Life Notes: Looking For A New Home

My dear readers, I need your help. I'm having some housing difficulties. Recently, the building where I live was inspected. The inspectors rated it at one step above Condemned. If a 2 month old sneezes the wrong way, it'll be condemned. So, my roommates and I have to move. I was going to go out on my own, but my roommate's 2 year old daughter has attached herself to me like a facehugger from Alien. Yes, I'm being completely serious. And it does make for some weird questions at work, but we all have burdens we must endure. After all, it would just be wrong to be as smart, sexy and talented as I am without having some kind of quirk to balance it out and having a 2 year old surgically grafted to one of my legs is the way the Universe chose to balance it.

Getting back to the point, I need to move. So, I'm currently on the hunt for a 4+ bedroom apartment, preferably in the Lowell/Methuen area. If you know of any good places that are renting in that area, please let me know either in the comments below or on Facebook.

I thank you for reading!

My First Thanksgiving...

And here we are on the far side of the Thanksgiving weekend. Surprisingly enough, I survived. Despite certain issues that threatened to destroy the holiday, I was able to spend time with family avoiding the usual bickering and such by having the holiday feast at MY house which seems to have been accorded the status of Neutral Territory.

After that, it was a great low-key weekend. I slept... A LOT! Catching up on missed sleep is such a good thing. I bummed around my house, hung out with some friends, and played video games. I'm almost done with Castlevania: Lords Of Shadow!

It turns out this holiday weekend gave me just what I needed. Rest and relaxation. It's an interesting twist for me. If things keep going like this, I might actually ENJOY this holiday season! I'm sure something will screw it up. Murphy's Law hasn't failed me yet!

Finally, After All This Time...

I've been in my apartment now, for a little over a month. And while it's still not quite up to what I envision, I thought it might be a good idea to give people a preview of my bachelor pad. If you click on the link below, you will be brought to my album of apartment pictures on FaceBook.

Apartment Pictures


They are arranged in a sort of tour-like fashion if you check them out in order. Otherwise, just click on which ever suits your fancy. Thanks to my little sister for playing photographer for me!

Once I get my place to the standards that I want, I'll take some more pics to really show off. This group of photos is more to give an idea of the layout of the place. As always, thoughts & comments are welcome.

An A.R.K. - Act of Random Kindness

Right on the heels of my rant (after which I felt much better, by the way), the Cosmic Awareness decides to throw me a curveball in the form of an act of random kindness. Here's the story:

My co-workers have had kind of a front row seat for the madness of my apartment hunt. Granted, I kept most of it kind of low key, but they still got to see a lot of it on a day-to-day basis. The day after my last posting, one of my co-workers, Janet (name changed to protect the innocent) comes up to me and says, "I have a gift for you."

I eyed her, suspecting some kind of prank. Not that Janet is a prankster in any way. She's an agreeable, solid character, a genuinely nice person. Which, of course, makes her the PERFECT front woman for a prank. I know there are several other pranksters in the office. I responded with a bit of my paranoia bleeding into my voice, "Really?"

"Yes, a big present. A service of dishes for 8 people!" As Janet goes on about a family member cleaning out old stuff from a previous (short term) marriage, all my paranoia dissipated to be replaced with amazement, gratitude, and yes, a bit of shame for suspecting her. (Which just adds to her being the perfect front woman for a prank!)

And the dish service is fantastic, too. Not at all girly or anything. Just simple and classic. It was a very cool thing for Janet to do. While other co-workers have donated stuff to my apartment, this instance struck a chord because it was completely random. I knew Janet was listening, but she has two daughters and a large extended family that she's dealing with, so I was thinking that my issue just went in one ear and out the other. So, the fact that my issues registered enough for her to remember it was really cool.

Second was the timing. Just as I'm at the point where I'm freaking out about all the little things my apartment needs, someone came and randomly gave me a chunk of the stuff I needed to get. Janet couldn't have timed it better if she were paid to! It was really cool.

Life Note: Apartment

I've decided to start a new ongoing series of posts on here called "Life Notes". Basically, it's just a mini-rant about a small, stupid issue that is either taking over my mind or bugging the living crap out of me. For my first Life Note, I'm going to rant about having an apartment.

 
You know the thing that messes with my head about having your own place? All the little things you find you need to have that you never thought about before. Like a can opener! Who in their right minds ever thinks about can openers? They are no-brainer MUST have, right? Well, here in my new place, I didn't have one.

My family and friends, trying to be helpful, donate stuff, cans of beans, soup, corn, etc. I'm thinking, "Hey, I can get me some corn for dinner tonight!" NOPE, because I didn't have a freaking CAN OPENER!!! (But I bought one yesterday, so I'm finally good there.)

