so, i'm going to write the crown a letter requesting immediate disclosure and leave it at the court house tomorrow morning. i just need to figure out the proper protocol...

and, i can be persistent about that, too.

what are they going to do?

charge me with harassment?

i know, i'm such a badass, aren't i.

sexy, isn't it?

lol.

ok.

i took three years of a "law and society" course, which included courses on tort law, constitutional law, aboriginal law and criminal law as well, but i have never studied the procedures involved in an actual trial. and, they tell you this, right. "this course will not prepare you for a court room". this is why lawyers go through an apprenticeship process, right.

so, i need to teach myself how this is going to actually happen.

one of the reasons that duty counsel was so necessary for me yesterday is that i didn't have access to a computer, meaning i was unable to research the topic. i've never studied bail conditions. i don't have any idea. if you gave me the night to figure it out, mind you...

i assumed i was going to go to a pre-trial hearing first, and a bail hearing second. that is, i assumed the judge would base their bail decisions on a pre-trial. well, how is a judge supposed to figure out proper bail conditions without looking at the trial evidence? apparently, what they actually do is look at prior history. i guess you could argue that i'm missing the point: the bail hearing is not intended to weigh the value of the evidence, but whether i'm eligible for bail, which is not determined by evidence but by history. but, that still strikes me as irrational. i do believe that had the judge looked at the actual evidence, i would have been released without conditions - and the case would have been dropped.

if i am right, and the judge dismisses the case immediately, i am going to be forced to deal with the consequences of a charge pending on my record while i am searching for housing, in a very critical period, in the first few days of a stay. it's difficult to underestimate the potential damage that this is going to create for me. and, while it may work out in my favour in the end, it's an outrageous scenario in the short-term.

imagine a scenario where, on sept 30th, i am permitted to sign a lease on the condition of passing a police check, fail that check, and then have the charges dropped on oct 1st. that's a lawsuit the cops can't win, sure. but, it's a deep cost for me, as well.

so, the purpose of the date on the 10th is supposed to be to ask for disclosure. but, i really feel that the crown should have had that information available before they even arrested me, and that it should have formed the basis of the bail hearing.

i frankly do not think it is unlikely that the court will drop the charges before the 10th, making the hearing and disclosure unnecessary - although i will ask for disclosure, anyways.

but, the longer this drags on, the more annoying it is for everybody, as the harder it is going to be for me to leave.

at this point, i don't even know if the crown is seeking to send me to jail or not. while i would consider that extremely unlikely, it's kind of important information for both me and a potential landlord to have, as i am about to sign a lease.

i suspect that the actual truth is that the situation was driven by the officer, who essentially filed a false report. but, this is what we'll need to determine over the upcoming weeks. either:

1) this woman legitimately thinks that somebody aggressively applying for an ad puts her in some kind of risk category, which indicates she's dealing with some kind of schizophrenia, or some kind of stress disorder. she appears to be imagining that i'm following her around. i've never met her. but, if her fear is truly honest, it implies she requires psychiatric attention. or,

2) the cop manufactured the situation to go after me, in whatever collusion there was with this woman.

so, it's either a crazy woman that needs help or it's a malicious cop that needs to be fired - or both.

we'll figure this out, soon enough.

i really had no option but to sleep.

i'm up now....

the most annoying thing about what happened yesterday is that i lost the day to applications, and i'm going to lose the day today, as well, because i lost my voice. i spent much of the night and day screaming to see a judge.

i sound like a kid learning how to play the trumpet: sound for a second or two, and then wind. if i yell, it comes back a little. i probably just need to rest them. hopefully, i'll be able to talk again tomorrow.

20 hours. i was very close to being released; the magic number is 24. 

i'm going to roll with the system so long as i have to, but i don't think things are happening the way that they're supposed to. i have yet to see the charges laid against me, or any evidence or arguments from the crown. i told them i was representing myself, but they put the situation in the hands of a duty counsel instead. she had a conservative approach that was focused on getting me out of jail, and she did - my conditions are that i can't apply to the ad again (until the charges are dropped) and that i can't be around guns, which isn't much of a condition at all. if somebody sees me with a gun, i'll have to pay a $100 fine. but, i would have taken a much more aggressive approach in insisting there are no grounds for any restrictions at all.

in my view, the situation essentially reduces to due process. the woman is making an accusation against me, and i need to defend against it. this accusation may be frivolous and vexatious, but i will need to suffer the consequences of it until that is demonstrated - and then be compensated for any damages i suffer as a consequence of it.

as this ad is posted every day, i'm of the opinion that i have every right to apply to this ad every time it is posted. i will continue to exercise my rights in due course. but, because i'm guilty until proven innocent, and i signed an agreement, i will need to back off for a few days or weeks.

i will be aggressively attacking this woman in the court. some cursory google research suggests that she has a history of filing vexatious charges, and usually has her cases dropped. i am absolutely willing to be the person that stands up and puts a stop to this, has her ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation and has her barred from further vexatious litigation. she should expect this to be very difficult. and, am i supposed to shed a tear?

i will be aggressively attacking the officer, as well, with the intent to have him fired.

i will be suing the city for emotional damages related to locking me up on false charges.

i will probably launch a civil case against this woman for damages resulting from having to fight off a harassment charge while i am trying to move. 

and, i will be launching a human rights challenge against the apartment complex, as well. i was going to have a hard time doing that, up until this point, because i didn't have a lot of information. but, the information being presented by the court is full of language like "the tenant is not welcome". that is, her vexatious litigation is going to give me the information i need to prosecute her for discrimination, that i didn't previously have.

in ontario, applications may be denied for financial reasons like failing a credit check. but, telling a tenant that they are "not welcome here" is discrimination under the law. it's amazing that this ended up in the court documents, but i'll take my good luck, as it is.

obviously, my first order of business is getting the charges dropped, and i legitimately do not expect this to be difficult. i'm really fairly stuck until i can do this. i'm almost wondering if i'm better off waiting, so i don't scare off any potential landlords.

and, while i don't even expect the case to go to trial, there is an obscure possibility that i could be facing up to ten years' imprisonment. it's almost impossible for me to think about moving until the tenth...

yeah.

i'll need to file in the morning.

i'm going to accept legal aid, because it is available and it would be foolish not to. i don't want to pay for a lawyer, but i'll take a lawyer, for free. see, i think i understand the law well, and i'm good at winning arguments, but i'm going to need help with the procedural aspect of it. i really think what i need is a tutor, to help me through the procedure the first time. and, once armed with that experience, i can then represent myself in future cases. i'm expecting to hear something back by the end of the day, and, if i don't, i'll call after 17:00.

the one qualification i need to present is the following: given the context, i need the lawyer to be female. and, you can expect me to show up to court looking pretty, too.

the last 30 hours have been absurd.

full write-ups will happen over the evening. but, i now have to fight an absurdly frivolous harassment charge over the next few weeks, which is going to make it difficult to find an apartment. i think i'm actually dealing with a dumb cop. but, i'm now going to fail a criminal check, until i can get the charges dropped..

i have no choice but to appeal and will probably file it immediately in the morning.

in the long run, i expect to end up richer from this. a lot richer. in the short term, it's massively disruptive.

