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Dealing with ST:DIS/TOS discrepancies

December 24, 2019October 4, 2017 by Michael Hanscom

Something for the Trek fans in my circles who either are watching Discovery or don’t mind spoilery stuff: I’ve just finished reading Desperate Hours, the first DIS tie-in novel. It’s set a year before the opening of DIS and a year after Pike’s Enterprise visits Talos IV (as seen in “The Cage”), and involves both the Shenzhou and the Enterprise under Captain Pike’s command. As such, it has to find a way to address some of the more obvious differences between the shows, and it doesn’t do a bad job, with some attempts at explanation, and some simple knowing wink-and-nod acknowledgements.

It’s also worth noting that according to the people behind DIS’s media tie-ins, this and any forthcoming DIS books and comics can be considered canon unless the show contradicts it.

Here are a few key things I noticed. Obviously, spoilers from here on down (though I’m trying to avoid spoilers for the actual plot of the book, and am concentrating just on the areas where the old and new overlap)…

p. 79:

Unlike many other types of starship in the fleet, Constitution-class vessels had no ready rooms for their captains. Most days, Pike didn’t miss having a ready room—except for those occasions when he received a classified transmission above the security clearance of his bridge crew, compelling him to return to his quarters to receive it.

p. 93:

In Georgiou’s experience, it was a bad idea for the captain to appear distracted on the bridge…. Thus had Starfleet adopted the tradition of a captain’s “ready room.” Though not all ships of the line had incorporated the concept, many had, and they were proving to be increasingly popular with commanding officers throughout the service. Georgiou was one of them.

p. 97:

In front of the bridge’s forward view of Sirsa III appeared a life-sized hologram of the commanding officer of the Enterprise. A grave expression darkened the human man’s youthful, chiseled features. “Captain Georgiou. I’m Captain Christopher Pike.”

So by this passage and others in the book, the Enterprise does have the holographic communications interface.

p. 97-98:

Responsibility for monitoring the wider theater of operations was actually the duty of Narwani, the junior tactical officer, whose head was encased in a gleaming metallic VR helmet designed for that task.

That’s the “Daft Punk” robot-looking character seen on the Shenzhou — not a robot, but an officer in a VR helmet.

p. 106:

Burnham had known Lieutenant Spock when they both were children, but it had been many years since they had seen or even spoken to each other in passing.”

The first mention of Burnham and Spock encountering each other in their youth.

p. 111:

“Time for full disclosure, Mister Spock. Who is the Shenzhou’s XO to you?”

“Her name is Michael Burnham,” Spock said. “She is…a friend of my family.”

Pike was confused. “How well do you know her?”

“She is a few years older than I am, so we rarely moved in the same social or academic circles. If not for her connection to my parents, I would barely know of her at all.”

So Burnham is slightly older than Spock. Also, this is one of Spock’s “technically not lying” statements.

p. 117:

A golden shimmer and a mellifluous droning washed away the familiar grey confines of the Enterprise’s transporter room and delivered Spock to its counterpart inside the Shenzhou. He noticed immediately that the two compartments were laid out very differently. Whereas the Enterprise’s transporter room consisted of a dias with six energizer pads in front of the console, on the Shenzhou the energizer pads were larger and mounted on a curved bulkhead behind a semicircular dais. Also of note to Spock was the darker ambience of the Shenzhou’s transporter room and its more spacious nature.

p. 118:

He fell in at her side as they left the transporter room and strolled the corridors of the Shenzhou. Once again Spock noted marked differences in the interior of the Walker-class ship from that of the Enterprise. Aboard the Shenzhou the grays were darker, and the bulkheads’ orientations more angular. It was clear to him that the two ships had been designed and constructed in different eras, according to very different aesthetic standards. Such drastic changes in a short span of time were not unusual among the humans of Earth, though it had proved a constant source of bemusement among their Vulcan and Andorian allies.

p. 119:

The doors closed, and the lift car shot into motion with hardly any sensation of movement. Spock noted the profusion of display screens that ringed the top of the lift car, and the complexity of the interface screens placed at eye level. He preferred the austerity of the Enterprise’s turbolifts, with their dearth of distractions and an optional control handle.

p. 145:

He stood at attention while he waited for the golden scintillation of the beam to resolve into the familiar shape of a humanoid female wearing a pale beige turtleneck tunic, black trousers, tall boots, and a small backpack.

