My Cave Story?

There have been a few little road bumps that I've run into since coming to Massachusetts.  These haven't really been issues with the state or the area but my situation in particular.  We moved in to the basement of a relative of Ashes'.  This set up was financially beneficial considering a) I don't have any income ATM and b) We don't plan on staying a full year because Ashes' will be applying for teaching jobs in the spring.  We aren't tied down with a 'contract' and can leave at any time it's convenient for us.  Also we are paying far less then the average apartment would be around here.  Springfield/Westfield isn't the most expensive area, especially compared to Boston, but it is not cheap.  So we are pretty well off for now.

The living situation does have a few little catches.  Most importantly for me, being the pop culture junkie that I am is the television.  Namely the absence of channels.  This relative of Ashes' isn't an avid television viewer and only has absolute basic, and I do mean basic, cable to go along with her high speed internet.  We have 13, count them THIR-TEEN, channels to chose from.  Two of them are the same and one is constantly out.  This leaves us with a horrifying 11 channels to watch.  I'm pretty sure cave men had more to watch.  I've just come from having 300 channels and an interactive menu to help me plan out my evenings/days/time at home when Ashes has the car.  Now I have to get up, walk over to the TV and cycle through nothing!  The last time I had access to so few channels was in the 80s.  No joking!  On Sunday the only option was football.  On Saturday the only option was football again!  I hate football.  I'm not in love with this but I'm willing to make the sacrifice for now.  I have other stuff to keep my occupied.  Like the internet... except...

The internet connection in our basement rooms is terrible.  Browsing is a nightmare on a connection that is rarely above 3 bars and half the time refuses to load.  Streaming videos on Hulu, Netflix and Youtube is now impossible since they simply crash and never start back up.  I was an annoying lesson to learn my first few days here.  I found out about the TV problem I figured "This sucks, but I still have stuff to watch on the internet."  Of course that would be too easy.  Most sites that are graphically intense load slowly especially if I have multiple tabs open.  I find myself rebooting pages about once every five page loads because nothing ever showed up.  This problem may have to do with our position in the basement since on the ground floor their aren't as many problems.  I'm guessing that if I bought a signal booster we would be able to fix that problem.  I can fix it but it still vexes my attempts at relaxation, job search and entertainment.

It's like living in a cave down here.  Other than the lack of television and internet there also isn't much light.  Our bedroom doesn't have any windows, which means mornings are as dark as night.  And day is as dark as night.  Darkness all the time is a little depressing even with lights.  Waking up in the morning is hard for us if we don't have the sun shining in to pull us out of bed.  We've been sleeping far later than at my parents house and our apartment, which might partly be due to Ashes' late night schedule.  Living in basement is a bit depressing but it's not terrible.  Our living room does have small windows to let in some light which makes it livable in the day.  It's not a dank basement which is good. 

It's not the ideal situation but the negatives are either fixable or can be lived with.  We won't be here forever so I can deal with these little inconveniences for the time being.  Once I'm working, which seems like it will be soon, it won't even matter so much.  There's enough around here for us to do that keeps us out of the house that it isn't a big problem.  In the week we've been here there has only been one day we didn't go out.  I'll make it.