Heh.. We're not moving out of Memphis completely, just to a suburb. After almost 5 months of living behind a bar (we share a parking lot with it) in Midtown, we've had enough. Anyone who I've talked to on a regular basis knows the story.. But in 5 months, we've had...
*Countless Roaches
*3 Brown Recluses
*1 Black Widow
*Since we do live right behind a bar.. When they fill up their dumpster, they think it's just fine to come and dump their trash in ours. So, we get the added bonus of the oh-so-wonderful scent of rotting seafood in the breeze.
*Countless Guys Trying to "Talk to Me" by either walking up while I'm standing outside the apartment having a cigarette.
*A crazed woman banging on our door at 3:30 AM. When Dan got up and looked out the window, the woman was peeing right in front of it. She then started banging again, and when Dan answered, she asked if she could come in and look at our apartment, because it was her first apartment ever. Dan's response of course was "Fuck You", and a slam of the door.
*Water Damage on our bathroom ceiling, that the rental office has known about for 2 months now. The ceiling is literally peeling off from it. I'd include pictures in this, but it would just gross everyone out.
*A bathroom flood caused by the toilet constantly running. The Maintenance people had called us the day we reported it, and said they'd be right there to fix it. That was Saturday. They didn't show until Monday morning.
*A bum camped out in back of the apartment building on Tuesday. He had his sleeping bag and all that. He'd totally set up shop right there in our backyard. Dan and his assistant manager ended up swinging by here and waking the guy up and sent him away.
We can deal with almost all of that. But, we are definitely NOT willing to deal with the roaches. Now granted, I wouldn't be so freaked if we only saw a few here and there. But, this place is INFESTED. Delia cannot sleep in her own room (even if she was willing to.. hahaha), because the dumpster is conveniently located just outside her window. So her room is generally hit the hardest by the roaches. It's bad enough that she can't go in there, and pick up a toy without finding one underneath it. These are not small roaches either, by the way... They are roaches that could carry her off in the night. Some fly and some don't.
We've attempted to break our lease before, and the rental person we've been dealing with since before we moved from RI, had sent us to look at a very nice 3-bedroom house in East Memphis. We loved it. After a week of waiting for an answer, we were finally told that they wouldn't allow us to transfer our lease, and would have to ride it out here until it was up (April).
After a couple months more of dealing with this, we had enough. I reached my limit Sunday night. I went to shut the kitchen light off before heading to bed. I saw 2 roaches on the floor. So I went and grabbed the raid, and gassed them. I turned around, there were TWO more on the wall. After killing those, I turned back towards the back door.. There were THREE more on the door. This went on for about 10 minutes. In 10 minutes, I killed about 20 roaches. When I couldn't take it anymore, I ran in and woke Dan up. I was freaking out. It was 3:00 in the morning, so all he said was "What can I do about it NOW?" He came out and checked for more, killed a couple, and then promised he'd call the rental office that morning (Monday). He did just that. No calls were returned. He called again Tuesday.. Same thing. Same on Wednesday as well. I was set on calling the housing board and letting them come take a look in here. I decided I'd wait one more day before I did that.
Dan FINALLY got a hold of the lady. She told him that she had a property that we could take a look at. They're in the process of renovating it, however, so it would be a bit before we could have it. She gave Dan the address, and he took one of his guys with him to look at it. It's a 3 bedroom, 2 bath duplex. It's loaded with everything but a washer and dryer (there's a hookup for them, however). It is in Bartlett, about 20 minutes from where we are now. Dan liked it, and the guy he brought with him assured him that it's in a very good neighborhood. So the only thing left to do was to bring Delia and I to look at it. He cut out of work early, and brought us over there. It's absolutely gorgeous. The living room alone is bigger than the whole apartment we're in right now. All of the bedrooms are HUGE. The kitchen is three times the size we have here (here, there is just enough room to squeeze between the appliances, and counter/cabinet space is non-existent.) Needless to say, I wanted it. I asked Dan if he had spoken to the rental office and told them that we wanted it yet. He said "Yeah, but she wasn't there so I left a message and she hasn't returned it." Of course, we're used to that. So we looked around a bit more when he turned to me and said "So, you like it?" Then, he said "Good, because we're moving in next Sunday!" He tricked me good. Heh. SHE called HIM right after he looked at the place earlier in the day, and told him that we could move right in.
They're transferring the lease, as well as our deposit. We were originally told that we could break our lease, but.. We would have to pay 20% of the month's rent (not a problem). Since they'd have to rent the apartment early, they'd need to run an ad in the paper. We were required to pay for the ad. Again, not a problem. The third thing, however, was a problem. We'd lose our deposit for breaking our lease. So, we figured we'd just make the best of it until April. But the other night with the roach invasion was it for me.
Dan even checked for bug carcasses at the new place (in the cabinets, and everywhere), and he found none. He also spoke to a neighbor who lives across the street. They left midtown 3 years ago because they couldn't deal with the roaches, or even the city itself. They said that in the 3 years they've been living there, they have not seen 1 roach. Good deal.
So we move in 8 days! I'm psyched! I'll be taking lots and lots of pictures for all to see.
I'm not knocking Midtown as a whole, because I have seen some really nice areas that they have fully restored and renovated. But, we're just fine with visiting Midtown, not living here.
Hope you've enjoyed my little rant/rave. Heh.
::snoopy dance::



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