saving the desk chair, again!

Wow, I have been a bad blogger. I have not posted in forever. Ahhh!

Sorry about that.

I should update you on the upcoming :::September 2018 Classes:::

Hit that link. Doy.

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In other news, I destroyed the desk chair again. This is the result of working too many hours in a chair just basically destroying it by sitting in it. The chair had reached this tragic point where once again it was coming apart — coming apart hard enough it ripped the back seam out of my favorite sweat pants. Something had to be done. First, so that I did not accidentally wear favorite sweat pants with the back seam out onto the balcony and flash my underoos at my neighbors, I had to fix the sweat pants.

So, I hauled the sewing machine out and fixed the sweat pants.

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Dear Neighbors: You’re welcome.

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Second because the sewing machine was out (ahh!) and I’m getting ready to hit the road again and put everything in storage and I can’t think of a more depressing scenario than pulling a beloved desk chair that still needs to be reupholstered out in a brand new place (okay I can actually imagine more depressing things but stick with me I’m going for still needs to be repaired not feng shui STILL NEEDS TO BE REPAIRED in a new place desk chair drama here quit it). That is pretty daunting going into a new place. You have not just hauled your whole life into a new place. You have also hauled uncompleted (big if we’re talking fix the desk chair) tasks into the new place. As in, great, new start, here are all the things you didn’t finish that are old stuff and not a new start.

I didn’t want to do that. I figured I better fix the chair.

I have to reupholster the chair because the manufacturers discontinued the chair model and won’t sell me parts (like a new seat of such) for it. And because I love the chair too much to give it up. Hence, damaged chair? It’s up to me. Ahhh!

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[Reupholstering the desk chair is pretty daunting, but I love this chair like a shark loves blood, I refuse to give it up.]

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So I bit the bullet and did it. I now have three weeks to sit in and love my beautiful desk chair again in pristine desk chair condition before it goes into storage when I hit the road again, and also, when it comes out of storage, (assuming movers do not destroy it), it will be my perfect pristine beautiful desk chair again wherever I land.

Yay!

 

 

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*By the way, the chair project is always :::pretty daunting:::

bark on, superdog….

 

A guy with a dog very excited and barky about the woman smoking on the balcony went by the other night. The dog could not be convinced I was not bark worthy material. The guy was wearing a Superman costume so I get why the dog was a little on task. The fate of the world was hanging in the balance….

 

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The dog was named Ace, by the way, and was a black dog. It is possible that was Batman’s dog and Superman just kidnapped him and Ace was shouting for help.

Um.

Oops.

 

waterfalls

 

 

I have interesting convo’s with my upstairs neighbor.

[Not on purpose.]

I will be having a cig, wearing white sitting in a somewhat expensive fabric chair —

[I bring that up to point out how problematic dirty water pouring from above can be because it really fucks up white shorts and also puts out cigs and damages nice expensive fabric chairs]

— watching water pour down the side of my balcony.

Pressed to speak to my neighbor — and I do not like her so this is pushing me — I profer up to the heavens, “If that waterfall moves over here to where I am sitting there will be trouble.”

A voice echoes back, “It won’t, that’s why I moved the plants over here.”

She did too, apparently she has actually taken some action to not impact me and moved her plants so the water she showers on them which she cannot measure showers down the side of my balcony instead of on my head and white shorts.

I am amazed she is actually trying. It is so out of character. But it is a start.

 

return to sender

 

I trot out to the local —

Mailbox. I have an envelope that needs to hit the mailbox by 5 pm. I know it has to get there by 5 pm because I know pick up schedules. And I have time. It is 4:35. It is three blocks. Easy. I trot along. Get to my corner.

And. The mailbox is not there.

 

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To an observer this probably looks like a bad reality TV show. I am standing paralyzed on the sidewalk looking up the street, down the street, checking landmarks, my corner, street signs, and the spot the mailbox should be in.

No mailbox. In its place there is a huge triangular sided metal structure with movie posters and advertisements on each side and at the top it says “information.”

I think, Yeah, I would like some information, like where did you take my mailbox.

 

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All is not lost. I still have fifteen minutes to make it to a mailbox. I turn and hoof it for my other mailbox. Time is shorter now. And. This mailbox is further away. In the other direction. This means going back three blocks I just covered and then another five to get to a more distant box. But no biggy right?

Until I get there.

THEY REMOVED THE OTHER MAILBOX TOO.

 

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Freaking aliens.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from redcrashpad

bad day for the neighbors

 

I trot outside —

There is a notice taped on the new neighbor’s door : Three days to vacate.

Uh oh. Bad news for pilot guy who appears gay but also checks out my legs [bi?] and his interesting in too short shorts friend who like me sometimes does laundry too late on Friday nights for it to be right or acceptable.

Also for the mysterious visitor dog that sometimes was in residence.

They have not been here very long.

They have very nice antiques.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from meaghan courtney

return of the loft

 

This is pretty —

Funny. Stiletto found it online it is someone talking online about the lofts I used to live in —

 

I’m happy to report that management has really put forth an effort to step the building up. Things they’ve recently taken care of include — relocation of the Marijuana dispensary OUT of the building (which has dramatically reduced foot traffic through the building), they added a 24/7 doorman/security guard, changed parking companies and hired an assistant for the building manager in addition to the on-site manager. Needless to say — things get taken care of very quickly now. I DID have some issues at first — but everything was resolved competently and courteously. The registered sex-offender that once lived in the building has long since moved — regardless of what the federal website indicates. Make sure you understand that your rent is broken up into two pieces (rent and CAMs) and be sure to ask for the total cost when dealing with the leasing agent. My company has been in the building for a couple months now and we’re very happy with the decision to relocate to the Cosmo Lofts!

