Background Check

I'm applying for a position that requires a background check. A special agent came to my house today to ask me some routine questions. The interview itself went smoothly and I have nothing in particular to say about it.

However, what happened right before the interview was a perfect example of someone being too persistent.

I opened the door to the Agent and offered him a seat. Before he even sat down, a teenage boy came and knocked on my front door. The Agent said, "I have no idea who that is."

The teen said, "Hey I'm knockin' on neighbors' doors, tryin' to get enough points." (One of his cohorts had already come by earlier, trying to sell magazines, solicit subscription donations for children's shelters, and earn enough points for a prize).

I said, "Sorry, but someone else already came by."

"But I didn't see a bug-off tag," he whined.

"What?"

He explained, "You're supposed to get a door tag that shows you were already visited."

I thought, "Do you think I'm lying to you?" but said, "I didn't get one. Sorry, but I already gave a donation." (Bug-off kid).

"Did you know it's illegal to solicit donations?" (Then what the hell are you doing?)

"I don't mean to be rude, but I'm in the middle of a job interview."

The teen peeked in and saw the Agent. "Oh, is he interviewing you right now?"

"Yes."

Rather than leaving, despite having been given 3 very good reasons to do so, the teen said, "Hey man, do you want to help me get some points?"

The Agent declined.

I wanted to say, "Sorry, but my employment prospects are more important than you getting a bike," but that would have been rude.

Instead, I politely expressed my disinterest again. As I was shutting the door he yelled, "I'll be back in ten minutes!"

Thankfully, he did not come back.

What cheek.

Overheard on the Bus

I was sitting on the bus today when a nearby bicyclist (who was riding on the sidewalk) pushed aside a pedestrian who was apparently walking too slowly, or in his way.

The bus driver began screaming, "Did you see that? That guy on the bike! Did you see that guy? He pushed that girl on the sidewalk! I wish I could run him over! If that was my sister I'd give him a beat down!"

He then began a long string of what I assume were Spanish curse words.

Gobble Gobble

Happy Turkey Day. I ate and did homework so nothing particularly exciting happened to me today, except for the dream I had this morning:

Female body builders were preparing to celebrate Harry Potter Day in Texas, while an eccentric old woman (Lady Emmeline), distantly related to British royalty, showed me her tacky collection of jeweled unicorns and dragons. She also had a giant "LE" rendered in gold and diamonds, like rapper bling.

I Invited Strangers to Our Home

This is a story about someone I no longer live with.

One day, after returning home from class, my roommate (whose nickname was Midget), regaled me with tales of some men she met. They stopped her on the street to ask for directions, she struck up a conversation with them, and everyone became fast friends.

I thought she's too trusting, but oh well.

Then Midget said, "They're coming over right now. You don't mind, do you?"

"What, right now? Today?" I was aghast.

"Yes, they're on their way," she said calmly.

"Well, it's too late for me to object, isn't it?"

"I guess, but they're really nice!"

"Uh huh. How well do you know these people? Do you even know their last names?"

"No, but don't worry, they know our phone number."

"Gee, that makes me feel a hell of a lot better. So are they students?"

"No."

"Do they live around here?"

"No, they're visiting from out of the country."

"How old are they?"

"Like 30." (FYI, we were about 20 at the time, so 30 to us was ancient).

"How many are coming?"

"I don't know. I said he could bring his friends."

"Let me understand you correctly. You invited some old guys you met ON THE STREET, and told them to bring an unknown number of possibly sketchy friends, who could KILL US and then flee the country without anyone knowing, and you think it's okay because they know our PHONE NUMBER!?"

"Um, yeah."

"What in the world made you think this was a good idea?"

"They seemed really nice."

I was speechless at her stupidity. I thought it couldn't get any worse. Then she said, "I'm going out to get some ice cream. Let them in when they get here okay?"

"You want to leave me alone with some people I've never seen before, that you don't even know?'

"I'll be back right away."

I thought, "It doesn't take long to get stabbed to death."

After she left, I left too. They're her guests, if there's no one to let them in, she's the one being rude.

The aftermath: Two men came over. She survived. I got her to admit she was stupid, and she promised to never do anything like that again.

Airbrushed Wedding

The most memorable wedding favor I've ever seen was a mix CD, with a picture of the bride and groom on the front of the CD case.

The reason why it was memorable was because the bride's chest had been photoshopped - badly - to increase her cleavage.

It looked like someone had drawn )( onto her photo, in a color that didn't quite match her skin, and then used the blur tool to try to blend it in.

It didn't work.

Emu on the Loose

A co-worker of mine was missing from work for a day. When she returned she told us she was gone because she "was chasing an emu."

We stared at her for a moment, wondering if this was the grown-up version of "my dog ate my homework."

It turns out she was serious. She really did own an emu.

Emu-Hunter received a phone call from her neighbor, who told her the emu was wandering around, unfettered. She went outside with some food, and tried to lure the emu back. Instead, it ran across the road (insert bad joke here) and escaped into a large field. It ran around the field, afraid to cross the road again.

Emu-Hunter and her housemate decided to chase it down with a 4-wheeler. The housemate drove, while Emu-Hunter held on for dear life, and waved a stick with a loop, trying to lasso the emu. Unfortunately, the 4-wheeler had a top speed of 28 mph, while the emu was able to run at about 30 mph.

Needless to say, the emu escaped, so they called animal control.

Later that afternoon, Emu Hunter got a call, telling her the emu was spotted 3 miles away from home. It had wandered onto the property of a woman who was bird-phobic, and the poor lady nearly had a nervous breakdown when she found a giant human-sized bird in her yard.

