I’m in love with our new apartment.
I’m not allowed to post photos, because, Steven reminds me, it’s show-offy. I guess it’s show-offy to even reveal the reason he said not to. If I’d just said, “Steven won’t let me post pictures,” and left it at that, it could mean we live in a dump and he doesn’t want anyone to see the pizza boxes and crack vials. But i didn’t leave it at that. So I’ve already boasted too much.
But how exciting is it that I love our new place?
Oh, that’s right — not exciting at all. Not to read about, anyway. It lacks conflict, which makes it a total non-story.
To counteract the boasting, and add some drama, I’ll tell you my major complaints:
1) The dogs upstairs. They do two things.
A) They walk around at night over our bedroom. Not a big deal, but unsettling, because the ceilings in this building are thick, concrete slabs. We don’t hear anything else from upstairs or next door, ever. Just the dog toenails, which, from the sound, are as long as an LA chola’s. They could be Lee Press-Ons. They click as loudly and vigorously as a 1950s secretary from Queens typing.
B) They bark through the bathroom vent. All the apartments in this line have the bathroom in the same location, which means, if they’re barking above my bathroom, they’re hanging out in the bathroom. What are dogs doing hanging out in the bathroom? I know them bitches ain’t filing their nails. And they only seem to bark when I take a shower. It makes me think they’re watching me through the vent, too. We all know dogs are perverts, especially the ones with long nails.
2) The static-y toilet seat.
I’ve never seen a toilet seat with so much electric energy. It collects dust and hair like a balloon. Have you ever noticed that about balloons? It beats me why people give them to their kids to play with. Why not give the kid a dirty mop? Or our toilet seat? Here kid, it’s on a string. Go play.
3) The fridge.
The door to our Sub Zero fridge sticks. Oh my god, that sentence just made me the most insufferable person in the world. I should delete-delete-delete, but it’s such a perfect, platonic ideal of a humblebrag that that removing it would be almost as criminal as chopping down a 400-year-old oak tree or killing a baby seal. You should know that the Sub Zero came with the apartment, and it’s an older model, and it’s now totally streaky from when I tried to clean it. The door seal is so strong that when we try to open it, the whole fridge moves and nobody gets a snack. Does that make me less despicable?
4) The bacon.
We have central air – which is considered a plus, always mentioned on a real estate listing if it’s offered. But it means that you don’t get to run the air conditioning until the building switches from heat to A/C in the late spring. I’m used to sleeping with the air conditioning on, and rely on it for white noise. I can’t sleep in silence. Luckily, I have an awesome white noise app on my iphone that plays at least 7 different kinds of rain. My go-to is the sound of rain on a tent. (Go figure – I hate camping.) So, all good, except that Steven insists it sounds like bacon frying in the pan. He hates it. And every night since we moved in, I’ve made him fall asleep to it. The last thing he says before he turns over is always some variation on “Oh goody. The cozy pitter patter of bacon fat.”
That’s all I have to complain about, which I guess is pretty good, if disappointing in the dramatic tension department. Sorry, I’m showing off again. What complaints do you have about your home? Tell me in the comments. Or boast how large you livin’. Or, just tell me I’m not the only one with a static-y toilet seat.
LOL! Laura…I read this when you first posted and wanted to comment but couldn’t underground in the subway car. Anyway, I digress. THANK YOU for making me literally cackle in front of strangers. You brightened my day.
x~Lindsay
That toilet would scare me so much (and I am not normally scared of toilets, ref my last blog). Does it give you electric shocks when you sit down? I am so scared of getting electric shocks (and swimming with jelly fish) that it is boardering on the ridiculous. Once I was greeting this person in an office with wall to wall carpets, and couldn’t stretch my hand out to greet him. I kept pulling it back every time we were a couple of cm apart. Jeeez. During winter I hardly touch my kids, with all that fleece and wool, and I have this ritual before I can open the car. An electric toilet seat would be the death of me. Dogs and locked Zub Zeros, on the other hand, no problem!