this is a letter meant for potential counsel.

http://dghjdfsghkrdghdgja.appspot.com/thoughts/kafkavsorwellinreallife.html

on that old debate as to whether kafka or orwell was the better prophet...

i had to get a few hours of sleep when i got home, as i hadn't slept in custody. they picked me up right before i was going to make spaghetti and take a shower, too, to end what was already a long day. so, i need to recuperate a little tonight. 

but, you are correct: i am a creature of the internet, and i make arguments better in writing. you also tend to take control of conversations, which is a good trait, but i learned a long time ago that i need to write an essay, sometimes, to accommodate for disconnects with certain personality types. 

i was barely awake during our conversation outside of the court, but if i remember correctly, you were going to speak to legal aid and get back to me before the end of the 26th. i'm hoping that this essay can find it's way to a potential lawyer that is making a decision on taking the case, as i don't think this case is really about harassment on my behalf, but more about police harassment against me. this essay should form the basis of my defence. i don't think that a bail hearing was the right time to have this discussion, but, as mentioned, it would have required a soliloquy from me that you weren't likely to grant. 

i got arrested for repeatedly applying to an ad for housing on the internet, and essentially charged with stalking somebody that i've never met. i had a speech prepared, but i didn't need to use it, because the justice didn't need to hear it - how do you get from being persistent in applying for housing (however annoying...) to criminal harassment directed at a specific individual unknown to the accused? and, this was really the crux of the matter from the crown's perspective. the bail conditions were set up to treat me like i was stalking this woman, and she required protection from me, when the reality is that i was being persistent in looking for an apartment, and had no idea she even existed. the justice immediately realized that disconnect. i think you saw the gulf in logic, too. even the crown seemed less than convinced that this was worth her time, frankly. so, how do you get such a ridiculous charge out of such a benign behaviour? 

ockham's razor really suggests something else is at play, and i do believe that the actual issue was that the officer was out to get me. if we need some alternate way to explain how somebody gets arrested and held for 20 hours for replying to a non-personal ad on the internet, this is the answer that seems most apparent. i had not only dealt with this officer previously, he had threatened to charge me with harassment previously, and i had in fact filed a complaint against him with the oiprd. while i do not claim to know whether caroline chevalier's fears are real in her own mind or not, i think the irony of the situation is that her narrative suggests some paranoia or ptsd on her behalf, and that that may require some treatment for her own well being. i don't want to seem insensitive towards people that are dealing with real harassment, as i actually have a great deal of empathy, but i must be adamant that this is not it, and that any attempt to frame the issue as one where a potentially vulnerable female is being threatened by a rejected suitor or aggressive pursuer is not consistent with any evidence that actually exists. i was pursuing an apartment, and under the impression that the person on the other side of the machine was ryan myon. this is a case the crown appears to be pursuing due solely to the nature of the report that exists, rather than any meaningful evidence, which reduces to an issue of framing by the officer. as such, i think this is the real issue before the court. 

i initially had contact with this officer in the summer of 2018 on an unrelated call regarding a conflict between my neighbour and i about the issue of secondhand smoke. i am living in a unit with poor flooring, on top of a very heavy marijuana user. i must keep the windows open at almost all times to prevent being stoned by the second-hand smoke. this is the topic of a suit i filed against my landlord, swt-16361-18. i actually took myself to the hospital at one point and tested positive for thc, from the second-hand smoke. at the start of the summer, a new tenant moved in next door that insisted on getting very drunk and chain smoking regular cigarettes directly in my air supply, leaving me in a situation where if i closed my window i'd get stoned, and if i opened my window i'd get smoked on. frustratingly, there is a very big yard next door, and no reason this person was required to smoke in my air supply. after several polite attempts to ask her to smoke elsewhere, i resorted to more powerful tactics, including blaring loud music and yelling rude things out the window. 

there's no question that i've been very rude to this person, but there's no question that she's been very rude to me, too. she doesn't have the right to smoke wherever she wants, and i don't have the obligation to live in her smoke, but most smokers don't see it that way: they think they do have the right to smoke wherever they want, and everybody else does have the obligation to deal with it. what should have been a polite and neighbourly request to move a few feet away from the building turned into frequent yelling matches with a quite belligerent drunk. and, at some point she decided i was harassing her and called the cops. 

now, this is really a situation without a proper remedy. i believe i should have some legal recourse to prevent her from smoking in my air supply. if these were private houses, rather than apartments, i could sue for trespass; i can't really do that, in the existing situation. i've explored the idea of having her charged with nuisance, and i'll get to that in a second. but, there really isn't anything i can do in this situation besides make the experience unpleasant, and hope she smokes somewhere else - which is in fact what happened, in the end. but, i'm cognizant of the law, too. i knew not to threaten her or make her feel unsafe - just to be irritating enough to get under her skin. i don't expect she had the same subtle understanding of harassment, and consequently felt justified in calling the police for being irritated. 

i believe that the first time i met the officer that pressed charges (an "officer muntino") was on a call from the neighbour that i was harassing her by yelling things out the window at her. and, i actually think that the key bias underlying the charges that were pressed comes from this encounter, directly. while i don't recall all of the mean things i said to this woman to try to get her to smoke somewhere else, i can be certain that i didn't say anything racist, for the reason that i'm not a racist. i'd just never do that, and i'm confident i didn't. there's certain things that you make sure you don't say to a black person, that you very carefully avoid, at all times. but, the smoker does happen to be quite visibly african in descent. i don't know how this information found it's way to the officer. it may have even been coerced by the officer, who could have accidentally framed the issue that way. but, when the officer appeared at my door, he accused me of hurling racial slurs and was quite angry and perturbed by it. again: it's hard to know what the smoker is thinking. but, the thing is that it isn't actually true. i simply wouldn't do that. this officer then reassured this woman that she has the right to smoke wherever she wants, which just fed into more conflict in the space. fwiw, she has no problems yelling transphobic slurs at me, and doesn't think twice about it, but i don't care as long as she smokes somewhere else. 

as mentioned, i am of the opinion that she should not be legally permitted to smoke at such a close proximity to my window, and i should have a legal method at my disposal to force her to move. i couldn't get bylaw to do anything. trespass doesn't make sense in context. i can't sue the landlord next door for reasonable enjoyment. but, in researching approaches, something that struck me as potentially worthwhile was building evidence for a possible nuisance case. i tried exploring these options with police, and was told i need to establish intent. so, i started filming her while she was smoking - and telling her why i was doing it. i then got a second visit from officer muntino, ordering me to stop filming her smoking, under threat of being charged with... 

....criminal harassment. 

i told him that i was building a case for nuisance, and he said there's no such thing as criminal nuisance. there is of course such thing as criminal nuisance, and this behaviour is not harassment, either. i was not charged for this, for obvious reasons. but, there's a commonality in these cases - this cop likes to throw his weight around, and ultimately doesn't know what he's talking about. 

the story i'd like to paint is one of a cop that is convinced i'm a racist, and is essentially out to get me, so jumped on an opportunity to charge me with harassment when he finally could, as trivial as it might actually be. but, i'm not a racist. nor am i even very white, really. i'm just a non-smoker trying to find a healthy place to live. 

the report i filed with the oiprd on sept 16th is based on a different narrative of the events that occurred in relation to this case than the one presented by the crown. from file #E-201809161252432765, 

Your complaint details 

Address 

15-851 tuscarora 
windsor 
there was a phone call & a visit to my door, of a threatening, harassing and frankly simply incompetent nature. 

