So, Paul walks up to the office today to find out what’s going on with the dishwasher. We could have bought one from Sears and had it installed already, if it were up to us.
As usual, no one is anywhere to be seen. No one returns our messages either.
That’s right, on Saturday, the dishwasher broke. Of course, no one is in the rental office until Monday, so I have to wait to make a call to get things repaired. I called on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, leaving messages each time that the dishwasher is broken. I also added in that the front door doesn’t lock and the closet doors don’t work and haven’t worked in the three years that I’ve lived here.
Finally, at 1:55pm on Friday, Sal appears. He looks at the dishwasher, turns the knob around a few times and says, “Looks like you have no power.” No shit Sherlock! Then he plays with the lever that locks the dishwasher closed and he asks me if I’m sure I know how to lock it. Uh, dumbass, I’ve been using dishwashers for 17 years and this particular model for 3, yeah, I think I know how the frigging thing works!
So, he walks over and proceeds to switch off some circuit breakers. Fortunately, I stop him before he gets to the computer and computer equipment. Surprise! The dishwasher still doesn’t work. After a whopping five minutes, he tells me, “I have no time to fix this. I’ve got other things I need to fix. I two dishwashers on order and I’ll just give you a new one when they come in.”
Yeah, I know. Moron. So he goes to the closet door and messes with it. “Yep, it’s broken,” he says and then moves on to the front door. I insist that he fix this as we haven’t been able to lock the door properly for nearly a month. He fixes that and leaves at 2:20pm.
No, I don’t think the dishwasher will be fixed before we move out of here.
Ah, it’s such a beautiful day that I think I’ll go out and enjoy the weather. It snowed yesterday evening and we were planning on spending the day running errands. But, since it’s 10:40am, first we must go shovel the snow that the landlord was too lazy to do, again. Next, we have to hope and pray we can get up the hill and out of the parking lot because that hasn’t been shoveled, nor has there been any salt put down to melt the ice. Then again, we can’t expect anyone to come and shovel when it’s only been twelve hours since it stopped snowing.
I just love living here and having every section of our lease broken by the landlord day after day, with no help from anyone to force them to fix stuff. Friggin’ slum. I feel sorry for anyone new who moves into this shithole.
Living in my little slum, I have recently learned how to play a new game. It’s called the reset game. It’s rules are very simple and, if you come visit me, you can play too. The rules are:
Get up at 4am, hit the reset button on hot water heater. This is the only way to make heat because the hot water heater has turned itself off, again, while you were sleeping. You will have hot water by 5am, but only for one 4 minute shower. You will not actually have heat. You must choose heat or hot water. You cannot have both.
The hot water heater will turn itself off again and you will have to go upstairs and hit the reset button again around 5:30am to get heat for the house.
Wrap up in a blanket until around 7am, when you have to go back and hit the reset button again. Wrap yourself up into your blanket until 9am when you telephone the landlord, leaving a message to inform him of the problem.
Go about your day as best as you can, considering you have a blanket wrapped around you. Hit the reset button again around noon. Go back downstairs and keep your hands warm by making something hot on the stove for lunch. After lunch, call the landlord and leave another message, this time adding that the leak in the kitchen is worse than before and that closet door is still not fixed, three years after moving in.
Go back to your usual routine for a few more hours until the heater packs it in again sometime between 3pm and 4pm. Run upstairs and hit the reset button. Find something to cook for dinner and hover over the stove to keep warm. Telephone the landlord once more (because the repairmen leave at 4pm) about your condition and then eat dinner.
Wrap up in a blanket on the couch and watch the news on TV. Go back to the heater and hit the reset button again between 7pm and 8pm. Get back to the warm couch as soon as possible.
Watch Keith Olbermann at 8pm. Get ready for bed at 9pm, checking to make sure there is heat. Go to sleep. Get up at 4am and start the game over again.
Well, we might finally be able to say we’re done getting the heat and hot water fixed. The casing that holds the fan for the hot water heater was broken, causing it to bend downward and drip water onto the floor. We finally got that fixed and mopped up all the water around the area, as well as cleaned our buckets and put them away. Hopefully, nothing else goes wrong with it.
Last Wednesday, someone decided it was a good idea to rake the leaves and leave them at the bottom of the stairs. Everyone that lives in my building had to kick the leaves away so we could get through and see the bottom step. It’s now Monday and the leaves are still sitting there. At this rate, we should have some good compost pretty soon.
This morning, as I took Paul to work, I literally got to drive through an obstacle course of garbage bags. Some were still sealed, while others were busted open, making the obstacle bigger. I just love how people can’t seem to manage to actually put garbage into the dumpster.
Lastly, on Thursday, the owners, in their infinite wisdom, decided that we needed more speed bumps. We had four. Now we have eight. That’s eight speed bumps for the 1/4 mile that I have to drive from the entrance to the townhouses to my parking spot. The best part: they are too high and not rounded off. There are ninety degree angles on both sides of the speed bumps. I’m sure that’s good for my car.
I really can’t wait to move from this shithole. I swear to God, my cursing will be cut in half just by moving from this place.