First mention of the differences in uniform styles.

p. 157:

Gant and his team from the Shenzhou wore dark blue Starfleet utility jumpsuit uniforms with black trim, while the Enterprise team members sported pale gold or light blue jerseys over black trousers—a new uniform style that so far had been issued exclusively to the crews of Starfleet’s vaunted Constitution-class starships.

p. 273:

“What if we devised an automated delivery system, such as a drone, to deliver the gas?”

“If it’s remote controlled,” Gant said, “the command system would be crippled by the same scrambling field that’s blocking our transporters. And as I’m sure you recall, autonomous robotic attack systems—”

“Are prohibited by Federation law,” Saru said, finishing the citation. “A most nettlesome restriction, if you ask me.”

Ensign Fan turned away from the communications console. “That’s what the people of Earth used to think, right up until World War III. Every time I think about those killer ‘bots in the streets of Paris, I get a shiver down my spine.”

Interesting bit of in-universe history.

p. 330:

Gant pressed his index finger to his panel’s firing control. Outside the center viewport, a fierce storm of energy pulses erupted from the Shenzhou’s numerous phaser batteries. the barrage tore holes in the Juggernaut’s shields, which crackled into view like a tattered bubble of sickly green light. Then a pair of steady blue beams from the Enterprise pierced the green cocoon, sliced into the goliath, and flensed off large pieces of its hull.

The fearsome power of the Constitution-class starship’s state-of-the-art weaponry drew a gasp from Oliveira. “My God,” she said. “The new type-ten phaser banks can do that?”

“And a lot more,” Georgiou said, succumbing to a small twinge of envy.

p. 352:

Blue-shirted medical crewmen from the Enterprise parted from their white-uniformed counterparts from the Shenzhou….

p. 356:

“You seem different since you got back.”

Her assertion aroused Spock’s curiosity. “In what regard?”

“You seem…I don’t know. Older? No—calmer than you did before.” She tilted her head as she continued to study him and collect her thoughts. “You present yourself in a way that feels more centered. Better balanced.” Her smile broadened to a grin. “You have gravitas now.”

Recognizing the difference in Nimoy’s portrayal of Spock between “The Cage” and later episodes.

So that’s it. I enjoyed the book, and the nods to trying to explain — or at least recognize and maybe rationalize a bit — the differences between two series set only a decade apart, but produced half a century apart, were a lot of fun.

A rare (these days) long political rant

December 24, 2019July 26, 2016 by Michael Hanscom

Here’s where I stand at the moment. (This is long.)

I believe that Bernie Sanders has a lot of good ideas, and — for a time — was doing a lot of good in pulling the Democratic party and Hillary Clinton further to the left of middle than they’d otherwise have been. I sent in my absentee ballot for Sanders in the WA Democratic Caucus, and I voted for Sanders in the (pointless) WA primary. At the same time, I think Sanders stumbled in a number of areas (particularly in his outreach, or lack thereof, to minorities) and then miscalculated by staying in the race too long and not conceding. What he ended up doing was mobilizing and encouraging the far-far-left, our corollary to the far-far-right, existing at the point where the two extremes of the political spectrum are so close in fanaticism that they risk bending the spectrum into a circle and meeting at the far side.

I don’t believe Sanders ever had a real chance at winning the Presidency, and he certainly wouldn’t now, even if by some bizarre set of circumstances he actually got the nomination. No matter how much I support his ideas and ideals, no matter how much I think we should be working towards them — and, generally speaking, I do — I don’t believe that it would have happened, even if he was able to become President. There simply would have been too much resistance from Congress and much of the American populace for the drastic, sweeping changes he was proposing for them to have gone through (look at what Obama wanted to do with health care versus what he was able to, and how much resistance there still is to that small, imperfect step towards actually ensuring that everyone in this country has the health care they should).

I think that Sanders will continue to do what he has been doing for years, working to promote his Democratic Socialist ideals and trying to pull the Democratic party back to the left, and I wish him luck and much success. But he won’t be doing it from the White House.

