Day 3: Goodbye Boston

Today, was so stressful… I slept so bad last night, mostly because I went to bed drunk, but also since I had to sleep on the old sofa. Arggghh! The damn sofa! As I was waiting for Eyal (also known in the Lab as “the OTHER Eyal”, since I got to the lab first) I found in may email inbox some good news - we have a contract for the apartment in Paris. The bad news - I had to pay the fees to the agency, and my credit cards would not let me spend that amount. So I made some phone calls and sent some emails and hopefully by tomorrow morning it will all be resolved. Why do I deserve all this stress?!

One noteworthy call was with my bank, as I was asking them to allow me to charge my visa with more money that I have.

- “Sir, you have a $1000 limit on your card.”

- “I know, that’s why I’m calling. I need more.”

- “Well, I can transfer money from your checking account to your Visa account”.

This is totally not the way things work in Israel. I’m so confused.

- “I think that’s exactly what I want”

- “How much do you need ?”

- “Like 900 something Euros.”

- “Sir, I need an exact number.”

- “Hold on, I have the email… I need 994.09 Euros.”

- “Sir, I can also transfer US dollars”

- “O.K., so however that much it is dollars”

- “Sir, I don’t know how much it is.”

Is she kidding? also, if she calls me “sir” one more time….

- “hold on, let me google that for you.”

I was so pleased with myself…

I was then comforted by some more good news - we have an appointment at the French consulate on Monday. We actually have one appointment for the both of us, which I think is a good sign: it means that the French dudes understand the urgency of our case.

The other Eyal came and helped me take the stupid sofa to his place, form where he’ll get rid of it on garbage collection day, basically saving my ass. In Israel it would have been so much easier getting rid of a couch. I’m not sure what that implies about Israel. Or America.

Now the apartment was finally empty, and it was time to return the keys to the landlady. I also gave her a cup Julia made as a present, and in return she gave me some fruit for the road:

I really don’t know what the small things are. She said they’re Chinese. I believe her (Edit - they turned out to be lichees, with a peel that is much darker than I’m used to).

I started driving towards Maryland. I stopped for lunch at Harry’s, in Westborough, MA. I got the “Boneless chicken breast deluxe”, also known in Israel as Schintzel.

Then I drove some more - a lot more actually. I made a stop in a visitor center, right at the border of Connecticut. There I saw a gate that said “Please close gate behind you”. That means you can go through! I went in to discover a catch-and-release trout fishing area. Being the only only one around, I started walking along the riverbank, and after ten minutes or so sat down, got a book from my backpack, and read for a while.

Yeah, I know it’s very pretty. I was also thinking how in Israel, a place like this would be a big thing: ooh - water! and green trees! and we’d probably have some stories about this place from the time of the Romans, and the crusaders, and the war of Independence, and they would fence it and charge money at the entrance. Here, in America, it’s just a stream where you catch trout.

After getting tired of reading and getting bit by mosquitoes, I continued driving and ended up in Danbury, CT. After checking in at the local Super-8 motel I went to the Molly Darcy bar. It’s an Irish pub, with the heavy wood and the Irish bartender with heavy Irish accent complaining about his Irish health - the whole deal! Had a couple of beers and the spinach salad while I was watching the Olympics. In fact, two TV screens were showing the Olympics games - men basketball and women football (soccer, if you’re an American). on two other TV screens were more American sports - baseball and poker. The differences in the  appearances of the participants is astounding - everybody is so fit in basket ball and soccer. I don’t need to describe baseball players, football players, or, god forbid - poker. Makes you think, doesn’t it ? Are baseball and basketball more popular in America because you can play them even if you’re fat, or were these sports invented for an obese nation?

While we’re at it, am I the only one who finds it absurd that McDonald’s and Coca Cola sponsor the American Olympics teams?

Day 2: a Cambridge Sofa

I’m pretty drunk so I’ll try to keep this short. I should also reconsider the time in which I make my posts. Perhaps posting right before I sleep isn’t the best idea.

Today was quite eventful. I woke up to find out that right next to my motel there’s a model ship kit store:

One day, when I grow up, I’ll build model ships. It seems like a real cool hobbie. besides the kits they also sell tools and books for building model ships. sooooo cool…..

I drove on the Maine turnpike, making two stops - one to eat a burger, and one to call lady B, who’s supposed to take care of our internships in Paris, and is doing a terrible job. She said she talked to the dude in the consulate, and he promised an answer by the afternoon. needless to say, he never gave an answer.

