Category Archives: apartment

Mar 15

Potential Moving Derailment

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We found out today that the apartment we wanted to move into has been rented out to someone else. They needed for us to give the entire deposit to them a couple weeks ago. We did not have it.

Also, Jennie has not heard back from the place where she had the interview last Wednesday. The person with whom she interviewed said they want to offer her the job and that she would get a letter with the details.

Even if she got the job we don’t have a place to stay down there. Our lease is up at the end of the month.

I’m still feeling kind of numb about everything.

Dec 28

The Melting and The Leaking

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What freezes eventually melts. All that snow we got last week is melting. This naturally comes with its own set of difficulties. I anticipate that waterways will become flooded from the large flow of melted snow.

Closer to home – inside our apartment, in fact – we’re dealing with leaks: Close to our patio door, we have water dripping. Earlier this year contractors came to fix the flashing outside to prevent this from happening again. It looks like it didn’t work.

The maintenance manager poked a hole in the ceiling to allow one focal point for the water to drain, so that we wouldn’t have a huge bubble suddenly crash down on us. I’ve had to poke another hole. We had to move furniture out of the way, lay down plastic and place an empty garbage can underneath.

Similarly, we have a leak in our bedroom, at the window sill. I have a 44-oz cup collecting the water.

The management at the apartment complex told us that there really isn’t anything they can do until the snow has melted so that they can get workers up on the roof. Our situation is a typical one in the complex right now, apparently.

Dec 23

Christmas Storm Chronicles, Part 9

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Here’s a picture in front of our apartment. I could look from the top of the pile and see into our apartment on the second floor.

Jim Borgman, the Pulitzer-prize winning editorial cartoonist for the Cincinnati Enquirer, has a great perspective on the storm:

A thought to brighten your season as you slide to work this morning…

Dec 23

Christmas Storm Chronicles, Part 8

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After Jennie went to bed, and I planned to head back outside to try to get our car into a parking spot. We told Keisha she could either play in her bedroom or lay down next to Mommy. We offered her that last choice because I’d waken her up early, and I knew she was still a little tired.

Armed with our shovel, Jake and I went to our car. He playfully dove into the snow, and I left him to do his business. I think he was a bit confused, as though thinking, “Hey! Where are all my usual smells? What’s this fun white stuff?”

Walking along an unshovelled area of our sidewalk, the snow was up to my knees. When I got to our car, I looked around and I saw that there were a lot of other cars that were stuck along the main roadway. I shovelled under the car and around the wheels. I also cleared the parking space. After awhile, I was able to get the car in the spot.

Jennie, Keisha, Jake, and I stayed inside for the rest of the day. We had left our shovel outside our apartment door, and, from time to time, some neighbors came by asking to borrow it. We obliged, and, they were considerate enough to bring it back when they were finished.

Dec 23

Christmas Storm Chronicles, Part 3

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I just came back inside. The spot where our car was parked last night has close to a 12 inches of snow in it. Our road appears impassable; you can barely see that it was plowed yesterday afternoon. Only the cars that were not moved yesterday show how heavy the snow has been. The airport may report only 13.6 inches, but it appears to be at least 24 around here.

While Jake and I were outside, I saw a neighbor’s SUV stuck at the top of the hill. Another neighbor emerged from his apartment, started his SUV up, commenting that he needed to be at the Columbus airport for a flight at 5 PM this afternoon. He has to dig his way out. I helped sweep some snow off his vehicle for awhile.

Jake started whimpering. The snow is up to his shoulders, and the wind is blowing pretty hard. I decided to bring him inside.

I called Jennie’s work and found out that she had already left. We’ve no cell phone, and it appears that she’s not going to get very far in our apartment complex.

Keisha’s awake right now, watching PBS Kids in our bedroom. Regis and Kelly are on the TV in the living room. I’ve made me a cup of coffee with some cocoa mix in it. I’m going to head back outside to look for Jennie in a bit.

Nov 26

Smells Like Dog Poop

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Yesterday we spent Thanksgiving with some friends from church who live in Springfield, Ohio. I’d taken Jake our dog outside before we left so that he could relieve himself, but he didn’t poop.

