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TMI probably
Nov. 19th, 2024 09:18 pmBodies are so weird.
( hormones and other nonsense )
Dear endocrine system, what on earth was the plan here.
( hormones and other nonsense )
Dear endocrine system, what on earth was the plan here.
fun with freight elevators
Aug. 20th, 2024 08:43 pmToday's minor adventure:
So we have a freight elevator in one of our buildings, right? Mostly our maintenance staff use it to move trash and recycling bins outside without needing to stink up the passenger elevator (and also because you can fit so many more bins per trip), but we also let tenants reserve it for an hour when moving in or out. It's especially helpful for people who bring their own furniture, but also for people who just have a lot of boxes.
Normally we get one of the maintenance staff to operate the freight elevator, but I am also trained to run it in case of schedule conflicts. Which we had this morning. So I spent 9am to 11am helping a tenant move in. There are two reasons the move took that long.
Reason 1: he had hired a couple people to help move his stuff but they had trouble finding the location and showed up 30 minutes late.
Reason 2: this is the adventure part.
This tenant was bringing his own furniture, which mostly wasn't an issue since it was either disassembled or relatively small. However, he had an absolutely MASSIVE sofa. Getting the sofa out of his U-Haul truck into the freight elevator wasn't terrible. Getting it out of the freight elevator and into the hallway, however, was more of an issue. There are two doorways to negotiate, and the sofa, as previously mentioned, was MASSIVE. So the tenant and the movers played applied geometry for a while.
They got through the first doorway, spent five minutes judging angles, then attempted the second doorway.
I leaned in to help squish the cushions.
They s q u e e z e d through by the skin of their teeth...
and slammed the sofa corner into a fire alarm (one of those little emergency pull-boxes), set off the fire alarm for the whole building, and summoned the fire department complete with heavy suits and helmets and a fire axe.
We did call to report that it was a false alarm, but the fire department takes precautions anyway, which is an extremely rational choice under the circumstances.
Anyway, the whole pull-box has to be replaced now. It was absolutely smashed and could not just be put back together.
So that was my small adventure this morning.
(Other mishaps during this particular move-in included me having to shove 5 pieces of our own furniture into random empty apartments because a guy was laying new carpet in one unit and had obviously moved the furniture out... and consequently blocked the hallway. *sigh* And then there was the time the tenant was helping me close the freight elevator doors, lost his balance, and almost got his leg smashed in the jaws of the rapidly closing door. But! We persevered, nobody got more than bruises, and the fire department let all the evacuated tenants back into the building pretty quick.)
So we have a freight elevator in one of our buildings, right? Mostly our maintenance staff use it to move trash and recycling bins outside without needing to stink up the passenger elevator (and also because you can fit so many more bins per trip), but we also let tenants reserve it for an hour when moving in or out. It's especially helpful for people who bring their own furniture, but also for people who just have a lot of boxes.
Normally we get one of the maintenance staff to operate the freight elevator, but I am also trained to run it in case of schedule conflicts. Which we had this morning. So I spent 9am to 11am helping a tenant move in. There are two reasons the move took that long.
Reason 1: he had hired a couple people to help move his stuff but they had trouble finding the location and showed up 30 minutes late.
Reason 2: this is the adventure part.
This tenant was bringing his own furniture, which mostly wasn't an issue since it was either disassembled or relatively small. However, he had an absolutely MASSIVE sofa. Getting the sofa out of his U-Haul truck into the freight elevator wasn't terrible. Getting it out of the freight elevator and into the hallway, however, was more of an issue. There are two doorways to negotiate, and the sofa, as previously mentioned, was MASSIVE. So the tenant and the movers played applied geometry for a while.
They got through the first doorway, spent five minutes judging angles, then attempted the second doorway.
I leaned in to help squish the cushions.
They s q u e e z e d through by the skin of their teeth...
and slammed the sofa corner into a fire alarm (one of those little emergency pull-boxes), set off the fire alarm for the whole building, and summoned the fire department complete with heavy suits and helmets and a fire axe.
We did call to report that it was a false alarm, but the fire department takes precautions anyway, which is an extremely rational choice under the circumstances.
Anyway, the whole pull-box has to be replaced now. It was absolutely smashed and could not just be put back together.
So that was my small adventure this morning.
(Other mishaps during this particular move-in included me having to shove 5 pieces of our own furniture into random empty apartments because a guy was laying new carpet in one unit and had obviously moved the furniture out... and consequently blocked the hallway. *sigh* And then there was the time the tenant was helping me close the freight elevator doors, lost his balance, and almost got his leg smashed in the jaws of the rapidly closing door. But! We persevered, nobody got more than bruises, and the fire department let all the evacuated tenants back into the building pretty quick.)
