The Unfauxhemian

tilden6, originally uploaded by unfauxhemian.

After feeling blue on a rainy day after spending many long months trying to figure out how to move my elderly parents into an old age home, I had just about had enough. I won’t go into the depressing and frustrating details of my parents’ lives, but I will say the pissy rain outside matched how I feel about them right now. Jason asked me where I wanted to have lunch and I just shrugged… ” I uh know.” mope mope mope. We piled into his van and he started driving while fiddling with the radio stations. Many imaginary arguments with my father filled my mind as I stared out the side window and sulked. After a while I finally noticed we were driving quite a distance.

“So”, I asked, “where are you taking us?”

“Oh… I don’t know. We’ll see if this place is open even. If it’s not, it’ll be a pain in the ass, but we’ll see.”, Jason answered.

We ended up at Nick’s Lobster shack near Floyd Bennett field. A perfect distraction. Home-made clam chowder and lobster tails. After that we wandered in the van a bit and explored the area near Ft. Tilden. We noticed a road that entered into The Silver Gull Club, whatever that is. It was gated but I noticed a little road off to the left. It didn’t say Do Not Enter, so we did. It winded down to a little beach where people fish. With the raining pissing away, there was nobody out there and we had the place all to ourselves.

We wandered about and took a look at some buildings that we thought were changing rooms, but weren’t quite sure. They were also empty. As we made our way back we came across a park ranger.

“So, did you catch anything?”, he asked.

“No, we weren’t fishing, just looking.”, Jason answered.

“Do you have a permit?”-ranger

“More or less.”-Jason

“What do you mean? You either have one or you don’t. I could give you a ticket. But if you take a look at those signs over there, you can see that you won’t need a permit after Sept. 15th.”-ranger

“How do you get a permit?”-me

“It’s so easy. Just go over the Floyd Bennett Field and take your state license and you fishing rod. They’ll set you right up. It’s about $50″-ranger

We thanked the ranger and went on our way. Maybe we’ll just wait the 3 days and go back w/out a permit.

http://www.fryingpan.com/

Bengali Block Party… while I liked your music, and you were not violent, my smile turned upside down when you would not let me pass and kept trying to use our alley when you had to pee. Luckily the Tommy made a BBQ blockade. He started talking about it a couple of weeks ago.

Tommy, the old-school Brooklyn man living across the alley from us had been in the neighborhood I think for 30 years or so. He told us they were going to do a giant party where they kneel in the street and pray. By they he meant the Bengali population in the neighborhood. There were no flyers and no notices posted other than a note that said “No Parking Sunday 5/16/10. I’ve only been in the neighborhood since December, so I felt pretty neutral about it. If they want to pray, who am I to complain?

When I saw them setting up, I saw a stage with chairs and many booths to sell items like just about any street fair I had ever seen around New York City. No big deal…I didn’t see why Tommy was so upset, other than a sense that we weren’t invited. Since it was a nice day, I left the neighborhood and went for a bike ride with Jason and Jamie. By the time we returned later in the afternoon, the whole street was flooded with people in colorful saris with live Indian pop music blaring from the stage. The people seemed in good spirits and the music would make anyone dance.

I started to make my way through the crowd to get to my apartment but realized, I couldn’t get through. The sidewalk was completely blocked and nobody was going to budge. I had to forcefully push my way while upsetting the fans, which then ticked me off. Why weren’t the cops keeping the sidewalks clear like they do with any other street fair or parade? This crowd was completely out of control.

Luckily, the crowd was not violent. But they weren’t particularly nice either. They weren’t respecting the people who lived here. When I finally made it to the front of the apartment, I noticed kids climbing all over the gate and in the flower pots and down our stairs at our front door. I walked down our alley and a man and came behind me looking around for a place to pee. Totally topless Tommy popped out, “Can I help you?” The man turned away at the site of Tommy’s leathered hide. “See?”, said Tommy. “Yeah, this is a little nuts.” ,I said, “I don’t mind the party, but I do mind the out-of-control crowd climbing all over everything and not letting me pass through freely. I also don’t like how they didn’t post anything about it so we would know what’s going on.”

A lady then came into the alley and begged my sister to let her use our restroom. My sis is a bit of softy, so she let her in. I said, “Don’t you tell anyone.. I don’t want this to turn into a public restroom.” One more thing to tssk at… why didn’t they provide enough port-o-potties for a concert-sized event? The pop singers that were here drew a huge crowd.

