I did this before cellphone and any sort of digital maps. It was hell. I memorized my city, that wasn’t the hard part. The hard part was the people who didn’t have their houses properly labeled with their address. Bonus points if they left their porch light off, as well.
“Why is my pizza cold?”
“Because I had to use complex mathematics to derive your house number among all of the unnumbered houses on your street.”
”Because I had to use complex mathematics to derive your house number among all of the unnumbered houses on your street."
Wouldn’t even be able to do that in the neighborhood I grew up in. They numbered the houses in the order they were built/the lots were purchased and that wasn’t often next to each other lol. So 64, 67, 88, 90 are next to each other for instance.
Wasn’t on any sort of grid pattern either. The roads just kinda meandered around willy nilly and would sometimes loop back on itself with random “bridge” connecting roads which I know isn’t extremely uncommon but definitely added to the difficulty of navigation.
Ahh yes, you grew up in a west coast subdivision. I am assuming either a late 60s to early 80s split level or a slightly more upscale true two story neighborhood, where every house is one of either two models, or a mirror image of those models to create the illusion of variation.
It is always funny, the first time you go to a friend’s house and use the bathroom, their mom will offer to show you, but you would just be like, “I know where it is.”
You got some right! All 60s-70s houses. Mine was split level. Decidedly middle class. However, it was smack in the Midwest and basically all the houses are about as different as houses built in that era can be. Now, the subdivision that popped up in the field next to my neighborhood in the 00s were cookie cutter 3-4 of the same houses (but sometimes the floor plans/elevations were mirrored to make it seem different haha).
I grew up in a split level as well. When I die, I hope in the afterlife I find whichever architect designed the American split level. I have so many design questions, mostly why was the billards room more important than a functional living room that could fit everybody at once? And if the billards room was so important, why is it always next to the laundry room?
Lol! We didn’t have a billiards room but we did have a wet bar that literally was never used and for the first 10 or so years of my life I was afraid to go near.
They aren’t called billards rooms these days, almost always just “family rooms” but they typically are essentially sized to fit a regulation table and a bar.
The neighborhood I grew up in had a scheme that made sense once you were told what it was, but you’d never figure it out looking around.
There was a center point to the town where all addresses started, as you went away from that point in any direction the numbers got bigger. Numbers are 3 digits. Each block away from the center gets a new top digit, so the four blocks that touch one of the axis lines are 100, one block away is 200 etc. There’s a North, South, East and West, so there can be a 200 North Something St. and a 200 South Something St. and they will occasionally get each other’s mail.
One side of the street gets the even tens, the other side gets the fives. So 330 West Example Ave is across the street from 335 West Example Ave.
Many homes sat on multiple lots, and they skipped the unused lot numbers (the tens digit) and even then they would skip a number in between, so it’s not unusual to see 205 East Example ave on the corner, and 235 East Example ave is next door.
Apartments or townhouses with multiple addresses on the same lot get a letter suffix, so you might have a 635B West Name St.
There are other context clues, like the North-South roads are “streets” and the East-West roads are “avenues”. But still it would be difficult to grasp this system if you weren’t told about it because “There’s three houses along this block, why are the numbers 30 apart?”
The misnumbered/not numbered houses is still a big issue. GPS can only be relied on to get you in the general area, and even then sometimes it points you to the middle of a field.
My real gripe is apartments. People will often fail to give you the apartment number and even if they do, every single complex has their own numbering system and layout. There is one complex near here where the signs on the buildings are completely illegible at night due to the lights above them casting shadows. I hate having to go there.
Almost every apartment complex I have ever been in has followed the exact same numbering pattern.
A single building will have the floors be a letter with each unit being a number like 01 while a multi building complex will have the buildings designated as letters and will use 3 digit numbering schemes starting in the 100s. The first digit applies to floor while the second two apply to units.
If a complex has more than 26 buildings, that is when things become funky. The 27th building will likely be the AA building and it will either be the second building chronologically. Next comes BB and it will either be the 4th or 28th building, and so on.
Another thing they might do is just have those duplicate named buildings be sectioned off into a slightly more prestigious part of the property, gate it off and give it a name like Chateau @ Bronson Heights (assuming the apartment complex is named Bronson heights). If something like that is done, they will just completely restart the numbering convention.
