This apartment includes utilities, a gardener, and DEATH

I go through a cycle every four months or so when I decide I simply HAVE to move. I realize how much my apartment sucks, and living there for one moment longer will suffocate me (as will the asbestos in the ceiling, but probably that would take years). So I go through all the apartment hunting sites, and find some okay places, and start thinking about the fact that I need to find boxes, and then fill said boxes with my stuff, and then carry said stuff to a new apartment (or, let's be honest, busy myself with "organizing" the move so I can appear to be doing stuff like crossing off check lists or overseeing the fitting of a couch through a doorway while boys carry stuff around...this is oftentimes more difficult than you would think), and then unpack at said apartment...and yes, I realize this is the very definition of moving, but it's pretty overwhelming when you lay it all out there. I think the worst is just finding boxes. I simply refuse to pay for them, so I spend the months leading up to the move like some sort of box vulture. I see boxes everywhere and must have them. Grocery stores, in alley ways, anywhere. I can start to sense when someone's about to chuck a box and move in for the kill. I may have even ordered supplies from Staples at work just to get the giant boxes they pack stuff in. I'm not admitting to anything, though.

Anyway, this is a lot of work, and I quickly get really lazy and decide I should just redecorate instead. Which I do, and it looks great (as great as a concrete box with few windows and popcorn ceilings can look), and I'm satisfied for another four months, until I get the bug again.

Last time I went apartment hunting, though, it sort of scared me off for a while, because pretty much I was almost murdered there. So I get there, and first off, there was graffiti spray-painted on the sidewalk. Very classy. The apartment itself had a lovely view of a concrete wall. The landlord dude was talking to some guy in the doorway about the apartment, and he wouldn't let me in until he was finished. So I just stood there in the creepy yard, while a scary dog yapped at me and tried to infect me with rabies. Finally it was my turn to step inside. Okay, so calling it a "shit hole" is unfair to shit holes, as this place could only be kindly described as a "snazzy crack den." I was told all the appliances, including the stove, would not stay with the apartment. I sort of hoped that rule applied to toilets because YIKES those were nasty. The landlord also said, "Under the carpet is hardwood floors." He didn't follow that up with anything. It was just FYI. Uhhhh....and that interests me...because...? Do you expect ME to rip up the carpet? The normal way for him to complete that thought would be, "And we'll be taking up the carpet so you can HAVE hardwood floors." Otherwise, it is of no interest to me. It's like, "Hey, just so you know, there's buried pirate treasure in my backyard." "Oh yeah?" "Yeah, totally."

Anyway, so we get to a closet. And the dude's like, in here is a giant closet. You can do whatever you want in there. Uhhhh....? Before I had a chance to say, "Like what?" he opens it up and displays a giant pot-growing operation. Which, okay, fine if you want to break the law...but how do you know I'm not a NARC?! I could be, you don't know.

Finally, we get to see the backyard. Again it is described as a place "where you can do anything you want." He says, for example, the upstairs neighbor is an aspiring stuntman and THROWS KNIVES AGAINST A GIANT PIECE OF WOOD JUTTING OUT OF THE GRASS IN THE YARD. Okay here's my problem. He's "aspiring." As in, not professional. As in, one day I'll be getting the newspaper and WHAM! KNIFE IN THE BACK! And he'll be like, "my bad! (pause) A little help?" as he waits for me to throw it back. And finally, what do I spot in the grass, next to the knife board? A FULL-ON GUN. Yeah. Just lying there. It was probably a stunt gun for our little budding stunter. But still, that's just not okay. So in the end, I said thanks but no thanks, and went back to my crappy apartment which has one thing going for it--no knife wall.