I live in Cambridge, Massachusetts blocks away from the river, and close to two separate subway lines. As my lease ends at the end of the month, I soon need to figure out where to live next, though I have no intentions of leaving Cambridge/Somerville. As a walker, though, I am looking forward to having a different neighbourhood to pass through. I'm simply bored of the same houses and businesses along the way. As it is, I switch up routes constantly, but after 18 months, I've done all I can do.
But I do truly love Cambridge. It has a certain reputation which remarkably even people I've known who've lived her believe in. My friends in Jamaica Plain will sneer at how it lacks the cultural diversity of their area. It's all college students, others will complain.
I, however, love that it's just city enough. Everything is walkable if you have the time and energy, but a reasonably reliable public transportation system if not. And sometimes, things are just strange here.
A few weeks back, I'm on my way to the subway, and there's this path I follow to get to Kendall Square (up the path, cross the street, through the lobby of the Marriott and voila, you're at the T) and I see a pair of woman at the end of the path. They've slowed down, and now they're pointing. Curious, I try to figure out what they're pointing at, and there it is, a rather large, wild turkey that is hanging out, looking at itself in the reflective glass. Luckily, I have my digital camera on hand, so I start snapping pictures. Soon, I'm joined by somebody else, also taking pictures.
"What is it?" he asks.
"It's a turkey."
"Oh. What's it doing here?"
"I wouldn't know. Turkey stuff, I guess."
"Oh."

On another occasion, I was out for an evening walk. I'd stopped by and gotten ice cream at Christina's (I highly recommend Christina's Homemade ice cream far better than the over-rated Toscanini's) and was heading up to Central Sq to rent some dvds. As I approach, I'm noting that there are search lights as if there is some sort of event going on. So, I get to the square, and I hear music, too loud to be coming from any of the clubs, and anyway, who'd leave the door open to let the ac escape? And then I see it. They've blocked off a section of Mass Ave, and they're blaring dance music, and everybody is dancing. But it's not just dance music, all of it has instructions for the dances. So you know when to step to the left, or slide to the right, or hop 90 degrees. And everybody is out there, doing this. Young, old, people my age who should be officially disaffected and too cool to participate. And bah to anybody who says there's no cultural diversity, cause white, black, asian, hispanic, they're all doing the electric slide together.
I still have no understanding of why this was going on, but of all the places I've lived that have had various fairs and whatnot, I've never seen anything quite like that.

Meanwhile, my landlord continues to show my apartment. He is full of reasons for why it hasn't sold yet, all of which center on why I'm to blame. "It's not clean enough." "When I show up with people unexpectedly and wake you up, you're grumpy, it ruins the experience for them." "Your cat looks at people funny."
This evening, however, when somebody was looking at the apartment, I heard the guy ask, "How much is it, again?" $200 more than I'm paying. I like the place and all, but the windows are old, with no insulation, the floors are all slanted such that my desk has been making a slow move to escape the living room. The layout is not great. And if you haven't noticed, the landlord is a bit insane. What appealed to me most when I found the place was that it was cheap. I'm not so up on the general state of real estate, but I know that in my mind $100 more than what I'm paying is seen as an acceptable increase (though I'd rather avoid it if I could), whereas $200 is placing this apartment out of its market of "Hey this place is a good deal" and into the range of "You want how much?"

So, given that piece of information, I suppose I can forget about this place being filled before I move out, and thus having the random people stop showing up. Now to find myself someplace to live.