Friday, July 3, 2009

not another fourth (3rd) of july rant

If you would like to see my general opinion on military-driven "holidays", please refer to Matt's post or to Josef Piper's book In Tune With the World: A Theory of Festivity. I rarely have the energy for such a thing as a fiery rant, so I tip my hat to those who do and move on to less exciting issues that are much more enjoyable to write about.

It's a slow week here at the desk. I'm sitting Campus Center, generally my favorite for weekdays, but due to the "holiday" tomorrow everyone else has the day off. Jerry Murphy and I have a chance at becoming good friends today as we schluff around doing our various duties. Only two worries are dancing around in my mind at the moment, so I guess you could call it a great day: my bike seat won't stay up and my roomate(s) is(are) being ridiculous.

Despite what you may think, these two worries are actually very closely related. You see, I have been spending 90% of my free time hunting down the "perfect" apartment, which at this point means the "apartment-that-doesn't-cost-too-much-and-is-relatively-clean-and-safe". Perhaps an indicator of my naivete, my disillusionment with the real estate industry has been compounded by the fact that it is so blasted difficult to find an apartment in the city of Chicago. Yes, an apartment, in Chicago.

Yeah, yeah, so there are a lot of factors. We're looking for a three-bedroom in our price range, preferably with heat included, preferably with enough room to hold at least some of my mildly-excessive furniture collection, and preferably with a closet in each room. Not really too much to ask, if you ask me.

Well, last week I found the place. It was perfect. Truly. It had everything we were specifically looking for and an additional front sunroom, enclosed back porch, dishwasher, front yard, and faux fireplace flanked by the ever-popular built-in bookshelves. It was an entertainer's paradise. Seeing as my roommates and I share many friends but also have our own friends, and all of us like to have people over on a fairly regular basis (though not all the time), I decided to pounce on it. I called the landlord and he emailed a rental application to me. I called/texted the one roommate who's sort of in town (the other is in Vermont and only snail-mail accessible) and told her the good news, expecting her to respond shortly.

Two days later and I hadn't heard from her. I had filled out my form and was trying valiantly to reach her. We made an appointment with the landlord, but forty-five minutes before we reached him, he called to say he had just rented out the place. Drat!

Needless to say, I was quite upset seeing as I had thought that we were through with the whole hunting process. I frantically scoured the listings on CraigsList and biked around the neighborhood surrounding North Park for hours on end. This is where the bike seat comes in.

So, all of this biking has been wonderful for my legs--combined with my flamenco class, I should be all toned-up by the end of the summer--but also not-so-wonderful. My knees hurt because my bike seat keeps sliding down. The day that I apartment-hunted forever, I finally fixed the bungee-cord rack to my seat post, and took the opportunity to attempt to raise it once more.

Well, I found the most recent "perfect" apartment yesterday and I biked over there. By the time I arrived for my showing, the seat was down again. And I can't get ahold of my roommate...again.

Perhaps they're mystically connected, and if I fix the bike seat, all of my apartment troubles will come to an end.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I'm glad my rants can fill in where you lack the energy! Sorry to hear about all this junk :/