life done write

Finding a bed-bug-free place to live has been even more of a nightmare than last time. Obviously, as you have deduced from my previous post, people think they can charge out the wazoo for places without kitchens, with rat holes or without any real space.

I’ll preface this by saying I’ve met a couple darling landlords, but if my roommate options keep falling through, I can’t commit to a two-bedroom and I’m always a little concerned about a lack of fenced yard.

The place I saw last night was cute, well-appointed and in a nice area, but didn’t have any natural light. Before that, there was a place that echoed like a cathedral. And, worse–much, much worse–the landlord stood me up, directly preceded by a potential roommate standing me up.

WHAT THE HELL PEOPLE.

You all have telephones. This is not a hard thing: being polite.

To be fair, the roomie said she texted me. But I called her twice and frantically and she apparently did not think that was an indicator that I didn’t get or don’t have text. I’d like to live with someone who has a brain, please. And a heart.

I think I may have to resort to living alone again. Darn it all.

Dear everyone,

Please price your rental appropriately. Below are some tips that will help:

1. If you do not have a kitchen in your rental, you MAY NOT charge $800. More appropriate charge: $6.00.

2. If there are giant holes in the wall (the size of rats), you MAY NOT charge $600. More appropriate charge: free.

3. If your house has 63 people living in it and sacks of flour in the living room, you MAY NOT charge $400. Appropriate charge: $10.

If your place is falling apart, I don’t care if it is across the street from a million dollar home, you MAY NOT overcharge people. Be reasonable, guys. Your place is worse than the $500 places in Glendale…come on.

Love,

Gigi

Okay. So, first off, I do love animals. I own one. I’ve grown up around them. I like them. Mostly.

But I will say that there are certain breeds of dog that I’m less inclined toward. Meaning, anything that drools. Drooling = not okay.

I’m also not okay with animals that people are not keeping under control. Just the same way I hate children whose parents let them run around the laundromat screaming and throwing people’s laundry in the garbage (you know who you are). Same thing with dogs. If you are letting your dog go crazy at a concert–jumping on strangers, making incredible amounts of noise, etc.–STOP THAT. You can leave your dog at home, people.

The reason I bring it up is this: last night at Wash Park’s Sunday night free concert (yeah!), I was sitting in the grass with my Luna and my book. Luna was rolling around on the cool grass in happiness. I was reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Music was playing in the background. All was well.

Until a woman walked over with her fat, wheezing bulldog and sat down right beside me. Not a few feet away: right beside me.

Firstly, her bulldog was the loudest breather I’ve ever heard in my life. I think I made a joke to the people behind me at some point “imagine trying to sleep through that!” The thing was snorting and wheezing and just generally sounded uncomfortable. I’m sad for your dog, as it seems to have a medical problem, but could you please leave it at home or stand in the way back of the crowd where it won’t bother anyone?

Secondly, her bulldog was out of control with the DROOLING. And it kept shaking itself, making drool fly through the air and land on any person within five feet. I happen to know (from the angry looks all around) that I was not the only person totally grossed out by this. Again with the PLEASE SIT IN THE BACK or DO NOT BRING YOUR DROOLING DOG.

Thirdly, the dog wanted to be my best friend. And the woman couldn’t hold on to its leash for whatever reason. So every couple minutes, the bulldog would launch at Luna and I, landing alternately on my lap, my purse and my dog and covering each of them in drool and grossness. I asked her more than once to please keep her dog off me. I was nice about it, so it made me even angrier the second, third and fourth times it happened.

Eventually, with a wet pants leg and purse, I got up and left, feeling totally gross.

Thanks, Assholes of the World who think that you are the only people on the planet and gosh darn it everyone should love your dog, even if they can’t hear over its breathing and don’t want a sticky spit bath.

Jerk-style.

Have I mentioned before how much I hate the Cherry Creek Club? And how normally I don’t use the names of my apartment complexes because: A. I have enough stalkers, thank you, and B. I try to protect the places I work, live, etc. But the Cherry Creek Club…they’re so bad that they don’t get that kind of treatment.

Here’s the latest:

So, for the SECOND TIME IN SIX MONTHS, our building has cockroaches. I haven’t seen any in my apartment because I don’t leave food out. In fact, I barely eat there at all. But that’s beside the point. The point is that people don’t take care of their apartments and thus get invested by bugs who think they just discovered the good life in those cans of crusty Spaghetti-Ohs and bags of discarded chips.

So, our apartment complex, as they should, is going to spray the building.

I’m all for spraying the building, for the record.

What I’m not all for is getting less than 24 hours notice about said spraying. And being told that I need to move my furniture (excuse me, but a 5′1″ single lady lives here with her ten pound dog…I don’t think anyone’s going to be doing any major furniture moving), clean all my floors, wipe down all my counters and, by the way, also empty every cabinet in my apartment and cover everything with a sheet.

Oh, just that? No problem. I totally want to do that when I get home at 9PM, exhausted at the end of a long (albeit productive and interesting) day.

No wonder I couldn’t sleep and had visions of punching everyone in my building who doesn’t throw away their garbage properly.

Dear Cherry Creek Club Management,

Can you please start asking yourself the simple, simple question: what would I want my apartment management to do if I had a full-time job?

Use your brain.

Love,

Gigi

The Tech Department
Case in Point#1
An error message on a slide projector: “The lamp is waste a duration life. Please change the lamp.”

Case in Point #2
A sentence straight out of the user manual for a content management system: “Media and data works much like Microsoft Window in that you right like to initial most tasks.”