Worst day of 2001

The BBQ Pit
1

Picture this:

It’s Thursday, September 6th. Your a fun-lovin guy called DaLovin’Dj. The alarm clock goes off at 7:00 in the morning. You hate to get up, but know you have to. A shower and an english muffin get’s the day started nicely and you head on into work.

Upon arriving at work you proceed to the SDMB for a day of fun reading and posting. Happily, you check the Thursday night dopers get-together thread in MPSIMS. Looks like we’re on for bowling. Yay! Life is groovy, got a cool place in Brooklyn, got some money saved, got plans for some leisure this evening, just cruisin’ with not a worry in the world.

5:10pm hits: You recieve a phone call from your roommate. Apparently someone had a minor kitchen fire in another apartment in your building. The fire department came, looked around, and then called the inspector. Fire inspector shows up, declares the entire building “Perilous to Life” for fire-code violations. My roomate tells me that we (and the other 100 people who live in the building)have until 10:00am the next morning to get all the stuff we want out and then they padlock the doors. To even be on the premises (that just a few hours ago was your happy home) is illegal and will get you arrested.

Now you have 17 hours to find a place to stay, a place for your cat, a place for your stuff, a truck to move everything with, and people to help you move. You quickly leave work and head home. After a few phone calls you realize you are very fortunate to have the friends that you do. You’ve got a place for you and your stuff to stay for as long as you need, a place for your cat, and some help. But you can’t borrow your friends truck till 4:00am. So you decide, what the hell, I may be homeless, but I have a few hours to kill, may as well go back into Manhattan and try to have some fun bowling and try not to think of how much this all sucks.

6:45pm: Go down to the old “L” train station on Bedford and proceed to wait for 30 minutes before someone comes up to me and tells me that trains aren’t running to Manhattan tonight. “Goddamit” you say. “this just isn’t my day”, thinking it couldn’t get any worse. You are wrong.

15 more minutes to find a cab (35 minute waits for a car service). Just as the cabbie is about to pull onto the Williamsburg bridge, 5 firetrucks pull in front of the cab to fight a completely unrelated fire. Traffic behind you, firetrucks in front, now your stuck in a cab for 15 minutes before they let you pass.

By the time you get to Bowl-mor an hour and 15 minutes after you left (it usually takes 15 minutes), you are in no mood to talk to anyone at all. You start bowling to yourself and can’t stop. Just whipping the balls down the lane like it’s the goddamned firemen at the end. Before you know it, it’s an hour later and you’ve spent $77 on bowling, plus another $20 on beer. Ooops. Didn’t mean to play that many.

4:00am rolls around and you and your friends spend the next few hours moving all your shit way deeper into Brooklyn and up 4 flights of stairs (note: records are VERY heavy). Returning the truck to Manhattan, you hit the morning rush hour traffic. Another hour of your life wasted on the WB Bridge.

Upon getting to your new temporary home, you make up some oven prepared frozen pizzas. When you try to eat it, it is too hot and you realize this by burning the roof of your tounge until it blisters(not to pop for several hours). Oh and guess what? Now it’s time to go back to work!!! Who needs sleep.

Can you imagine? If I hadn’t spent most of Labor day weekend in a jacuzzi I might have killed someone. But as it is, I was very relaxed this week. I’m sure I’ve had a worse day before, but for the life of me I can’t think of one. So I just wanna say:

Fuck the Bullshit. Allright. Enough with this goddamned trials of Job shit for the kid. Give me a little fuckin’ room to work with here people. I never hurt anybody and yet I am all of the sudden on the recieving end of a Karmic beating with a big fuckin’ stick. Must have been from some other life. But let’s fuckin’ call it even and leave out any more of these type of fuckin’ days so I don’t have to kill anyone. Fuck.

DaLovin’Dj

2

That bites! That is much worse then anything that has ever happened to me. I am so sorry. I didn’t even know that they COULD kick you out with that little notice.

3

The landlord couldn’t. He would have to take us to court to kick us out. The City? They can do whatever the hell they please when they say safety is an issue.

DaLovin’Dj

4

Oh. My. God.

I take back my <ahem>.

That has got to be one of the crappiest compilations of events I’ve ever seen.

And to think you were probably bowling right next to us…

Best of luck :frowning:

5

Whoa. I was looking forward to meeting you at bowling, dj, but I can see how you might not have been in the mood. I’m glad to hear that you found a temporary place to stay. Best of luck.

6

It was nice of Mannhattan to let you use his truck, though.