Also, if a complex layout doesn’t seem like it makes sense while being driven, say an E next to an S, imagine it with a top down view, they likely named left to right regardless of cul de sacs, so you should have a rough idea of where each building logically should be if not chronological by drive.
What specifically about my post makes you think I’m angry? And defensive doesn’t even make sense as we haven’t spoken before. Maybe take a deep breath yeah?
I’m not the delivery driver you replied to. I just thought it was dismissive to reply to a person saying “it’s difficult to figure out apt numbers” with a long explanation on why they’re wrong and how it’s actually easy.
Why would you find it dismissive of me to take time out of my day to give somebody a basic overview of the very thing they outright told me confused them?
I live in an apartment complex where the only distinguisher between the two halves is street number, they share a name entirely and have the same numbers.
I delivered pizza for a few years in my early years, and poorly lit addresses were the absolute worst. I was delivering in the pre-smartphone but post mapquest era, and we had a computer in the shop with a touch screen (which was crazy at the time) map on it so you could figure out where we were going. But God forbid you ended up on a one way street looking for an address that was poorly labeled or unlit and you got somebody behind you laying on their horn… At some point I bought a 1000 candle spotlight that I used at night, and that got me pulled over several times because people would call the police about “a slow driving car shining a spotlight out of its window”… Like… For fucks sake. I’m just trying to deliver some pizza.
With that said, while working I smoked a bunch of weed, listened to a bunch of good music, and generally got tipped well so… It was a good time.
Nothing changed drove for Grubhub for awhile. Google maps isn’t 100% correct and the amount of customers expecting food to be delivered with their porch lights off and no numbers on their homes. It was a shit show.
I had to visit a house the other week in a place I hadn’t been before. Sat nav got me to the post code just fine only but the problem is it’s one of those villages on a long road where everyone thinks they are special and don’t need house number. Instead they all have names. It’s horrid! Driving up and down real slow, blocking the road, while I read every bloody house name.
There were a couple of times where I just turned around and went back to the store with the pizza and said no one was home. That would have been one of those times.
I did this before cellphone and any sort of digital maps. It was hell. I memorized my city, that wasn’t the hard part. The hard part was the people who didn’t have their houses properly labeled with their address. Bonus points if they left their porch light off, as well.
“Why is my pizza cold?”
“Because I had to use complex mathematics to derive your house number among all of the unnumbered houses on your street.”
Wouldn’t even be able to do that in the neighborhood I grew up in. They numbered the houses in the order they were built/the lots were purchased and that wasn’t often next to each other lol. So 64, 67, 88, 90 are next to each other for instance.
What kind of sick fuck…
Wasn’t on any sort of grid pattern either. The roads just kinda meandered around willy nilly and would sometimes loop back on itself with random “bridge” connecting roads which I know isn’t extremely uncommon but definitely added to the difficulty of navigation.
Ahh yes, you grew up in a west coast subdivision. I am assuming either a late 60s to early 80s split level or a slightly more upscale true two story neighborhood, where every house is one of either two models, or a mirror image of those models to create the illusion of variation.
It is always funny, the first time you go to a friend’s house and use the bathroom, their mom will offer to show you, but you would just be like, “I know where it is.”
You got some right! All 60s-70s houses. Mine was split level. Decidedly middle class. However, it was smack in the Midwest and basically all the houses are about as different as houses built in that era can be. Now, the subdivision that popped up in the field next to my neighborhood in the 00s were cookie cutter 3-4 of the same houses (but sometimes the floor plans/elevations were mirrored to make it seem different haha).
I grew up in a split level as well. When I die, I hope in the afterlife I find whichever architect designed the American split level. I have so many design questions, mostly why was the billards room more important than a functional living room that could fit everybody at once? And if the billards room was so important, why is it always next to the laundry room?
Lol! We didn’t have a billiards room but we did have a wet bar that literally was never used and for the first 10 or so years of my life I was afraid to go near.
They aren’t called billards rooms these days, almost always just “family rooms” but they typically are essentially sized to fit a regulation table and a bar.
The neighborhood I grew up in had a scheme that made sense once you were told what it was, but you’d never figure it out looking around.
There was a center point to the town where all addresses started, as you went away from that point in any direction the numbers got bigger. Numbers are 3 digits. Each block away from the center gets a new top digit, so the four blocks that touch one of the axis lines are 100, one block away is 200 etc. There’s a North, South, East and West, so there can be a 200 North Something St. and a 200 South Something St. and they will occasionally get each other’s mail.