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Aug. 15th, 2024 12:30 pmAugust continues to be The Worst, but I persevere.
I got my sleep schedule utterly mangled at the start of this week (you know how sometimes you're so tired you cannot make the choice to go to bed and just sit trapped in a mindless activity loop? yeah, that), but I think I have wrenched it back on track.
I have also mysteriously bruised my left forearm, bashed the hell out of my left wrist (pro-tip, when walking backward carrying half a loveseat, be wary of doorframes!), and done something to my right foot that caused a case of painful pins-and-needles that lasted for about 10 hours. (It has cleared up!)
It's been just oodles of fun all around, really.
On the bright side, one problem tenant vacated at his lease end date, which was nice. And what's even nicer is that fake!FBI tenant vacated his apartment only a few days late and then, yesterday, FINALLY confirmed in writing that he has relinquished the apartment!! So I turned off his key fob access to the building and we are going to throw out his mountains of junk and then spend probably a month rehabbing the apartment because he destroyed it. Holes in multiple walls and doors, broken mirror, broken furniture, weird substances gunked everywhere, etcetera.
Anyway, as soon as Mr. Geniality returns from grabbing lunch I am headed down to the Commons to stage an apartment and check on the turnover progress for a few others.
-----
In unrelated news, I gave blood on Saturday. I always enjoy that -- it's a very low-cost, low-effort way of making a tangible positive difference in the world. (I mean, it's low-cost and low-effort for me. I have good veins and am not bothered by needles. This is not true for everyone!) My iron was a little lower than usual, which is probably because sometimes during turnover season I am too tired to practice proper nutrition, but eh. I just need to remember to eat more broccoli or something.
I got my sleep schedule utterly mangled at the start of this week (you know how sometimes you're so tired you cannot make the choice to go to bed and just sit trapped in a mindless activity loop? yeah, that), but I think I have wrenched it back on track.
I have also mysteriously bruised my left forearm, bashed the hell out of my left wrist (pro-tip, when walking backward carrying half a loveseat, be wary of doorframes!), and done something to my right foot that caused a case of painful pins-and-needles that lasted for about 10 hours. (It has cleared up!)
It's been just oodles of fun all around, really.
On the bright side, one problem tenant vacated at his lease end date, which was nice. And what's even nicer is that fake!FBI tenant vacated his apartment only a few days late and then, yesterday, FINALLY confirmed in writing that he has relinquished the apartment!! So I turned off his key fob access to the building and we are going to throw out his mountains of junk and then spend probably a month rehabbing the apartment because he destroyed it. Holes in multiple walls and doors, broken mirror, broken furniture, weird substances gunked everywhere, etcetera.
Anyway, as soon as Mr. Geniality returns from grabbing lunch I am headed down to the Commons to stage an apartment and check on the turnover progress for a few others.
-----
In unrelated news, I gave blood on Saturday. I always enjoy that -- it's a very low-cost, low-effort way of making a tangible positive difference in the world. (I mean, it's low-cost and low-effort for me. I have good veins and am not bothered by needles. This is not true for everyone!) My iron was a little lower than usual, which is probably because sometimes during turnover season I am too tired to practice proper nutrition, but eh. I just need to remember to eat more broccoli or something.
the saga of fake!FBI tenant continues
Jul. 9th, 2024 10:51 pmMr. Geniality was out sick today (apparently he has Covid? oh dear), so my plans for the day got thoroughly derailed since I had to cover his three scheduled apartment showings. I did still get several turnover inspections done, though, and one of the tours should result in a lease, so not a total loss.
I also had three phone calls from fake!FBI tenant, which were of varying length and varying degrees of frustration. The context is ( this gets long )
...
He was doing okay-ish for about a month after his extensive hospital stay, but he has clearly stopped taking whatever medications he was prescribed and has slid back into delusions and/or mania. He is not well, he needs help, and our company is 100% not equipped to provide it.
I also had three phone calls from fake!FBI tenant, which were of varying length and varying degrees of frustration. The context is ( this gets long )
...
He was doing okay-ish for about a month after his extensive hospital stay, but he has clearly stopped taking whatever medications he was prescribed and has slid back into delusions and/or mania. He is not well, he needs help, and our company is 100% not equipped to provide it.
what even are bodies
Jul. 2nd, 2024 11:16 pmRandom thing I dislike about summer: the soles of my feet peel. I think this might be partially related to wearing sandals, but I don't actually wear sandals that often so maybe it's a humidity thing instead.