Incident Dates 

Date 
12/9/2018 
Time 
3:56 
Date 
16/9/2018 
Time 
12:00 

Summary of complaint 
Please note formatting has been stripped for preview purposes - original intact 
this officer has threatened me with arrest for a non-crime on two occasions. the first occurrence occurred by phone, and i have a recording of it. the officer called me at 3:56 am - that is almost 4:00 in the morning - on sept 12, and threatened to arrest me for repeatedly responding to an online ad. the number that the officer called me from was (removed). i txted a response to this number, and was told it is not an officer's number. it must have been a friend or partner's number, i suppose. i do have the recording of the officer identifying himself and can email it somewhere. i explained that my behaviour - repeatedly responding to an online ad for an apartment - is not harassment under the criminal code, and not only would i not stop, but i am preparing a human rights case against the landlord, for discriminating against me on enumerated grounds. the second occurrence happened at roughly 12:00 pm on sept 16th. two officers showed up at my door (the other was a white male officer and said nothing during the encounter), and this "constable mancino" threatened me with arrest a second time if i did not stop responding to the ad. i asked the officer to explain what harassment under the law is, and he failed to do so in a correct manner. he seemed to believe that harassment is merely annoying somebody, rather than threatening to harm them. of course, if that were true, then telemarketing would be against the law, and the jails would be full of call centre agents. it's just wrong. after determining that the officer did not understand the law, i told him i didn't have time for this, encouraged him to launch a report if he wanted to and went to close the door. he then put his foot in the door, preventing me from doing so. i informed him that he does not have a warrant, and yet he still refused to move his foot. he did eventually move his foot after i asked him to several times. he then threatened to arrest me if i reply to the ad again - not if i conduct in threatening or harassing behaviour, but if i merely reply to the ad. on his way out, i asked him for his badge number and he refused to give it to me. he started with "184" and then said he already gave it to me, which he did not. even if he had already given it to me, that would not be a reason to not give it to me again. when a citizen asks for a badge number, an officer should state it slowly and repeatedly if necessary. this officer may have been acting out of bias regarding my gender identity, as i am openly transgendered, but i cannot state that for certain. regardless, he should not have called me at 4:00 am from an unofficial police number that may or may not have belonged to his friend or partner, he should not have threatened me with arrest without understanding the nature of the law, he should not have prevented me from closing the door without a warrant and he should have given me his badge number when i asked. i would suggest that this particular officer has a superiority complex, is unreformable and should probably look for a different line of work. 

i was arrested on the evening of sept 24th and held for 20+ hours before being released. 

while i understand that i am the one on trial, i think that the evidence against me is so flimsy as to dispense of it rather quickly, and i think that it is the officer that truly needs to stand trial here. i believe the case should be dismissed, that this officer should be severely disciplined and that i should be compensated generously for the ordeal. so, i would hope that potential counsel would be looking towards the longer term, in turning the situation over: for the person being harassed here, and quite violently, is in fact actually myself. 

so, this isn't exactly what i wanted to do, but it's an approach, if you'd like to help me get out of this situation.

if you've been reading this page, you know why i'm doing this.

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=13732362

06/2016 is updated.

finally.

07, 08, 09, 10 left to fill the gap.

05/2016 is updated.

& i left off midway through june, so i'm actually back where i started.

that took longer than i wanted it to, but i think the outcome is meaningful, and, as mentioned, it's not like i had anything better to do.

i don't know when i'll pick up the politics site in the alter-reality, but if i can find some old usenet posts, it could be relatively early.

to be clear: my politics blog now exists, solid, from aug/2013 to june/2016. i just need to fill in about five more months. & my music blog now exists solid from aug/2013, although i'll be updating it as i continue, as well.

these documents will be used to create liner notes for inri000-inri074, and to close the aleph discs. the first set of liner notes should close when i finish rebuilding up to the end of 2016 - when i can finally get back to catching up in the alter-reality.

that's right. this has all been a part of the process. as should have been obvious.

04/2016 is updated.

03/2016 is updated...

02/2016 is updated...

let's try to get this done tonight.

01/2016 is updated.

almost there.

again: there's not anything more productive i could be doing right now.

i'd might a well get this over and done with.

all of 2015 is now updated, and doublechecked, which is what i did last night.

i'm also now - excluding the smoke from downstairs - at three months, straight-edge.

nope.

i'm falling asleep.

fuck :(.

11/2015 is updated...

i'm going to try for an all nighter tonight. i'm sick of living normal hours, which i've been doing for weeks to conform to normal scheduling for viewing and whatnot. i want to see the sun come up this morning...and i want life to start getting back to normal...

again: i've been to like 100 places, and the smoke is just endemic.

i couldn't tell, today, if i was smelling paint or pot. paint dries. &, if it was pot, it's not obvious where the source was - this was a semi-basement without neighbours and no shared entrance, the kind of space that should be shielded fairly well.

but, i was smelling something.

and, there really has appeared to be no escape from this, up to this point. we'll see what tomorrow brings...

so, 10/2015 is updated.

i'm making progress. slowly.

i put an application down on something today, but i'm again not really stoked on it. i really haven't found the place i want, yet. but i'm running out of time, too.

there's a few more showings in the next few days.

i had 09/2015 just about updated before i fell asleep, and have now finished it, as of this morning.

again: minimal updates.

hopefully, i can keep this rate up.

barring an act of god, it seems like i'll be here until oct 1st.

08/2015 updated very quickly as well....

07/2015 updated quickly. there were like two or three new posts...

06/15 is updated...

and, that was a lot faster, as i had hoped.

05/15 is updated...

there were very few new posts for the second half, so i'm hoping i'm over that hump.

04/15 is now updated.

hungry...

03/15 is updated.

that's another brutal night for the smoke, here. bad enough that i'm getting chest pains...

02/15 updated....

fwiw, i don't know where all these hits have come from recently, but do please take the time to head over to the bandcamp site on the side of the page.

01/15 is updated...

ok.

the rebuild is now complete, from the beginning of 2013 forwards.

i'll need to push through 2015 quickly, to double check. but i should be back to where i was shortly.

and, i guess i'll need to be studying the market out of town, soon.

at the least i can say i got this done...and there's not a lot else i could be doing right now....

...& that does complete november, although i still have to format that mega post to november 30th.

you could publish that thing as a socratic dialogue. it's 50 pages on office paper, so you're looking at a 100-200 page paperback.

i'm going to nap a little this morning, though. the headache is gone, but i'm zombified. hopefully, i wake up a bit more fresh...

october is now done.

i would have hoped for more action on the market today,  but what can you do?

i want to catch up to where i was before i get to seriously looking for stuff out of town. two more months. and, about two hundred pages in the doc.

listings still suck.

still no ruling.

still stuck in time.

i did finish september early this morning, and crashed quite promptly.

the smoke was worse yesterday than it's been in a while - although still localized to the hole in the floor - and i think it's had an effect on my energy level.

i'm very tired, right now.

august, 2014 is done.

still no listings.

still no order.

