Art and Joan, You're Getting Your Mail!

Four months ago, a few weeks before Christmas, my roommates and I received a red envelope at our home in Washington D.C. The address was a little off. We live on 10th St. S.E. The letter was addressed to 10th Ave E.

And it was addressed to West Fargo, North Dakota.

Oopsie!

I assumed it was a Christmas card and, as a responsible citizen, quickly showed it to as many friends and family as possible, took a few photos of it, and promptly forgot about it for the next five months.

That is a slight exaggeration. I did reinsert it into the mail slot. The mail carrier didn't pick it up. Hey, buddy, I don't blame you. Not your state, nor your problem. I tossed it on a pile of junk mail, made a vague notion to do something about it, sometime, preferably soon, like before May.

And I did! I unearthed it while cleaning up a few days ago, beating the deadline that I have a very clear memory of probably making. I took action, removing the red missive from the pile of old Val-U-Pak coupons and letters of various importance for former housemates that they have no chance of receiving unless they get severe amnesia, turn to a life of crime, and then break into the house, creating a confusing and awkward moment for all when they see a pile of mail addressed to themselves, on top of our liquor cabinet and weighed down by an old, rotting onion.

The letter in hand, I vowed to make one more attempt to guide it back into the U.S. Postal System. Now is not your time, little one. This time, I would ensure the post carrier took the lost letter by writing "Misdelivered" on it, because evidentially "North Dakota" wasn't vaulting over the Try Again bar.

I gave up after writing the "M". I only had a red pen, and since the envelope was red (I give no extraneous details!) the writing was illegible.

What to do? Get a black pen, you say? Well, cowboy, here's the problem: the black pen was upstairs. I was downstairs. Lazy people don't go up and down the same flight of stairs unless it's an emergency. The practice is inefficient, and once we start, who knows what horrible chores our feet may take us to?

Instead, I left it on the dining room table, where one of my two roommates would surely see it and handle the situation, or at least have a dark-ink pen.

Alex ended up having the right equipment + gumption to do the job. I provided supervision, namely asking "Do you have a black pen?" and "Would you mind writing 'Misdelivered' on this letter?" I pointed out my red M, lest she think I was lazy and didn't follow through with my tasks. I also stopped her from opening the letter and peeking inside. She'll claim she was joking, but I think my tut-tutting and a weak bond of paper and glue were all that was protecting Art and Joan's perverted secrets.

Art, Joan, your letter is on the way. I hope your friendship with the sender is still intact. If it isn't, that's okay, because you two would have to be big jerks to break a friendship over a missed Christmas Card. Merry Christmas. I'll assume you'll write a wonderful thank you note to me, and that it will get lost in the mail.

How Powerful is a Penny?

This isn't the beginning of a financial advice column on how to scrimp and save your way to being a millionaire. This is the beginning of a column, and possibly on-going series, on how to annoy your roommate with pennies.

When I got home, I saw some pennies on my drawer. I dislike pennies. They're like herpes: never around when you need them, and always there when you don't. Okay, that's nothing like herpes. There's a cure for herpes. But there's no cure for pennies.

There's no cure for herp--

Shut up. I read it on Wikipedia. Anyway, I saw the spare change and had a though that has occurred to many, if not most, of my readers: how can I use these to annoy my roommate?

I decided to see how many pennies I would have to throw at her door before she opened it to investigate the sound. My hypothesis is that it would take three pennies thrown intervals of 10-15 seconds before she opened the door and screamed at me, assuming I didn't run into my room and pretend to be sleeping when I saw her door crack opened.

The equipment was simple: me, pennies. The procedure was simple as well: Throw penny. Wait. Giggle. Repeat.

Result: It took four pennies. On the third penny, I knew I was close, because I heard her exclaim, "What is that?" The fourth penny did the trick. As a bonus, I no longer had four pennies.

Conclusion: There were several factors that contributed to my roommate opening her door after four pennies. One, pennies hitting a door make a loud and unnatural sound. Two, my roommate is smart and curious, making her disposed to investigate unusual sounds. Three, my roommate was unfortunately awake pre-experiment, shortening the length of this innovative excursion into the realm of psychology.


In case there are any science goobers out there, I know this isn't a real experiment. It can't be repeated. The best I can do is throw pennies at my other roommate's door, but she lives around the corner and down a long hall. That's why experiment #2 will measure the correlation between scream volume and #of Cheez-whip topped pennies on well-trained rats.

Where Have I Been?

