adventures in amy-land

Again I find myself feeling like I need to apologize for not keeping up. I am amazed at bloggers who are able to do this daily, I get so caught up in my life I forget to blog about it….

So I last left off with the craigslist roommate search, and no, I never found a “normal” roommate. I was instant messaging a friend of mine about the slug visitations and she mentioned that I might have a mold problem. She told me that slugs actually ate mold and that I might want to look into it. I sent my landlord an e-mail basically expressing my frustration with some of the various problems with the house for the umteenth time, the infamous leak in the kitchen under the sink being one of them, and stated that I was concerned there could be a mold problem.

*Poof!!!* Suddenly, we have action. You mention mold and even the slummiest slum lords have a tendency to respond!!! They offered to send a maintenance company “to take care of any mold problem there might be, the defective light fixture in the kitchen, the stovetop burners that don’t work, etc….” and he finally got a pest control company to take care of the slugs.

I want to back track for a moment on the lighting issue. I had complained about all of these problems, and others many times before. I was getting ready to go out with a friend for her birthday and my 187 year old landlord (okay he was in his mid-80s, still….) shows up completely unannounced (last time I checked the law and my lease stated that I was owed at least a 24 hour notice) to fix the light. He had no step ladder, went in the garage and took a wicker (WICKER!!!!!) laundry basket of mine, without asking and stood on it!!!!!!  I don’t know if I was more afraid of him breaking his hip or my basket. Anyway, I got him a chair instead. Then I had to leave and he acted inconvenienced!!! Uhhhhhh sorry I have a little bit of a life, but you never informed me you were coming a-hole!!!

Okay so putting my little rant aside, I got home late, and the next morning walked into my kitchen. The light fixture was hanging an inch and a half off the ceiling rather than being mounted flush, and the landlord took a bunch of packing peanuts out of a box I had on the floor and stuffed them in the space between the ceiling and the top of the fixture!!!! Fire hazard anyone????

So…this was kind of what spurred me cyber-yelling at my other landlord (the older guy’s son) about their inadequacies when it came to taking care of problems that were their responsibility. Because they moved so fast when I mentioned mold, I wondered if it was’t something they actually knew about already and failed to disclose (which is also very illegal), so I took hiring an independent mold inspector upon myself.

As it turned out, the house was full of toxic mold, the entire back wall of the kitchen was covered in it, all you had to do was take some of the drawers out, and the walls were covered in black mold. It was in the garage, it was in both bathrooms, and according to the mold inspector, it was very possibly in the walls of the master bedroom because the shower pan was “dead”. Hmmmmmm…..no wonder I had a headache that never went away the entire time I lived there (I am out now by the way). I sent a certified letter with a copy of the mold inspection demanding that I be released from the lease immediately. I got a call the next day saying “Gee, we wish you would have given us a chance to negotiate this. Would you be willing to stay for reduced rent?”. WHAT???!!!!!! Are you SERIOUS????!!!! Obviously I told him “Uh no, it’s a health concern, and I am not interested in exposing myself to something that could make me deathly ill”.

Sooooo, after another two months of searching for a place that I could afford and have my dog and cat at, I finally moved in the beginning of October. No more mold hole!!!! My pets are happy, I’m happy, I don’t need roommates and I can see the ocean from my back balcony!!!! My neighbors also have a beautiful garden with a butterfly bush right outside my kitchen window, and the butterflies were here through the end of October .  So for the most part we are pretty close to being up to date….

Sorry it took me so long and I am sure there will be many more stories to come….

As always,

Make Good Memories!!!!