakened by an earthquake but fall back asleep in a split second, comforted by the assumption that other coopers are simply conducting a morning activity.
A 5.2 on the Richter scale.
I vaguely woke up, roused to semi-consciousness, and quickly returned to sleep after wondering what my housemates were up to in our basement.
That is co-op life: you get awakened by an earthquake but fall back asleep in a split second, comforted by the assumption that other coopers are simply conducting a morning activity.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Sunday, February 10, 2008
chili & pizza & creativity jam
A couple dozen people passed through last night.
I discovered that Brian took 11 years of piano lessons, and has a black belt in tae kwon do. I confirmed that Haymarket is the heart of attendance on many of the co-op-wide activities I plan, perhaps in part because I can berate them over kitchen chats. I concocted a white chili, set up a help-yourself scrabble game where players could come and go, and found out that a kazoo made out of a paper towel tube can sound pretty excellent in a jazzy jam session.
Personally I trotted out the old clarinet, got tipsy enough to do some improv vocals, and was particularly delighted to hear how well Cat's Cradle, Chapter 33, fit into the melody of Scarborough Fair. Thank you to Colin for co-vocals, and Brian and Rachael for musical arrangement. (They also were my orchestra for reading the flavors of jelly bellys and a suprisingly successful beatnik interpretation of an extract of an article on Obama's drug experience.)
And, erm, the guy who was tearing it up on the bongos gave me his CARD.
I love our basement on a Saturday night.
I discovered that Brian took 11 years of piano lessons, and has a black belt in tae kwon do. I confirmed that Haymarket is the heart of attendance on many of the co-op-wide activities I plan, perhaps in part because I can berate them over kitchen chats. I concocted a white chili, set up a help-yourself scrabble game where players could come and go, and found out that a kazoo made out of a paper towel tube can sound pretty excellent in a jazzy jam session.
Personally I trotted out the old clarinet, got tipsy enough to do some improv vocals, and was particularly delighted to hear how well Cat's Cradle, Chapter 33, fit into the melody of Scarborough Fair. Thank you to Colin for co-vocals, and Brian and Rachael for musical arrangement. (They also were my orchestra for reading the flavors of jelly bellys and a suprisingly successful beatnik interpretation of an extract of an article on Obama's drug experience.)
And, erm, the guy who was tearing it up on the bongos gave me his CARD.
I love our basement on a Saturday night.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
artistic process
My plans of a "Apocalyptic Prophet Musical in the CTA" is brilliant! Just not very concrete yet...
-an email from german lisa
Sunday, January 20, 2008
the point in winter
It was the coldest day of winter so far, clocking in at -2 f/-19 c. Being the hardcore of haymarket, we elected to trek to the Point at night to burn our Christmas tree.
Do we need lighter fluid? someone asked, and was reassured multiple times that the tree would combust almost immediately and without struggle. No one, however, took into account the task of massaging a flame out of a lighter while standing on windy lake shores.
After 10 minutes of bumbling with flameless results, Glenn caught a single sheet of twisted newspaper which sparked the tree at last. (He and Ben kept jumping around somewhat IN the firepit, to the distress of Lauren. She calmly requested Ben stop picking up the burning tree.) We stood circled around ignoring our toe-cicles and sipping spiked hot chocolate (soy milk, mexican hot chocolate, kahlua, & peppermint schnapps).
The tree was quickly naked of needles, but we couldn't feel our fingers much less stand to stick around for the grand finale of total disintegration. Ben volunteered to stomp out the tree and the rest of us returned to the car, marvelling at our original plan to WALK to the Point and saying grace that our idiocy had not reigned.
Do we need lighter fluid? someone asked, and was reassured multiple times that the tree would combust almost immediately and without struggle. No one, however, took into account the task of massaging a flame out of a lighter while standing on windy lake shores.
After 10 minutes of bumbling with flameless results, Glenn caught a single sheet of twisted newspaper which sparked the tree at last. (He and Ben kept jumping around somewhat IN the firepit, to the distress of Lauren. She calmly requested Ben stop picking up the burning tree.) We stood circled around ignoring our toe-cicles and sipping spiked hot chocolate (soy milk, mexican hot chocolate, kahlua, & peppermint schnapps).
The tree was quickly naked of needles, but we couldn't feel our fingers much less stand to stick around for the grand finale of total disintegration. Ben volunteered to stomp out the tree and the rest of us returned to the car, marvelling at our original plan to WALK to the Point and saying grace that our idiocy had not reigned.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
moving the monkey
In Haymarket lingo, "moving the monkey" refers to spilling something juicy. Moving the monkey can be both euphemistic and literal. If he's hugging a new kitchen pipe then you know to perk up your ears around the cutting board for co-op news of a scandalous variety.
After 18 months performing such sacred symbolic duty, this monkey knows our secrets. And if you ply him with enough banana tea & peanut crumpets, he talks.
After 18 months performing such sacred symbolic duty, this monkey knows our secrets. And if you ply him with enough banana tea & peanut crumpets, he talks.
externalized memory
I am actually stealing my piece today, an extract from an email written by a friend of Lydia's who visited a co-op in Boulder one spring evening. Lydia forwarded his email to us not long after I moved into Haymarket. The author marvels at the warmth and welcome of folks who seem so relaxed and informal, yet quietly depend on a firmly structured community manifesto & rules.
I thought of this passage when I saw the plantains Rachael labeled with directions.
When I was there, I noticed that the collective had a tendency to externalize its memory. There were labels on everything about where things go, and whose chores were to be done when and peg-boards and notes on a white-board. There were notes in the bathroom requesting that the yellow not be mellowed...
After describing a sumptious community dinner, a jam session and meeting new friends, the author concludes with a wish to join a co-op. I have so many questions, but they all boil down to this one, primary question: How much of what I saw is real, and how much is illusion? Certainly this is not what life is like every day for you?
I feel lucky to say the vibrancy of his visit was no exception. And Corrigan's right, there is something incredibly affirming to hear that other houses like ours exist and bring happiness too.
I thought of this passage when I saw the plantains Rachael labeled with directions.
When I was there, I noticed that the collective had a tendency to externalize its memory. There were labels on everything about where things go, and whose chores were to be done when and peg-boards and notes on a white-board. There were notes in the bathroom requesting that the yellow not be mellowed...
After describing a sumptious community dinner, a jam session and meeting new friends, the author concludes with a wish to join a co-op. I have so many questions, but they all boil down to this one, primary question: How much of what I saw is real, and how much is illusion? Certainly this is not what life is like every day for you?
I feel lucky to say the vibrancy of his visit was no exception. And Corrigan's right, there is something incredibly affirming to hear that other houses like ours exist and bring happiness too.
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
scenes from the season
Dec 9 - Rachael seranades BJ with a melody she wrote in ode to his awesomeness.
New Years Eve - Parisian Keith tends to the ice bar on our snowy front porch.
New Years Day - parade for brunch at Valois.
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