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2004-08-31 - 7:13 p.m.
OK apartment
This week as the new month begins, my roommate Jace is moving out and my new roommate Landon is moving in. Landon had pretty much confirmed that he’d be moving in over a month ago, but we didn’t get around to setting up an appointment and going to the rental office to take care of the paperwork until last week. We’d originally scheduled it weeks ago, but then decided to reschedule, and then I wasn’t able to get in touch with Landon the week of the rescheduling and then I went out of town for a week, and it was just a big headache. The paperwork basically involved Jace signing one thing saying he approved his name being taken off the lease, and then me and Landon signing a whole new lease, which I also had to do a few months ago when Mike moved out and Jace moved in, and it’s a big pain in the ass that I have to fill out everything all over again when I’m staying in the same place and there’s just a new name on the lease. This was the 3rd time I’ve had to fill out all my info and sign a new lease and I’ve lived in this apartment for all of 15 months. Landon’s a bit of a joker, and has a tendency to say inappropriate things regardless of who’s around. So while he was signing these documents and basically applying to live here, he joked around with the lady in the rental office, casually asking if there are any rules about having a crystal meth lab or a pet llama. Not that the lady really seemed offended or worried or that she probably even has any authority over the matter. But it was still a little discomfiting. I don’t know what living with Landon is going to be like. He’s an old old friend of Mike, so I spent plenty of time around him during the year and a half that I lived with Mike, so I know him, but not too well. He kind of has a reputation for doing crazy things (he was discharged from the military under mysterious circumstances), but Mike assures me that he’s actually a fairly normal, boring guy most of the time, and that living with him shouldn’t be too risky or strange. And in any event, it should at least be better than living with Jace. Jace moved in in Febuary, and after over 6 months of cohabitation, I still know barely anything about the guy. I guess I could’ve tried harder to get to know him and establish a rapport, but he’s not a very talkative guy, and I guess I wasn’t really up to trying to bring him out of his shell. It wasn’t a big deal, he had his space and I had mine, and for the most part there were no conflicts. I’m kind of glad to be rid of him, though, mainly because he was always a little sketchy about paying rent on time, and he had a tendency to leave messes in the bathroom and kitchen. He shaved with an electic razor, and would get stubble all over and around the sink in the bathroom. For a while he was good about cleaning it up, but for the last few weeks it seemed like the same pile of stubble just sat there, and it was so gross I didn’t want to mess with it. He also had the habit of leaving dirty dishes in the sink, which I didn’t mind as much because for some reason I like cleaning the kitchen even while I’m a slob in every other room. But after a while even that got old, especially when he left bits of food on the dishes until they started to smell. Lately there’s even been some little gnats or fruit flies or something in the kitchen and that’s pissing me off. So yeah, what I’m saying is the guy was a slob. I mean, I have some poor cleaning habits too, but the stuff he did just does not fly with even me. Landon, by contrast, is I think going to be a pretty clean roommate. In fact, he already made me feel guilty when he came up to sign the papers and had a look around the place and was pretty disgusted. I felt bad, especially since a lot of the mess was Jace’s and I had just been out of town for a few days. But hopefully his cleanliness won’t be overboard. He’s already talking about renting a carpet shampoo-er thing before moving in. But it should be good, as long as he doesn’t make me feel like an asshole for not keeping everything spotless. Generally I find that if I live with someone cleaner than me, it motivates me to do my part, whereas with Jace I knew that if I cleaned something up, he’d just get it dirty again in a couple days and it felt kind of pointless to bother. I asked Jace to be moved out by the 1st of the month, which is Wednesday, but I went out of town for a couple days over the weekend, and when I came back on Monday, he and pretty much all of his stuff were already gone. As far as I can tell he didn’t leave his key, though, and I need a check from him for last month’s bills, so if he doesn’t come back I’m going to call him this week. I’m kind of glad that after that I’ll probably never have to deal with him again, though. I was just never comfortable talking to the guy. In any event, I feel like I’ve been in a bit of a rut for a while now, and hopefully going back to school and getting a new roommate this week will be enough of a change to get me out of it. -al
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