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. Last week, I had my 30th birthday party. It's the first time I went out with friends for my birthday in almost a decade. For much of my life, I felt like I didn't have many friends that liked me enough to come to a birthday party, so I rarely had one. I feel blessed to be in a different place in my life now.

Also, two months ago, I vowed to myself that I would move out of my Mom's place before my 30th birthday. I was a day late, but I did it: I moved to NE D.C. It took a lot of hard work and\or me doing absolutely nothing while an opening came up in my friend Meghan's place and she asked if I wanted to move in. This just goes to show you that if you have a specific goal and focus intently on it and/or scratch your balls while random events in life conspire to deliver your goal to you, you can achieve anything. I am submitting a longer version of my inspiring story to Parade magazine (Motto: "Thank God We're Free").

The house is big, old, roomy, and has lots of neat quirks about it. There are cupboards everywhere, some of them 10 feet above the ground. There are about 3 dozen light switches in the house, none of which do what I expect them to do. For example, the garbage disposal light switch has three settings: Off, On, and Really On. Off and On do nothing. Really On, lifting the switch a little bit past the On position, like turning to the 11 setting on a Spinal Tap speaker, activates the disposal.

I like the place a lot, and both my roommates are awesome. We don't have Internet access though, and won't get it until next Friday, so I haven't been able to update the blog or do much besides check my email at the library occasionally.

When I have had Internet access, I was on the Internet for at least 2-3 hours almost every day, mostly playing online poker or reading poker web sites. Occasionally I would watch TV. We have neither Internet access or a TV at the moment, and I'm really surprised how little I miss it. I haven't been bored or going through withdrawal symptoms, as I do sometimes in the past. I'm happy in a way that the DSL won't be activated in a week. The only hassles are checking my dog walking schedule, posting on the blog, and checking my email, the total of which I could do in 15-30 minutes. I like being disconnected, although the second we get net access I know that I will likely fall in my old time wasting habits.

I'm going to try to upload something I wrote about the new James Bond movie before the post becomes irrelevant with time. Besides that, I doubt I will be able to update the blog. Check back in a week. I hope to have a few substantial posts ready to go by then.

Room Huntin'

I've been responding to several group housing ads a day with little luck so far. One of my roommates said he has been getting a 1 in 10 response to his emails. I told him, "Well, that's what happens when you smell" but that was hypocritical of me to say as I'm getting the same ratio of responses. And I haven't showered in a week.

I got tired of sending a personalized email to each person, so I wrote script to scan the ad and incorporate the info into an automated response. Example:

"Hi, I'?m JASON. I saw your ad on CRAIGSLIST for the open room in your BUNGALOW/PLEASANTLY SIZED DWELLING. The description of your BUNGALOW/PLEASANTLY SIZED DWELLING sounds really nice. I'?ve always wanted to live in your LIVELY IN A NON-THREATENING WAY neighborhood.

It seems like we also have a lot in common. For example, I share your interest in QUIRKY HOBBY I DON'?T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT BUT SAW A PBS SPECIAL ON LAST YEAR. I never thought I'?d find someone else in the D.C. area that shares my deep-held love for MATING HABITS OF THE MANATEE."

Wolf Turned Into Dog

Still browsing craigslist for potential rooms. Nothing too interesting since my last post, although I noticed that the hybrid-wolf guy now has a dog. I'm half-tempted to see the house, just so I can meet the pet and have this conversation:

ME: "Your dog looks different from most dogs. This is going to sound weird, but is there any way that he is half-wolf?"
RENTER: "Yes! That's amazing. How did you know?
ME: "I have a special connection with 'dogs'."
RENTER: "Why did you make the air quote sign when you said 'dogs'?"
ME: "I'M ON TO YOU, WOLF BOY!"

Moving Soon

There's a 95% chance I'm moving in the beginning of September. My roommates and I live in a house that's falling apart, and we're all in places in our lives where we want to obtain the American dream of living in a place with a fresh coat of paint.

I'm browsing ads on craigslist for places in Arlington or Alexandria. A lot of the places have "special features" that are always mentioned off-handedly at the bottom of the letter. Like...

"If you'd like to talk about it...please drop me an e-mail and tell me a bit about yourself. Here are a few pics...not the best as I need a fisheye lens...but you get the idea. Thanks and best of luck to us all. Oh, I have a wolf hybrid. He's very mellow and stays in my bedroom in the basement for the most part...so, no other pets...unless they are in aquariums...sorry."

