Category: Uncategorized

Quick post about the money here: wtf

First off it looks like it’s from the turn of the century. A thai guy told me that there are 10 seperate anit-forgery traits built into thai bills. Yank money looks like it has about 4.

But you can only see those if you look for them. They’re all of the hold-it-up-to-the-light variety. The bill faces themselves just look like grainy pictures. They’re so un-sharp they looked photocopied to begin with!

I just got 100$ out of wells fargo, a big bank, and all the 20s are wrinkled and weathered. No nice crisp monies, just ancient stuff that feels like it went through the wash a couple of times. I don’t feel rich with 200$ in my wallet, I feel like I’m carrying around a handfull of greasy rags. Please can I have a sandwich? I’ll trade you this piece of cloth I ripped off my painting-shirt.

So I figure either get used to looking at every bill you get through a light or go down to the copy-shop and supplement yourself for the inevitable loss.

And they still have 1 dollar bills. Arg. This is such a bad idea. I figured out how to determine what your smallest bill should be: whatever it costs to buy a decent but cheap lunch.

You can get lunch for 5 bucks. You can get lunch for 20 baht. You can get lunch for 1000 yen.

You can’t get anything substantial for a dollar. Bus fare is over a dollar! If you can’t buy lunch with it then it isn’t a significant enough amount of money to be worthy of a bill – it’s change.

AND they don’t have 2s. So now I have twice as much change, all in bill form! Plus everything is the same damned colour and the same damned size. So a 1 and a twenty are at first glance exactly the same. You have to actually read the number to figure out what bill you have. So good luck paying for something that costs 26$ Finding a 20 a five and a one in the wad is going to take you all day.

And don’t pay the 26$ with two twenties because you’re going to get back 6 bills. 4 ones and 2 fives. They have no 10s! How do you not have 10 dollar bills! Our god damned number system is base 10! It’s a basic unit of currency. That’s what a burger costs!

I cannot believe the money in this country. I have to meticulously arrange the contents of my wallet to keep all the bills in precise increasing order or It takes me an hour to pay for anything. I’ve started keeping the 1s outside the wallet with the rest of the change.

Oh god and the loonie is worth 0.987 yank now. So the point of using this inferior currency system is getting pretty acedemic.

Ah well. In a couple of days when CAD > USD we’re going to go have a ‘do you take real money’ party with my Canadian debit card with Canadian dollars! w00t w00t!

Apartment Hunting
Originally uploaded by apes_at_home.

Visited 6 apartments today. Which was good for getting a feel for what’s available and what things cost.

We where originally contemplating a bachelor suite but we’re starting to think we just want the space of a one bedroom.

Looks like we’re going to end up spending between 1400 and 1900 a month. Which is alot I guess but as long as I can find a job we’ll be cool. Actually we’ll be cool even if I can’t find a job. Wages here are pretty high.

If you twist around and look at the situation from a very narrow angle we might actually be saving money by living right downtown since we won’t need a car. Parking spaces go for 300$ a month.

I don’t know what sets prices here. Everything could cost more, demand is rediculous. And quality varies hugely within the same price catagories.

The first place we went to today cost 1850 a month. It was recently renovated to a reasonable, but not great, standard and sits on the 7th floor of a fairly delapidated building. It was ostensibly 1 bedroom simply because they put a wall through a bachelor suite to bump the price. It had a decent view of… well other buildings I guess.

The 2nd to last place we saw today cost the exact same amount. It was the whole 2nd floor of a townhouse. They had accidentaly listed it as 1br. It had like a bazilion rooms (5) and a view down nob hill of the bay!

The only problem was that we couldn’t get a real good look at the place since every flat surface was covered by people filling out rental applications.

So it’s nice to dream about that place but there’s just no way. There were lots of roomate double-income pairs moving in who for sure look better on paper than us.

I’m starting to think we aren’t going to get a decent place until I find a job so we can look more renterworthy than some of the competition.

Also we’ve decided where we want to live. Which is kind of tricky because that really limits where we’re now looking. We really like Italy Town. Around Columbus and Broadway. It has good food and a happy, relaxed atmosphere. Right now we’re on Nob hill and it just isn’t cool. It’s too upscale. There are all these wine and coctail bars on the nob while italy town has all the cool pubs and espresso places. Plus italy town is close to china town. China town = grocery shoping horray.

So now a 1 bedroom above a cafe in italy town has to open up for 1500$. Just gotta keep watching craiglist. Actually we know a place is opening up in early October. Mabey I can be employed by then!

Also, just as an asside, do you know what pints go for at the San Francisco brew pub during happy hour (4:00-6:00)? 2.75$!! 2 dollars and 75 cents! What the fuck! Free beer! And that place is on Columbus and Broadway.

So anyway. I guess we’ll see what happens next.

Our View
Originally uploaded by apes_at_home.

In San Francisco we are.

So we’re getting set up. The piccy is the view from our room in the Gaylord Suites (awesome name). The first resident-hotel in San Francisco. Built in 1927. Or some such thing. It’s pretty fanzy.

We have a phone. I’m actually surprised what a decent deal we got. Shopping around we found t-mobile had the most european system available. We buy cards at the 7-11 and put money on as we use it. No monthly fee. Much like civilized countries.

The price isn’t as nice as thailand. 10 bucks for 30 minutes. But it doesn’t expire for 3 months(!) and there are literally no other fees. If we use the phone more we can get more minutes for a better rate. I guess we’ll see. If we get the hang of messanging then communication will be very cheap.

So now it’s finding an appartment. We already have some calls/emails off to some places. We have a good idea where we want to live. We like the china town/nob hill/commercial kind of general area. West of Union where we are now is a little high brow. north and east looks more our style. And is closer to San Francisco brew pub.

A few places mentioned they wanted to see credit scores. I never really knew what credit scores where. Just that rental places went and dug them up before they rented to you. I was stressed about credit scores crossing borders. Since people where asking us to bring our own I did some reasearch and we paid equifax to tell us what Sarahs score is.

Turns out Sarah’s score is really good. So it should be pretty easy to convince someone to rent to us on the spot. First open house is at 3:00.

A yay for San Francisco moment: surfing a google maps/craigs list mashup on free wifi in union square with a really good iced tea in hand.

She Made It
Originally uploaded by apes_at_home.

We’re through customs and on our way to the USA.

This is a picture of me really happy because they gave me TN Status to work for Three Rings in San Francisco.

Although I’m really just relieved, and a little hungry. I’d worked up in my head how hard it was going to be to get my work status, but in the end the customs guy only wanted to see two sheets from my 15 page dossier, and sent me on my way in a matter of minutes.

Horrah!

Or the “Land of Milk and Honey” according to some airport security guy. Yes, I got the job at Three Rings and will soon have a hand in developing such games as Puzzle Pirates (Yarrr) and Whirled (sort of Second Life with Flash and less suck).

I’m scheduled to start in about three weeks, so we’ve got to find accomodation in San Francisco and work out the visa stuff pronto. Don’t worry, we’ll still be around for Beer Fest.

Next stop on our little outing is PAX in Seattle. See some of you there!

… I suppose we’ll still be “APES abroad” for awhile then, eh?