*shrug*.

i was thinking august 1st would be a good moving date because it would help me get in before the influx of students, over the summer - and i was fully aware from the start that i'd be competing with students for spots. that's why i picked this date....i didn't want to deal with the problems around september 1st...

what i'm learning is that there's a lot of people that have set up basement apartments, explicitly hoping for students. a lot of them are overcharging.

what i'm learning is that there's a lot of furnished rooms available in badly cut-up housing, and these people are explicitly looking for students, as well. these people are overcharging.

& what i'm also learning is that even people with normal apartments are prioritizing students over non-students. & these people are overcharging, too.

it's easy to understand why, after a moment's thought: renting to students means they're going to move out in ten months, and you can jack the rent up for next year. or, at least, that's what people are thinking..

yet, it's abundantly clear to me that these people are getting greedy, and the fact that they're overcharging in the presence of an oversupply of student housing is just going to leave them with empty units.

i want to avoid the professionals...these people are scum bags...

but, given that the whole city wants to rent to students, to the point they don't call non-students back, it seems like october might be the better choice than august.

that's what i'm learning.

i guess we'll see.

but, i'm going to wait until the end of august before i started pitching to mom in the suburbs about renting that basement suite unfurnished.

for me, what it means is that i might be looking at a lot of units that are opening up for what is essentially the same reason as this one, and that i need to be extra cautious about the potential of just moving in parallel.

it seems like renting to a pothead creates a deadzone in the units around it that can only be sustainably filled by other potheads.

so, what i would suspect you'll see begin to happen is that these units will begin to form blocks, and expand to take over entire buildings.

the conclusion is undeniably that a single pothead can irreversibly ruin an entire building very quickly.

but, a pattern may be developing: all the empty rental units in what is currently a tight market are in close proximity to marijuana users, it seems.

it makes it seem like everybody smokes pot.

but, we know that's not true...

when this unit opens up, it will fit that pattern.

maybe, the truth is that nobody wants to live near dirty potheads.

is this quitting smoking thing worth it?

i dunno.

but, i'm hardly going to go back to it, now.

yeah. that unit was basically the same thing as this one. slightly smaller bedroom, slightly bigger kitchen, but the same floor space.

same old flooring that doesn't keep anything out...

and, i could smell the pothead below me, walking by the door.

the only substantive difference is that it is $50 more expensive....

i asked the tenant if he could smell the smoke, and at first he said "sometimes", but then backtracked immediately.

listen...

if you're a property manager, or a tenant, and somebody asks you about smoke, please be honest. if you tell me there's no smoke, and there is, i'm going to sue the fuck out of you. it's not sneaky. it's not smart. it's not a save. it's false advertising, and i'll make you pay for it.

non-smokers do not want to live with smokers.

deal with it.

i took an application, but i'm viewing it as a last resort, and expect it to actually be gone fairly quickly - if i was a smoker, i'd be all over it. but, then again, if i smoked, i wouldn't need to move in the first place...

i'm really not apprehensive about calling myself middle-aged at all.

i've been keenly aware for my whole life that i have noting in common with my own age group. and, i think i've demonstrated clearly enough that putting me in close proximity with young people is just going to lead to conflict.

i'd love to move to a seniors home, if they'd have me.

again: i am not a young person looking for a wild atmosphere.

i am a middle-aged transwoman looking for a clean, safe & healthy environment.

july's done.

i'll wait until tonight before i get a start on august.

i've got a few showings in the next few days, but i'm not really excited about any of them. i expect the building i'm going to see this afternoon to be full of drugs, for example. but at least i'll be able to cross it off...

i've been completely straight edge (except coffee.) since memorial day, fwiw - which is not particularly unusual for me, even if it's not reflective of recent habits. i have a history of staying sober for months at a time. so, have i officially grown out of intoxicants? i guess we'll see. probably not. but, i plan on staying completely smoke & alcohol free until i move, at least.

that should make it easier to identify smoky apartments, i hope.

i'm going to be extremely picky. i have to be. i don't want to do this again. but, if i end up in the same situation, i will do it again, too.

yeah.

so, i think what i'm learning here is that evicting the tenant below me would not have been sufficient to solve the problem.

i do think she's gone. and it is way better. no question, but, it's not good enough.

and, that's kind of what i reasoned. well, what i decided was that she'd likely be replaced by something as bad, or worse. i mean, at least she works. what if she was down there all day? egads.

i may be stuck here another month, but i'm confident i made the right choice in getting out.

so, that gets me through june....

july may be a little slower, but nothing's coming up in the listings, so i'd might as well be industrious.

can i get this done before the sun comes up?

can i stay awake that long?

i'm due for a long day...

still raining.

market still sucks.

no response from the adjudicator.

hopefully, i can get through most of june by midnight. and, hopefully, the rest of the week is as productive, if i'm stuck here for another month - as it is increasingly appearing as though i am.

if you think i'm too crazy to start a band with, then you're too conservative to jam with me.

...& that was a quick movement through may.

as the air has legitimately cleared out, i've been able to stay awake a little longer over the last few days - although i say that as something is wafting in, i think from a different unit, perhaps a few floors down.

i've picked up a nasty smokers' cough, though, i'm not exaggerating. it's that tightening in your chest, and that constant inability to be able to cough out the obstruction. i thought i'd gotten rid of that...alas...

market still sucks.

on to june...

so, that's april.

as expected, it was a little shorter, and i expect that to hold for the rest of 2014.

the market is not opening up like i hoped, but i do have some showings on the weekend.

back to looking for the day...

i think i need a personal update.

i appear to have forgotten to mention that i finished rebuilding february, 2014 on the 10th; i think i thought i'd get through this fairly quickly, and not need to update. i guess i forget that i spent most of march with a broken recording machine. it was a heavy posting month. but it's done now...

how's the smoke? well, it has gotten dramatically better, but i wonder if the heat is a factor. the flip side of that is that the a/c might be off downstairs, which is a sign suggestive of the idea that she has left. that said, i've also been very ired this week for some reason, and my sweat smells alarmingly like marijuana. so, i don't know. it's weird all around, it really is.

i would expect that the posts will start to slow down again soon. i guess we'll have to see....

i'll need to stay in on monday because of the weird message about the electrical. i don't currently have any showings planned until saturday.

i filled out an application, but i don't intend to move into that unit; it's far too small.

she's been blazing all day. again. gross.

i intend to get some work done tonight.

i don't care where the pot store is located; i'm not going to be in there very often.

my biggest concern, location wise, has always been access to downtown. i've wanted to be close to the downtown strip, and close to the tunnel - because that's how i get across.

i suppose that the tunnel is still going to often be the easiest way to cross, even after the bridge is built. it depends on where i'm going, right? and when i'm coming back.

the key thing about the bridge is that it means i won't have to wait anywhere any more - i can just bike through at 3:37 or whatever.

it's maybe the space between the bridge and the tunnel that is optimal, then. but, i should be a little less dismissive about sandwich. it might be boring as fuck for right now, but it will be nice when the bridge is built.

