But Seriously, I Have A Great Relationship With My Landlord.

You guys, I think it's time to pull up stakes and just go live someplace else, like maybe Seattle or London or the moon or some far-off outer galaxy (what's the rent like in space? Better than NY? Worse than SF?) because I just cannot anymore with these landlords. Seriously? I cannot. I might as well have a disabled monkey or a really stupid chair watching over my apartment. (Not just any chair, mind you, but a stupid chair. Like a chair with two legs or a chair that thinks its a table.)

Anyway. Here's what happened.

"Picture it: my apartment, three days ago."

It's two days after my bathroom ceiling has been "fixed" ("fixed" being the loose term we'll use for something that is no longer actively dangerous) and my husband and I are sitting around being serious grownups doing serious important grownup things (playing the new Mortal Kombat, goading the dog into attacking the cat so the cat will bite the dog, etc) when the Landlord calls.

"Sorry to bother you," says the landlord, "But I need a copy of the rent."

I ask, "Why? Is something wrong?"

And my husband, who's clearly eavesdropping but incredibly busy with the serious business of figuring out how to achieve a fatality, asks, "Is that the landlord?"

I nod.

"Nothing's wrong," says the landlord. "I just need a copy of your rental contract. I'm asking all the tenants to include a copy of their agreement with this month's check."

So at this point I'm still kind of worried. The rent in my neighborhood has, for the past few years, begun to hover around the Fuck-All Insanity mark. Is he planning on raising my rent? And what happens if I don't have a copy of said rent? How the fuck much will he raise it then?

"Okay," I say, "But might I ask why you need a copy of the rental agreement?"

Which is when the landlord and I, officially, launch ourselves into the Abbott and Costello Long-Lost Slumlord Variety Hour.

"I'm asking all tenants," says the landlord unhelpfully.

"A copy of the rent?" asks my husband, still knee-deep in Mortal Kombat. "Why doesn't the landlord already have a copy of the rent?"

"Aren't you the landlord?" I say. "Shouldn't you have a copy of the rent?"

"Are you saying you don't have a copy of the rent?" The Landlord's tone sounds positively scandalized, which (I'll give him credit for) is pretty damn ballsy. "How do you not have a copy of the rent?"

"How do I not have a copy of the rent? How do YOU not have a copy of the rent?"

"You should really keep copies," says the landlord.

"Didn't you CREATE the copies?" I point out.

"Yes," he says, "But I lost my blue folder."

"What does that even mean?" At this point I'm livid. "What the hell happens if I lose MY blue folder?"

"I don't follow."

You... don't follow.

So, to recap: my landlord is missing important paperwork for (not just me, but) literally everyone in my entire building because my landlord has but one --ONE!--blue folder that apparently IS NOT secret code for "computer" where he keeps all his important documents. Next up he'll ask me to calculate next year's rent for him because he can't find his abacus.

So I say, "What if I can't find my copy?"

"What do you mean what if you can't find your copy? How do you not have a copy of the rent?"

"How do YOU not have a copy of the rent?"

"Glad to see you're getting somewhere," says my husband.

And here, guys, is the reason why I desperately need to move, or buy a house, or just shoot myself out into fucking outer space or something. Because then it just gets weirder and he says, "You're welcome, by the way. For the bathroom. You didn't call me or anything to say how much you liked it."

Really?  REALLY?

At this point I'm unsure why we're even still talking and frankly I'm angry and I have a lot of agitating my animals to get done, so I say, "Thank you?"

"It was a lot of work," says the landlord. "We worked really hard on your bathroom."

"Okay."

"We were there for eight hours."

We?

My landlord wasn't even there when the ceiling was patched.

For the record, my Landlord opened the bathroom door, took one look at our moldy, bulbous ceiling and then promptly exited, leaving us in the hands of "his very capable, very professional, very trusted team." (FYI: Team = One Dude With A Fake Name Who Used To Live In Our Basement But Is Now Fixing Our Bathrooms Apparently, and nobody else.) That said, we did in fact thank Mr. Fake Name Dude (who also painted our bathroom tiles the same color as the wall, by the way) although I suppose in hindsight I could have reached out to my overly sensitive landlord --perhaps via flowers or singing telegram or personal string quartet, because if nothing else, my landlord works very, very hard at avoiding ever having to work very, very hard.

"What's he saying?" asks my husband, who at this point has mastered the art of the fatality because I've been on the phone an abominable amount of time for no reason at all. I roll my eyes.

"Thank you for fixing my broken bathroom," I say loudly, "Thank you so much for finally fixing it, we very much appreciate our new working bathroom." (which is part of your job, I should have yelled, which you avoided doing for over a year, but hold on, let me buy you a bouquet of flowers and a six foot tall fucking greeting card and a ticker tape parade because I'm so crazy grateful my ceiling did not cave in.)

Finally, mercifully, the conversation ends and my husband and I are left stupefied on the couch. "Give him a copy of the agreement from 2010," he suggests. "We'll pay less rent."

Except the truth is we'll pay MORE! MORE RENT FOREVER! hahaha HILARIOUS!

Welcome to Queens, everyone - Slumlord/High Rent Capital of the United States. Remind me to check Zillow for better deals in outer space.