I don’t think that Clinton is perfect — but neither do I believe that she is the scheming, lying, backstabbing, crooked caricature that a depressing number of people seem to think she is, thanks to years of Republican attacks. I think she is a marvelously successful, effective, and savvy politician, who has had a long career during which she’s done things that I disagree with, but has also done a lot of good. I expect this will continue if she gets into office — no big surprise there, because that’s really the best that can be expected of anyone who gets into that office. I think Obama is far and away the best President this country has had in my lifetime, and he and his administration have done a number of things that I find questionable or strongly disagree with; that’s simply the reality of the office. Besides, Clinton has been attacked and investigated for years (decades), over and over again, for all sorts of reasons (some more reasonable than others), and not once have any of these investigations turned up any reputable evidence that she was doing anything more sinister than being a politician.

I don’t believe that the primaries and caucuses were rigged. I think the Democratic party’s mish-mash of primaries, caucuses, and superdelegates is problematic at best, and would much rather we simply went with open primaries across the board. However, the system we have, such as it is, worked as intended, even if many people don’t like the intent. Independents not being allowed to vote in the Democratic primary isn’t a bug, it’s a feature, even if it’s a feature you disagree with. While I haven’t done a deep dive into the reports, it looks like the DNC emails are a lot of fuss over little actual substance; since the organization’s goal was to select the candidate with the best chance of winning the Presidential election, showing favoritism to Clinton over Sanders (especially as it became more and more clear that he simply didn’t have the popular support of the American people) isn’t corruption or conspiracy, it’s doing their job. They could likely have done that job better in many ways, but it’s not a scam.

I’m far more concerned by the very strong possibility (perhaps even probability at this point) that the DNC email dump is an attempt by collusion between Putin (and/or his administration) and Wikileaks (an organization I have serious issues with, given its support for Milo Yiannopoulos, that it’s headed by an accused rapist avoiding extradition on said rape charges, and its willingness to doxx innocent bystanders in its information dumps) and possibly the Trump campaign or Donald Trump himself. Basically, it looks very strongly like this was an organized attempt by a foreign state (Russia), possibly in collusion with the Republican party’s candidate himself or his campaign, to influence our election — and I find that much more troubling than the content of the emails themselves.

I respect, understand, and sympathize with many of the concerns of those who look seriously at or support third party candidates. I fully support supporting candidates from outside of the two primary parties, have no problems with those who vote for them, and it’s entirely possible I’ll be voting for some of them myself — at non-Presidential levels (local, district, city, county, borough, state, etc.). But I don’t believe that the major systemic changes advocated for by many third-party candidates have even the tiniest, remotest chance of being successful unless we start at the bottom and work up. Like it or not (and many don’t, and that’s fine), the “revolution” isn’t going to happen. A third-party candidate is simply not going to come out of nowhere and take the Presidency. Third-party candidates can be elected and start making differences at local levels (and a few have started, at least in the Seattle area), and that needs to happen so that they can build their base and support and work their way to the Presidency. That stands a chance, and we collectively should be putting more effort and support toward these candidates when we feel that they’re in line with our goals. But “cutting the head off the snake” just isn’t a viable political strategy at the national level.

I am extremely concerned that the current state of the non-Republican parties (Democratic party plus independents, third-parties, etc.) is such that Trump stands a depressingly and frighteningly high possibility of actually being elected as President. Generally speaking, the Republican party is extremely good about unifying behind their candidate and mobilizing their voters, while the non-Republican parties consistently fall apart in this respect. Idealism is all well and good; idealism at the expense of reality is dangerous. The current fractures in the Republican party are unusual, and while they make for good entertainment, I don’t for a moment believe that they’ll really split the Republican vote apart the way that non-Republicans have a tendency to do. As a whole, Republicans believe that a candidate who is imperfect but is more in line with their beliefs than the Democratic nominee is the better choice; meanwhile, there are a disturbing number of non-Republicans who believe that a candidate who is imperfect but is more in line with their beliefs than the Republican candidate still isn’t good enough.

I would love to vote for a candidate who in every way espoused every belief I have and hold dear. But if such a candidate existed (and none ever has) and I knew that no matter how much I liked their stance there was no real chance of winning, they wouldn’t get my vote, especially when there’s even the slightest chance that someone like Trump might win. I’ll support them as much as I can — as I said above, I supported Sanders in the early months of his campaign, and I still think that he has a lot of good ideas and that he should continue working for them however he can — but generally, I’d much rather have an imperfect Democratic candidate in office than a Republican candidate, and that’s particularly true this time around.

