I'm a rather frustrated bunny as I type this. 'AH!', sighs my (1) reader, 'It's another Rant Blog of exceeding length. Again' Well yes, I'm afraid it is, although I will try to keep it briefer this time around. Thanks to everyone who took the time and could be arsed to read the last or any post (novel length ones especially). Nice to know it’s all being read.
So what is it now? Well, life, the universe, the unrelenting injustice poured down on our heads on a daily basis by each other and our maker(s)and those really petty annoying things like forgetting your umbrella when it rains, train delays and hay fever which come together to make a collective miasma of misery and fill me and others like me with 'Not-a-Happy-Bunny' Syndrome The main bugbear at present however is the time period which I shall refer to in later times as the Great Flat Hunt Tribulation, or possibly the House Hunt Horror (more poetic, but less accurate than the first title).
So, the current living situation is with the 'rents, which, whilst not the best situation in the world, could be a hell of a lot worse. For one thing, the fridge is always stocked. None of that cobbling together a meal together from pasta, leftover eggs and something which you (literally) dig out of the back of the freezer, so encrusted with ice crystals you can't identify it as animal, mineral or vegetable until it's irradiated for half an hour in the microwave (by which point it's either inedible or so unappealing you eat the pasta dry).
I'm also saving a packet by not paying rent, bills etc which is rather handy. My father has always warned me that nothing in this life is free and that is indeed true. The payoff in this case is an infringement of my civil liberties. But that's an entirely different story.
Ironically enough, after dealing with enough letting agents and braving grotty flats to decide that I've had enough of the whole process, I've come to the conclusion that I need to spend MORE time with them in these grotty places in order to gain enough insight and information to beat them at their own game. This means loosing a few battles but winning the war in the end.
Yes, I did just equate house hunting with warfare and I stand by my analogy. It really is very fitting. Expectant lambs promised a glorious future are taken to these exotic places they've never been to before (the wilds of Cardiff’s backstreets to be more precise) where anything could be lurking behind the nearest door, more often than not stepping gingerly over uneven ground, wary of stepping on an explosive or half digested pizza ends. Then there's the psychological warfare with the silky tongued agent 'Yes it's a beautiful flat isn't it? Don't worry about the gaping hole there, that will be gone in 30 seconds time, we have a very fast building contractor. Yes the windows are bullet proofed. That attack last week was exaggerated by the media. Mind the blood there.' The lambs leave, feeling cheated angry and more often or not, out of pocket because 'I'm sure the asking price in the advert was 500 a month but it's suddenly 600?' The lambs return home to a cheering crowd, but they feel they've somehow lost their innocence because of the things they've seen and the lies they were told.
And then the cycle begins again.
Haven't actually looked at many of these, but the ones we have seen so far have been pretty horrific. We have a very tight budget so I'm not expecting the Taj Mahal, just something liveable that isn't a shoebox. No luck so far with what we've seen. First, there was the one that was a hole. A top floor flat in a house with another flat and 3 bedsits all squished into the middle floor, with a 3 foot wide by 6 feet long, carpeted kitchen complete with symmetrical sloping roofs which stretched down to meet the counter tops with probably a metre at best between said sloping ceiling and the cooker hob. Ridiculous price tag of 600 a month. Then there was the one my future housemate saw which had a random shower cubicle in the corner of one of the bedrooms.
There was also the hair-raising journey in the back of the letting agents car to the property in genuine fear for our lives. Every time he changed gear, the car jerked in a way that made you appreciate the value of a seatbelt and feel like a human crash test dummy. I wanted to kiss the ground when I finally got out of the car. That session was particularly grueling and annoying because we didn’t get to see the one flat we specifically asked to which meant I had to go back today, on my one day off, to look and guess who it was showing me around? This time we followed behind him.
To cut a long story short then: no joy with house hunting, very demoralising and stressful all round. Moving house and all it entails is supposed to be the most stressful thing you can ever do and now I understand why. Ready for the primal scream? AGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!
I'm done now.