The price of luxury

Posted on May 14, 2005 by Gene

I’m going to need knee replacement surgery very soon.
Jann’s house, where I’m staying, is one of those townhouses with many staggered levels. All in all, it has 5 different levels. So, when I’m downstairs using the washer and dryer — the huge kind that you can wash all of your clothes in at once and which requires a degree in computer programming just to turn on — I must then haul all my clothes back upstairs to my bedroom… four flights up.
The older one is, the more likely it is that one can afford a home like this. Unfortunately, the older one is, it’s less likely that one could deal with the stairs.

Between doing a little freelance work for the old office today, I’m going to wander around looking at apartments. I saw a very nice one yesterday, but the fine print is starting to wear on me. There’s fine print everywhere you look in California, from warning signs about substances known to the state to be carcinogenic — i.e., cigarette smoke — to the culture shock of the missing refrigerators.
Let me explain. Homes in California do not come with refrigerators, unlike back in Virginia. People haul their fridges from home to home like a television set here. It’s daunting to think that when I buy a home, I’m going to have to buy a new refrigerator in addition to new furniture.
The apartment I looked at did come with a fridge, as well as a washer/dryer. What it didn’t come with was curious to me: water or trash pickup. Now, I can understand paying for your own electricity, but those other utilities are universally paid by apartment complexes back home. Weird. Meanwhile, the apartment was $1500/month, which is pretty hard for me to part with considering that I am unemployed and no longer have an income. Everything I spend is coming out of savings and house proceeds.
If I’m going to spend that much, I’d far rather find a cool loft downtown and be bohemian rather than suburban.