Generally speaking, Republicans don’t scare me. I disagree with many of their viewpoints, but the vast majority of them are at least reasonable people. But the current incarnation of the Republican party has been co-opted by the far-right wing, and preys on fear, sexism, misogyny, racism, xenophobia, homophobia, transphobia, and general hatred of anything other than straight white male. In many ways, Trump himself doesn’t even really scare me (though he comes closer than any other major Republican candidate ever has), but the fact that he’s tapped into such a strong vein of hatred and fear that he’s actually been able to capture the Republican nomination does scare me. His followers scare me. I don’t really believe he’s any more able to get many of his wilder promises enacted than Sanders would be. But those that he and a Republican controlled congress would be able to enact would likely be disastrous; beyond that, his being elected would be even more of a call for the worst of our society to make their prejudices known in visible and often violent ways than we’ve seen yet with his candidacy and nomination.

I’ve been very pleased to have seen the great strides forward in tolerance and acceptance over the course of my lifetime, and I fear that we’re on the precipice of losing much of that progress. I have too many friends, family, and loved ones who stand a very real chance of being adversely affected by a Trump Republican presidency. I’m very saddened by seeing people who I agree with in many respects declaring that they’d rather risk Trump than vote for Clinton — especially as most of those who think along these lines are those who have the privilege (be it racial, economic, sex or gender identity, health, or any other sort of privilege) to not have to worry about actually being seriously affected by whatever might happen under a Trump presidency. There’s a real blindness here, whether willful or unconscious, to the very real possible effects of a Trump presidency on people who don’t have the privileges and resources that they and many others (including myself) do.

I will happily, willingly, and uncompromisingly be voting for Clinton in the general election. I understand that many won’t be able to vote for her happily, willingly, and uncompromisingly — but I do hope that you’ll at least vote for her, even if you grumble while doing so.

(That said, if you can’t, and if you vote for someone else, that’s entirely your right, and I won’t say you shouldn’t. But if Trump ends up in office and you complain about his policies, I reserve the right to cast some serious side-eye your direction.)

(And if you’re one of those who simply won’t vote? As far as I’m concerned, you have no right to complain about the direction this country goes. None. And I will never apologize for holding that particular view.)

What do I want to do when I grow up?

December 24, 2019April 11, 2016 by Michael Hanscom

So on my earlier post grumbling about needing to find a new job, I was asked what I would like to do. Here’s my answer (with a few edits/clarifications), on the off chance someone out there knows of likely possibilities (and my LinkedIn profile is current as well)…

I’m kind of trying to figure that out. :) I know what I don’t want to do — I’ve been a secretary for years, and while the job itself isn’t bad, there’s limited mobility, and I’m tired of basically just feeling like I shuffle paperwork without actually doing something worthwhile. The best parts are when I’m working with helping students with something, but that’s a pretty minor part of the job.

At this point, the “real” (paid) experience on my resume is all secretarial and making copies, neither of which are high on my wish list right now.

Ideally, I’d love to make a good living doing what I do for Norwescon. ;) But photography/web management/social media marketing (individually or together) are all very competitive and tough to get into.

I did just complete a Master’s degree in ITAM (Information Technology and Administrative Management), basically a managerial program with an IT focus. So I’m likely qualified (between my degree and experience) for a managerial position in the tech world…but most such positions I’ve seen so far either require more years of existing experience than I have (even doing my best to emphasize the volunteer work with Norwescon managing the photo, web, and social media departments) or ask for more actual programming/database management experience than I have.

I also have a BA in Law and Justice, so if I could find away to combine my BA and MS degrees in some way…. A “pie in the sky” possibility would be something like getting on board with the Seattle Police Department’s (or some other law enforcement agency) social media team or IT department in some way (basically, something in the general law enforcement arena without actually going the Police Academy route to be an officer).

And Prairie and I want to get back over to the west side of the state, so I’m looking along the I-5 corridor roughly between Bellingham and Portland (my pull is closer to Seattle, since that’s where most of my friends are; Prairie’s pull is further south, since she has family in Portland, Vancouver, and Olympia). Olympia would be an ideal location (close to her family, easy to get to Portland or Seattle), so I’m keeping an eye on the WA state jobs site as well.

So…lots of factors there. I’m looking, and trying to figure out how to sell myself with the combination of degree and volunteer experience to get into a career very different from where my actual paid job experience sits. Not easy to do. Everyone who knows me swears up and down that I’d do great in all sorts of positions, but my resumé doesn’t seem to be convincing hiring committees of that so far.

