Despite the headache gleaned from teaching two classes, advising more students than I’d like to count and general other running around here at work, when I got home yesterday I decided that the husband and I should do something. I had suggested to him the day prior that he might really enjoy shooting the Terre Haute House since it’s half destroyed and the rubble is fascinating to look at. He had taken pictures of a construction site in town before, and this one was far more impressive than that one. I had even scoped out spots where he could shoot from without worrying about cars blocking the shots. He agreed and grabbed three rolls of film and his Canon and we were off.

We parked behind the Terminal, a former streetcar hub turned sports bar, and walked across eighth to the alley behind the deconstruction site. Two cops were chatting at the end of the alley and Ian decided we should go talk with them to make sure it was okay that we were back there. We weren’t inside the chain-link fence or anything, but we just wanted to be polite. They said it was fine to take as many pictures as we wanted so long as we stayed outside the fence. Apparently they were trading shifts as someone is posted there to keep people out of the building as it’s being destroyed. I personally know a number of people who want to get onto the site to take bricks from the building as souvenirs and to sell them on eBay.

Ian started taking pictures of the half-destroyed building, constantly wishing he’d had a telescoping lens and some color film because many of the shots he was taking could have been so much cooler. The rubble everywhere was fascinating, and you could see into the bathrooms where toilets and sinks ignored the sharp drop-off beside them. We even saw a patterned curtain billowing in the breeze behind a door half off its hinges. A mirror to a medicine cabinet was opened reflecting the metal wires sticking out of the concrete floor above. All those thick metal wires sticking out of the destroyed floors made one entire side of the building look like it had grown hair. Ian let me take a shot of one of the rooms, and then he took some pictures of the front of the building which has been, so far, left relatively untouched. The large stone front over the once-awning which read “MDCCCLXVIII TERRE HAVTE HOVSE MCMXXVII” had been removed, but Ian got some shots playing with the dying light against the still intact windows. The building has been there since Chauncey Rose opened it as the Prairie House in 1838, the name becoming Terre Haute House in 1855. Its renovated form, the form we see today was done in 1927 hence the final date on the front. Ian found some of the front mural which had been removed, and he took pictures of it as well. I can’t wait to see some of the finished pictures!

Afterward, we went to Moggers which I love more and more that I go there. I got an awesome burger and a bottle of Jever (a pilsner from Friesland, Germany). We followed that up with some shopping at Office Max (Hippie, our new HP inkjet at home, needed color ink.) and then some shopping at Books-A-Million. We finished off the night with some grocery shopping at the south Kroger’s because we’re having a pitch-in lunch today at work and I signed up to bring Katie’s ham/green bean/potato crock pot thingie, which the adorable husband made last night for me since I was feeling dizzy and nauseous (Damn you, Fatigue, damn you!) and went to bed early.

All in all, it was an awesome evening. Ian took two and a half rolls of black and white pictures of the Terre Haute House (I’ll post pictures of it when it was all still standing for you out-of-towners who’ve never seen its majesty.), we went out to eat, did some shopping, and had a really good time. We don’t have nights like that often. I think that maybe we should do it again sometime: go for a walk then for dinner. It’s nice. That and Ian’s the mostest awesomest husband in the whole widest world! 🙂 Now if only the headache I’ve got would go away so I could enjoy my quiet day here at work (Heather’s out sick again, so I’ve got the office to myself and no students coming in). Oh well, Happy Day Before Thanksgiving!