Some stupid country thinks I owe them money
Alright, I rarely do this, but it's time to take advantage of what blogging really is all about and vent...
Some time ago, more than two years ago to be more accurate, I lived in a little house in New Hampshire. I'm pretty sure this house was built during the Eisenhower administration and contained some of the crappiest appliances and fixtures known to man. One such fixture was the window in my bedroom. I had moved in during the summer, and without the luxury of air conditioning, said window needed to be opened in order to keep from waking up dead in the morning. Being the dilapidated piece of shit house that it was, this window would not budge. Seems like the sort of thing a landlord would check prior to his tenants moving in. Nonetheless, I pulled and I yanked, but my efforts were becoming futile. That is, until I somehow summoned some extra gumption and finally got it up (uhuh huhuh). In doing so, however, I managed to bend the glass enough to create a crack in the upper left-hand corner. I immediately thought aw crap, but then I switched to ...meh. It was summer, and I'd be leaving for London for the fall semester, so I decided to a adopt a full-fledged "fuck-it" attitude. But, for the sake of covering my ass, I did talk to our landlord's wife, who frequents the place and checks up on things for him. I told her about how lame her window was, and she seemed to understand and said it wouldn't be a problem. My fuck-it attitude was not out of place.
Use the >> button on your remote and skip ahead to the chapter entitled "Logan Graduates College." It was May, I was done with my schooling, and was ready to move out. During the interim in which I was in London, my then soon-to-be roommates had moved in for the new school year. One of whom took my old, crack-windowed room. So then when I moved back in during the winter, I had taken over another room from someone they had found to live there for the fall (still with me?). Anyway, the window was still broken, but that's because no one else seemed to care either. Fair enough. Summer was right around the corner, and I was ready to move on with my life, and I did. I got out with my security deposit and everything. Time to face the "real world."
Now skip to the all-too common "1 year later in the real world" chapter...aka the present. I get a message from my old roommate explaining that the landlord's charging $70 to replace the window, and of course the trail of blame led right back to me. This the window I broke two years ago! Awesome. I felt like I was being scolded retroactively for misbehaving in middle school. Now, there are two reasons I shouldn't have to pay:
- I had cleared it with the wife! That should have been the end of it right there! If she's going to say "It's OK, don't worry about it," she should have had the foresight to remember such a statement come time the lease ends... which leads me to my next point:
- I moved out a year ago! My involvement definitely should have ended after that! I got my security deposit back, and nothing was said about the window. Granted my roommates were staying for another year, but for each renewal of the lease, all damage should be accounted for or should be rendered null and void! Especially for the guy who moves out.
Now, I do feel bad for my old roommate, who's caught in the middle and is taking the brunt of all of this. But I feel like I'm being made into a sucker--the end result of someone's let's-find-a-scapegoat plan. Well I will not be the sap, greenhorn, pigeon or rube. I'm taking a stand. Who's with me?!
PS. $70 is a bullshit price. Window panes cost like ten bucks. Our landlord is such a dick.