I arrived to our place in Central Square, Cambridge, in the late afternoon, and called our landlady. She asked if we emptied the apartment, and I replied that the sofa that was here when we moved in is still here. She insisted that the sofa should be removed. After fighting with her for a while I realized that I have to find a solution to this damn sofa, which turned out to be  a real pain in the ass - nobody wants to deal with old furniture if it’s not in perfect condition. The salvation army, MIT furniture exchange, the Media Lab community, the MIT computer science community - nobody wants to deal with a sofa. A fellow Israeli from the Media Lab offered assistance, and we’ll see tomorrow how that turns out (stay tuned), but that still means I will leave for Maryland only later tomorrow. well, whatever.

I then went to the Muddy Charles, MIT’s notorious pub, to meet Sharly. I first met Sharly, a post-doc physicist in MIT, right as I arrived to Cambridge, and he immediately became one of my favorite people. Not only is he kind and funny, he’s unbelievably musically talented. He brought along a friend, another Israeli named Avi  (also bald, like me, Sharly, and the rest of our Israeli gang) and together we demolished three pints of the Sam Summer ale.

I returned to the apartment, talked to Julia on the phone, and proceeded to Hi-Fi Pizza, where the pizza is a bizarre combination of  really low quality, really low price, and amazing taste.

And now, I shall collapse. stay tuned.

Day 1: A night in Searsport

We are all packed. We started driving at about 10AM towards Maine. It was a typical summer day in New England - which basically means rain. We stopped for lunch in Augusta. Too  bad it wasn’t a Tuesday:

You gotta have some seafood if you’re in Maine. Americans, however, deep-fry everything. They will deep-fry their own families, given enough oil:

By the late afternoon, we got to Deer Isle. Haystack has amazing facilities for teaching weaving, graphics, photography, dying, glass-blowing, and working with woos, metal and clay. There is also a fab-lab, where some of our colleagues from the Media Lab will be mentoring.

After saying my goodbyes to Julia, I turned back to find a place to stay for the night. Entering Deer Isle was easy, but leaving was hard, as I had no 3G reception, and could not navigate with my phone. After about an hour of driving in circles, I remembered Julia keeps an old-fashioned map in the car. I managed to escape Deer Isle.

I missed a turn and found myself in Bucksport. The weather was starting to get clearer, and I got this beautiful panorama with a rainbow and some mist over the  Penobscot river.

Next stop was Searsport. We drove by it on our way to Deer Isle and it looked really cute, with several motels, a flee market and a model ship store on the main street. I decided to spend the night there, and got a room at the Yardarm Motel. Searsport is tiny and sleepy, and as I got settled in my room it was 8:45PM, which made finding dinner a little tricky. I found the Mermaid bar in a nearby inn. Besides the staff, I was the only one there. I had some beers and a pretty good maple broiled salmon. The owner asked me what brings me to Searsport. I told her the whole story, and she was blown away. We talked some more about technology and cognition - it turns out she studied software engineering, and decided to give up her career at some point to become a stay-at-home mom. When the kids got older and she found herself in Searsport, she started running the Inn.

Some guy walked in and said he and the boys are going squid fishing - or at least I think it was squids. What ever they were fishing , they had to fish it at night. Turns out this is what the guys here do for fun. I should have joined them. Next time. I had to get some sleep.

How did I get into this mess?

The original plan seemed perfect: Julia goes away to a two-weeks glass blowing workshop in Haystack, a craft school in Deer Isle, Maine, while I go on a road trip. When we are done, I will pick her up, then we drive to her family in Maryland, and then fly to Paris, where we  both have four-months internships waiting for us, as we both graduated from the MIT Media Lab. Lovely, isn’t it?

Well, not exactly. somebody messed up. In fact, several people did, and as a result, we still don’t have our visas. worse - we don’t even have appointments in the French consulate to apply for visas. You are supposed to have your appointment at least two weeks before your flight. today is July 31. Our tickets are for August 15.

And so the new plan is:

1. drive Julia to Maine and drop her off
2. drive back to Boston and return the keys to the landlady, thus officially becoming homeless
3. drive to Maryland with our stuff to drop off at Julia’s sister’s place
4. hopefully, have an appointment by then
5. drive back to Maine, and pick up Julia
6. drive to Boston and apply for visa at the French consulate
7. drive to Maine, drop off Julia back at the workshop
8. drive around the states until the workshop is over
9. drive to Maine, pick up Julia
10. drive to Boston, for a secret mission, to be revealed here when accomplished
11. drive to Maryland, where we will stay for a couple of days
12. fly to France
13. live happily ever after

I will try to post here at least once a day, and since this is the second day of this adventure, this post doesn’t count, I owe you two more posts. here we go.