I have a crazy, crazy landlady. Her name is Sally I-Love-to-Overreact-to-Complaints Johnson. Her main goal in life is to cry at her tenants when they call her about miscellaneous maintenance issues. Sally is working hard to become the very best cry-at-tenant landlady there ever was. I feel it my obligation to assist her in her endeavors, because I'm a closet feminist who thinks all elderly women should take up a second career late in life. Who's with me?
Let's start oh, 5 months back, shall we? That would make it March, which was the month I decided I had had enough of the troops of GIGANTIC child-eating "Waterbugs" (we all know what that cozy little word means) parading around my apartment, and so I put in a friendly call to Sally. Needless to say, Sally was not emotionally stable enough at that time to deal with the Waterbug Issue. She did, however, feel comfortable enough to expound on the depths with which I was forcing her spirit, by inquiring if there was an exterminator whom she knew of who I could call about our little infestation problem. Far.Be.It for me to assume that a landlord or lady (read: crazy lady) is responsible for keeping giant cockroaches from taking over the apartment building where her tenants are paying kajillions of dollars to live in BUG INFESTATION FREE. *Editor's note: Kajillions is not a word, as per my spell check, but gazillions sure is.
Maybe there are woes of the money-grubbing apartment owner lifestyle that I am not aware of. If so, please share them with me, because not having enough free time in between counting the piles of money you have painfully extracted from your tenants does not sound like it warrants a depressive episode on a daily basis to me. ! After Sally, begrudgingly gave me the information for the exterminator, she slipped in a nice, "Oh by the way, you've gone and caused me a small coronary infarct with your nagging naggingness, thank you very much," closing comment. Since I pride myself on using Pavlov's theory on anyone and everyone I come in contact with on a daily basis, I start buttering up old Sally over the coming weeks with notes and cookies, even visits from our pup which everyone loves!
So then May comes around, and I notice the actual movable space in my bathroom has diminished to about 8 square inches due to the impressive amount of Black Mold growing on the ceiling and walls of the shower that has no outside vent. Eh-hem, Sally? I wouldn't even have mentioned it, but there were painters traipsing up and down the hallway stairs re-painting from the smoke damage that I will have to use at least four posts to tell you the story about THAT one, but just know there was smoke damage that needed painting over in the hallway for a year before it actually got done. Sorry for the side-tangent, mid-tangent there. Anyway, the painters were so nice and right there ripe for the picking to ask about our bathroom situation/disaster. After one of the guys took a look at our shower, he said he'd be happy to fix it in a jiffy if it was okay with Sally. That night I called Sally and once again unaware of the precariousness of her emotional stability, kindly tried to rip her heart out by inquiring about the paint job. Again with the wailing and the sobbing and the tearing to shreds my dark, black soul. But eventually, after she had decided I had endured enough, she gave in and huffily conceded to tell the painters they could re-paint my mold infestation. (Wiping sweat from brow.)
May = Me spotting what I think is a mouse fece in the dog's bowl, and flipping out for the millionth time since we moved to this beloved little city a year and a half ago. Call Sal, she flips out in turn, I flip out again, Mr. G loses half of his hair. Exterminator comes back, and Sally says that's it, she's sick of being bothered by me and my home-care issues. Dear Sally, how I want to see you treated with heavy medication and possibly shock therapy.
Which brings us to June-July-now August, because I am too afraid of my 85 year old landlady to even ask her about what the hell is wrong with our air conditioner and is it supposed to be completely still as a ghost when plugged in and turned to the ON position? Is this some kind of new invention that is designed specifically to not give any indication that it works while it is in fact in working order? I'm thinking no, because it's hotter than 12 Lesbian Whores in Church in my apartment right now, despite the mute air conditioning units in two windows. I finally decided that I'd had enough, and bought a damn air conditioner that I then had to pay 40 bucks to get delivered to the apartment because that's what you have to do when you live in a city as big as this one with no car because the car insurance people and the street cleaning police are in conspiracy to steal all of your money and fly to Tahiti together. God Bless America.
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