Holy shit (har har) – looking at your recent post, I think I’m not likely to go to China. I know that’s not the intention. But I’m very toilet sensitive. As for electric shocks, our toilet doesn’t do that because the position is already filled by my puffy coat. Its sole job is to torture me. You should see what happens when I wear it and listen to my iPhone. The shocks are constant, zapping my ears, and hands, if I touch my iphone, with every step. Love your blog!
Don’t even mention the puffy coat, there mere thought is killing me. Mine is only in use when I’m with the kids on the playground during winter, and I can pretend I’m in a sleeping bag. Must remember not to make any calls! Your blog and writing is an inspiration. Happy Monday
Yes, that was the best humblebrag ever!
There is some kind of Japanese idol incubator in the condo above the one we rent. Aside from seeing young kids come in on the weekends who I always want to tell to run, the studio has practice sessions that have started running really late at night. They aren’t really playing songs, just noodling around on the bass and the keyboard. It’s a slightly muffled noodle, noodle, slap slap slap, from 11 pm to 2 am. But I fear it would be some kind of offense against “politeness” to ask them not to do it. (I know that sounds insane.)
Japandra, I love Japanese noodles! Oh wait, that’s not the kind you meant. That sounds like the most annoying sound ever. Hey, is it impolite in Japan to bang the ceiling with a broomstick?
Please excuse the redundant “by the ways”, trying to make my humble brag seem casual but tried too hard. Kind of like those “oh, you come here on Wednesday nights? Me too” to whatever guy I was stalking in my twenties. . .
I thought they were very effective “by the way”s. You could’ve made the second one “BTW” or “Bee tee dubs”
By the way, visiting your incredibly clean and organized apartment (the closet!!) sent me into paroxysms of jealousy and I had an all-weekend obsessive fit of cleaning and organizing but no matter how hard I try I just cannot escape the ever-creeping clutter and aging disrepair of an incomplete renovation that did not take into account how much I would use the kitchen! (By the way, this is the worst of all humble brag because it really is about how I don’t need to see pix because I saw your apartment in real life!)
Thank you for giving me a new double humble brag: “I feel so bad that seeing our apartment made my best friend Victoria jealous.”
Dude. This was so funny. Ok true story: The woman I live with? She listens to Imus and Rush Limbaugh. All day. On transistor. That she carries throughout the house. No headphones. And at night? Reality TV. I *never* wanted to know this much about Real Housewives of Atlanta. NEVER. But on the flip? My roof is to die for and so is my fireplace. 🙂 For a temporary living sitch…I’ll deal.
Who still has a transistor?? I guess people who listen to Imus and Rush. It’s so Brady Bunch of her. Does she put it down on the ground and dance to her favorite groovy tunes?
I agree with you about Atlanta. Bev Hills and NYC are the only ones you want to know about. But on your own terms, not through the walls.
I saw that fireplace in the pic. I’d listen to Nene all day for that.
Does cutting a dogs nails make them less perverted? I am going to have to give my dog a mani pedi. And who doesn’t live the sound of bacon frying?
Old man perverts always have long toenails (I’m making that up, but instinct tells me it’s true) so there must be some correlation. Try cutting them, Angela, and them maybe your dog won’t be such a crotch-sniffing deviant.
So far what I don’t like about my new house is the stink bugs. Even in the winter I can see them skulking across the ceiling. All bugs are terrifying but these are particularly gross.
Also, my outdoor hot tub water keeps evaporating. It may have a leak. Oops, I’m humblebragging too. LOL
Stink bugs! I’ve heard about those. Is there still a plague of them? They were the big thing in DC when we had bedbugs. Are they those bugs that curl up when you touch them? I used to bring them home in a jar. They smelled like shit.
No they look like cockroaches. They’re horrible.
I’m SO excited you have a new post this week! Mine is a brag/complaint combo — our cleaning lady changes our sheets to the flannel sheets…in the middle of August! The horror! So put a sign on them in the linen closet that said “Do not use – for Winter only” and my husband called me a douche.