PROSPECTIVE RENTER: "I like the place a lot, but I'm very concerned about the wolf hybrid. Is he, um, aggressive?"
OWNER: "Oh, no. Not at all. He's very relaxed. I keep him securely in the basement most of the time. You'll barely know he's here. "
PROSPECTIVE RENTER: "Sounds good. Just curious, what is he a hybrid of?"
OWNER: "Most of his fur his gray, but his head and tail is white."
PROSPECTIVE RENTER: "Wait. So by hybrid you mean his fur is two different colors?"
OWNER: "Oh, yeah. He's 100% wolf."
PROSPECTIVE RENTER: "Lovely. I gotta go."

Then there's the 2BR apartment looking for 4 roommates. For those who have fond memories of living in a dorm room.

One of my favorites: Club Kemper. I can't even tell if this is a real post. How did their old roommate make it to graduate school in that house?

Another Random Assortment

The election results for Canada's next Prime Minister will be announced tomorrow. Which brings up an obvious question: Canada has elections? Good for them. Just like a real country.

(Look, I need a warm-up people. You don't serve aces without some practice, and Canada's my automatic ball machine.)


"Lay, Skilling Ask to Postpone Trial"
How's 2017 work for everyone? No? Shit.


My roommate was watching a History Channel show on "USOs: Unidentifed Submerged Objects." Essentially, they're UFOs that swim under water. Here's a typical line from the show:

NARRATOR: "Some researchers believe that the lost city of Atlantis is the home base for USOs."

How many takes the narrator went through to say that without snorting milk through his nose, I don't know.

The show references an event many years ago on a dark night (of course) where "hundreds of objects burst from the ocean and flew into the air." One of the producers found a 911 recording of someone calling in about the event. Here is the beginning of the dramatic conversation, which I swear I am not embellishing a bit:

OPERATOR: "911."
CALLER: "Has anyone reported anything unusual tonight?"
OPERATOR: "Uh.....can you be a little more specific?"
CALLER: "Anything involving lights?"

And was the caller arrested afterwards for crimes against humanity? No. And some say there is justice in the world.

Well, It *Was* Cloudy Today

It's 6:24 p.m. I'm watching Seinfeld with my roommate. Our screen door opens.

ME: "Are you expecting anyone?"
ROOMMATE: "Nope."

We wait for a knock. Instead, the mail slot opens and the mail plops on the floor. We hear the footsteps of the mailman scurrying away and we burst out laughing.

Easily the highlight of my day. If I were a mailman, I'd deliver the mail after 8:00 p.m. at least once a month, just to make people laugh. I'd alphabetize people's mail too on occasion, just to give them the frustrating sense of noticing something is odd not being able to figure out what it is.

Craigslist Ad Update

I got 10 responses so far, all of them of the type "I'm not a psychiatrist/obsessive-compulsive, but I am a clean person who is very interested in renting the place." Evidentally, the rent was too low for outrage.

The only mildly humorous response was this one:

"I don't quite suffer from obsessive complusive order but that is a plus for you. As a land lord if anything goes wrong obsessive complusives will call you all the time, trust me I lived with one."

Update 2:
I took the ad down. I was feeling guilty from the deluge of serious responses. I need more experience writing fake housing ads--I must have underpriced the rent by several hundred dollars. I have an idea for another fake ad, which I'll post in a few days, that will much more obviously be a joke.

Craigslist: Room for Rent

(original link here; loosely inspired by my Mom's experiences with renting.)

I have a one-story brick rambler with a large yard in Rockville, MD that is renting for $1,250, a great price for the area. The problem is, the past three tenants have been extremely messy and have not taken good care of the house, causing me thousands of dollars in repairs.

Are there any psychiatrists out there that have an obsessive-compulsive patient that is looking to rent in Rockville? The house has two baths, four bedrooms, W/D, AC, cable-ready, and is a five-minute walk to the Rockville Metro station. Your client can live in comfort and privacy and satisfy his need to clean at the same time. I am happy to provide cleaning supplies, as well as replace any doorknobs or hinges worn from excessive use.

I will give any licensed professional who makes a successful recommendation a $250 finder fee. I request that you only recommend clients who won't fully recover for at least 12 months. If you think your client will recover sooner, 9 months for example, maybe we can talk about ways to get the same results without pushing too hard on the gas pedal.

If you could mention this offer at your next visit with your client, I will greatly appreciate it. In a time where celebrities are attacking psychiatry (e.g. Tom Cruise), I think it’s important for psychiatrists to show that they are willing to go the extra mile for others.