Security

December 24, 2019March 17, 2016 by Michael Hanscom

So, security and privacy have been in the news a lot lately, particularly with Apple’s fight against the FBI over accessing data on an iPhone. This is something that I pay attention to, and try to make sure I have the option to do, not because I feel I’m doing anything that needs to be hidden, but because I believe that personal privacy is important, and because I don’t think the government (or Facebook, or Apple, or Google, or any other company) really needs to have unfettered access into my life.

But I’m a little curious how many people I know actually take steps to protect their communications. I’ve only seen a few people actually mention using overtly privacy-conscious applications, and though I have a few installed, since I don’t know of that many other people that bother, they don’t really get used all that much.

Here’s what I’m set up with at the moment, in case anyone’s interested. I’m also open to suggestions for other possibilities.

For email, I have Apple Mail on my desktop computer set up to use PGP encryption (through the GPG Tools suite), and have iPGMail on my iPhone and iPad so that I can en/de-crypt messages when mobile (it’s a little kludgy, but workable).

For messaging, I have both the Signal and Telegram messaging apps on my iPhone, both of which boast secure end-to-end encryption for chats. I can be reached through each of those via my phone number, which either you have, or can be asked for, since I tend not to post that entirely publicly.

Things I Will Not Do

December 24, 2019July 3, 2012 by Michael Hanscom

Things I will not do, in no particular order (a list that can be revised at any time, though such revisions are likely to be additions, unless there’s a very good reason for removing an item):

Refer to Prairie as “my woman”. I do not own her.
Use “bitch” as a generic term for women. I reserve the right to occasionally describe someone as “a bitch” or “bitchy” when appropriate, but women in general are not “bitches” (or sluts, hos, or any other demeaning term).
Share any cute, funny, poignant, political, or any other kind of image on Facebook that uses improper grammar. Not that I share many images, but if they’re made without proper use of the English language, they’re not getting shared (with occasional, very rare exceptions for obviously intended humorous butchering of the language by people who know what they’re doing and why it’s funny).
Share any image that denigrates one body type in favor of another. I find skinny women attractive, I find curvy women attractive…basically, I find women attractive. No one body type is better than any other. As long as someone has a body, I’m good with that.

I’m sure this list will grow over time. These just popped into my head this morning based on things I’ve seen posted recently.

Home Networking Questions

December 24, 2019October 4, 2011 by Michael Hanscom

I’m looking for some help from those who are a little more familiar with (computer) networking than I am.

Until now, our home network has been relatively simple, running off of an Airport Extreme base station, which has three physical LAN ports.

WAN }---> [cable] }---> [AE] }-\---> iMac (wired)
          [modem]            .  \--> iMac (wired)
                             .   \-> printer (wired)
                             .
                             ......> various WiFi devices
                                     (two iPhones, one iPad,
                                      one MacBook, one Roku)

One of the fun things about our new house is that it’s actually fully networked with Cat-6 cabling, with six two-port jacks on each of the two floors. All the cabling runs into an upstairs closet. In the closet, a 24-port patch bay is set up so that the lower port of each jack leads to an open data port, and the upper port is hooked into a POTS patchboard. Since I’m not hooking up a POTS line, I can easily disconnect the POTS patch cords, opening up a total of 24 network jacks around the house (serious overkill, I’m sure…but damn it’s cool to have this built in to my home!).

On the basic assumption that whenever possible, wired is better than wireless, I’d like to be able to physically wire in as many devices as is possible. At this point, that’s four (two iMacs, the printer, and the Roku). However, I can only currently get three wired in at a time (by running cables from the AE’s three LAN ports into three ports on the patch bay). Since all of the above devices (save one old iMac) are WiFi capable, this isn’t a critical issue — I can just leave one to run wirelessly, and wire the other three in — but I’d like to get all four on wires…and if possible, allow for possible future growth or configurability.

What I think I need to do is add a switch (like this) to the network. However, I’ve not played with switches before — just home routers.

If I were to add this switch, could I just plug the AE into one port, all my other devices into other ports, and have everything still “just work” (to borrow Apple’s language)?