Anyway, they peel in slow, ragged patches (because the soles of one's feet are generally callused and callus doesn't peel well), and they itch in the process. It's not a constant itch, but it's extremely distracting and I sometimes wake myself up in the middle of the night to discover I've dug bloody scrapes into my ankles and the more delicate tops of my feet by trying to dig out the itch with my toenails.
And anti-itch creams don't work super well, because they can't get through the callus. *sigh*
I think I need to buy a new pumice stone and spend half an hour just scraping my feet tomorrow.
Anyway, they peel in slow, ragged patches (because the soles of one's feet are generally callused and callus doesn't peel well), and they itch in the process. It's not a constant itch, but it's extremely distracting and I sometimes wake myself up in the middle of the night to discover I've dug bloody scrapes into my ankles and the more delicate tops of my feet by trying to dig out the itch with my toenails.
And anti-itch creams don't work super well, because they can't get through the callus. *sigh*
I think I need to buy a new pumice stone and spend half an hour just scraping my feet tomorrow.
TAX DAY COMETH
Apr. 14th, 2024 10:09 pmI foolishly let myself get talked into working another 3-hour shift at Not the IRS after my main job on Monday evening, so even after an 11-hour shift on Saturday and another 6.5 hours today, I am not quite done.
However! I have resolved all but two of my holds, and I have arranged to get those final two returns dealt with tomorrow. I also seem to have acquired two additional evening appointments -- please god neither client turns out to be too much of a mess.
I have purchased some cheap champagne to go with my pretty decent cognac and my angostura bitters. Tomorrow I'm gonna grab some sugar cubes from the grocery store after I escape the tax office, and then I will head home, make myself a champagne cocktail, and possibly indulge in a hot bath.
I have arranged to take Tuesday off my rental company job. Alas, I cannot sleep in until noon because I foolishly scheduled a dentist appointment for 8:30am (what was past!Liz thinking???), but I intend to come straight home after that and take a very long nap. And then perhaps another champagne cocktail in the afternoon.
I DESERVE THIS.
(I also intend to treat myself to brunch next Sunday, but that's a bit less immediate, you know?)
However! I have resolved all but two of my holds, and I have arranged to get those final two returns dealt with tomorrow. I also seem to have acquired two additional evening appointments -- please god neither client turns out to be too much of a mess.
I have purchased some cheap champagne to go with my pretty decent cognac and my angostura bitters. Tomorrow I'm gonna grab some sugar cubes from the grocery store after I escape the tax office, and then I will head home, make myself a champagne cocktail, and possibly indulge in a hot bath.
I have arranged to take Tuesday off my rental company job. Alas, I cannot sleep in until noon because I foolishly scheduled a dentist appointment for 8:30am (what was past!Liz thinking???), but I intend to come straight home after that and take a very long nap. And then perhaps another champagne cocktail in the afternoon.
I DESERVE THIS.
(I also intend to treat myself to brunch next Sunday, but that's a bit less immediate, you know?)
why does everything happen at once?
Apr. 10th, 2024 09:07 pmWe had a bunch of problem tenant issues today (or problem would-be-tenant, in one case).
1. Fake!FBI guy had been doing relatively okay since his lengthy hospital stay, but is now backsliding. ( cut for details )
I have a feeling he's going to keep escalating.
2. A long-term tenant has either gone off his meds or is having trouble with dosages/efficacy, and ( cut for details ) I feel terrible about all that because this tenant is a genuinely lovely person when he's on his meds.
3. A former tenant who moved out a couple years ago wants to rent from us again, but ( cut for details )
...
Other than that, I spent most of my day working on floor plans. I have finished all the individual apartment plans for the large 5-story building, and am now working on building-wide key plans for the large 4-story building.
1. Fake!FBI guy had been doing relatively okay since his lengthy hospital stay, but is now backsliding. ( cut for details )
I have a feeling he's going to keep escalating.
2. A long-term tenant has either gone off his meds or is having trouble with dosages/efficacy, and ( cut for details ) I feel terrible about all that because this tenant is a genuinely lovely person when he's on his meds.
3. A former tenant who moved out a couple years ago wants to rent from us again, but ( cut for details )
...
Other than that, I spent most of my day working on floor plans. I have finished all the individual apartment plans for the large 5-story building, and am now working on building-wide key plans for the large 4-story building.
assorted tax clients
Mar. 17th, 2024 11:49 pmProfessional tax prep is kind of like... look, income has to be reported. But sometimes clients get kind of weird about forms?
