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| Friday, September 5th, 2008 |
docjen
|
6:06p |
Followup to Homeless note -
Several folks have already suggested a few things -
But I figure it'd be good to state my needs as to what sort of rental property I need:
1) I have a dog and a cat - both are outdoor/indoor - thus pet friendly lease and neighborhood
2) I have a decent amount of house furniture - so I am looking for a house - not an apartment - and it would probably need to be empty when I move in.
3) Roommates are a definite as my current income at part-time wages (I went part-time this year in order to have enough time to complete the Faces of Asheville project) is only netting $800/mo. So $400/mo is the max I can afford lest utilities are included in which case I could go as high as $500/mo.
4) Must be in decent condition - no mold - no mildew - no bug infestations.
5) It must be in Asheville city limits.
Thanks all!!!
It will all work out - I know it will. |
docjen
|
12:46p |
Land-Lords, Tenants Rights, Black-lists ... and now I'm really homeless
Yesterday I stopped by my house to feed my cat Kechina who is residing there until I was supposed to be able to move back in week after next. At that time I found out from one of the handy-men who is working on the house restoration that my land-lady Carol Ann Winters of WNC Rental had decided to no longer abide by our verbal and written agreement to pull the carpeting out of the attic. The carpeting is very old and the fibers are actually disintegrating making going up into the attic, even just for storage space, an unhealthy place to be. When we got robbed last August the Police Officer who came told us (without even going inside the house!) that he remembered that nasty carpeting and all of the human waste, excrements, and stains that were on it when he busted the crack fiends living in the house during the 1990's. Umm... gross?!
I also found out that I have been placed on a blacklist of tenants -
See as it turns out - if you are a tenant who is in a shitty situation with a crappy landlord who won't make repairs to your house, and your house has severe issues which can jeopardize you health & well-being, and you turn to the Housing Authority to help you, and you get a Housing Inspector to come to your house, and they find cause to site and fine your landlord - well that landlord can put you on a blacklist that is shared with other landlords as a person who is 'troublesome' to rent to. What bullshit!
Where are the tenants rights in any of this?!?!
So Carol Ann agreed to take the carpeting out as well as do the other renovations the house. Yesterday I was told she decided not to - but that she wanted me to sign a lease before the house work was even finished. I stopped by her office and talked to her property manager - saying I didn't want to sign a lease until after the work was done because she was changing the rules in the middle of the game. I already transfered all of the house utilities to my name so that was, I thought, a pretty big commitment as there was monetary costs in doing so. So she knew I was moving back in & was committed to doing so, but that I didn't think it to be wise to sign a lease on a property when I can not even say WHEN I can move back in. Plus she wasn't fixing the agreed upon issues, and that if I signed the lease she didn't have to do any more work. I was protecting my rights and interests & I see nothing wrong with that whatsoever.
Then I went to my folks' home to crash-out for the afternoon as by that point my viral infection that has been plaguing me for over a week had given me a fever of 102 degrees. As I was napping in a fevered sweat when I got a phone call from the property manager informing me that Carol Ann has decided to no longer rent to me because I am so 'troublesome' & wouldn't sign the lease before the renovations were completed.
I called her this morning to discuss it - seeing how I've transfered utilities to my name and my cat is still there. Plus I figured she could have the nerve to tell me herself since I've made myself homeless on account of our agreement that I could move back in. When I called her I asked her if she had time to talk and she said,
"No, I don't. And I won't speak with you. Please don't call me again." and then she hung up.
I called back and left a message but I expect her passive-aggressive ways will prevent her from being a responsible, reasonable, human-being.
How rude! I've never EVER been that rude or passive-aggressive to her, or to anyone in my life! I have to believe she will get what is coming to her - and it is difficult for me to control my anger and not want to hire someone to drop a ton of manure on her lawn. Obviously part of me wants justice and vindication. I wish I could sue the b*tch because I know she is also eating our entire housing deposit - so I am out that plus the cost of the utilities plus now I am really homeless.
I don't know what I am going to do -
This city is terrible for renter's rights - all of the power is in the hands of the property owners.
And that crap about the landlord's blacklist of tenants who want to protect themselves... seriously?!
Couldn't that be considered slander or libel?!
If anyone hears of a property opening up, I guess let me know. I have a house of furniture in storage.
I'm really inbetween a rock and a hard place and I don't know what the solution is. It's hard to trust the universe has be on the best path in moments like this, but I have no other options.
I am just so mad at this stupid lady.
Note to all - Carol Ann Winters, WNC Rental - DO NOT RENT FROM! DO NOT TRUST!!! |
polexa
|
12:00a |
|
| Thursday, September 4th, 2008 |
crystalpyramid
|
7:05p |
power
Hey, when I send random emails to random people at publishing companies, they send me email within six hours saying they sent me the book and all the ancillaries. How cool is that? I'd heard you could do this, but had no idea it was so ridiculously easy. I wonder if there's anything else I need...