WAN }---> [cable] }---> [AE] }---{ [switch] }-\-----> iMac
          [modem]            .                 \----> iMac
                             .                  \---> printer
                             .                   \--> Roku
                             .                    \-> (theoretical
                             .                      future devices)
                             .
                             ....> various WiFi devices

In the current setup, the AE acts as DHCP router, assigning internal IPs to all my devices. Would the switch recognize this and still shuttle traffic around without my having to do anything? Or would I need to switch my internal wired network to assigned IP addresses so that the switch knows where to send traffic? Am I even asking the right questions? Am I overthinking this?

Help! I have new toys, and I don’t know how to play with them!

Moving Hell, Part II

December 24, 2019January 4, 2011 by Michael Hanscom

Dear [redacted],

I am writing to you on behalf of Prairie Brown, as she does not currently have internet access. Thank you very much for your assistance with the problems Prairie had with the unit yesterday and throughout today. Unfortunately, due to those issues and others that she has discovered, we are giving formal notice that she will be contacting you tomorrow morning (Wednesday, Jan. 5th) to make arrangements for leaving the property.

The following is a list of issues we have discovered with the property over the past 36 hours. Some we might have noticed during the initial walkthrough if we had had more time, but many, including the most serious issues, would not have been noticed until we had taken possession of the unit.

Apartment-wide:
- Frozen pipes (only partially thawed after 4 and a half hours of intensive work by Roto Rooter, requiring a team of three technicians and two specialized thawing units). Because the pipes were only partially thawed, water pressure is extremely low. In addition, Roto Rooter recommended leaving the apartment heat on high so that the pipes do not refreeze, making the apartment unbearably hot.
- When water started flowing from the pipes, metal shavings were ejected along with the initial flow of water. Due to the metal shavings, the age and type of pipes, and the water quality, the Roto Rooter representative recommended that the tap water not be used for drinking or even for cooking.
- The fuses seem unable to handle electrical loads. Four fuses blew over four hours, exhausting the supply you provided and requiring Prairie to buy the entire stock of appropriate fuses from Fred Myer to ensure she would not lose power.
- Dust and cobwebs throughout the apartment show that it has not been cleaned in quite some time. Cobwebs even exist within the vents of the gas furnace, potentially a serious fire hazard.
- There is no fire extinguisher provided (though this may not be an issue, as we admit we’re not positive on the requirements in this instance).
Exterior:
- The odd extension cord that terminates inside the main room of the apartment appears to lead to some exposed wiring near the floodlights for the parking spaces, which may present a fire hazard.
- Though a mailbox key was provided, Prairie was not told which mailbox it belongs to.
Living room/kitchen:
- Once the pipes thawed, it became apparent that the pipe leading to the sprayer nozzle on the kitchen sink has a steady leak.
- The kitchen stove top was dirty.
- The electrical socket underneath the kitchen counter is not physically attached to the wall, and requires cautious steadying when attempting to plug or unplug anything.
- There are no brackets for the shelves in the living room closet, so the shelves (currently laid against the wall) cannot be used.
- The refrigerator is powered by a jury-rigged system consisting of an extension cord (plugged into the loose electrical socket) with a triple-socket adapter that the refrigerator plugs into.
Bedroom/bathroom:
- The bathroom window does not open.
- The water heater is ancient, filthy, and has areas that are apparently plugged with paper towels.
- The shower head literally fell off of the pipe when we first touched it. When we attempted to replace the pipe (to attach an extension pipe along with a new shower head), the threads of the pipe broke off inside the pipe within the wall, requiring a call to a plumber before the shower was useable.
- The bathroom door does not close properly due to a loose upper hinge.
- The doorknob to the bedroom closet is loose.

Due to these issues, quite a few of which seem to question the safety of the unit, Prairie was uncomfortable staying there a second night and has left to stay with a friend from work. Because she will not be present overnight, she was uncomfortable leaving the furnace set at its maximum, and left it set to 65°. She has also left the water slightly running to keep water moving through the pipes. We sincerely hope that this will prevent the pipes from refreezing overnight. She will be contacting you at her earliest convenience tomorrow to make arrangements for leaving the property and getting her rent and security deposit refunded. Thank you very much for your kind understanding in this situation.

Sincerely,

Michael Hanscom and Prairie Brown

Adventures in Moving Hell

December 24, 2019January 4, 2011 by Michael Hanscom

So, as those of you who read my last note know, Prairie and I are in the midst of a major upheaval, part of which includes getting Prairie moved to Ellensburg on a moment’s notice. This has rapidly descended into a particularly hellish experience.