i'm going to take a walk around the block to see something, but it's surely far too small.

i was again knocked out cold by the pot this morning.

i'm 60% asleep...barely awake...what a sad excuse for an existence...

no new listings to take note of, just the big apartment buildings. i'm going to have to start a deeper search on monday, i think. that's how i got my spot in 2013 - i found something that was only listed at an obscure site.

i'm going to try to get some work done tonight, but i suspect i may end up sleeping all night.

i have no intentions of doing any partying at all, whatsoever, until i get this sorted out. life is not about the time you spend partying, it's about what happens in between.

where does the compliant worker get her mind-numbing drugs from?

the state.

and, who tells her it is "cool" to get stoned, and non drug users are "uncool"?

the corporate media.

do you get it? because orwell got it, and huxley got it, and bakunin got it and...

i mean, you'll note that it's the employed worker that is the pothead, and the unemployed anarchist that isn't - and you'll note what the drugs are doing to this employed workers' revolutionary potential, as they likewise harm the productivity of the unemployed anarchist.

the pothead worker doesn't want to start a revolution; what the pothead worker wants is for the unemployed anarchist to get a job.

this is not some accident, it's by design. and, it's what everybody on the left (except marx.) has always seen as patently obvious.

my position has been clear for years: i reject schedules.

i don't want to live on a 24-hour clock.

some days, i want to go to sleep at 5:30 am; other days, i want to wake up at 5:30 am. and, if we can't be free to set our own schedules, what does freedom mean? is that not the definition of freedom?

so, if somebody is infringing on this ability (be they a boss, or a pothead), are they not restricting your freedom, by definition?

these are actually very basic left-wing arguments; this is not a conservative viewpoint. i'm appealing to ideas of autonomy and self-ownership, and i'm attacking those that would restrict peoples' freedom by enforcing their habits on others. that's the very centre of left-wing thought.

there's a reason why all of the dystopian literature places drug use as a central component of statist mind control. what i'm typing here should not be surprising; i'm really just living through something that every single leftist 20th century visionary saw coming from a great distance away.

waking up stoned on a saturday morning from your neighbours' early morning second-hand smoke is pretty awful. it's just kind of like "i just slept. i shouldn't be tired. that's why i slept. what's the point of sleeping, if you're just going to wake up tired?".

ugh.

i need to be up early until i can find something else, but i won't start calling until after 9:00.

because i'm a fucking polite canadian.

fwiw, she is of course still smoking inside.

my lease is cut. i will determine whether i am going to file a human rights complaint or not depending on the ruling i get. documentation, moving forward, is not particularly worthwhile.

what i'll say is this: the situation is not different than it was previously, and there is no reason to think it will change, moving forwards, unless the property managers react to the settlement by attempting to evict her. so, the assumption should be that i'll be dealing with this pretty much constantly until i leave, unless i state otherwise.

i didn't really sleep this week, as i had a lot of video editing and journal compiling to do. i tried to get up around midnight, but i really actually mostly just slept for the last 12+ hours - a needed and very much wanted sleep. i'm up now and ready to start a new day...

the temperature fell sharply over night and it's actually quite nice, right now. i like the heat & humidity, but i was developing a mild rash from exposure to it and did need a bit of a break from it. it's actually going to be a bit cold this weekend, and balance out to "seasonal" again for next week.

today, i need to look at listings. tonight, i'm going to clean a little. i'm going to have more flexibility this month, at least until the ruling comes in the mail, but the basic situation hasn't changed - i still need to save money to plan for the move.

the lease is done on sept 30th, so i need to be out by october 1st at the latest. i'm confident that i can do this, and that it should prevent me from needing to compromise too badly - i think this should be enough time to get what i want.

i think my arguments went over well, but it's not clear what kind of damages i'm going to get. i think i probably got moving costs, or some abstraction of it. i'm not going to get cleaning costs, but i might get an abstraction of it in pro-ration. i don't expect costs for furniture or dry-cleaning - and knew that would be almost impossible to get. that was meant almost solely as leverage for mediation; i didn't actually intend to go to trial.

the big wildcard is that pro-ration. if i'm here for ten months, that's $7000 paid in rent. i asked the court to determine a percentage, because i claimed i couldn't quantify that kind of hardship - but what i was really worried about was lowballing myself. i would have asked for something in the 10%-25% range. but, i know this judge is very sympathetic to non-smokers. if i asked for 60% and that was too much, she could have kibboshed it; if i asked for 25%, i could have been missing out on an opportunity for 40%. so, i instead left it at the court's discretion to determine a percentage - under the expectation that such a percentage is going to be higher than any guess i could have made. it's a sneaky algorithm to optimize my return. 30% is over $2000; 10% is a month's worth of rent. but, it relies on the judge not seeing through my ruse - or at least being sympathetic to it. i mean, i volunteer that it's manipulative, sure, but it's not so terrible, is it? is the judge not best qualified to figure this out? am i not putting myself at a threat of lowballing myself by presenting a percentage, or harming myself by appearing too greedy?

we'll know in a few weeks.

for now, i'm glad that there's some certainty about things...and eager to get things back in order.

the time spent preparing was not wasted: i've now sorted through vlog data from most of the last six months, which i needed to do anyways. i should be back to rebuilding from 2014 on within 24 hours.

so, i crashed around 2:00, meaning yesterday was about 20 hours - far too short, for this time of year.

i should be enjoying nice, long 36 hour days in this kind of heat. and i shouldn't be sleeping for ridiculously long lengths like 7 hours - i should be wide awake after three or four.

the stench of pot was weaker than usual but steady last night. even after seven hours of sleep, i'm not 100%, right now.

as mentioned: i'm not partying this weekend. i don't feel like there's much to celebrate, right now. that might let me steal something when everybody else is too stoned to notice.

that gets me through january 2014 (on the politics page).

i think i can get through the summer by sunrise. honestly.

right now, it's time to eat, again.

marijuana is not a medicine, and it is not used to treat symptoms, whatever those symptoms are.

rather, it's a recreational drug that is used in social situations in order to have a good time with.

i'm just not feeling up to going out this weekend at all. i've actually been over this before, but i guess i get the opportunity to demonstrate it, now.

a lot of people would say something like "you're having a shitty weekend, so, relax and smoke a joint - it will make you feel better.". no. if i go out for beers on saturday, or i find drugs this weekend more generally, it's just going to make me more depressed. it's not going to make me feel better. i know that.

drugs can work alright with stress, sometimes. but, that's different. that's "i'm feeling like i need to take a load off and forget about things for a few hours". fine. it usually works best with music or dancing - it's a process of getting away.

but, when i'm actually angry or frustrated or upset about something, drugs are just going to make the situation worse, and the absolute last thing i want.

what i want right now is cold sobriety and absolute social avoidance. i'll go out and have fun again when i feel more like myself.

so, they filed an l2 after all.

i guess that the landlord thought she had to wait until the 27th; she could have filed it the day of.

i expect to beat the l2 if i have to fight it - they lied on the forms. but, i don't want to reschedule my t2/t6 after their l2, regardless of the outcome.

