micheleandtom.com

Unfortunately, “we gotta get outta this place” has become a frequent refrain from the three adults living in this apartment. (The girls love it here — there is no accounting for taste.)

HIGHLIGHTS:

• The refrigerator has two settings: “not cold enough” and “freeze everything in your refrigerator.” I can’t find a spot in between, though I keep trying! (We inadvertently froze a perfectly good pineapple the other day. Fruit doesn’t really respond well to being frozen.)
• The under-the-cabinet fluorescent lights in the kitchen, which we need to be able to see in the morning, cause a rain of dead bugs to fall along the counter top every time we turn it on.
• The dishes and utensils in the kitchen are icky, and it’s not just a girl thing. The spatula was so irretrievably gross, Tom wouldn’t use it while making hamburgers. (He used a fork instead!)
• The toilet in our bathroom doesn’t really flush, so we can’t use it. Instead, we use the one in the girls’ bathroom that isn’t bolted to the floor, so we have to be careful that we don’t tip the whole toilet over while reaching for the toilet paper! (I never realized going to the bathroom could be such an adventure.)
• The air conditioner in our room doesn’t work well (relevant when it’s in the 90s).
• The water doesn’t get very hot in the kitchen, so hand washing dishes is a challenge.
• The overhead light in the girls’ room has blown out twice with new bulbs, so the housekeeper and I agree that something is wrong with the wiring. I’ve asked that they deal with it after we leave.
• The lights just burned out in Ian’s room, and the fixture makes a weird sparky noise when he flips the switch, just like the girls’ room.
• The light back by the washing machine also has burned out, so we take a flashlight back to do laundry after dark. (At this point, with the faulty electrical system, we don’t want any part of these fixtures, even to change a bulb.)

Let’s just hope the place doesn’t burn down in an electrical fire before the 10th of December!