Has Pearson always owned Prentice Hall and Addison-Wesley? What else do they own? |
| Wednesday, September 3rd, 2008 |
q10
|
11:11p |
‘Al Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America ... [Senator Obama is] worried that someone won’t read them their rights.’ -Gov. Palin i wasn't aware of that. i'd actually been a lukewarm supporter of Senator Obama because i couldn't find anywhere were he expressed such worry explicitly. but y'know what, Governor? i'm going to take your word for it. you just secured Senator Obama a slightly larger campaign contribution than i can really afford.* i hope you're very, very pleased with yourself. *η: still depressingly small, alas. η 2: i'm also not completely sure how that can be that same Governor can , just a few days before speaking those words, [η: in fairly recent memory] have signed off on something like this proclamation for Jury Rights Day without suffering some kind of fatal cognitive dissonance overload, but i am grateful to Gov. Palin for bringing this most excellent day to my attention - it'll be joining Hangul Day and Jan Hus Day on my list of observances. |
q10
|
9:22p |
speech video online?
is there anyplace i can go online to watch various people's convention speeches from start to finish? all i can find at the BBC and CNN are obnoxious little two-minute clips. |
polexa
|
11:59p |
|
q10
|
3:39p |
Jack Chick's latest it's about vampires, and it's even less clear than usual how it's supposed to cohere. |
arctangent
|
9:48a |
I hate science fiction writers Every time something like this happens, I lose a little bit of my faith in the idea that genre fiction has racked up more points on the positive side of the social ledger than the horrible selfish destructive racist reactionary evil side. ETA: So true. |
| Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008 |
polexa
|
11:59p |
|
aridice
|
11:09p |
feeling miserly and nerdy... ...I rewired my crickety speakers! and they work again! I didn't even cross any wires! Granted, my speaker wire is half green and half black now, and there's a tender spot sealed by... duct tape (yahyah, so i didn't have electrical tape, but this is a non-power wire so i'm not worried...too much), but i have surround sound again! without having to manually manipulate the wires every half second! I am pleased. |
q10
|
6:35p |
procrastinatacular
spent past couple of hours doing improvised testing of Chrome on a departmental XP box with a friend and then installing the latest versions of IE, Firefox, and Safari to compare. no real conclusions yet, other than that IE sucks and Chrome has some shiny interface stuff but too little menu. |
arctangent
|
8:06p |
Lifestyle update
There was a time in my life when I could survive a night of summer in New York without air conditioning and not suffer horrible, long-lasting debilitating health problems.
That time is over. |
q10
|
3:01p |
proposed Settlers variant
1. assemble 10 ‘cost determination’ cards. each card contains two distinct resource names or symbols. make sure to include all 10 (order-independent) combinations of two distinct resources, and make sure to make sure that each resource is the same resource in a pair the same number of times.
2. remove all the victory point cards from the deck, but add one extra of each of the ‘do cool stuff’ cards. interpret monopoly as in Cities and Knights so that it takes at most two of each resource per player.
3. to determine costs, draw as follows:
-draw 1 cost determination card. the resources listed on that card are the cost of a road.
-draw 1 cost determination card. the resources listed on that card are the cost of a card.
-draw 1 cost determination card. two of the first resource listed on that card, and three of the second, are the cost of a city.
-draw 2 cost determination cards. the combined resources on those cards, including any duplications, are the cost of a settlement.
4. calculate the ‘strength’ of each resource by adding up the number of times it occurs on the cards drawn, counting the resources on the city card double and triple, respectively [η2: and counting road costs double]. the weakest resource is also the ‘trade goods’ resource (as in starfarers). that is, it trades at 3:1 without a port, 2:1 with a 3:1 port, and 1:1 with a specialty port. the specialty port for trade goods can be used at most once per turn. [η3: if there is a tie for weakest resource, trade goods in the one with more hexes on the board. if both have the same number of hexes, it's the one whose highest value production number is lower-value. if there's still a tie after that, flip a coin.]
5. maybe do one of the funny things to randomize the mix of resource hexes on the board that various people have tried.
6. everything else is about like standard settlers.
you could make this work for seafarers by adding another draw for ships. you could probably also add a draw for ‘city walls’ to increase hand limit if you deemed them a desirable game addition. some more planning would be required to run this with Cities and Knights.
η: oh - cost determination cards once drawn stay out for subsequent draws, so, for example you can't end up with exactly the same resources involved in roads and cities. the thing about the card mix is tentative, and could be adjusted in various more and less radical ways - maybe the exact card mix could be randomized secretly at the beginning of play, so that there would be no guarantees as to which cards might be available (beyond the soldiers). there might be some charm to incorporating the merchant from Cities and Knights by making up some number of merchant cards and including them in the deck. |
q10
|
2:04p |
hrm
i recently found myself wondering what you call a case that's the natural opposite of a sublative case. according to wikipedia, you just say ‘superlative’ and count on context. |
docjen
|
3:37p |
Shout out of ever grateful thanks - - - - -
Thank you to the following super-hero friends:
David S.