( cut for technical details )
-----
In other frustrating tax prep news, the client whose return is on hold because they were missing two income documents (and I wouldn't file their return without reporting that income) hung up on me when I called them last week to ask if they'd found the forms. This week they sent me straight to voicemail, but hopefully they listen to the message instead of auto-deleting it because the gist was, "Hey look, if you aren't going to bring me those two forms, can you please come to the office, pick up your other papers, and confirm that you're not going to file with us? That way I get your unfinished return out of my workload and you get off my call list. Win-win!"
I emailed another client to say, "Hey, we do need to finish your return, please schedule an appointment!" because their phone number just rang forever and then said it couldn't connect. I left voicemail for a third client to say, "Have you worked out with your child which of you is going to claim your grandchild so we can either edit or paper file your return?" And I emailed a fourth client to be like, "Hey, I uploaded your return a couple days ago, but you need to actually approve and sign it in order for us to send it to the IRS! Please let me know if you're having trouble."
We shall see if anything comes of those efforts.
-----
Today's client was lovely, though. They are a disabled veteran who likes to have someone look through their documents and see if they need to file. This is the third year I have reviewed their situation, and once again they were not required to file a federal or state return. We could have filed to get their small amount of withholding refunded by the state of New York, but that would cost more in prep fees than they'd get back. So they decided not to file, and I told them to let the payroll people at their extremely part-time job know to stop withholding state taxes they way they'd already stopped withholding federal taxes.
I always enjoy chatting with that client. Absolutely lovely human being. :)
( cut for technical details )
-----
In other frustrating tax prep news, the client whose return is on hold because they were missing two income documents (and I wouldn't file their return without reporting that income) hung up on me when I called them last week to ask if they'd found the forms. This week they sent me straight to voicemail, but hopefully they listen to the message instead of auto-deleting it because the gist was, "Hey look, if you aren't going to bring me those two forms, can you please come to the office, pick up your other papers, and confirm that you're not going to file with us? That way I get your unfinished return out of my workload and you get off my call list. Win-win!"
I emailed another client to say, "Hey, we do need to finish your return, please schedule an appointment!" because their phone number just rang forever and then said it couldn't connect. I left voicemail for a third client to say, "Have you worked out with your child which of you is going to claim your grandchild so we can either edit or paper file your return?" And I emailed a fourth client to be like, "Hey, I uploaded your return a couple days ago, but you need to actually approve and sign it in order for us to send it to the IRS! Please let me know if you're having trouble."
We shall see if anything comes of those efforts.
-----
Today's client was lovely, though. They are a disabled veteran who likes to have someone look through their documents and see if they need to file. This is the third year I have reviewed their situation, and once again they were not required to file a federal or state return. We could have filed to get their small amount of withholding refunded by the state of New York, but that would cost more in prep fees than they'd get back. So they decided not to file, and I told them to let the payroll people at their extremely part-time job know to stop withholding state taxes they way they'd already stopped withholding federal taxes.
I always enjoy chatting with that client. Absolutely lovely human being. :)
At work we have had a sudden spate of leases -- both renewals and new applicants -- so that's nice.
On the downside, Horrible Tenant has become even worse, ( cut for an extra layer of obfuscation )
There's not a lot I can do about that slow-motion catastrophe, so I have spent the past couple days working on another key plan for one of our buildings. This building has four floors of apartments, and each floor has a different layout. There are not two single identical apartments in the entire building. So I have been using digital photographs of floor plans from the late 1980s, cleaning them up, tweaking for some modifications and updates that have happened in the past 30 years, and creating a nice final product that shows how all the apartments fit together. This is both extraordinarily tedious (especially because I am working in MS Paint due to corporate reluctance to shell out for an actual graphics program) and oddly satisfying, and has been eating a lot of my creative impulses. (Floor plan work and apartment staging/photos/videos both scratch a lot of my creative itches.)
-----
In non-work news, yesterday I washed three (3) loads of laundry. I was going to wash a load of linens tonight, but it is pouring rain and I didn't want to schlep myself to the laundromat, let alone myself plus a bag of laundry, some detergent, and some dryer sheets.