I knew that we would be gone a long time, and I didn’t want Jake to have an accident in our apartment, so I put him in his cage (what we call his ‘bed’).

Fast forward seven hours… we return and find that he had gotten out of his bed. Did I fasten the door securely? I guess not. I inspected our apartment. Fortunately, Jake hadn’t left us any “presents”.

I took him outside for a walk, and he pooped, to my relief. I brought him back inside, and we got ready for bed. Since one of the local radio stations has changed their format to all Christmas music for the season, Keisha kept her hearing aids on so that she could listen to it while she fell asleep.

About an hour later, I got up to take Keisha’s hearing aids out so that her ears could get some rest. I thought she’d taken them out and put them on the floor, and I bent down to pick it up.

It wasn’t a hearing aid. As I walked down the hall to the main bathroom, I realized

that I had a piece of dog poop in my hand! I flushed it down the toilet and washed my hands really well with antibacterial soap. Then I returned to Keisha’s room, this time turning her light on. I saw that there were other pieces on the floor. I was so upset.

I took Keisha’s hearing aids out and placed them on the window sill next to her bed. Then I went to our bedroom, where Jake was laying in his cage. I grabbed him by his collar and drug him to Keisha’s room, showing him that he’d been a bad dog.

I then grabbed a wad of toilet paper from the bathroom to pick up the rest of the poop. I flushed it down the toilet and got some carpet cleaner for the floor. After all of this, I returned to our bedroom, and I made certain to lock Jake in his cage for the night.

The next morning, as I let him out of his cage, I told him I wanted him to be a good dog. And I let him outside to go poop. Which he did.

Oct 31

Happy Halloween at Our Place

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In typical Halloween tradition, I changed the answering machine message this morning. It says, in a very spooky-sounding voice

Hallow. Yoou hahve reached the hoame of Dan, Jennie, and Keisha Johnson. We ahre not able to come to the phone right now because we are out being spoooky and being spoooked. Please leave yoour message ahfter the tohne and have ah vehry spoooky day.

Jennie and Keisha went to Ace Hardware this morning to decorate a pumpkin. When they returned, Keisha and I carved hers and the pumpkin we’d already had. I put candles in our jack o’ lanterns and placed them in our respective bedrooms, which overlook the parking lot. Keisha named the one in her bedroom Geri. Hmmm. Geri O’Lantern. The one in our bedroom is named Jack O’Lantern. Whatever.

We’ll roast the pumpkin seeds tomorrow. That is, the ones that didn’t accidentally get washed down the drain as I was straining them in the collander from rinsing them off.

Also, tonight was Beggar’s Night in much of the greater Dayton area. Keisha dressed up as a purple princess. Jennie and I decided that most, if not all, of our apartment complex, comprised mostly of childless households (single and married), was not the most effective place to “Trick or Treat”.

Keisha, Jake (our dog), and I walked across Philadelphia Avenue to some residences. One couple gave Keisha some candy. We then walked down Macy Avenue past the Shiloh church of Christ to a residential area across Main Street.

Keisha made out like a bandit. It was great for Jake, too, to get such a long walk. I dressed in a white oxford shirt with a red, black, and white jersey on top. I didn’t even mind that I carried a bag of doggie doo from Jake for most of the trip.

As we headed back home, we stopped by the Kwik n Kold to get something to drink. Keisha got a Sprite Plus, and I got a 22 oz Bud Ice. We also got some Funjons and a couple of Slim Jims for Jake and I.

I guzzled that beer down, and I quickly felt the buzz. Jake thoroughly enjoyed his Slim Jim, and Keisha shared the Funjons with Jake and me as we paused by the bus stop to finish our refreshment.

When we arrived back home, Keisha and I sorted through her stash. She was outraged to think that there are people in this world who are so mean that they would tamper with someone’s candy. C’est la vie.

She told me she didn’t like the Baby Ruths, so I get to have them all. (Yum!)