Then there's pots. Not frying pans, but POTS. Like a medium sized pot that you could cook rice in... or like 4-5 chicken thighs in. Nothing huge like the soup cauldrons that Grandma's the world over use to indulge in their arcane magic of cooking, just a nice medium sized pot. They're like EXTINCT!! I went to a couple of places looking for a single, solitary pot. (On my shopping trip for a damned can opener, figure why not kill 2 birds with one stone, right?) Couldn't find them anywhere!! Oh, sure for like $130 I could get an entire SET of pans, pots, and stuff, but I don't have that kind of money. And all I wanted was a medium size pot for me to cook some rice in. NOTHING!! Sure they had pressure cookers that I could fit my TV in, and they had waffle makers, and pancake makers, and George Forman's "THE NEXT GRILLERATION". I kid you not, that's actually in stores. But, a single solitary pot was NOWHERE to be found!!

And let's not even talk about other little things.. like spreadable butter for sandwiches.. or garbage bags, or for that matter a garbage CAN!,  push pins, Tupperware, BOWLS, for crying out loud. How difficult is it to get a non-miniature sized bowl where I can get more than ONE spoonful of cereal in? And there's hand towels, spatulas, a ladle, sieves, glass cleaner, paper towels, those plastic things to organize your utensils, sponges to do dishes, dish washing soap, broom, mop, bucket, dustpan..... I MEAN COME ON!!!!  

People, if you are living in an apartment with others, whatever you do, DON'T MOVE OUT ON YOUR OWN!! Your wallet/purse will NEVER recover!

On My Own, Again...

I'm on my own again. It's been three days, and already this apartment feels more like home than the place in Manchester. As I write this, I'm trying to figure out why. I have the same stuff. It's in the same boxes. I'm the same person, and I have the same job. Everything is the same, yet I feel different. It's not the place itself, although it helps. It's that I'm on my own again.

Many times, in many places, to many people, I have said that being alone is my default state of being. It's in my nature to desire to live in solitude. While people have refuted my claims, citing personal history or depression or some other reason why I don't really want to be alone, it's in moments like this that the truth of what I am resonates within me. This new apartment feels like home to me, and it's because I'm on my own again.

I had a three bedroom apartment in Manchester. Ninety percent of the time I spent in the apartment was spent in my bedroom. With my door closed. Despite the fact that I was living with TWO other people, I spent my time alone. It's kinda sad when you think about it. I was paying for a five room apartment and was only living in one of those rooms. I was living with two other people, and I spent most of my time ignoring them. And even though I lived there for a year, that apartment was nothing more than a rest stop for me. Despite my fondest desire, it never felt like home for me.

I don't have to worry about hearing things that I shouldn't. I don't have to worry about things not being where I left them. I don't have to worry about people I don't know appearing with no warning at all. I could go on for days about all the things that I don't have to worry about anymore. I feel remorse about uprooting the lives of the people I lived with, but sitting here in this place, my place, in the still of the night, I know it was the right thing to do. Not for someone else, which is mostly the reason I do the things I do, but for me. I made this move because it was the right thing to do for me.

I'm on my own again and I'm at home.

The Great Apartment Hunt

It's been awhile since I posted, dear readers, and I apologize. But I do have good reason. Two actually. One, I've been swamped at work and haven't had the residual neural energy to write. Second, I was hunting for a new place. I'm sure, dear readers, that you've noticed we were closing in on my first anniversary in Manchester. Now, my life is very different that it was when I first got here.

For example, Manchester has lost a great deal of its appeal. There is virtually nothing for me to do here. There isn't even a MOVIE THEATER in the town!! I'm working in Nashua. My lease is up. I don't like this place anymore and I can't afford to live here, either. So, at the beginning of the month, I started looking for an apartment. I'm also experiencing a relapse of my hermitism, so I'm looking for a place for myself. Just a nice one bedroom, no roommates unless they are female and willing to have sex with me. B-)

The good news is, it only took me a couple of weeks to narrow the search down to 4-5 places. I made the mistake of telling my co-workers about my apt hunt and that's when things really got fun. My boss immediately announced that she has veto power over where my next apartment will be, and my coworkers all started giving me advice and hunting down ads for me in newspapers & on the 'Net. It was very touching how much they got into it. Even the CEO was in on it!

A couple days ago, my app was approved and I put the deposit down on the place. In a few days, I will be a resident of Nashua, NH. A town that HAS a movie theater, that I currently work in, and has more than one good chinese food place!! When I move in, I'll put up some pics of the place.

Two Week Anniversary

Well folks, as of yesterday, I completed two weeks in the new apartment. It's still a bit weird living in a new space, but I find myself getting used to it much faster than I initially thought.

It still doesn't feel like "home" though. But I guess that's because things aren't running the way I want yet. At least not in MY section of the apartment. But it takes time, I guess.