Sunday, May 22, 2011

Old Faithful

This past week has been a crazy one for me. Now, I'm sure you're all expecting me to talk about how busy things have been at work, and while things have been busy at work, things have been crazy in other ways. Earlier this week while I was watching TV, I heard water dripping in my kitchen. I thought I might have not closed the faucet all the way, but when I checked, it wasn't coming from my faucet. I opened the cabinet under the sink, and the cabinet was flooded with water. Everything under the cabinet was wet, so I had to pull all of that stuff out and had to mop up the water with a towel. I thought that maybe one of the drain pipes was leaking, so I put a bucket and a pot under the pipes. Thinking that was all I needed to do and thinking that it was a minor problem, I continued to watch TV.

Suddenly I heard the sound of rushing water. So I ran into my kitchen, looked under the sink, and saw that water was shooting out of the overflow pipe from the dishwasher. I hardly even use my dishwasher! And the water wasn't just spilling over or gurgling out; it was shooting out of the pipe like a geyser. Being in a bit of a panic and completely unprepared to deal with something like this, I grabbed an empty yogurt cup from the top of the counter and tried to catch the water. That idea was a total failure because the yogurt cup is small and the water was coming fast. So I threw the yogurt cup across the kitchen and dove into another cabinet to grab the largest saucepan I have to catch the water. But the water was still coming too fast, and a 4 quart saucepan was filled in a matter of seconds. So I grabbed another sauce pan, unfortunately a smaller one, and it was also filled within seconds. I was at a bit of a loss at that point, but fortunately the water stopped.

I had to get more towels to mop up the water that once again filled the cabinet. Now that I knew where the water was coming from and now that I was prepared, I got a bucket and put it under the pipes just in case it happened again. Well, it did happen again, and it was almost another disaster. Water started shooting out of the pipe again, and as I was watching it, I noticed that the bucket was filling up fast. I grabbed a measuring cup and started to scoop water from the bucket and pour it into another big cooking pot. My 4 gallon bucket was filled within 30 seconds, and because I wasn't quick enough to catch all of the water, some water still spilled over into the cabinet. And I, once again, had to use more towels to mop up the mess.

I called the maintenance people in my apartment complex, and they came over to look at it. When I explained what was going on, they realized that it was a problem with the main plumbing line and not my apartment. Apparently whenever someone else in the building ran their dishwasher the water backed up and overflowed into my kitchen. The maintenance people called a plumber and he was able to clear out the main line. I'm glad he fixed it, too, because I was getting tired of running to my kitchen whenever I heard the sound of rushing water. Late one evening when I was already in bed, the sprinklers outside turned on, and I sprinted to my kitchen because I thought the pipes were overflowing again.

Everything is fixed, thankfully, and needless to say, it's been an eventful week.

Thursday, May 05, 2011

Curve Balls

Once again it has been a long time since I've last written. It will probably come as no surprise that I've been busy with work. And it just feels like I've been busier than usual over the past few weeks. And if I wasn't busy enough with my "real" job, I have also taken on a few additional freelance jobs. The extra money will be good, and the projects are fairly easy, so it was hard to turn down.

In unrelated news, I came home yesterday and found a note on my door from the apartment complex. Unfortunately they are raising my rent next year. A few weeks ago, I overheard someone walking through my building saying "I can't believe how much they are raising the rent." That's never something that you want to hear and initially I was really worried and panicked about it. But I convinced myself to calm down and to just wait to see what they were going to do with me. And apparently they are raising my rent, too. So now I'm worried and panicked again.

If they were raising my rent by $20 or $50, I wouldn't be bothered. But they are raising my rent by $100. Right now my rate is $850, but they always add extra for certain utilities (water, sewer, and trash) and it usually ends up being about $880. Now that the rent is going up to $950, it will probably be about $980 with utilities. I just can't afford to pay nearly $1000 on rent with my salary. If you do the math, my rent is going up by about 10 or 12 percent. Unfortunately my annual cost of living raise at work is only 2 percent. As it is, I highly doubt that 2 percent is even enough to compensate for the cost of gas and groceries these days.

So, over the next few weeks I have to start looking around for a new place to live. My lease is technically up at the end of June, but I have to give my complex 30 day's notice if I'm going to leave. So I have to at least find something by the end of this month. Then I just have to deal with the costs of application fees, deposits, moving expenses, and who knows whatever other expenses I could encounter. I think I'm mostly just really sad to leave this place. It's a nice, roomy apartment, the area is nice, management has been nice. Unfortunately, I suppose, they just need to raise the rent to keep up with the market and their own costs.