Sigh, apartment hunting again…

Today I screamed at a homeless man for peeing on my car. I said the f word a lot. People were probably staring. But I was enraged, as I watched in horror from across the street where I was stuck at an intersection cursing the little electronic white man for not popping up to instruct me to cross. Once he did I stormed over with my shopping bags and fired, “Were you just f’ing peeing on my car!?!??!?” To which he calmly said no, no I wasn’t. And then I screamed some more. And he said, “Look, lady I didn’t pee on your car.”

First off, that is the first time someone has ever called me lady. I look like I’m eighteen years old, so I was kind of flattered. Secondly, by the time I marched over to my car I saw a nice little puddle next to my passenger side door, but sure enough no pee on the car. That I could detect anyways.

I drove off thinking to myself, do I really want to live in Santa Monica? Where I have to worry about parking my car and returning to puddles of homeless people urine surrounding it. What else do they do when you’re not looking? Maybe roll around on the hood with their grimy, sweaty booze-infused skin? Or use my mirrors to pop their zits? Gross, I don’t want to be around to find out. Nevertheless, I’m apartment hunting again and Santa Monica is on the list of potential spots to relocate. It’s beautiful (in most areas), close to the beach, near a gazillion coffee shops and in close proximity to plenty of shopping. Sounds like a dream town. But man, the homeless people are ev-ery-where. Literally everywhere. It’s like having a pet in your yard that you don’t really want, but it always shows up begging for food, booze or use of your bathroom.

I took this picture of two drunk, unconscious homeless people being taken away by paramedics on Lincoln Blvd in Venice. Happens a lot on this corner.

Venice is not much better. Where I work, I’m privy to a front row seat to the crazies that inhabit Venice, including drunks, homeless people, thugs or drunk, homeless thugs. I routinely see people overdose or drink themselves into a coma by the bus stop where several cop cars, ambulances and a token fire truck show up to whisk them off to the hospital to bathe in our tax dollars. Or then there’s the insane, jacked white guy who always has his shirt off and often feels the need to karate chop the nearby bike shop’s sign on the sidewalk or harass the neighboring salon customers as they get their hair did. On slow days at work, this kind of behavior serves as great entertainment. As a place where I’d consider relocating, I don’t think Venice makes the cut.

Then there’s Marina del Rey, where I currently reside and absolutely love. It’s peaceful, quiet, close to the beach and nearby quaint sailboats and massive obnoxious yachts. I live near people who have a lot of money and I like to pretend I do too. Sometimes I go home and cry at night because I actually have no money. But I digress. Living here is damn expensive. I am a young twenty-something girl who has needs, among the most important of which are: need to be by the beach, obviously, and also, need to be somewhere safe so I don’t need to drop kick a mugger’s ass at night when I go to my car. Oh, did I mention I’m a writer? Which should help to further paint my picture of poorness. But! I’ve played sports since the age of nine, so in case I do get attacked or someone is chasing me at night in the ghetto where I will likely be relocating to, at least I can take solace in my ability to run like the dickens. Thanks mom and dad, for making me play soccer as a kid against my will.

Moving on up. Again

The next time I revamp my resume I am going to add the job title: Professional Mover. Because I am one. In the last three and a half years I have moved six times. I’m thinking I should stay put for a while so I don’t lose my friends and family, who most likely are screening my calls for fear being asked to help me transport heavy boxes and furniture to yet another destination.

My latest house-hopping experience was unlike any other. I’ve been living in LA for about four months and due to the uninvited residence and succeeding death(s) of some hairy long-tailed rodents in our apartment walls, my roommates and I were forced to move immediately. Armed with face masks to avoid the smell of our dearly departed rat friends, my roommates packed up their things and I braved the stench while packing, au natural. All three of us got sick.

Under the gun to find a new apartment, while battling a war against the landlord who claimed the dead rat smell was actually a dead computer battery in the wall (what??) and that we were being dramatic, we spent almost two weeks calling in exterminators, the Health Department and some lawyer friends to help our case. How the landlord was able to claim a dead computer battery caused that smell and also impressively left behind some rodent-sized droppings along the roof and vents still puzzles me.

 

I'm sure this is what our dead rat friend looked like in our wall. But we'll never know because our landlord refused to cut the wall open to remove it.

 

 

During the time we spent crashing at friends’ apartments while house hunting, we returned to find we were paying rent for not only rat carcasses, but a large family of bugs and flies. Who wants to visit me in LA now? No?

Fortunately we’re out of the rat house now, and are in the process of setting up our new place, thanks in part to two of our new Mexican friends, Francisco and a man with the mustache. In the past, as I mentioned, I’ve recruited friends and family to help move my junk, but since I’m 3,000 miles away from them and my two roommates didn’t have reliable friends here to recruit either, we decided to hire some professionals. We found them outside of a Home Depot, among dozens of other Mexican men (note: I am not certain all of these men were Mexican, though they were of some Latino descent) who flooded our car as soon as we pulled up. They knew we were moving and needed their help, and they needed our money.

To my knowledge, this kind of stuff doesn’t happen in Boston.

After a Home Depot employee threatened to call the police if we didn’t leave (pretty sure what we did was illegal), we grabbed two Mexicans and hit the road with our 16 foot Budget rental truck. Oh, I’m also putting Professional Truck Driver on my resume too. By some grace of God, I successfully trucked our belongings around LA in this beast of a vehicle without smashing into any cars, mailboxes or small children. See how badass I am?

Last year when I moved to a new apartment in Boston, I drove a 17 foot UHaul a half a mile down the street and scraped a parked car, resulting in $800 dollars worth of damages, and a unique way of meeting our new neighbor. Clearly the 16 foot truck was a better choice.

I do highly recommend stopping by Home Depot if you need help moving or building things. I can only speak for those in LA, but there were a lot of able-bodied workers there willing and ready for a job at a minimal price tag (we paid $100 total for 4 hours worth of efficient help and a lot of stair climbing). That way you give a job to someone who actually wants it, and you don’t make all of your friends and family hate you for dragging them into manual labor. Everyone wins!