Location blogging #9.

Home sweet Hell.


Well, took these along multiple days along several of the other trips, plus sprinkled in some Google Maps to fill in missing pieces, plus put 'em in scrambled order (to throw off the cyber-stalkers).

So, here we go.

Here's the liquor store/redemption center where I take my bottles back.

Only place left I know of that just takes your bottles back, and hands you a slip.
Everywhere else has this fucking "Clynk", scam running.

What a fucking racket.
You give them your bottles.
They send 'em to a facility.
You get your money in a little auto-teller machine the next fucking day, THE NEXT FUCKING DAY!!

Two fucking trips, more fucking gas burned.

Yeah, there's helping the environment.

Oh, and you just can't give them your bottles, you have to use THEIR bags, that you have to buy!
And of course, they take it out of your bottle money.

Sonovabitch....

And they shave a couple bucks off your total for processing, or some shit, and you don't even know how honestly they counted your fucking bottles, unless you counted them yourself, but who fucking does that?

At least the other way, you can watch them do it, and there's no bullshit, no waiting another day, no burning extra gas.

Clynk this, motherfuckers!

Course, someday, all the redemption centers will die out, and this Clynk shit will conquer the earth.
And on that day...I'll stop taking bottles back.
Fuck it.
Fuck you.
They'll go to the MERC plant to be burnt with the rest of the rubbish.
On this I swear.

Course, then they'll make throwing bottles and cans illegal.

I hate the system...*grumble*...fucking people...*grumble*...

Okay, 'nuff of that, here's Blast From The Past diner.

Nifty little 50's nostalgia diner.

It's like eating meatloaf, or salmon pie, or a double cheeseburger and fries, except if you were Fonzie!!

And, up the road a helluva ways, here's where the Station House Grill is, which used to be Don's Market, and that's what it used to look like as Don's.

Go to the official site to see what it looks like inside and out as Station House.
Heh, heh, the address is still "donsmarket".

Anyway, food there is awesome, menu is still the same as when it was Don's, but they've jacked the prices up.

They've got literally everything, pizza, sandwiches, Mexican, meat & potatoes type supper meals, pie, cake, you name it.
If it ain't on the menu, they can probably cook it for you anyway.

It's half restaurant, half variety store, I love places that are two things.

If I had a business head, I'd run a variety store, restaurant, pool hall, bowling alley, arcade.
If it were in Nevada, I'd add brothel.
Heh heh.

Anyway, up the road a piece, ya got Nicely's Video.

Ahhhh, you served me well over the years, Nicely's, but your time is passed.

So many memories, Toxic Avenger, Evil Dead trilogy, countless Nintendo games, countless shitty cult movies given the MST3K treatment by me & Hyla & Spencer.

So damned many memories.

And it's all fading away.

They became a half & half video and tanning place some years ago, and the tanning part has slowly been gobbling up real estate, and now I hear they're adding a beauty parlor.

It ain't a geek place anymore, it's a bimbo place.
I don't go there anymore.

Okay, so I don't always like half & halfs. :P
Not when one of the halfs becomes malignant.

Anyway, these days, it's easier to Redbox.
Think everyone's discovering that.

And even then, there hasn't been very much the past 5 years or so I was super-compelled to see.
Think I can count on two hands the new movies I've seen in the past 2 years.

So yeah, the Nicely's age is over for me.
*Sigh*

Up the road a little bit, we've got Tory Hill Variety.

They've been rebuilt from the ground up, they used to be a rustic little shack.
It had a certain charm, now it's all new and pretty, and ruined. :P
Lol, nah, it's cool, and their menu is improved.
They have a great fish sandwich now.
Haven't tried anything fancier yet.

Ah, yeah, around some corners, and up some streets, is this place that used to be Morrison's Gun Shop.

Been gone for ages, but lotta memories there.
Used to ride up there on my bike as a kid, and buy comics, and candy, and Garbage Pail Kids, and old paperback compilations of Mad Magazine.

Anyway, back on the main path, and up the road from Tory Hill, is this Hannaford.

Nice store, has the Redbox I spoke of previously, but...they have that fucking Clynk racket running redemption.

Y'know what was easier than Clynk?
The self serve machines they used to have in grocery stores.
Remember those?
You shove in a can at a time in the aluminum one, or a single-bottle, or a boss (2 liter) in the plastic one, and it crushed 'em up, and spat out a ticket to cash in, and you were all set.
What happened to that?
What was so hard about that?
Yeah, there was machine maintenance, but nowhere near the bullshit of Clynk.
*Sigh*

So, turning off a bit, here's Aubuchon Hardware...

...and up the road a bit, this variety store I can't remember the name of, they used to take redemption, so I just called them "the redemption center", but they stopped taking redemption, so I was like "fuck them", so I don't even go there anymore.

...and right up at the same corner, and across the street, is Low's.

Like Tory Hill, they had a big makeover done.

Little story here, they used to take redemption in the real old days, when I was a tiny little kid, and Dad would always use the bottle money to buy more sodas.

So...I thought the system went, you buy new sodas with old sodas.

So, one day, a dude knocks on our door, and he's on some kind of bottle drive for something, must have been charity, and internally, I was like "holy crap, this thief wants our bottles, without those, we can't get new sodas, doesn't he know this?", so I was like "no 'fanks, we take 'em to the store, and buy sodas wif' um".

So, that idiot/lunatic was fended off, and I felt like I'd saved the day.

Strangers, ain't they something?
;)

Anyhoo, up the road from there, we come back to the actual Tory Hill, and the cemetery there.


This is the cemetery I had in my head when I wrote "Bride Of Ka-Ka Pants", and where the zombies in that story were rising from.

See, you zoom down the hill, and you come right back around to Tory Hill Variety, so, if the zombies did sweep down on the town, Tory Hill Variety would bear the brunt of the assault.

So, the store in the story is a cross between Tory Hill Variety, and Morrisons.

So, there's that loop around, so let's head back, and up the road a helluva ways from Low's, we got the Sur Fine, which used to be Plummers.

Same store, different name.

Which is the other closest grocery store until you have to go way the hell out to Westbrook, or Saco, or South Portland.

That bit there is the Sur Fine/Plummers...

...that bit there's the pizza place....

...that bit there's the video store. I keep thinking of getting a membership...but...again, I don't rent enough, and Redbox is easier.

And that bit there is the Chinese place, called simply "Yummy".
Which is the closest Chinese place in the whole damned area until you have to head out to Westbrook.


At that intersection, you've got this Rite Aid.
Which is pretty much like the new CVS-es (Westbrook, Gorham).

And up the road a bit, we have the other Low's.
In High School, all the seniors with cars would have their lunch here.
I had no car.
I got no Low's.
I got no love.
High School sucked.

...and up the road, is the High School I went to.
*Shiver*

Well...Harry evolved into his final form there, that's about all I can say 'bout the place.

So, that's my 'hood.