Instead I have put away some of yesterday's clean clothes, and now I think I might go to bed early because I am once again absolutely exhausted. I suspect some of that is the weather, but some is probably also because I stayed up a little too late on Monday and Tuesday nights out of overdone relief at finally feeling better. *wry*
On the downside, Horrible Tenant has become even worse, ( cut for an extra layer of obfuscation )
There's not a lot I can do about that slow-motion catastrophe, so I have spent the past couple days working on another key plan for one of our buildings. This building has four floors of apartments, and each floor has a different layout. There are not two single identical apartments in the entire building. So I have been using digital photographs of floor plans from the late 1980s, cleaning them up, tweaking for some modifications and updates that have happened in the past 30 years, and creating a nice final product that shows how all the apartments fit together. This is both extraordinarily tedious (especially because I am working in MS Paint due to corporate reluctance to shell out for an actual graphics program) and oddly satisfying, and has been eating a lot of my creative impulses. (Floor plan work and apartment staging/photos/videos both scratch a lot of my creative itches.)
-----
In non-work news, yesterday I washed three (3) loads of laundry. I was going to wash a load of linens tonight, but it is pouring rain and I didn't want to schlep myself to the laundromat, let alone myself plus a bag of laundry, some detergent, and some dryer sheets.
Instead I have put away some of yesterday's clean clothes, and now I think I might go to bed early because I am once again absolutely exhausted. I suspect some of that is the weather, but some is probably also because I stayed up a little too late on Monday and Tuesday nights out of overdone relief at finally feeling better. *wry*
burn the sickness out
Feb. 23rd, 2024 08:21 pmI continued to feel gross today, so I have decided Not to bake snickerdoodles for the memorial service tomorrow. Instead I will apologetically drop off three boxes of Thin Mints, because A) more sanitary and B) who doesn't like Girl Scout cookies?
I did an apartment tour this afternoon, whereupon my body smacked me in the metaphorical face and waved a "Stop exerting yourself; you have no energy reserves!!" banner until I was back at my desk and could spend a couple minutes just breathing and existing. I hate that part of being ill.
Tonight's tax prep appointment turned out to be real -- we were unsure because the client had been going to a Not the IRS office in another NY county for several years, but they moved to Ithaca in 2023 and did actually want an Ithaca-based tax preparer. So that worked out nicely.
Now I am going to faff about online until 9pm, at which point I intend to take a nice hot shower (for decongestion and relaxation purposes) and then fall into bed.
...
I have a litany I sometimes repeat in the shower when I have a nasty upper respiratory infection. It must be spoken only when the water is set very hot, almost to the point where I can't tolerate it anymore and periodically need to pull the shower curtain aside and gulp cooler air. It goes, "Mother oh mother oh mother of mine, wash me cleaner than clean. Scour me purer than pure. Burn the sickness out. Burn the sickness out. Burn the sickness out." Repeat as needed.
I am fairly sure there are some residual cultural Christian influences floating around in those words, but mostly it reflects a desire to sluice away all the gooey unpleasantness of being ill (why is producing floods and swamps of mucus the human body's go-to immune response? WHY???) and temporarily induce a sort of floaty no-mind state where I stop caring that I am sore and tired and full of snot.
Seeing that I am currently sore and tired and full of snot, I may invoke that litany tonight.
I did an apartment tour this afternoon, whereupon my body smacked me in the metaphorical face and waved a "Stop exerting yourself; you have no energy reserves!!" banner until I was back at my desk and could spend a couple minutes just breathing and existing. I hate that part of being ill.
Tonight's tax prep appointment turned out to be real -- we were unsure because the client had been going to a Not the IRS office in another NY county for several years, but they moved to Ithaca in 2023 and did actually want an Ithaca-based tax preparer. So that worked out nicely.
Now I am going to faff about online until 9pm, at which point I intend to take a nice hot shower (for decongestion and relaxation purposes) and then fall into bed.
...
I have a litany I sometimes repeat in the shower when I have a nasty upper respiratory infection. It must be spoken only when the water is set very hot, almost to the point where I can't tolerate it anymore and periodically need to pull the shower curtain aside and gulp cooler air. It goes, "Mother oh mother oh mother of mine, wash me cleaner than clean. Scour me purer than pure. Burn the sickness out. Burn the sickness out. Burn the sickness out." Repeat as needed.
I am fairly sure there are some residual cultural Christian influences floating around in those words, but mostly it reflects a desire to sluice away all the gooey unpleasantness of being ill (why is producing floods and swamps of mucus the human body's go-to immune response? WHY???) and temporarily induce a sort of floaty no-mind state where I stop caring that I am sore and tired and full of snot.
Seeing that I am currently sore and tired and full of snot, I may invoke that litany tonight.