Last week, when all this started, we started looking for one bedroom Eburg apartments for Prairie, searching real estate websites and Craigslist from our place in Kent. Since we were calling around on Christmas Eve day, we weren’t terribly surprised when we couldn’t get ahold of many offices, but we were able to get ahold of one of the most promising looking places: a 1-bedroom unit, half of a duplex, that was listed on Craigslist. The landlord sounded decent on the phone, and was willing to do a short-term four-month lease, so we set up an appointment to look at the place while we were in Ellensburg so that Prairie could have a few meetings about the transition to her new job.

We got there, and while it’s an old building and the place looked kind of funky (in a fun, quirky kind of way), it was actually quite a bit bigger than we expected, and we agreed that it would fit our needs perfectly. We signed the lease, got a key, put the utilities in Prairie’s name, and (after the work meetings) came back home to pack for the move.

Yesterday morning, with the help of Prairie’s dad, we schlepped all the stuff she’d packed out to the new place…and it wasn’t long before things started to look a little pear-shaped. There’s an extension cord sticking out of one wall that can be plugged into one of the few interior outlets, and leads outside, apparently to the floodlights for the parking spots, but it doesn’t seem to actually do anything. We’re not entirely sure why that is, but Prairie’s dad looked at it and said that it looks like there’s some disconnected and possibly exposed wiring. The electrical socket in the kitchen underneath the counter is kind of falling out of the wall, and because there’s no other socket close to the refrigerator, there’s an extension cord (just barely long enough to reach) with a plug doubler on the end running from that socket to the fridge (I added a power strip to the mix so that the cord wasn’t quite so stretched, and so that we could plug in the toaster and microwave). There are cobwebs in a number of places around the apartment, indicating that it hasn’t had a good cleaning anytime recently. When we touched the shower head in the bathroom, it literally fell off of the pipe. Initially, this wasn’t a big deal, as we were planning on putting a newer shower head on anyway, but when we tried to remove the old pipe, the threads broke inside the socket, rendering the shower unusable. However, even the unusable shower paled in comparison to the realization that the pipes were frozen, and there was no running water.

So, by noon yesterday, we’d had electrical weirdnesses, cleaning grumbles, broken plumbing, and frozen pipes. We called the landlord, and I (reluctantly) left Prairie to wait for calls from the plumber and Roto Rooter (since the plumber doesn’t have the equipment to deal with frozen pipes) to let her know when they would be arriving, and Prairie’s dad brought me back home to Kent. That evening, Prairie let me know that the plumber made it out that afternoon to fix the shower, but all she’d gotten from Roto Rooter was a statement that they’d “probably” be out to her place between 8 and 10 this morning, though they wouldn’t actually make a definitive statement.

By 9:30 a.m. this morning, Prairie’d heard nothing from anyone, and was justifiably pissed. After filling me in, she made another round of calls to Roto Rooter and the landlord, and Roto Rooter finally showed up just before noon (perhaps coincidentally, but perhaps not, just before the 24-hour window where landlords are legally required to respond in instances where apartments lose water or heat). As the Roto Rooter guy started to try and work, he wasn’t sure where the pipes came into the building, so Prairie called the landlord…who didn’t know. The Roto Rooter guy went over to ask the neighbors in the other half of the duplex, who weren’t sure about where the pipes were, but did say that frozen pipes is apparently a pretty regular occurrence for the building. Great.

So, as the Roto Rooter guy got to work, Prairie went off to the store to find space heaters, as one of the things tenants can do to avoid problems it to keep space heaters near the interior pipes during cold weather. She gets back home with the heaters, plugs them in…and not much later, a fuse blows and the entire place loses power. And, of course, these aren’t circuit breakers, but old screw-in style fuses. So, another call to the landlord…and that’s when I put out the question about whether there is such a thing as the rental equivalent of a “lemon law” or “buyer’s remorse” clause. At this point, it was looking like if things didn’t improve fast, we’d be better off just getting out while the getting was good, and finding Prairie a different place.