Sorry about the sucky night.

7

Should have been only one ‘n’

old man voice, shaking cane over his head:
“Hey, you damn kids!! Stay offa’ my keyboard!!”

8

Goddamn,man! How much did bowling cost???
It’s $3.00 a game here, and only $1.50 a game if you’re on a league.
I don’t know if it will make you feel any better, but I’m enjoying imagining you furiously playing 25 games of bowling in an hour to the tune of $77. (250+ frames of bowling in an hour? That’s 4 frames a minute!) The $20 on beer I can see. (I’m kidding-I realize he didn’t say he bowled that much, it’s just what I’m picturing based on what bowling costs here)

Seriously, I’m sorry to hear of your plight. I’m glad you’re not in the apartment anymore if it’s a real fire hazzard, though. What would we do without dalovindj???

Take care man!

Zette

9

Thanks for the kind words folks. Zette, it costs $7.00 a game. 11 furious games in an hour. My second game I hit 182 and was determined to get a 200 before I left. Didn’t work out. But I did get a Turkey for the first time ever. Naturally, being as it was September 6th, it was the ONE time I decide to bowl ALONE, so there is no proof of my glorious exploit. Par for the mutha fuckin’ course yesterday. Jeesh.

Dalovin’Dj

10

Ouch. The worst fear of all us walkup dwellers. Each of us fears that the city might drop by after someone burns their popcorn and decide that the stairways are too narrow or the sides are crumbling or whatever, and BAM! out on the street.

I feel for ya, man. Hope things turn up.

11

Oh man, that really sucks. You know that old saying that there is always someone who has it worse than you? I think you are that someone. :wink:

Seriously, I hope life gets back to normal soon.

12

Gah, DaJovinDJ, that sucks.

I live in an older building that probably has some fire code violations. I fear the fire department.

The irony is the city’s code enforcement office is on the next block.

Robin

13

Damn. Sorry to hear about that. I can’t imagine what I’d do if I were kicked out of my apartment. And I’d also like to take this opportunity to clear any bad air that you might have gotten from me from your evolution thread. While I think your “theory” is a bit whack, you have shown yourself to be an incredible Doper. I hope things look better this weekend.

[sub]In a completely unrelated note, I just had to buy a book entitled Bowling Alone for one of my classes.[/sub]

14

On the update tip, the fire department told the landlord to fix the sprinklers and a couple of other things, and then we can move back in. The Landlord says they should be done in a couple days. So it looks like I moved . . .into the same damn apartment. I guess it’s better than having to find a new place. Damn if you don’t have to do the strangest things to keep a pad in New York.

Munch:

No sweat. Concerning that thread, I like the description, from the recent flame the newbie’s thread, posted by Acco40:

While I stand by my main points from the thread (matter evolved and continues to evolve ((and this disproves the bible)), I think my delivery was a little less than perfect. But oh what fun. The word nazis get real mad when you use a different definition then the one they are used too. This certainly forces you to understand and express your thoughts clearly. I consider the thread a valuable learning experience.

Thanks. So am I still a newbie?

Funny stuff. What’s it about? How to vent frustrations? Or maybe how to spend too much money?

DaLovin’Dj

15

Shee-it. FDNY suspended the Certificate of Occupancy over a sprinkler problem and maybe a couple of rusty ladders on the fire escapes?

Wassamatta, one of your neighbors piss off Guiliani personally?

Seriously, I’m glad you’ll be able to move back in. Recession or whatever we’re having notwithstanding, it’s still a major PITA finding new digs in the city.

16

manhattan:

No kidding. It doesn’t help that the average rent of any given apartment rises by about 10 times the rate inflation every time they rent it to someone new. The flipside is you can often get landlords to PAY you to move out. I’ve pulled this move a couple times. You can usually get 2 or 3 months rent out of 'em to move out because it’s worth so much more in the long run if they can get a new tenant.

I’m hoping for a big pop in the New York real estate market bubble, like there has been with the stock market. I love Brooklyn (especially Williamsburg), but nothing beats the convienence and coolness of Manhattan. But I don’t have to tell you that!

DaLovin’Dj

17

I bet you’re glad that you are not in Manhatten today, of all days. Don’t worry, life will get better. Prayers to y’all.

18

It’s amazing sometimes how events can put things in perspective…

19

Hear, hear Myron.

I’ve nothing else of substance to add. I was worried about finding a job here in Arizona, but now, that seems to be really insignificant.