I have settled in to my new apartment as much as I can, at least until the furniture arrives in the moving truck, hopefully sometime Monday or Tuesday. Until then, it’s just me and this pile of blankets on the floor, and this box I am using for a desk. And this lamp, and that’s all I need. And this paddle-ball game, and this ashtray, and that’s all I need. And this matchbook. That’s all I need.
My apartment is very large, as they claimed, but it definitely has some skanky elements to it — a mystery stain in the middle of the living room carpet, a stale smell, and some mildew on the shower grout among them. I quickly rid my shower of the mildew, however, with a few squirts of “Scrub Free” cleanser, and, as the name suggests, I did not even have to scrub. This tells me that there is no excuse for that shower not being clean when I moved in. No excuse.
Anyway, I think it will be quite nice once I have everything set up. For once I don’t have “Basic Apartment White” paint on the walls, but some nice khaki-type color with white baseboards and trim. It’s as if the paint is trying to class the place up a bit, in apology for the mystery stain. (That’s not quite working however, as my eyes gravitate to The Stain every time I’m near it, and sometimes when I’m not. Sometimes I’ll be in the bathroom, and I’ll find myself straining to see out the door and around the corner, just to stare hypnotically at that stain again.)
Judging from some of the people I have encountered, teaching my writing and lit classes is going to be another uphill battle. Today, for example, I had to go send a fax to the Home Planet for some school paperwork, and so I looked online for print shops (we ain’t got no Kinko’s). I called this one place and asked if they offer fax services, and the guy was all, huh? and made me hold forever, and finally he came back and confirmed that they do, in fact, have fax capabilities. When I got there, I saw their huge sign painted both on the storefront and on the wall behind the front counter, where, in letters a foot tall, they had written a list of their services: PRINTING, BINDING, GRAPHIC DESIGN, COPY, FAX. I can see my close-reading-based methodology is going to take hold here with a quickness.
In other news, I have already learned the name of one of my neighbors — I greeted her and her dog when I saw her the first day, and we had a brief, friendly conversation. This was an extremely un-me-like thing to do; I tell you. I prefer to ignore and be ignored, but I think it might be nice just to have some people around here who know who I am and all, you know, in case I slip in the shower and die. Someone will have to call the coroner so he can come and pull the cat off my face and give my nose-less corpse a proper burial.
sems unfare to teh cat.
Wow, that stain would never pass the ?tat des lieux (kind of like an apartment inspection) in Switzerland. When you leave an apartment here, a deceptively friendly (it’s all a front) little Swiss man with white gloves comes to “inspect” your apartment. He does the “white glove test” and scrapes the top of your ceramic stove with a razor blade. If he discovers dirt or scrapes off cooking residue from the stove, well, YOU FAIL! Failing means you have to have it professionally cleaned again to the tune of 800 Swiss francs - about 666 (heh!) American dollars. So, no. No stains here. However, I could see how a suspicioius stain could easily add a little “atmos” to a swingin’ pad…And what??!! No whiskey?
I’m not into neighbours either, but I’m thinking of having a giant party to celebrate the opening of my new apartment in France. My intention is for it to rage out of control (rage, rage against the dying of the light, apartment party!), involve noise, booze and plenty of French women with those pouty, red, French-woman type lips. Oh, and lots and lots of awesome French food and wine…who knows - you may end up reading about it on one of the major news outlets.
HA — Yeah, well, the cat bit the shit out of me more than once on the trip here, so I am not placing her desire to eat my dead body at the top of my priorities. In fact, I highly suspect that she is sneakily slickening the tub floor with Crisco at this very minute!
J — I can picture that little Swiss man right now. He would be disgusted with this place! I think it’s one of those places that thinks that f mostly students and young people rent from them, they don’t have to keep the place spotless, I guess because the students are just going to crap it up all over again. I’ve run into that philosophy before, and I tried to get a non-student-oriented apartment, but I think I failed. Enh. In regards to your party, that sounds awesome. I hope it makes the news!
Well, providing you can make your way to France, consider yourself invited. I’ll be the one with the questionable sanity wearing a Led Zeppelin t-shirt.
In apartment related news, I have just been informed by the rental agency that part of the roof of my apartment received water damage and apparently caved in to some extent. They are now trying to contact the owner regarding getting it repaired…want to trade?
Oh man, I can so just see the cat, all tail-deep in the Crisco because, you know, she’s just so *hungry*, and then jumping into the tub to “rinse off”… She’s going to try to pass it off as an accident!
I don’t know how she’ll explain the missing nose, though.
CONSTANT VIGILANCE, Alfina.
Please accept one Australian-sized dose of winter chill* free with this comment!
Man, nothing is humid like Town. At least it isn’t [Large Gulf-based oil importing/processing metropolis with terrible 2007 National League baseball team]!
If the stain starts moving, it’s a trick, get an ax.
OK, it’s not moving, yet, but it seems to be getting uglier. I hate that stain SO MUCH!