• Amalah
• Ampersand
• Cowgirl Funk
• Cut the Crap
• A Damn Thing
• Fly in the Honey
• From the Mind of the Dawnie
• Hannah Cooks
• Hannah Talks
• Hashai
• Hate Your Daddy
• Hussified
• Invinciblegirl
• JournalCon 2004
• Journey of a Girl
• Kiss My Grits
• Les-Cadeaux
• Meegor
• Nearly There
• The Nuthouse
• Pineapple Girl
• The Rage Diaries
• The Random Muse
• SkinnyKat
• That Something
• What Does a Girl Do?

I’ve lived in this apartment for a little over a year and a half and my second one-year lease expires in May. I’m planning to month-to-month the place after that so that I can skip town when I find a more desirable job in a more desirable city. Anyway, the place is perfectly fine except for some damage that occurred in a 12-hour timeframe on Sunday.

First, we’ve had about a foot of snow in the past few weeks, and it all drifted down to the part of the roof that is directly above the fireplace in my bedroom. I woke up at the crack of dawn on Sunday morning, stumbled out of bed and stepped in something wet. As a cat owner, I immediately suspected that I had planted my foot in a pile of cat barf or that one of the kitties peed on the floor in front of the fireplace. I was too lazy to hop over to the nightstand to grab my glasses so that I could inspect the damage, and waking T up before he’s good and ready is like trying to rouse a person from a coma, so that was out. I was going to have to inspect the damage close-up.

Just then, I noticed that a steady stream of dripping water was flowing out of the fireplace and all over the floor and carpet. Water was everywhere, including all over the pile of magazines I hadn’t gotten around to reading yet, the laundry that had just been folded, and the carpet was a soggy mess. I started screeching about the injustice of it all, when T rolled over and mumbled at me to go back to sleep. So, a maintenance call was placed to the landlord, and a roofer would be out on Monday. They also offered to have the carpet people come by and take care of the damage, if I could wait that long. I am incredibly lazy, so that sounded perfect. Sweet.

A few hours later, we woke up and I went downstairs to get the newspaper. I unlocked the front door, turned the knob to open the door, and the knob fell apart. So, I have half a doorknob in my hand, I am shrieking about how This Is Not A Trailer Park, and I don’t know what to do to fix it. T came downstairs and semi-assembled the doorknob, totally giving me his You’re So Dramatic look the whole time. So, crisis mostly averted, second maintenance call was placed to landlord to ask them to please take a look at the doorknob on Monday. Apartment office staff may or may not have made fun of me after that call.

That evening, I got the bright idea to roast some garlic heads and make a cream cheese spread for Italian bread. I drizzled the garlic with olive oil just so and I was practically drooling at the thought of eating roasted garlic spread. Except that my vintage baking dish had a teensy crack in it that appeared out of nowhere and olive oil started dripping all over my oven. I didn’t notice this until several minutes later, when the downstairs of my apartment was filled with smoke and my eyes were burning. I was convinced that a cat had knocked over a candle or something scary, but then I remembered my garlic…and I discovered the vile mess of burning olive oil in the bottom of my oven. So freaking gross. Luckily, some Mathletes came to my rescue and provided tips for cleaning strategies, so I plan to tackle it this weekend and cook without using the oven until then.

I realize my damage is pretty trivial, but it makes me think I just shouldn’t touch anything in my apartment for a few days until karma is back on my side.