One side of the street gets the even tens, the other side gets the fives. So 330 West Example Ave is across the street from 335 West Example Ave.
Many homes sat on multiple lots, and they skipped the unused lot numbers (the tens digit) and even then they would skip a number in between, so it’s not unusual to see 205 East Example ave on the corner, and 235 East Example ave is next door.
Apartments or townhouses with multiple addresses on the same lot get a letter suffix, so you might have a 635B West Name St.
There are other context clues, like the North-South roads are “streets” and the East-West roads are “avenues”. But still it would be difficult to grasp this system if you weren’t told about it because “There’s three houses along this block, why are the numbers 30 apart?”
The misnumbered/not numbered houses is still a big issue. GPS can only be relied on to get you in the general area, and even then sometimes it points you to the middle of a field.
My real gripe is apartments. People will often fail to give you the apartment number and even if they do, every single complex has their own numbering system and layout. There is one complex near here where the signs on the buildings are completely illegible at night due to the lights above them casting shadows. I hate having to go there.
The rare times a complex had a map of the complex when I was delivering was a godsend.
Almost every apartment complex I have ever been in has followed the exact same numbering pattern.
A single building will have the floors be a letter with each unit being a number like 01 while a multi building complex will have the buildings designated as letters and will use 3 digit numbering schemes starting in the 100s. The first digit applies to floor while the second two apply to units.
If a complex has more than 26 buildings, that is when things become funky. The 27th building will likely be the AA building and it will either be the second building chronologically. Next comes BB and it will either be the 4th or 28th building, and so on.
Another thing they might do is just have those duplicate named buildings be sectioned off into a slightly more prestigious part of the property, gate it off and give it a name like Chateau @ Bronson Heights (assuming the apartment complex is named Bronson heights). If something like that is done, they will just completely restart the numbering convention.
Also, if a complex layout doesn’t seem like it makes sense while being driven, say an E next to an S, imagine it with a top down view, they likely named left to right regardless of cul de sacs, so you should have a rough idea of where each building logically should be if not chronological by drive.
You really think you’ve lived in enough apartment complexes to know better than a delivery driver?
What specifically about my post made you angry and defensive?
What specifically about my post makes you think I’m angry? And defensive doesn’t even make sense as we haven’t spoken before. Maybe take a deep breath yeah?
I apologize but you seemed to think I was attacking your career, which in no way was my intention.
I’m not the delivery driver you replied to. I just thought it was dismissive to reply to a person saying “it’s difficult to figure out apt numbers” with a long explanation on why they’re wrong and how it’s actually easy.
Why would you find it dismissive of me to take time out of my day to give somebody a basic overview of the very thing they outright told me confused them?
I live in an apartment complex where the only distinguisher between the two halves is street number, they share a name entirely and have the same numbers.
I once lived in a complex where Google had my apartment so wrong I’d have to stick gps coordinates in the delivery instructions.
Maybe one of these? https://www.popularmechanics.com/home/tools/g37899122/best-handheld-spotlights/
I delivered pizza for a few years in my early years, and poorly lit addresses were the absolute worst. I was delivering in the pre-smartphone but post mapquest era, and we had a computer in the shop with a touch screen (which was crazy at the time) map on it so you could figure out where we were going. But God forbid you ended up on a one way street looking for an address that was poorly labeled or unlit and you got somebody behind you laying on their horn… At some point I bought a 1000 candle spotlight that I used at night, and that got me pulled over several times because people would call the police about “a slow driving car shining a spotlight out of its window”… Like… For fucks sake. I’m just trying to deliver some pizza.
With that said, while working I smoked a bunch of weed, listened to a bunch of good music, and generally got tipped well so… It was a good time.
Nothing changed drove for Grubhub for awhile. Google maps isn’t 100% correct and the amount of customers expecting food to be delivered with their porch lights off and no numbers on their homes. It was a shit show.
I had to visit a house the other week in a place I hadn’t been before. Sat nav got me to the post code just fine only but the problem is it’s one of those villages on a long road where everyone thinks they are special and don’t need house number. Instead they all have names. It’s horrid! Driving up and down real slow, blocking the road, while I read every bloody house name.
There were a couple of times where I just turned around and went back to the store with the pizza and said no one was home. That would have been one of those times.