Brooklyn Bound!

It begins. It’s moving day. This is the weekend I leave my small, disgusting upper west side apartment and move to Brooklyn. It might be my last night sleeping in my bunk bed! I’ve already started the process:

Step 1: Wake up, drink coffee made to the intensity of rocket fuel in underwear with roommate #1.

Step 2:  Stop at the delicious and comforting Absolute Bagels to try to bring about a will to live.

(Last night, after going out to gay clubs with my Aussie friend, I found myself bent over the toilet, vomiting whiskey and sushi around 2 am. I also put at least ten $1 bills into a gay dancer’s G-string. This is the sort of nonsense this girl gets me to do.)

Step 3: Go to the bank and withdraw money needed for paying roommate #1 for the bills, his bed, money order for the security deposit on my apartment, and for paying movers tomorrow. I’ll basically just be hemorrhaging money all weekend.

Step 4: Buy boxes, collect things, and pack them up. Roommate #2 finally gave me back the glass from my picture frame that he’s been borrowing to do lines of cocaine. My laundry is in process at the laundromat, and otherwise I don’t have a whole lot of stuff strewn about the apartment.

Luckily, I haven’t acquired much living here, but I always tend to drag out the entire process of packing. Man. I hate moving.

Lucky Day!

WELL!

What with the way things are going today, I am definitely feeling optimistic on my chances of getting lucky with Unsuccessful Date Guy tonight, who will be referred to as Potentially Successful Date guy from here on out. Here are the reasons that things are going well, and therefore making me believe this streak will continue:

Actual sign that sold me on the apartment.

The big one is- Today I found the apartment I will be moving to! It is in Brooklyn, NY. Clinton Hill/ Bedstuy area (which actually means nothing to me, as in my desperation I didn’t do much homework on the area). What I DO know is that I have hot roommate chemistry with the girl who lives there, we will be on the first floor of a brownstone, I can fit a queen sized bed in my room and we have separate bathrooms! Outrageous for NY. And only one transfer for me to go to work! Also, apparently someone in the neighborhood is giving away free hot dogs, which is clearly a sign from God that it’s meant to be.

Relating it to Potentially Successful Date guy- he apologized for taking forever to get back to me and we have arranged a breakfast date for tomorrow morning. Brilliant! As I am going to the variety show that he and his best friend host tonight, it would be quite easy for me to suggest a sleepover to make breakfast tomorrow that much more convenient AND since the show is downstairs in the same building as his apartment, it’s too easy! (Much like my sad, celibate self in this case)

The only thing that may thwart this plan is my preparedness. Everyone knows that if you go “too ready” everything will be jinxed for sure! Presently, I am wearing hot red lace underwear and a nice bra (not one of the gross nude colored ones with no padding that I typically wear) and I actually shaved my legs and underarms completely. Due to not liking the itchy growback phase with pubic hair, I’m sporting a “soulpatch” of sorts, but it’s still groomed enough that I am probably dooming myself to another night of solitary lameness. The fact that I regularly carry an emergency toothbrush in my purse almost guarantees I will never come into any action. 

Oh well- I can still hope! If I don’t come back to my apartment tonight, things either went really well (went home with Potentially Successful Date Guy) or really, really badly (got kidnapped during some process of commuting to the show). Wish me luck!

Impending Homelessness

Well… no progress to report in the apartment hunting realm of my life. I have been scouring Craigslist fruitlessly all week since the adorable, gay-man –filled, apartment of my dreams went to another guy. I’ve now sent out something between 20-25 emails, and recently got a raise at work so I can look in a higher bracket of apartment expenses, yet the only responses I can get are from a girl who will not give me her phone number (and who I suspect may not have excellent command of the English language) and a Hungarian couple in Queens who work for the circus or something. How cliché Craigslist of them.

Potential Future Roommates

It seems unbelievable to me that myself, a full-time employed, clean, considerate, girl of nearly 25 cannot find a ROOM in an apartment for under $900 a month in New York City with anyone who does not seem unbearably sketchy. I’m normal! Well, I wouldn’t send them a link to this blog necessarily, but my shenanigans are endearingly awkward for the most part. It doesn’t have much effect on my home life. (Save for the last post where I began crying all over my roommate about my first world problems… perhaps I will not list him as a reference.)

I’m trying to think of some good alternatives, in case I am not successful in finding an apartment in a week. Here is what I’ve come up with so far, in order of likelihood:

1.       SRO. Single Room Occupancy. Basically it works like a dorm- you provide proof of employment and have some references, you receive a furnished room, a communal bathroom (typically same gender), and sometimes some meals are included. It will feel like a weird blast from the past, but at least it’s legitimate and could work for a short time.
2.       Summer Sublets. There is always the option of finding a less permanent arrangement for a month or two while I continue to look. And I can tolerate anyone, even the Hungarian trapeze couple, for two months.
3.       Youth Hostels. Hotel alternative for poor people. I feel like the ones in Europe are safer and a bit more mainstream. I’ve seen the hostel situation in NYC. Not cute.
4.       Couch surfing. Friends in NYC who would put me up for a few days include:

·         A nearly 50 year old gay fashion designer from Portland

·         A Broadway marketing girl in Queens who went to highschool with my sister

·         A 45-year-old former stripper who carries a knife in her bra and used to work at my restaurant. She also has a rabbit, two mice, a turtle, two cats, and a 30 lb dog freely roaming her apartment.

·         A jewelry designer who lives in California and keeps an apartment in the city, but creepily has requested that I share the bed with him when he’s in town visiting (says he’s just kidding, but I doubt it)

·         The early-thirties Jewish nephew of another guy in the diamond district who never fails to attempt to molest me when he drinks. He has a studio, which he generously offered to share.

5.       Sleeping under my desk. Our office is under construction (ie covered in dust) and I don’t know what I would do with my stuff. Also, I don’t think my boss would go for this plan.

Clearly, none of my existing choices are optimal. Apparently, all the normal, clean, responsible, non-creepy roommates are unavailable in the NYC area.