Craig
Rebecca
Brandy
Steve
Frank
Jaq
James Jimmy Jim
Courtney
Annie Grace
Jason
David F.
{I hope I didn't forget anyone!}
Just goes to show...
It takes a village to raise a child
and a city to move Jenny Bowen!! :-P
Seriously though - thanks so much. After 6 days of 16 hr days of intensive moving, hauling, packing, sorting, and cleaning I am exhausted.
And were it not for my friends - I would have been sunk.
But the silver lining is at 9am my landlady started a massive overhaul of the house - we are getting a totally new remodeled bathroom, all windows will be working, some fresh paint, and the two doors that lead to the outside from within the rooms (left over from during the days it was a "brothel") will be taken out and the walls rebuilt.
Keep an ear to the floor for the house microwaving party - and the need for help moving stuff BACK into the house. ;-)
Much love to many -
One love to all -
JBo |
meanfreepath
|
1:28p |
Amusing lines from the literature... From Onoda, G. Y., "Direct Observation of Two-Dimensional, Dynamical Clustering and Ordering with Colloids," Phys. Rev. Lett. 55, 226 (1985): It appeared that the possibility of obtaining reversible clustering phenomena at the air-water interface should be possible if the right interparticle bonding conditions are found. I, in fact, have succeeded in finding such a condition. |
meanfreepath
|
11:51a |
This is so not the time to come down with a cold... At least it's not the middle of winter and the odds of this turning into pneumonia are probably a lot lower. |
q10
|
1:33a |
i, for one, welcome our new open-source masters by now, i'm sure y'all have seen the news about google's new browser OS plan for world domination. everything they're saying makes it look totally inspired. of course, it'll take some time to see if it lives up to the hype, but, in terms of understanding what customers need, and in terms of understanding how to achieve insidious control over anything, the manifesto linked above is alarmingly insightful. key line: ‘if you can just ignore the browser, we've done a good job.’ you may recall that during my last round of failed os installation efforts i listed something like this as my criterion for a good OS. since chrome looks like it plans to be the first browser that's actually also an OS (none of this ‘let's artificially entangle IE with windows’ bullshit), i think this bodes pretty damn well. |
| Monday, September 1st, 2008 |
q10
|
10:44p |
this is not anarchy ... this is chaos
there seem to be credible reports of a fair amount of inept violence and petty vandalism being carried out (and possibly more that was planned) in the vicinity of the Republican convention by a number of self-described ‘anarchists’.
i just thought i should say that i think these people are giving anarchy a bad name - that the anarchist political agenda is supposed to be about something more than random, and politically ineffectual acts of violence and destruction. even if one does believe in the legitimacy of a violent and destructive revolution in principle (which is something an anarchist needn't accept, although many anarchists do), that doesn't justify violence and destruction which makes peoples lives worse while serving no strategic purpose for the revolutionary cause, and all available evidence points to the conclusion that these activities are making the world a worse place for real people today while failing to move us any closer to an anarchist social and political order tomorrow.
just as the real, legitimate need to combat terrorism doesn't justify just going around randomly destroying stuff with little or no association with terrorism, so legitimate complaints about the way political authority is organized don't justify just going out and making random trouble in the general vicinity of that authority. |
q10
|
10:29p |
silly hypothetical question
in a society of frog-people whose reproductive process involved external fertilization, under what circumstances, if any, ought it be permissible to willfully cause the destruction of a live fertilized egg? |
polexa
|
11:59p |
|
q10
|
3:59p |
everybody at all respectable seems to be tripping over themselves to emphasize how much of a nonissue one Ms. Bristol Palin's pregnancy is, and how it doesn't reflect badly on her parents or the cultural setting in which they raised her in any meaningful way. why, it's almost as if the major news outlets are only covering it extensively to emphasize how much of a nonissue it is.
we all agree that it's a nonissue then? good. i'm glad we do. because it really is.
now then, we surely all agree that it's also a nonissue of the same kind when the same narrative plays out among people with less money and more melanin. i mean, i wouldn't want to accuse any of our fine respectable social commentators of being racist or - apparently worse - elitist.
so we're in agreement on that too, i hope? how delightful.
so then i can count on never having to deal with another stupid-ass moral panic about this narrative cropping up among this or that demographic - and never hearing about how this is a sign of bad parents or a crisis of values - ever again, right?
thank you. |
arctangent
|
4:43p |
|
q10
|
3:41a |
why?
why is there not a hipster Chez Geek spinoff where the characters can accumulate irony points in addition to slack point? (presumably these would have mechanics something like the gloom points in Chez Goth.) |
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