However, things do seem like they’re improving…or at least on the way to improvement. Roto Rooter hasn’t succeeded in getting water flowing yet, though they are certainly trying: as of the last update from Prairie, they’ve gone from one guy to two vans, three guys, and a “big scary machine” working on the pipes. More importantly, though, when the landlord came by with more fuses, Prairie was able to get him to agree that after all the problems, if the water doesn’t get going soon (by tonight or tomorrow morning) then he will be willing to let Prairie out of the lease so that she can find another place. We’re still hoping that it won’t come to that — there are enough good aspects to the place (location, price, size, the short-term lease, etc.) that we’d rather keep it if it’s livable, and the process of finding another place (quickly) and moving (quickly) again isn’t terribly appealing — but at least we’ve been assured that we won’t be locked into a lease on an apartment that isn’t actually livable.

Once again: Wish us luck! We need it!

We’re Moving to Ellensburg!

December 24, 2019December 30, 2010 by Michael Hanscom

You weren’t expecting that, were you?

This is the short version of a longer story that will go up as soon as I can post it. For the moment, though, we’re restricting the news to Facebook friends and contacts, rather than an all-out, full-public post.

So, here’s the short version.

Prairie’s boss at the Central Washington University Writing Center just accepted a new position at another school, leaving the directorship of the CWU Writing Center open…and last week, Prairie was offered the spot! It’s a huge boost for her career, so she took it, but it means some big changes for us.

First off, Prairie’s new position requires that she be in Ellensburg, and it starts with the winter quarter, beginning January 3rd. This means that over these two weeks, in addition to dealing with Christmas, New Years, and her sister’s New Years Eve wedding, we’ve suddenly had to cram in suddenly moving Prairie to Ellensburg, complete with finding an apartment for her. We’ve managed to get it all done, but it’s been a pretty crazy process.

I won’t be moving to Ellensburg immediately, as I still have my last quarter of school to go, and we won’t close out the lease on our current apartment until the end of April. So, for the next three months, Prairie will be living in a little one bedroom in Ellensburg and I’ll be living at our place in Kent; after March, once I’m done with school, we’ll take April to get all of our stuff either moved or put in storage, and I’ll join Prairie in the one bedroom in Ellensburg.

Her position is technically an interim position for the first six months, through the winter and spring quarters, as CWU is required to do a formal search. We’re optimistic that she’ll end up taking on the full position at the end of the search process, though, at which point we’ll find a house and get ourselves permanently set up in Ellensburg.

For myself, this means that rather than graduating and going into the job market, I’m going to be looking into the master’s degree programs that CWU offers on the main Ellensburg campus, and spending another few years as a schoolboy and getting a master’s degree.

It’s all pretty exciting stuff, and I’m thrilled to be able to let all of you know about it. There are a few more details in the full post, but we’re waiting on making the public announcement until next week sometime, after Prairie’s set up and has her new contract all signed.

I’ll still be making trips into Seattle from time to time — the monthly Norwescon planning meetings help with that — and I’ll do my best to continue to head out and hit the clubs from time to time when I do. Considering that school and life has had me busy enough that I haven’t been doing that much more than once every couple months as it is, though, this really isn’t going to be that much of a change…it’ll just mean a longer drive to get to Seattle!

So, that’s the big news that I’ve been itching to tell all of you for the past week. Wish us luck!

Tentative non-housework visiting plans so far…

December 24, 2019August 5, 2010 by Michael Hanscom

Facebook’s really ticking me off. This is my fourth attempt at getting this written without losing the whole thing. Argh.

Okay.

Here’s my tentative schedule for finding and visiting with friends while I’m in town.

Today (Thursday): Lunch with my folks and Andrea (done!), dinner with James and Stacy (and perhaps Marc and Laura if they’re free) (done!), random drop-in visit with Royce and Stephanie (done!).

Tomorrow (Friday): Dinner with Marc and Laura (done!), late-evening/night high school “lunch bunch” get together with Royce, Tammy, Laurie, Bryan, Jenny, Jen, possibly others (too bad you’re in NY, Jill!)… (done and mayo-riffic!).

Saturday: Burlesque at ‘Koots with Kirsten (done…more done than I expected!), then bouncing around at Myrna’s with Kirsten, Krystal H., possibly others (Lydia, Kathy, Reed, anyone else? As far as I’m concerned, it’s an open invite)…? (done!)

Sunday: Hanging out with Krystal V. at some point in the afternoon/evening (done!).

Monday: Lunch with Reed and Krystal H. (done!), dinner/evening hangout with AnnaMaria (done!).

For those of you I didn’t get to see while I was here, I’m very sorry! I’ll try to find you next time I come through (whenever that might be), otherwise, come down to Seattle at some point and say hi!