I used to live in the Boston Apartments on 38th & Main, circa 2000-02 back when the place was a total roach motel. I’ve heard tell that it’s been bought by someone responsible who has fixed the place up really nice nowadays, but back when I lived there, it was pretty freakin’ squalid. One would find crackheads smoking up in the “security†foyer with surprising regularity, besides the aforementioned cockroach issue.
Among the many charming features of 7 E. 38th St. #3 was that the furnace didn’t work worth a hoot, and the management company was apparently entirely without contacts to a competent HVAC guy, so it was always igloo-cold in there during the wintertime.
Except for one peculiar place: the toilet.
I don’t know why, and I kind of don’t want to think too deeply on it, but at some point during my residence at 7 E. 38th, the toilet tank started having hot water in it. In retrospect, this is kind of an alarming turn of events, and even at the time it worried me. It could be that the downstairs neighbor, who had a tendency to mania might have undertaken some home-made plumbing and crossed up the hot-and-cold pipes between downstairs and upstairs…except the hot and cold in the shower and sink remained normal. Which leads one to more sinister considerations involving possible electrical malfunctions.
On days when it was particularly cold outside and the furnace was malfunctioning particularly badly, the toilet actually exuded steam!
Ultimately, it was not the steaming toilet, but rather the omnipresence of cockroaches that drove me out of that apartment. That and the heroin addict upstairs with the yippy Chinese Crested Hairless dogs, the woman next door with Tourette’s who let out hoarse, guttural cries sporadically at all hours of the day and night, and the mutually-domestic-abusive gay couple in the back unit who would have knock-down, drag-out, furniture-thrown-off-the-balcony, call-911 fights on a weekly, if not every-other-daily basis.
A steaming toilet is one thing, but a total lack of peace and quiet is quite another!
A steaming toilet is indeed alarming!
Though on days when the apartment was cold enough to allow the toilet to steam, that warm cloud was actually kind of welcome to engulf the chilly-cheekers.
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Must every apartment complex feature a yippy dog? My apartment complex’s yipster was Mojo, the maintenance man’s ferocious pomeranian (sp?). He barked at every real and imaginary sound…aptly named.
No steamy toilets though.
Pomeranians, man! Those little fluff buckets appear to be composed of equal portions fur and yip. And nothing else whatsoever.
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