Tuesday, March 8th 2011

Tomorrow my furniture arrives from Canada, and so - of course - today I had to figure out where to put it. The basement seems like the obvious choice, right? So this morning I explored the basement of my building, and...what a creepfest...

This is my locker (#14), with the door swung invitingly open. In a horror film it would have slammed shut to and jammed when I stepped inside, imprisoning me two floors beneath the streets of Vienna. Two years from now, when the standing order to pay my rent finally expired, the new tenant would have found my cobwebbed remains slumped dejectedly in a corner (why do skeletons always have such bad posture?). 

The only unanswered question would be whether or not I was dead - or just too near death to move - when the first of the rats attacked.

Anyway, this is no horror film. In real life I didn't step inside. Fuck that.

But at least the bright, fresh wood mitigates the creepiness of the room. That and the electric light.

But it gets creepier.....

This is the view from a floor further down. Don't ask why I went down there. I just did. Was I tempted to climb those steps and investigate the strange light that appears to be emanating from just around the corner at the top of the stairs?

Not really.

And it gets creepier....

By now I'd figured out the settings on my camera, so this frame is lit as if the steps leading down to the fourth level of the basement had quite a wholesome - even inviting - feel about them. Believe me, in reality, in the dank and must, and by the dim light from a single bulb they weren't the least inviting. If nobody could hear you yelling for help from two floors below Vienna, you'd be SOL if you fell and broke your leg four floors underground. Plus the Viennese are busy people. Even if they could hear your screams they might well just continue about their business.

But in all likelihood no living thing would hear you scream down there.

Except the rats. Your screams would bring the rats.....