a worcester retrospective

on saturday night the husband, our friend mike, and i were strolling down memory lane after we caught a quick meal at the new buddah hut restaurant (aka kuan yin II) and a sweet treat at the bean counter. the highland street neighborhood was where we spent most of our college years. the following is a nice little retrospective of all the apartments where the husband lived one point or another. actually, we were quite surprised because most of the triple deckers had been greatly improved upon since we lived in the ghetto. of course, as you'll see, some of them not so much...

this is where it all started. actually this is john street and happens to be the place where i first met the husband way back when i was still a bad girl skipping school and hanging around with older boys. who knew we would come this far? highlights included our first kiss and many other acts of mischief that i know nothing about. no seriously- this was not my hang out. anyway. the husband only lived here for a month while he waited for the next place to open up...

ah, hackfeld. this is the place where the husband and mike had their first lease. jaymo lived there as well and amy, heather and i were regular fixtures. as were waterfalls, mushrooms and 'the ralph'. oh also notable were the asian kids who lived upstairs and never walked- they only rolled on their computer chairs and vacuumed several times a day.

the next year the husband and mike moved into this place with aj and shanna. all i can say is that this place has undergone a serious face lift since 1999. many shenanigans went on at this place. highlights included suspicious fake closets, naked jumps, rules posted to the walls and throwing stuff out the 3rd floor window. ah, college.

this is house next door and is much better representation of what their apartment used to look like. when the boys lived next door, jose lived in this place. he was this awesome puerto rican dude with about 62 children. that is relevant because he rocked a puerto rican flag in his rear view and he drove a sea green taurus station wagon. he parked "his baby" on the street and washed constantly while blaring the local hip-hop station through the bumpin' system he had. my guess is that he did this to escape said children as he was out there at the crack of dawn until nightfall.

this is einhorn. to think that when the husband and mike first rented this place that heather and i were jealous is laughable. this has to be the biggest shit hole of them all. highlights were the landlord who went by the name of 'frank sketchy', the immense amount of crap on the porch, the shag carpet and broken toilet. this is the only house that hasn't changed a bit.

this is the institute house. heather and i lived here for a year and then they boys moved in. highlights included dinner out on that roof, the time our crazy downstairs neighbor, gary, almost burned the house down , the bat, the skunk, the lady with no neck, the time gary locked himself out when he was completely wasted. that gary was a riot.

ah- this is a famous corner. when we left institute road, mike and heather moved on to greener pastures but the husband and i had to move to the 'other side' of highland street. the classy side. this corner looks innocent enough but don't be fooled. excitement was always present here, like the time i literally walked into a drug deal or the time the husband witnessed some dude getting a blow job on the side of the road. what you don't see is that there is an elementary school directly across the street. like i said, classy.

this was bodoin street- sort of temporary housing if you will. we only spent a few short months here which was long enough. highlights included the closet that the husband lived in, his roommates moving out like 2 months after he moved in, me moving in, the two of us having only a bed and a bureau between us, the lady who played dido over and over again, and that time the sink broke and the water ran for DAYS because we couldn't figure out how to turn it off and the landlady wouldn't call us back.


finally. this is the last place we lived. home street. a cute basement apartment that i was so excited about getting into. of course it ended up being a cold and moldy basement apartment with a broken dishwasher and a dark bathroom. the owners lived upstairs and were lovely people but when we had the chance to leave this place i jumped. highlights included gray kitty, who would watch tv with us from the outside window sill.

and now i know you're jealous that you didn't get to live in worcester. i am a little sad that i didn't have a camera for most of these years and took almost no pictures.