Shortly after that, Tommy busted out the grill and set up at the entrance of the alley. “This’ll keep them out of here.”, he said. I wasn’t sure if he meant the his toplessness, his beer-swilling-rowdiness, or the smokey BBQ. I noticed a little girl walking by and snearing at us as she clutched a teddy bear close to her chest, “EEwwwww!!!” she exclaimed. Tommy’s dog, who looks like a big teddy bear himself, woofed and wagged his tail as the girl ran shreaking.

Meanwhile, there were kids climbing all over our gates and running up and down our stairs. Dee tried closing the gate, but they would just open it again. Jason put a plank by the flower pots to keep them from climbing on those at least. We and our alley-neighbors hung around to protect our turf from pee and garbage as we swilled beer, ate hotdogs, and danced a little. It felt strange because it was a huge block party and we felt kinda unwelcome, even the old-timers who had been there for decades.

I later learned that there is a petition to name the street Bengali Way and to erect a monument. There are also a 2 more petitions to have 2 more street parties in June and in July. Ugh. I don’t think the our diverse neighborhood is going to like that. There are Asian, Italian, Jewish, Indian, the list goes on and on. Kensington has been described as one of the most diversified neighborhoods in the whole city. Calling the street Bengali Way is getting some opposition. I’ll be curious to see how it plays out.

Stir Crazy!

Happy New Year! It’s cold!

It’s official. I now live in the Kensington neighborhood of Brooklyn. I feel as though I’ve moved to another city I need to get to know all over again. Other than the newly renovated Food Town with the elevated pricing to match, this neighborhood doesn’t seem to be touched by gentrification, yet. I’m guessing the pricey Food Town and the fact that we can’t afford to live so close to Prospect Park is the first hint that this neighborhood might be in the first stages of change. Or not… it’s hard to tell.

Also, in order to make rent cheaper, I’m roommates with my sister, Dee… and Jason is along for the ride. Luckily, I get along with both of my sisters. We have had our differences in opinions, but we’ve never had the throw-down biting, scratching, or hair-pulling fights that I’ve heard some siblings have had as they were growing up together. Even so, I haven’t had a roommate other than my bed-buddy Jason in over a decade. And yes, Jason has been my bed-buddy for 10 years… so what of it? Regardless, we are now sharing space with my younger sister. Luckily, there is enough separation of space that I think it won’t feel too cramped. We get the whole upstairs, she gets the whole downstairs with separate bathrooms. We just share the bills and the kitchen. Of course we will share camaraderie, but we will have the ability to escape to our separate levels when privacy is needed. So why do I look so stressed?

I hate moving. Who doesn’t? The cardboard boxes. The not knowing where stuff is. The cost of moving it. The routines being interrupted and the comfort zones are in flux. The next tenants constantly emailing and calling forcing you to move 2 days sooner or they will move their stuff in while your stuff is still there.

Wait a minute! I’ve never had to deal with new tenants before. The past couple of weeks have been made very bizarre by a couple from Minnesota who are moving into our old apartment. It all started the second they looked at the place.

“So, I hear you’re moving on the 1st. I really need you to move over Thanksgiving weekend. Can you do that? I already reserved the Monday after Thanksgiving off from work, so your moving on Tuesday won’t work for us.”, is what she said as they walked through our apartment. The landlord had not even made his decision yet. I was thinking… why are they reserving a moving day before they have an apartment yet?

I was a little flustered but told her, “There’s a person who is still living in the space we are moving into. I don’t know which day he is moving, but I can ask to see if he can move over Thanksgiving weekend. But for now, we are moving on Dec. 1st.”

“Oh. Ok… well… we can just move on the same day. Just make sure your stuff is to one side so we can fit our stuff in there.”

“Um… no. I don’t think that’s a good idea. Just look at that narrow hallway, 2 sets of people moving in there just won’t work. And we’re hiring movers. I don’t want to pay for the extra time it will take. I really think we should move on 2 different days. The best I can do is confirm with the guy living in our space to find out when we are going to move, and then you can move after that.”

“Oh. Hey, where’s the other one that lives here? We really wanted to talk to him too to get an idea about the neighborhood and stuff.”

“Well, it’s going to be a while until he gets home. He texted me that he has to take a bus from Jay Street because something happened on the F train.”

“Hmm. Well, we’ll just go down and talk to the landlord some more. Here is my email and phone number… just let me know when the guy can move and stuff.”, spathered the weirdo woman. The guy barely spoke and just nodded his head or went hrumph from time to time.

