Fake Poland

I have thrown in the rag on Hipster Central and migrated 15 minutes northward to Fake Poland, also known as Greenpoint. And, the lovely Dave has finally become an official New Yorker! His arrival to the city was indeed exciting, but within a few days of living in our teeny railroad apartment that barely fit 1/4 of his belongings (leaving the rest of his stuff in his parents' garage), we realized we had to move.

This means that after spending a long week packing the house Dave lived in for 5 years in Boston, moving some of it to NY (including his cat) and then the rest to his parents, we had to move everything all over again. But before we could even get to the stage of moving, we had to talk this all over with the roommates, find a subletter, find a new place, and then move.

Simultaneously during us making this decision, the hot water at the Bedford apartment wasn't working. It had been on and off for two months even though the landlord, Bill Lika, had supposedly fixed it three times already. So, I got wildly pissed when I came home for a shower and it was ICE COLD, and called him at 1 in the morning, leaving an angry message about how this has been going on for too long and it was not okay and I work nights and should be able to come home from work and take a decent shower. I get a message from him the next morning, about how nothing is broken and we're the only tenants complaining, and I better not call him again outside of business hours and he doesn't want to hear anymore about it. He, of course, ignored my calls later that day, so I left a calm message apologizing for the late hour at which I called but saying that whether the other apartments were having problems or not, we definitely were not getting hot water and I would like to discuss this.

Also happening simultaneously was a ridiculous "fight" with this woman who lives downstairs. She has given us shit since we moved in, asking us to turn our music down even when it's not allowed and saying that we're rude and disrespectful to her because we walk in the apartment wearing our shoes. She honestly said to me that I should never wear shoes in my apartment and should learn to walk more quietly up the stairs and in my house. And also, most of the complaints came between 3 and 9 IN THE PM! First off, it's absurd to make noise complaints in the afternoon (especially on weekends), and secondly, the music was played through an Ipod dock set up on a shelf so she must have been listening closely in order to even hear it, and lastly, all her complaints were made in a horribly snotty tone of voice that very clearly said to us, "How could you jerks ruin my living situation by simply living above me, you assholes!".

Well, we responded to this at first with niceness, then with anger and bitchiness, then by just saying okay to her but only turning it down one notch. Well, she got really mad at us one weekend night at about 8 pm, flipped out that we didn't turn it down within 30 seconds and wrote this ridiculous note about how we are the cause of gentrification, and that the whole complex was happy before we came and we're ruining it (which isn't true because everyone else is friendly to us and we've received ZERO complaints from anyone else). Then, she posts the note on the front door to the whole building!! Crazy lady. And to top it off, she called and reported us to Bill.

The next day, I went and talked to her about this note, asking what we needed to do in order to make her completely happy. And you know what? She stumbled over her words and couldn't come up with anything. She finally said that her main problem is how we speak to her when she complains, so I apologized for that, and then explained that we find her requests outstanding and ridiculous, and that's why we responded in such tones. Then I said that I'd rather she had come to talk with us than post a note about how we're the cause of gentrification on the front door, and she looked downward all sheepishly and grunted. But, I said, I understand that people do and say things we don't mean when we're upset, and that when I responded to her in angry/bitchy tones, it was because I was responding out of the exact same upset space that motivated her to be all passive-aggressive and immature. Just joking! I didn't say that, I was nice, and actually just said that I understand people are mean when they're upset and that I had responded to her in a nasty way before because I was responding out of the same upset space that encouraged her to post the note. I was good and left out any insults.

Anyway, I then said that we think it's absurd she expects to never be able to hear us ever, because we live in New York City and simply walking around is heard below (the kid in the apartment above us woke me regularly at 7 am with loud kids cartoons...that's how it is in nyc!), and that we're allowed to listen to our music. I suggested that maybe we come up with a compromise where during certain hours, no noise, and other hours, no complaints. She told me she wanted to discuss it with her roommate first and then come talk to me about it the next day. I gave her my schedule for the day, thanked her and never saw her again.

So Bill the Landlord of course used this complaint as motivation to further hate me. When days passed and we still had cold water, my roomies and I wrote a letter demanding repairs, and Lizzy called him to inform him of this letter. He then tells her that we are terrible tenants and should just move out, and he'll take our names off the lease and give us full deposit back and everything, he just wants us out. This is GREAT news for me, as Dave and I were moving out anyway, so I was psyched. But the other roomies, not so much.

Both Mark and Lizzy took it really well that we were moving, especially considering all the other stress happening at the same time. They both decided to stay, and we began the hunt for a subletter while also hunting for a new place. After two sketchy realty companies and over a week of looking at places and obsessively checking craigslist, Dave and I found a perfect apartment in Greenpoint, with windows in every room, a big kitchen with exposed brick, a (non-working) brick fireplace in the HUGE living room, a walk-in closet and big bathroom, and all for cheaper than what I paid at Bedford. And then, Mark's girlfriend decided to be my subletter! So the remaining roommates switched things around, thus eliminating a walk-through bedroom, and everyone's happy.

This drama took about 3 weeks to settle down, but now I couldn't be happier. Living with Dave is awesome. We can decorate everything the way we want, leave dirty dishes out all night if we so desire, walk around in undies and play loud music. There's a deli below us so we can be as loud as we want, with zero complaints. And the other tenants are awesome! Young and friendly, almost all of them own dogs. Life is good.

Now I'm back to writing regularly (working on two stories at the moment!), doing yoga and running, working with the girls...I like feeling settled again. And now that I have more free time, I've come up with a few ideas for my blog! First off, I've waited way too long to give updates about my job and the girls, so that will be coming up (but everything's going REALLY well with them). Secondly, I go to shows all the time and really miss writing about music, so I plan to post more reviews and stuff. And lastly, I know my life is incredibly interesting, but I think my blog needs the spice of a bi-monthly survey. I'm going to come up with topics and 3-5 questions per survey, and then ask random people the questions and post their responses. The first survey will be posted next week! The topic: GAS. Get psyched!

P.S. Dave and I are celebrating our one year anniversary tomorrow! Yay us!