After disposing of some questionable items, Keisha and I put the rest in her candy container. I then mixed it up, and she picked out a Reese’s Nutrageous to have as a special treat for tonight.

Then I called my Dad for the first time in over a year. We chatted for a moment, trying to catch up on what could be caught up in such a short time. I told him I’d felt guilty for not calling him for so long, asked him to not be a stranger himself, and, after getting my sister and niece’s information, hung up.

I tried my mom’s number, and I got her roommate, who told me she was at work. I look forward to talking with her in awhile.

Jennie will be waking up shortly to head to work tonight. Since Keisha didn’t wear the purple hair wig as part of her costume, I think Jennie might wear it instead.

Aug 19

Noisy Neigbors Arousing Suspicions

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We got some new neighbors across the hall from us about a month ago. The previous tenant was a single mom with two school-aged kids. In general, they were a quiet bunch. That’s quite a contrast to the current tenants. The new neighbors are generating a lot of suspicion around here.

I have no idea how many people actually live there. We’ve seen so many people going in and out of that place that I almost think they should install a revolving door. Traffic exists at all hours of the day. There have been several occasions where I and others have been bothered by the loud noise coming from cars (stereo systems and horns blaring).

I had to address one vehicle this evening. A blue van arrives, and shortly after parking, starts to blare their horn. Several times.

Keisha and I were playing frisbee in an adjacent field while Jennie was resting. I got indignant at this driver and hollered, “Hey! Cut that out! Some people are trying to sleep around here! Why don’t you just get out and go knock on their door?”

The driver said something like her foot was broken so she couldn’t get out. She asked if I could go knock on the door herself. I then saw that she was talking on a cell phone, apparently to the tenants of the same apartment. She hung up and told me that they were coming out.

Why couldn’t she have just called in the first place?

Another thing I’ve noticed is that there is a lot more litter around our building than there used to be. I am peeved that people are too d*** lazy to take their trash to the dumpster, which is less than 50 feet away.

Another neighbor, with whom we’ve been to a neighborhood watch meeting, talked with me tonight. He and his wife have begun to take down license plate numbers of vehicles that are frequenting this residence. They believe that these signs all point to drug activity. They’ve seen people come by with an air compressor, some hubcaps. He said that what also makes him think this way is that it’s not only black folks but also white folks that are coming and going.

Jul 21

Chalking Escapades

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Yesterday evening after dinner Keisha and I took Jake outside. While he did his business, she and I made some chalk drawings in the parking lot.

At first we did some random stuff. Keisha drew a picture of a sun, a tree, and some clouds. I drew something that resembled a sine wave and proceeded to add facial features to each hump of the design.

Then I wrote the following:

You can pick your nose
You can pick your friends
But you can not pick your friend’s NOSE!

Keisha and I wrote our names vertically. I added descriptive words that begin with each letter of our names while she drew pictures of things that begin with the letters in our names. In parentheses are the pictures she drew:

  • Kind (Kite)
  • Enjoys (Easter egg)
  • Inventive (Ice cream cone)
  • Smart (Snake)
  • Happy (Happy face)
  • Artistic (Apple)
  • Daredevil (Dinosaur)
  • Artistic (Ant)
  • Nutsy (Nose)

Then I walked around the area and wrote words with arrows pointing to the objects they described; for example, light, dumpster, parking space, peeing stone (for Jake the dog).

We then walked back to our apartment building and did some chalk stuff there. I wrote more words with arrows; for example, lamp post, tree, retaining wall. Then I felt a little bored, so I started writing the license plate numbers of cars that were parked in front of the sidewalk. I also wrote

Take trash out
This way

with an arrow pointing toward the dumpster.

Finally, I noticed this Ford Bronco that has been sitting for as long as I can remember in the same spot. Once, when the tires had gone flat, the apartment company management stuck a Tow sticker on it. The owner reinflated the tires and removed the sticker.

I wrote in front of the car on the sidewalk:

Does this Bronco ever move?

I spoke with Mom on the phone last night and mentioned our chalking escapades. She said I should be careful because someone might want to kick my butt.