This time, Emu-Hunter and her housemate were able to catch the emu, put a sock over its head (to calm it down I suppose), and herd it into the back of a truck.

I hope the emu learned a lesson. Whenever it escapes, its owner will put a dirty sock over its head, after chasing the emu in the aforementioned sock.

The Roomate Saga Part 4 (The End)

For the rest of the story: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

Quick recap: Sleazy Chick, my ex-roommate, left town without moving out her belongings or paying for her damages. The landlord charged us $800 for repairs, cleaning, and dumping Sleazy Chick's junk.

Good Roomie called Sleazy Chick's parents several times, after finding their phone number in the yellow pages. No one picked up the phone, but Good Roomie didn't leave a message, afraid Sleazy Chick would erase it.

After several calls, Sleazy Chick's mom, Mrs. Chick, used caller ID to call Roomie back.

"Who is this? Why do you keep calling the house?" she said, angrily.

Roomie explained who she was, what situation we were in, and that her daughter owed us money. Like her daughter, Mrs. Chick tried to weasel out of paying.

Mrs. Chick's first argument: "Well, everyone used the furniture, so everyone's responsible for it."

Excuse me? We all brought items that we shared, and we moved all our own items out of the apartment. If we dared to touch your daughter's things, she would probably be suing us.

Mrs. Chick's second argument: "You can't blame my daughter for everything. Those French girls who subletted during the summer probably left a mess."

What? They brought furniture and potted plants in their luggage for a 6-week stay? They had barely enough room for all their clothes and toiletries in their suitcases. I took them shopping right after they landed. Furthermore, they were very neat, and cleaned the house without being asked, even though they were in a hurry to catch their departing flight.

Mrs. Chick's third argument: "Some of the stuff belongs to my daughter's old roommate Mandy."

So what? Mandy lived there before us. Your daughter had a full year to get Mandy to move her stuff or throw it out. When we moved in your daughter gave us the impression everything belonged to her.

I wrote Mrs. Chick a calm, polite letter explaining what her daughter did, why she can't blame anyone else, what the charges were, and how much she owed the landlord and each roommate.

Instead of trusting her to mail 4 separate checks (for me, Good Roomie, Good Roomie #2 and the landlord), I told her to send one to us, which we would split up, to make it more convenient for "her."

I also added, since we owed the landlord money, it was in the best interest of her daughter's credit report to pay us soon.

To my surprise, Mrs. Chick sent us the money. Promptly. And the check didn't bounce.

Throughout all this, Sleazy Chick stayed silent. I'm glad all this is over, but the whole situation left me very disappointed, and surprised at how selfish someone can be.

I can understand if you're spoiled, and you can afford to buy a new TV, living room set, kitchenware, etc. every time you move. What I don't understand is why it takes too much effort to put an ad on Craigslist saying, "Hey broke students, poor people and recyclers: come get some free stuff."

At the very least, how hard is it to say to your roommates, "I don't want ____, so throw it out so you won't get charged" ?

The Roomate Saga Part 3

Earlier posts: Part 1 and Part 2.

In my last post I described how my roommate Sleazy Chick left sent me a text message indicating a stranger was moving in with me, then dodged my calls for a week.

She finally called back, saying Jack was a "student" who wanted to move to town 6 or 7 weeks before school started, so he could "settle in." Okay. She also said she planned to move her personal belongings out of her room before he moved in, but would return at the end of the lease to take her furniture and dishes. (This second part later turned out to be a lie).

While I was out of town for the weekend, she moved everything out of her room, but left a lot of shopping bags and trash in the apartment, outside of her room.

When I came back, the French subletters told me they had tried to ask her about Jack (which they had every right to do, since they were being forced to live with him as well), but were brushed off rudely. This only made me more nervous.

I know, "appearances can be deceiving," but it was hard not to remember my ex-con suspicions when I finally met Jack. He was older than your average college student, very burly, very tattooed, very very scarred and drove a very beat-up car. He looked like a man that had been at the wrong end of a broken beer bottle many times.

Luckily, I was able to move into my new apartment early, and didn't live with Jack long. He was probably rather nice, but living with an unknown man wasn't a chance I wanted to take.

Crisis averted, right?

No. After this, Sleazy Chick ceased all contact with us. Our landlord insisted we turn in all our keys together, so I kept calling her to ask when she was moving out, and if she could give me her keys. (We had apartment, room, closet, pool, exercise room, and mail keys, and would have been charged $5 for each missing key).

She refused to respond, even when I called again the day before our lease was up. I told her I assumed she was coming on the very last day to move out, and I left the envelope with all the keys on the kitchen counter, for her to turn in with her keys. I explained the situation to the landlord, and said my procrastinating roommate would come on the last day.

Remember Sleazy Chick's promise to remove the ridiculous amounts of junk she accumulated over 3 years? It didn't happen.

The landlord called me several days later and said Sleazy Chick never returned. The landlord was "appalled" at the amount of furniture, trash, knickknacks, dishes, food, etc. still in the apartment. It took 2 people 4 hours to move everything out and dump it. On top of that, there were damages in Sleazy Chick's room. The landlord had called Sleazy Chick before, without response, and was not dealing with her again.

Thus we -- yes, WE -- were being charged $800 for Sleazy Chick's crap.

Our deposit didn't even cover the full amount. On top of the money I handed over when I moved in, the landlord wanted me to pull another $100 out of my outlet-store, student-budget jeans, to cover her designer-clad ass.

That was what really galled me. I suspected I wasn't going to get my deposit back, but to have to shell out more money for someone else, in order to avoid my credit being ruined, seemed incredibly unfair.

I'm going to try to wrap things up in Part 4: Chasing the Money.