what that means is that i have to carry through with the court process on thursday, because i want my court date first. so, i might as well print the letters this afternoon.

this is going to put me in a tricky situation of potentially having the tenancy cancelled august 1st, without being ready to move on that date. so, this is a gamble. it would be an awful judge, however, that would order an eviction within weeks of the court date...i would expect her to set the date for either september or october.

give that there's an l2, they are not likely to consent to a rescheduling. so, i'd have to cancel and resubmit.

they should have waited until after the 5th. that's an error on their behalf.

so, the politics blog is now filled in from the time i got to windsor until the beginning of 2014.

i finished archiving my link dump in early 2014, which was mostly spent on music, and on youtube debates. again: i don't expect this to be all that lengthy. i hope to get a lot done this weekend.

nothing up this morning. no response from the agent from yesterday. i need to make some calls and eat.

i have to brace myself for the reality that i'm probably going to get overwhelmed repeatedly and spend more time sleeping this weekend than i'd like. it's going to simply be disgusting in here.

but, right now the steam is working relatively well in cleansing the air of whatever the fuck it is that she's smoking.

the down side is that i'm sopping in sweat in my bed, but at least i'm wide awake and not wasting the night away sleeping...

what if it's the drug addict below me that is moving out?

i don't know if the situation is salvageable. it would be a step in the right direction.

four rooms is actually a little better, as it lets me have the following:

1) studio
2) bedroom
3) eating space
4) library (+ cd library)

in the last space, i was planning around building book shelves in the bedroom & cd shelves in the eating space. i was planning on putting all of the shelving, here, in the bedroom.

the four rooms are all smallish, but it will work out fine if you keep that in mind...

and, while i don't smoke a lot of pot, it would be nice to have a patio space out back for once in a while :)

don't misunderstand me. the place is kind of dilapidated. creaky. old. i'm sure there are various things living in it. the bath tub is ancient. the water might not be great. it may be drafty. and, everything about it will require some effort.

but, what i need is a relatively big smoke-free space at a price i can afford, and that is this.

yeah.

i'm not leaving the apartment unattended all day, and advertising it to them. i'm not even sure they'll obey a court ruling.

i'll play the angle that i gave them previous notice of cancelling the hearing, and am consequently giving them the opportunity to reschedule this case or force me to open a new one. and, i'll put in a request to reschedule without them, either way.

the worst thing that could happen would be for the judge to end the lease on the first of august, but

1) i can appeal that &
2) i hope to be out by the first, anyways.

it will also allow me to present more concrete moving costs. i did this backwards last time: i moved a bunch of stuff by truck, and the rest by hand. we'll do this the other way this time.

if i have sufficient time to do it in, and the distance is short enough, it will only be a couple of items i won't be able to move by hand: a couch, a dresser, a desk. i could maybe even put up an ad on kijiji for somebody with a truck, looking for a good deed. or, maybe a moving company will accept the sob story and do it on their lunch break: it will probably literally take 20 minutes.

i think the guy over-charged me last time, because he sent the bill to the city. maybe he'll be willing to balance it out...

it's the moving costs i'm trying the hardest to recoup.

my landlord just put a unit in this building up.

there's furniture that is not mine outside, so it might not be my unit. or it might be.

it's got me kind of antsy...

i'm thinking that we're going to have to skip the middle option, at this point, because i don't really want to leave the unit unattended all day on the 5th if i'm not certain i'm moving out. i'm not even happy about it on the case of certainty - i would rather get out first and sue them after.

the place is shady, all around.

so, i'm just going to give them the opportunity to reschedule outright. if they refuse to do that, the court will be within it's bounds to hear the case as i present it - but i'll also be within my rights to cancel and reschedule unilaterally.

that place was actually acceptable, but i think i got brushed off a little bit. the ad says 825 + hydro. she's claiming it's 825 + utilities, generally.

i wouldn't have gone at all if i knew that. but, why would the ad say 825 + hydro if it's 825 + utilities?

so, she says she'll check and call back. there's some chance she might be wrong, fair enough. so, she has until 8:00 before i call her...

i can be a bit annoying when i want something done :).

there's three stores on the bottom floor and an empty dance club for lease next door. it's four equally sized rooms, and a patio on the roof in the back. kinda perfect, all around.

if it's that easy, great. and we'll be in court on the 5th. we'll find out in a few hours.

i don't have issues with depression, but i do have issues with solipsism, and living in constant drug abuse certainly isn't going to help me with that. i'm actually at high risk for marijuana-induced dementia, because i'm already in the spectrum. my mom has severe mental issues, of the type that probably are genetic. and, ive been through a few episodes...

so, at risk of sounding like i'm under the influence of this drug (and i am.) let me state that, on the remote chance that i'm being experimented on, these negative effects are a consequence of dose.

all that's happening is that i'm falling asleep. i'm not even getting high. i'm just become immobile.

i don't want a drug that's going to "chill me out". i enjoy wild mood swings - it's a part of existence. but, if i don't have a choice for as long as i'm here then please reduce the dosage.

knocked me out again this morning...

i've been having difficulty staying awake the last 36 hours, which is no doubt a combination of the rain and the pot. i slept through her blaze this evening and woke up to a remnant smell around midnight, and with a splitting headache.

the showing yesterday was another ashtray of a house - a laundry room that smelled horribly of stale tobacco, and a lawn littered with discarded butts. just fucking gross...if the guy didn't catch me immediately, i would have walked right by without even bothering to go in.

there's something tomorrow. it's a bit bigger than i might need, and a bit more than i might like, but there's some upsides: great location, right downtown, and on top of a storefront, so probably minimal smoke issues.

it's for july, though. and, i'm not going to be ready to move until august 1st at the earliest. so, it;s just to see it.

at least it's going to be nice this weekend, but i plan on staying in. i need to save money. i need to catch up on work. the stress has been hard on my skin. and, i'm not in a good mood right now, overall.

what does it mean for me to break even?

i signed a lease in 2013 for $650 all inclusive, and the place was perfectly sized. my income at the time was $1075, not including tax rebates. that's about 60% of income - relatively high, but i was happy.

today, my income is $1151. the equivalent percentage of my income works out to $695.95. i'm currently paying $700.

i understand that housing inflates slightly, but it should not be growing faster than inflation.

that said, i know i got a good deal - and i know i'll need to shop for a bit to find another deal that good.

i found one today, but she wants a student. sadly.

so, i got a very quick response on my request to reschedule: i used the wrong form.

well, i had previously made a request to move the hearing forward, called a "request to extend or shorten time" form. if the request to move a hearing up is a request to shorten time, a request to push the hearing back should be a request to extend time, right? that's rational, isn't it? so, i used the same form to request an extension that i did to request an expedited case. what makes more sense than that?

it turns out that there's a "request to reschedule hearings" form, but you only use the request to reschedule when you want to reschedule later on (that is, extend time); when you want to reschedule sooner, you request to shorten time. meaning, there's a different process to extend than there is to shorten - despite the form being to request to extend or to shorten.

it's less legalese and more bureaucracy.

worse, there's a caveat: i need to ask for consent to reschedule later.