HAHAHAHA! Your husband called you a douche.
Domingue took the laughs right out of my mouth. Hilarious. HPG, that’s an awesome humblebrag. Complaining about the housekeeper is a classic. And rightful complaint, too. Flannel in August? We don’t even do that at our summer home in Maine! (We don’t have one, I made that up.)
I think what you’ve done is arouse curiosity. Now we all want to see pictures of your new place! 😉
The one thing in our new place that bums me out is the downstairs dog. It’s not that it barks, and we have an upstairs dog with clicky nails too… But the one downstairs cries during the day when his/her parents leave for work.
And I work from home, so I hear the crying every now and then during the day. Part of me thinks I should just bring the dog over to my place during the day (and explain first, of course) but then I might be running a doggie daycare instead of an online business. 0_0;
So, there’s that. Otherwise, we dig our space.
That’s hillar.
You’ll just need to come over!
A friend of mine was just here talking about her neighbor’s weeping dog. She said it’s excruciating.
But Nath, you’re right. Step away from the doggy daycare. You’d totally get roped into that. Dogs and their neglectful owners can smell a nice person through the walls.
My go-to sound on the sleep app is the wind, rain and thunder combo. You should try it for variety. Are you using Sleep Pillow? Also, people who live in a third world countries complain about the Sub Zero fridge sticking all the time. That, and not having food. So don’t feel bad!
Yes! It’s Sleep Pillow. I live for it. It makes me sleep later than I intend to, though. Why do you think people in those countries don’t have food? It’s because they can’t open the Sub Zero.
I would love to see the pictures of your apt. <–not a joke.
You can go to a hardware store and buy yourself a new static-free toilet seat, and you can even install it yourself. It's that easy. Go ahead and splurge!
My suspicion is that the doggy nail sound is in fact a 1950s typist who has been trapped in the upstairs apartment for 6 decades. Next time you are in the shower, call upstairs through the vent and see if she needs to be rescued.
You might get to see some on the sly, Cuz.
Do they sell special static-free toilet seats? Or do I have to rub dryer sheets on it?
I’m hoping the imprisoned Jane Eyre typist is Peggy from Mad Men. Too bad she barks so much.
Actually, your post made me feel better. I have a blog — not work related — called Changing Your Grip, and I haven’t posted in at least three months. People read it and like it and even comment, but I always push it to the back of the Never Ending To-Do List. And since I’ve already stated in public (my website) that yours is 1 of the 5 blogs I never fail to read — I forgive you for not posting, since when it does come out, it’s always worth reading. Seriously. I’m not being obsequious.
I have a 104 year old house and a kitchen that is still stuck somewhere between 1950 – 1970. But it works for me. I love reading about remodeling — I secretly wish it was my other job — and I only get pissy about people on HGTV shows who look at homes to buy and whine “Open Concept” and “I don’t like the color of those granite counter tops!”
You are not one of those.
It’s so nice to know I’m not alone in my blog shame. I’ve discovered that the main thing keeping me from posting more is thinking it has to be some epic thing. If I just take the thing I was about to post on FB and expand it a little, boom – it’s a blog post. Now that I’ve put THAT here in public, I’d better stick to it.
OMG, these HGTV people and their open concept. Who told them to use that expression? And don’t they know that ceasarstone or corian is where it’s at??
The other day I wrote on my blog that my child’s vomit ruined the carrara marble on the bathroom floor. I deleted carrara because it made me look like less of a jerk. But I’m glad you kept the thing in about the sticky Sub Zero door.
You should’ve gone for it. What’s sad is when people boast that their kid’s vomit ruined the granite. It’s so HGTV.
Was it free-range bacon fat? Over the weekend we had some bacon made from free-range piggies. It was gamey. Required lots of maple syrup to cut down on the gaminess.
Nice to see you posting again.
🙂
Oh, I’m sad for you! What a tragedy to consume bacon that needs smothering. What’s the point of eating pure fat if it doesn’t taste good? On the other hand, it’s great to sleep to however it was raised and fed.