--Sandy

Damn it

My roommate got me sick. I'm going to piss in his bed. I'll blame it on the dog. We don't have a dog, but I'll tell him that I brought one of my clients' dogs over and he pissed on the bed. And so he doesn't get mad at the dog, I'll get a picture of the cat hanging from the tree branch ("Hang in there!"), replace the face with the head of a really cute dog, and place it in the middle of the wet bed.

And if my roommate gets me sick again, I'm going to repeat the whole process, but this time I'm going to tell him the dog didn't leave his photo as an apology. Oh, no. It's his calling card. The psychological blow will be devastating.

I made an alfredo sauce yesterday and have an extra ¼ cup of heavy cream. Left-over heavy cream is as useful as a third testicle. If you search long enough, you can find a fast food place that will give you some sauce to dip it into, but it really isn't worth your time.

That analogy makes as much sense as a horse drinking water on a motorboat made out of chocolate. The engine is spitting milk, Junior is eating the mast, and no one can find where the horse pooped.

The problem with writing is that it takes effort to make sense. And time and effort don't mix.

But what does mix is this transition sentence, a.k.a. the spoon for the ceramic bowl that is this essay. I don't want to throw away the pampered milk, but my plan to put a packet of sea monkeys in it and donate the cream to a sperm bank didn't make it past their microscopes. Damn you, science! We could have had a new world order.

So I'm forced to do the next best thing: pour it in my roommate's soy milk. That'll teach that lactose-intolerant commie to mess with America. You want to support the terrorists by voting for John Kerry? Fine. America's going to blow a hole through your ass, and she's not going to close the door behind her.

I love mixing stuff.

Bonus info:

Originally, metaphor was a Greek word meaning "transfer". The Greek etymology is from meta, implying "a change" and pherein meaning "to bear, or carry". Thus, the word metaphor itself has a metaphorical meaning in English, "a transfer of meaning from one thing to another".

Amusingly, in modern Greek the word metaphor is used to refer to a cart or trolley; thus visitors to Greek airports will find themselves using metaphors to carry their luggage.

Is This Wrong?

I put up a dry erase board in our kitchen today, and inaugurated it by witting this message. My roommates, one of who moved in a few weeks ago, haven't come home yet.

A Note to Potential Roommates Attending the Open House This Saturday

If you reserve a time but find out you can't make it, that's fine. Really. Maybe you'll pull up to the place and the brick walls will remind you of the time your favorite doll, Moo-Moo, was crushed by one of these rectangular, maroon monsters as a result of a minor earthquake and shoddy masonry. But if you could call and cancel, or slip a note under our door, that would be appreciated.

Roommate Hunt

I am looking for a roommate. The old one got arrested for cocaine trafficking by the DEA last weekend. Or he moved out. I forget. This is the ad for the place. If you find me a roommate, I will give you a cupcake.

My Mom is looking for someone to rent her house in Rockville. Rent is $1650 and it is a five-minute walk from the Rockville Metro. There is also an ad for this place, and that ad can be found here. Just kidding. Here. If you find my Mom a family to rent her house, I will take you out to dinner to The Melting Pot or a similar-quality restaurant.

More Frightening Than Freddie Krueger

My roommate entered the bathroom right after I took a dump. It was like a horror movie. I swiveled around in the chair in my room as he grabbed the doorknob. "Noooooooooo!" I yelled, my vocal chords undulating in slow motion. But it was too late. The door cracked open and the putrid spirits of the Netherbowl flew out, spiraling down the staircase like a drill and scaring away dust balls, Freon, and the faint smell of socks.

The Zen of Repair

My phone and DSL are back up. The phone repair guy came this morning, right after our water stopped working. I was hoping he was a Renaissance man and could flip his hat inside-out to the plumbing side, but he was a specialist. Everybody is a specialist nowadays.

Compared to my roommates, I have been inversely affected by our house troubles. I'm at home most of the day, so I was going crazy without the phone or Internet. My roommates have cell phones and Internet connection at work and school. On the other hand, I don't have to shower.

Perhaps I'll call the maintenance office to get our water fixed. Or perhaps I'll play computer games for the next few days. Who can tell what will happen in this crazy world?

True Artists Suffer

I slept on a pen last night. After I got over the discomfort, I had a strong motivation to write. Tonight, I'm putting a wrench under my roommate's pillow. The hot and cold on our sink is reversed, and I don't feel like fixing it.