Needless to say, they went downstairs, talked the landlord into moving in, and sat there and waited for Jason to come home an hour later. I thought they were strange, but nobody else seemed to notice. So I thought maybe I was being overly-sensitive about moving out of an apartment I really love. When I told my sister about it, she asked her roommate about moving Thanksgiving weekend, who then felt pressure to move early, which he couldn’t. We all decided that it would be ok to move in with him still there. We would move our stuff to one side while he keeps his stuff to the other side for a few days. I feel so bad for him, because it’s just what that weirdo couple wanted to do to us. I called and left a voicemail to let weirdo woman know we could move the Sunday before her Monday move date. I’m kicking myself now because we’re all crammed into this apartment to make her more comfortable. And then the endless emails and phone calls began…

I saw the MN area code and let it go to voicemail. “Hi Erika, I got your voicemail. Thank you so much for confirming the move date. But I thought you were going to email me about this. I don’t know. I’m not sure. Here’s my email again: weirdo@douchebag.cum Let me know about changing the utilities over to our name.”

I then received several emails of the like: “Hi, I hope you are doing OK with packing. I was wondering if you could email me your account numbers so I could change the utilities into my name. Thanks, Weirdo”

“Hi, I’m still packing and look forward to moving into your lovely apartment. I called Cablevision and tried to change the service into our name. It would be much easier if you just gave us your account numbers. Could you at least cut off your end of the service so we could turn our service on? I’d really like to get this taken care of today. Thanks, Weirdo”

You get the idea… it just went on and on with the emails from Weirdo. I didn’t give her any account numbers, by the way. When I called her, she would email me instead of talking to me. I kept wondering, if I turn off my cable internet, how am I going to email her? I guess she noticed my iphone and thought, “She has an iphone… great. She can email me instead of call me on her iphone.”

The very last email I received was on our moving day… when everything, including my laptop, was packed. Oh wait… I still have my iphone, but I wasn’t checking my email. I think she finally realized this and for the 2nd time, called me…

“Hi, it’s Weirdo. You said we could pick up the keys today before your movers arrive.”

“Yeah, the movers will be here sometime between 1pm and 2pm. So if you want to avoid being in their way, anytime before that would be good. You mentioned in an email that you would come around 11am?”

“Well, he’s going to pick up the truck and load up our stuff from storage and then I’m dropping off a check somewhere and… Oh… we will get the keys later when we unload the truck at your apartment today.. “

“Whaaat??!! I thought you were moving in on Monday?”

“Well, we’re just picking up our stuff out of storage and realize that we can’t leave it in the truck outside overnight. So we really need to get it out of the truck. So we need you out of there so we can organize and reschedule our movers to move in say… is 7pm enough time? That’s really late, but you said you’re movers would be there at 1pm.”

“Ummmmm!!! You’re really stressing me out!! You said you were moving tomorrow!”

“Oh, I don’t mean to make you nervous. I’ll just get the keys and we can talk about it some more.”

I hung up on her just as Jason walked in the door and told him the situation. He finally agreed that they are nuts. We also agreed that it would be best if he gives them the keys when they come to pick it up because I might push her down the stairs. Then she calls back just minutes later…

“So tell me when a good time would be to get the keys. We have to drive to Ikea to buy some more stuff, so it’s not going to be before the movers are there… it’ll be, say 2 or 3?”

I could feel the heat on my face and imagined a fire engine red color. I had to speak very slowly… “If we are here…… come.. get.. the keys……If we are not here….. I will leave the keys…. with the neighbors…. because… the landlord… as you know… is out of town.”

“Ok… we’re on our way.”

Just then, the movers arrived outside. I was fuming and spewing anger. I just wanted to only deal with moving our stuff, and for Weirdo to leave me the fuck alone. Just come get the freakin’ keys and leave me the fuck alone. I could here the movers coming up the stairs and they opened the door, and Weirdo and Hrumph were right there with them.

“Knock knock… hheeEEyyy… how’s it going? We’re here for the keys. We need to take some measurements because we’re going to Ikea….”

Jason promptly gave them the keys and replied, “Now is not a good time for that…” as he swiftly ushered them back out of the apartment and down the stairs and away from me. I was 2 seconds away from flying through the air with kartwheel kicks like Kato and Zena the Warrior Princess… KaaiiiIIYYY AIYYY AIY AIY YAAAAH!!!!!!

Jason came back up and they were all gone, “Fuck that. I’m not promising to be out by 7. Fuck that noise. Let’s move now.”

Then we moved.