now, i grasp the value of doing this, don't get me wrong, but the situation is really not consistent with itself. i can unilaterally schedule a hearing. i can unilaterally ask a hearing be held sooner - which is a reschedule request, isn't it? and, i can even unilaterally cancel a hearing by not showing up. but, if i want to reschedule a hearing, i need to ask for consent.

sort of.

i could always cancel the hearing by not showing up, and then reschedule it later by reapplying, right? and, that's what i think i'm going to do...sort of....

i need to write this down because the second-hand smoke is affecting my ability to think clearly, right now, against my will. it's the perfect example of why i need out: i'm trying to carefully work through the logic of planning a move out properly, and i can't focus because i'm forcibly second-hand stoned. i can't be trying to work out recursion relations right now, but how about that? it's surreal, it really is. i'm too stoned to be able to focus on planning to escape from the drugs. fuck.

so, the reason i wanted to file the extension is so i could withhold rent on the 1st. it's just about optics, right? if i withhold rent on the 1st and show up to a hearing on the 5th, they can throw that at me, and i look like a bum. yeah, i'm going to explain the situation and keep paying rent if i have to, but it's better if i just put it off. and, even if i'm still stuck here at a hearing date in october, i can point out that i've paid rent since then, and will until i can plan an escape. at the least, i'm escaping the situation of suing somebody for damages days after i've withheld rent.

but, if i have to ask for consent, the logic of tiptoeing around the situation evaporates.

i have a showing across the street from their rental office tomorrow, so i'm wondering if it makes sense to leave them a letter when i'm there. the letter would say something like "in pursuant to the previous letter..", and lay out a request for consent to reschedule. it's just that i'm wondering if i may catch something over the next few days when everybody else is distracted. the apartment tomorrow looks a little small, but it's cheap - so, if it's big enough, it's good enough, if there aren't smokers (let's be realistic: there probably are). she didn't know, on the phone. then, i caught a standalone house for $600, which would be completely fucking perfect, but the idiot landlord only wants to rent to students, which makes no financial sense on her behalf. odsp is the most stable income in the city. why would you rent to some kids that could move out in october after flunking their midterms when you can get a longterm tenant on odsp? that's just dumb. really, really dumb.

but, it demonstrates the point: i could get lucky. i mean, you can't predict stupidity, but an ideal option just appeared and disappeared in front of me, right? if i can sign something for august 1st in the next ten days, i want to appear at that hearing on the 5th...

the reason i filed today was because i wanted to make sure the board had a week to process it, but it seems like it's only going to need 24-48 hours, if that. in fact, the form specifies 48 hours. so, i could have waited anyways - and probably should have. i may have been saved from a mistake, there.

hey, i'm largely winging this. i've never done this before. that's why clear thinking is so important.

i think i want to lay the situation out clearly.

if consent to reschedule is not granted, i'm going to unilaterally cancel the hearing and refile the same case the day of the previous hearing. i'll have it ready to go and stop at the office on the way home. so, the choices are that we can reschedule the existing hearing or we can start the process a second time. why bother denying consent, then?

well, the answer to that is that they could file an eviction notice the next day - but, if they do that, i'll carry through with the hearing. and, it wouldn't necessitate the need for costs, anyways.

and, if i'm going to give them this letter, i'd might as well wait until the very last minute, which would be when i don't pay my rent, rather than tomorrow afternoon. it may be a nice idea to think i can trick them into giving consent and then not pay rent, but i don't think i have the timelines - and i don't think that wrath is worth generating. i'm still a little apprehensive about an illegal eviction attempt.

but, what if i withhold rent on july 1st, and move august 1st? if i do that, i'll have at least $1200 for moving costs. i'll be broke, but at least i'll have a receipt to take to the court.

the flip side is that if i win money for a new couch & bed then i won't bother to move the ones i have, which would save me a lot on moving costs. i may even be able to try and sell them.

so, i don't want to give them anything until saturday.

and i'm not sure yet exactly what that should be.

it's either going to be a statement that i'm moving on august 1st, or it's going to be an attempt to strong-arm a rescheduling or it's going to be a statement that i've changed my mind and am ready to go for the fifth, in which case the judge will almost certainly reschedule.

yeah.

i'm glad that didn't work...that was a little premature...

i don't actually have to technically file until the 3rd.

now, here's an interesting grey area - what if i get consent to reschedule and change my mind before i file?

i want to specify that i'm not really acting in a shady manner, here. i'm trying to get out as soon as possible, and i'm going to eventually sue them for costs. these things are certain. and, so, to an extent, i'm acting in their interests, as well. what's less clear is timelines. and what i'm trying to avoid is a situation where i move before i'm ready, and just have to do it again.

i guess what i wanted to figure out is if i should make the request for consent tomorrow afternoon, and the answer is that i shouldn't. and, i shouldn't have tried to file today, either - that was premature on my behalf.

also, don't tell me smoking pot is "cool".

to begin with, that's wrong. it was never cool. it's not cool now. the beatniks were losers. the hippies were losers. and, the potheads of today are losers, too.

if your kids smoke pot, it's not because it's cool, it's because they're losers and you're either too out of touch or too lost in self-delusion to clue into it. don't fall into that trap.

but, even if it were true, that wouldn't make it ok - just as all the propaganda in the world from edward bernays doesn't make smoking cigarettes ok, either.

science-based policy is not about what's cool, it's about what's true.

i mean, say it how you want.

it's bad etiquette.

it's impolite.

it's a filthy habit....

...but, understand that this was the premise in the first place: that it's ok as long as you're not bothering anybody, and that once you start bothering people, it's not ok any more....

we need to uphold and maintain the idea that smoking pot is something you do away from other people.

the building i'm in right now is actually a good example.

i'm trying to escape a terrible situation with a government-protected drug addict ruining the entire building, who is being coddled by a property manager that seems to be her smoking buddy. but, the actual owner just declared the building non-smoking, and i've been told that the manager has been instructed to take advantage of the new lease requirements in not renting to smokers.

right now, these buildings are full of smokers. but, as tenancies open up, they're going to be pushed out - and it's going to be harder and harder for them to find a place to stay, while it's easier and easier for me to find a place to breathe.

the smokers will complain, of course. but, i think this is the correct rights balance: smokers should get used to a future where they need to start renting rooms in houses, or buying the houses themselves, because apartments are turning over on this.

and, why should a smoker be allowed to ruin everybody else's good time? it's 2018. we know with absolute certainty what smoking does to people's health. this is scientific fact. and, the premise of agitating for legalization has always been that it's harmless, and this does remain true, so long as the social stigma remains attached to it. for years, the argument was always "they're in a field over there, they're not harming anybody, they'll be gone in ten minutes, just leave them alone.". that argument simply does not transfer over, remotely, at all, to somebody that is sitting inside an apartment building smoking an ounce of pot day after day - that person is harming everybody stuck consuming their filth.

and, this is the literal definition of filth. you're just delusional to deny it.

if we want to transfer the argument over, it should only apply to people that own their own property - and smokers that want to rent should continue to go out in the field, where they're not bothering anybody, as that was the premise in the first place.

so, the longer i wait, the better my chances actually become.

i need a relatively big, non-smoking space for dirt cheap.

i simply can't fit my stuff in a small space, and i simply don't want to live with smokers.

