Being Technically Homeless
Posted by Andrew | Filed under General
It has been nearly two weeks since I was kicked out of my room in Sandy, Utah. Since then I have been making my residency in a Days Inn in Midvale and at a friend’s condo in Draper. Which really isn’t a residency, more of a potentially worse situation. I have been making phone calls, writing emails and meeting people trying to find a new place to live. But I have found that re-watching Seasons 2 through 3 of the modern incarnation of Doctor Who with David Tennant playing the Doctor (and I will miss him in that role) for more productive.
It all started Sunday morning when one of my roommates told me that my landlord was unfairly criticizing my father behind my back. This is a man who has only met my father twice and has barely said a word to him, and yet believes he needs to protect his pride by badmouthing him. Yes, I really sound like a hypocrite right now because let’s face it, I use this blog to badmouth people I haven’t really met all the time. But then again, I don’t really say anything that someone on The Soup would say, or even think of. Needless to say, the idea that my father was being badmouthed upset me and I confronted my landlord about it.
My landlord, his name is Bill, so let’s just call him “Bill the Bully,” tried to defend his comments saying that my dad was antisocial and ungrateful for the things that he had done for him. What on God’s green Earth has Bill the Bully done for my dad? All he did for him was blatantly avoid him, which looking back on it was a huge favor, so maybe thanks is in order.
During the four plus months I lived in the basement of the home of Bill the Bully, he has never been able to admit that he is wrong about anything. He reminds me of an 11 year old boy who has never heard the word “no” before and is being told it for the first time. Let me give you an example.
There is the thing widely available at fast food restaurants here in Utah called “fry sauce.” It’s ketchup and mayonnaise mixed together, sometimes with pickle juice added in. Bill the Bully proudly told me that this culinary revolution was invented and is only available in Utah and nowhere else in the world. As a member of the culture which invented fries, the Belgians, I happen to know that that statement is complete rubbish. Utahns weren’t the first to mix ketchup and mayo together, that’s something that you can find across Europe. In fact, the standard “frituur” in Belgium has at least 2 dozen things to dip fries in.
But no, upon telling the Bully that fry sauce isn’t a unique commodity of Utah, he began insisting that I didn’t know anything about it. I could go on, but the fact is that the Bully didn’t back down, and even resorted to yelling at me, despite never having been the Europe like I have (I think that leaving the United States would scare him).
Not to mention the constant pestering into my personal life. He wanted to know how school was going, and how my job hunt was going, and the intimate details of my financial situation. Here’s the answer to all of them: NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS. It was like he was trying to be my parent, or at least my estranged Uncle of some sort. He would come down to my room and knock on my door and ask me questions and he would pick and prod through my personal things. I also happen to know that on more than one occasion, he entered my room without my prior permission.
So, he got so angry at me that he decided to kick me out, even though that’s illegal. He told me that I owed him $400 for December’s rent despite November just having barely begun. He demanded that I return his key and that everything in my room now belonged to him, and then he threatened to call the police on me. And here I am, sitting in my friend’s living room stealing WiFi from someone called “linksys” across the street.
But as for Bill the Bully, he can stay in his house adorned with miniatures of Disney characters, frogs, pigs and old people that only seventy year old women and gay men with no taste would posses. But he should know that he has not heard the last of me. I will prosecute him and I will win. He can’t always have it his way.
Parking Corruption at the U
Posted by Andrew | Filed under Education
I’m looking to get the following Opinion/Editorial piece in the Daily Utah Chronicle. But that’s unlikely and I want some feedback anyway:
Allow me to begin my piece with a short story. Don’t worry, it’s very exciting and will only take one or two inches of this column. Besides, it’s a good story about the blatant money grabbing corruption going on right here on campus that is being facilitated by administrators. One day, I was walking back to my car after class and was surprised to see a parking ticket on my windshield for $15. I was surprised, because I was in a “U” parking lot and my “U” parking permit was prominently displayed in the window hanging off of the rearview mirror. Not wanting a parking ticket on my car’s record, I went to the Commuter Services office in the Annex to protest my receiving a ticket for no apparent reason.
The person behind the counter (which in case you didn’t know, has a sign above it saying “Cashier,” which I think is part of the problem) said that I either had to pay the fine or appeal it. Why? Why should I, after spending $125 for a parking permit, have to pay another $15 just because one of those men in shorts on a bike was to blind to see that I wasn’t parked illegally? In fact, why after paying thousands of dollars in tuition (I am currently classified as an out of state student, so I pay an obscene amount right now) to become a full time student here have to pay anything at all to park my car here?
But no, there is more to this problem. Last month, my car had to go into the shop for some repairs for a week and so I borrowed a car to use. By accident, I left my parking permit with the original car and so went to the same Commuter Services office and talked to a “Cashier” about getting a temporary permit for the borrowed car. I was told that I would have to buy a temporary permit. Why? I have already paid for a parking permit, why should I pay more?
I can hear their lame excuse right now, “Oh, well, you see, we have to charge for the temporary permits so that you don’t give ‘em out to people and they end up parking for free.” That is simply ridiculous. The temporary permits have expiration dates on them and they are linked back to my UnID, so they certainly should be able to catch something like that. I guess that it’s too hard for them to figure that out though.
And what does it matter anyway? Apparently, they will just stick a parking ticket on any car that they want. Which is why I recommend that no one do anything to upset someone who is a parking patrol officer, or whatever they are actually called (I call them “parking jackals” personally), because if you do, you will get a parking ticket. And from what I can see, there is no way to oversee such activity because you have to go through some appeal process, and how are you supposed to prove that you didn’t deserve the ticket?
Which is why I encourage all the students here on campus to consider the amount of money you are spending to be here. Whether you are full-time or part-time, undergrad or graduate, you are paying a lot of money to be here. Why do you have to pay even more so that you can have a parking permit? And why is there no oversight over the issuing of parking tickets and why do you have to go through an appeal process for wrongfully issued tickets? After considering these things, write to President Young at president@utah.edu, and voice your concerns about this issue.