 

Gotta love the cheery spin they are putting on parking attendants hitting on residents, the resident registered sex offender [who was living there nine months ago when I moved out so if he is gone it is only after two years of happy secrecy about his presence on the part of management and the move is pretty recent], and drug traffic. They forgot to mention no sound proofing and regular police visitations when unhappy residents go unhinged. Oh, and also occasional small arms fire and who can forget Spidey [who roomed with Sex Offender Guy] and —

Come to think of it, they left out a lot. Oops.

 

the russian of spaulding avenue

 

I was walking through —

The neighborhood the other evening and a woman coming towards me took one look at my face and immediately looked relieved to see me and started speaking to me in Russian. She was looking for a place. She needed directions. This is about all I could get from what she was saying since I do not speak Russian.

Afterwards I thought, Wow, my cheekbones must really be looking Slavic tonight. But today I went for a walk and went into this little store in the neighborhood and it is all Russian. Russian foods. Russian shop keepers. Russian clerks. Russian shoppers. So it was not my cheekbones. Or maybe some of it was my cheekbones, but also, this little shop is flourishing so a lot of Russian people must live nearby.

In the shop, I cannot be mistaken for a Russian. I towered over the women. And some of the men. It is clear in a crowd of Russians I come from some other barbarian stock.

The shop had good strawberries. The neighborhood smells like honeysuckle. It was early evening. People were walking their dogs. I took my Russian strawberries home. I met a funny Dalmation.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from beyond the sparkle

a tragic shortage of quarters

 

New Year’s Eve I am —

Trotting up and down stairs from the laundry room because I swore I would have clean clothes for the New Year and it was the last day to make that happen. [I blame a tragic shortage of quarters for the laundry build up do not ask how many coat pockets in the closet I had to turn out to even accumulate a quarter convoy to do that laundry.]

I am coming up stairs and a little cat comes out of an apartment downstairs. He is a very cute cat, a dark gray and black tabby with soft shiny fur. I say, Hello Minew. [I say Minew because I cannot spell in French.] And he gets brave and comes over to say hello even though I am holding a huge scary hamper of laundry.

There is a guy in the apartment looking out and a woman coming up the stairs behind me and he is saying, Look it is Max, and she is saying, Hi Max!

I am wondering how they know my name I have never met them and also they sound way too friendly.

Then I get it. The cat’s name is Max.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is cat with the broom from redart

my neighbor the squirrel

 

The first night I stay here —

I sleep on the floor.

The movers moved me out Sunday night but could not move me in till Monday afternoon. So I sleep on the floor [do not do this when you are sore from packing and moving] to be here for the cable man, the gas man, and the mover men bringing my stuff back the next afternoon.

The next morning I am lying on the floor. Kind of dazed and exhausted from the move thing. Half inside the apartment. Half outside on the balcony —

[That means my legs are on balcony in sun but the rest of me is lying on carpet inside staring at ceiling. That is not where I slept it is just where I ended up the next morning.]

And I hear a squirrel talking.

 

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There is this big utility pole outside the balcony and I looked at it after I first got here and thought, That is not feng shui kind of missed that on the first pass through hmm.

But now I am lying half on the balcony, half not, waiting for mayhem to hit, and I hear the squirrel talking.

Not yelling the way squirrels do when they get mad. Just low volume squirrel muttering.

I lie there a while, just sort of absorbing everything and being dislocated, but finally I get curious about the squirrel talk and start to look for him.

He is a gray squirrel and he is sunbathing on one of the t–bars of the utilities pole. The t-bar is exactly the same gray as he is it is weathered silvered wood. And he is lying on his stomache, blending and absorbing sun and his mutter is like someone getting a good back rub saying, Yes, right there.

 

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The squirrel checks me out every once in a while. Making sure I am not dangerous. And adjusts positions every once in a while. Making sure maximum squirrel is getting maximum sun.

Some finches come and sit on the wires and that makes him mad, he gets up and curses them out till they fly away.

This is his spot.

They fly away and he settles back. And I settle back. And we lie there a long time.

Then his interior squirrel alarm goes off and he goes away to do squirrel stuff.

I miss him a little after he leaves.

Soon my phone rings and it is time to go do things apartment and I go away too.

 

where that squirrel photo came from :
that is from silent enough

muppets do not live here

 

I will not miss my neighbors.

Or [cue Jaws music] building owners.

But —

I will miss the little Mexican hole in the wall restaurant where the guys all know I get either the number eight or the number ten. The lady at the magazine rack with the bleached–white–white hair who always wears interesting hats and cowboy boots when it rains. And always smiles when I walk by and says, There she goes with her Cokes. The lady at the post office who is delicate like a bird and sometimes has her gray hair [her face is too young for this hair] in pigtails and always talks to people too much when there is a long line except she is so nice you cannot get mad about it. My favorite Sushi restaurant where I do not eat sushi I eat teriyaki [unless Stil makes me eat raw tuna] and they have two little tables outside where I can sit when I step out to have a smoke. The postman who is always happy and always smiles and knows which box is mine and when he sees me coming stops sorting and looks for my netflix arrivals so he can give them to me first. The building maintenance man who drove his truck all the way across town one night to open my door so I did not have to call a locksmith — while his family was at a holiday picnic. The Asian man with silver hair and a stone face who runs the corner shop that sells smokes and cokes late who has a smile you do not see until he decides you are okay….

I have without meaning to learned to know and love pieces and faces of this place. There are no muppets. There are large men with weapons and bad habits and too loud music and coughs and I know why it takes that Asian man with silver hair so long to smile. But there are corners of this place I have grown to know — and in a way love.

I have been a lot of places.

These are the things I take with me when I go.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is waiting by xdjio