Apartments, Associations

Before buying a home, I had lived in five different apartments since leaving the nest after my second year of undergrad. Four of these places have been with Terri, the other - an unfortunate three-bedroom flat/drop-in centre that was desecrated by three hicks living in the city. I only lived in most of these places for a year or two, and as such, for each I have very specific associations for both food and music. I will now list these places and their corresponding associations, for no reason other than my own (insert witty adjective) amusement. This is a long post that was cobbled together over a few days - an autobiography through food and music and apartments. A revisionist history? through rose-coloured glasses? Maybe. Read on if ye are interested.

1) Quinn Street, Halifax - the undergrad crash pad. Beef and rum. The Verve's "Urban Hymns", UNKLE's "Psyence Fiction" and Pavement's "Brighten The Corners". Looong days at school. Binge drinking on the weekends (starting on Thursday). Vomiting and hangovers and many poor decisions. Amps and drum kit in the bedrooms. Open mics at the Grawood. Adventures in grocery shopping with three guys. Eating heroic portions of meat. And very limited privacy. We used to buy huge trays of ground beef, which we would then make into freezer patties in the living room, absent-mindedly while watching the television, which was perpetually tuned to Muchmusic or Space ("Movies From Space" - awesome) or Sportsnet. Oh did the girls hate those freezer patty sessions. We absolutely de-stroyed this place. I feel sorry for the landlords and the neighbours, but especially those poor neighbours (sorry!).

2) Corner of Windsor and Young, Halifax - final year, moved in with the girlfriend. Nachos in the oven and powdered iced tea. Rheostatics (everything), the Matador Records "Everything Is Nice" compilation and Sloan's "Between The Bridges". The nachos and iced tea are not meant to be a slight on Terri's cooking, rather, this is what I ate as a snack when I got back from school every evening - needless to say, I gained some weight this year. The apartment was on the ground level, above the parking garage and on one of the busiest corners in the city for truck and bus traffic. The relentless noise is laughable in retrospect, but was sooo aggravating at the time. I think we planned our escape within the first two months of living there, but we still stayed for the entire year. This was a return to semi-civil living and structured meals. For music, I might add The Beta Band and Grandaddy, which I would listen to on the long walks to school, on my Discman through big DJ headphones with a 6-foot cord. I also associate this apartment with the poor fashion choices of a hick in the city.

3) Tobin Street, Halifax - grad school, year one. Towering bagel sandwiches and Sobeys deli calzones (blech). Radiohead's "Kid A", Elevator To Hell's "Eerieconcilliation" and the first Stephen Malkmus solo album. A dive with paper thin walls, mice and a sleazy, Jag-driving landlord. The stress of grad school. Continued worthless employment at Sobeys. A relentless bubbling hatred for our noisy hippy neighbours, and my subsequent joy when they were evicted and lived out of their car in the parking lot for a few weeks. I don't have many good memories of this place - this was a rough year.

4) Hollis Street, Halifax - grad school, year two. Tim Horton's coffee and walnut crunch doughnuts, and all varieties of Snack Wells crackers (supposedly "light"). Death Cab For Cutie's "Photo Album", Hayden's "Skyscraper National Park" and Calla's "Scavengers". A clean, conveniently located place with crooked landlords. Fat Aaron discovers KEXP's John In The Morning, gets fatter, buys a computer, starts a website and becomes a hermit. Outside of my complete lack of physical activity and exposure to sunlight (none), oh - and the stress of preparing a defending a thesis, this was ideal living for me. I essentially worked from home, listened to awesome music all morning, and indulged my wannabe writer/photographer self. Things were going well - I took in plenty of Mooseheads games and saw plenty of great concerts and movies. Every morning I would walk to Tim's for my coffee and doughnut, then settle in for a good day of perfectly practiced - albeit unhealthy - routine. Plus, lots and lots of those damned crackers.

5) Dundas Street, Dartmouth - into the working world. Burned barbequed pork chops and Christmas shortbread. Matt Mays s/t. So we moved across the harbour to a great, newly-finished place with easy access to the ferry, Sportsplex and whorehouse located across the street. Man, that whorehouse provided hours of entertainment - the fights, the drunks, the weird noises late at night. Fat Aaron goes to the gym, tries - and fails - to master the BBQ, discovers the CBC Radio One Saturday morning line-up, and listens to Matt Mays' first album almost exclusively for about a year, or so it seemed. Plus, I finally had some spending money, which I blew on a towering semi in the suburbs. And thus concludes my life as a lowly apartment dweller.

Breathe.