and, i'm stuck here until it comes up.

that's reality...but, the lease changes might be opening up the market i want, too. we'll see.

that building i saw today might be very different six months from now, if they're serious about throwing the smokers out.

if i get into a bad situation, i may have to move into an office space, short term, which isn't as crazy as it sounds. i can claim it's a recording studio. could even get a small bar fridge. there are very, very cheap office spaces around with communal showers that i'm sure nobody else uses; the problem is i don't expect to be able to claim rent.

right now, i'm paying $700 for rent. $479 is listed as shelter, and then i have to pay $221 out of my other costs. if i can get an office space for ~$300, that would be the same thing as paying around $800 in rent, which is the absolute maximum i'm budgeting for. i'd no doubt have to leave my couch here. but, i'm not sure i can salvage it, anyways - the smoke coming in is really that filthy.

if it comes to that, i'll just lock myself inside somewhere for a winter and get as much work as i can done until i can get out.

hopefully, something comes up soon and i can get out fairly quickly, with costs.

so, it seems like i'm out of options for arranging an august 1st move in date for july 1st.

it's after 9:00 pm on june 25th and there are still listings coming up for july 1st. i need my deposit back if i'm going to move for august 1st. that's just how shit works - and i'll have to argue the point in court, if it comes to it.

i got a letter in the mail today telling me i can pick up the police reports that i filed in march. i'll need to use that as evidence for the eventual hearing.

and, tomorrow, i'm going to have to file the request to extend the court date until...i'm going to guess the earliest dates are in october. if it's denied, i'll plan to go to court on july 5th. if it's accepted, i'll withhold rent on the 1st, give them a letter indicating that i don't necessarily plan to move at the end of the month (and will resume normal payments until i move out, if i don't) and wing it from there.

i confirmed today that i'm going to lose my oesp credits when i move, so i'm better off ramping up the hydo than cutting it down. it's about $200 in credits, so that should be enough to get through as much of the last year of vlogs as i can. but, i'm going to catch up on the rebuild tonight instead - because if the request for the extension gets denied, i'll have to use that document to build a journal, by the 5th. i'll at least have several weeks to create vlogs, after that.

so, i'm probably not going to hit the july 1st deadline, but i might have the last year's worth of vlogs ready to publish by august 1st.

the smoke was not bad this evening, but it's gotten very bad over the last hour. hopefully, she's leaving, soon, for the night.

i don't want to drag this on - i want out. but, the reality is that my resources are limited, and there's nothing to gain by moving into another unit with the same set of problems - i'll just have to go through this all over again.

that unit is going to sit forever.

smokers are going to see the non-smoking listing and recoil. non-smokers are going to walk in and walk right out.

so, i walk up to the building and the first thing i see is a non-smoking sign - and at least 30 cigarette butts littered around in front of it, indicating two things:

1) there are many smokers in this building.
2) the rules don't appear to be being followed.

so, if the first thing i see is a bunch of butts in front of a non-smoking sign, how confident should i be that i'm going to keep the smoke out of the unit?

and, why bother advertising a unit as non-smoking when so many of your tenants are smokers?

so, i'm not impressed to begin with, to put it lightly.

i call the rental office and indicate that i had an appointment at 9:00.

"something changed over the weekend."

she then hung up on me. i call back...

"is the unit still available?"

she said to come back at 2:00.

i don't think i'm going to bother. again: it's a shame. it's a nice, older building. good location. but, full of filthy people...

so, i've rebuilt from july-october, 2013 this afternoon. october seemed unusually heavy, due to getting back on the internet after a two month layoff.

this is also an error-checking process, and i've updated a couple of little things.

i should probably try and get a few hours of sleep tonight, but she's home and blazing non-stop, as she does - just chain smoking one after another. and, i've been through this before. i went through it two weeks ago: i fall asleep in the smoke and then i can't get up until noon.

but, i have an appointment at 9:00 in the morning.

so, i'm tired, but i'm afraid that if i fall asleep, i'll end up too stoned (due to sleeping in the second hand marijuana smoke) to get up. and, as it is, i may very well walk in there with red eyes, and smelling like drugs. that doesn't help my chances in getting out of here, does it?

what a catastrophe.

what a fucking mess...

on twenty-seventh thought...

this catastrophe of an apartment is going to be a space solely of typing and writing.

i will not record here.

and, the alter-reality has advanced into the internet era, now.

so, let me set up the politics blog for the alter-reality, too and move forward as one after i move.

i actually do not expect this to take nearly as long.

there will be a third blog for music reviews, but i'm not touching that at all right now.

yeah.

on second thought, why don't i get that in order after i check the listings after lunch.

i'm also going to need to call the oesp tomorrow, and figure out what happens to these electrical credits.

if i have to use them before i move, i should get the other machine on compressing vlogs for the last year.

i wanted to to fix the other laptop and use it for a dedicated vlog machine, but, right now, that seems pretty distant, with all this chaos going on. i guess i could get these compressed and published for the first after all...even if it's just raw, for now....

i napped on friday evening and woke up friday night after she'd left to go where she goes and finished archiving the facebook page over night. that was planned; it's not acceptable, but it's pragmatic on my behalf to try to schedule work periods for when she's gone. she was smoking all day saturday, but the steam was actually effective in keeping the air clear, and i actually had what was a really long, nice day - not crashing until late on saturday night. i'm at least happy that i had a productive day...

the smell today is mostly of stale tobacco, from who knows where in the building or even outside. but, she is smoking down there...so i don't have the option to close the window....i'm just steaming out as much as i can....

the music vlog is now completely backed up in the master archive. so, the next thing to do should be to distribute the material in the master archive back out to the two vlogs, and also to the music master list. but, i am also going to need to use the master archive to build the journal for the court date, whenever it is. ideally, i'd be able to do that after i've weaved everything together...

i'm going to get something to eat, and then check listings. if i see some more leads for august, i'll wait for the rescheduling request; if not, i'll put that in on monday, after the showing in the morning (which i expect to be a bust, but need to try...). i'm going to get back to what i was doing for the night, and could conceivably get most of the way through the summer done. i'll know in a few days if i need to fast forward or not.

so, the next section to rebuild is from june 19th to dec 8th - and that is the last rebuild. it's all archiving after that.

lastly, i suppose that it would be prudent to run the master list through an error-checking process before i start using it to publish liner notes.

when? before i move. hopefully.

"but, when am i going to write new music?"

i'm probably not going to do that at all.

i'm trying to finish my incomplete works. when that is complete, i will likely focus full time on my writing. when looked at more broadly, my musical career will end around 2011 or so.

there may be loose ends; i may change my mind. but, my reaction to the world around me, as an adult, is through the written word.

if that isn't obvious.

at some point it will click: this drug addict is costing me a lot of money.

in this circumstance, i have to hope the landlord eventually takes it out on the pothead; all i can do is extract damages for negligence.

and, i'm sure he will, eventually.

i mean, if the action was meant to punish this woman for her actions, and it was, then i'm certain she paid dearly, in the end - and there was really nothing i could have done to hold the space, anyways.

i just want to clarify a point, as i'm backing up the music vlog...

the last time i had an argument with a landlord, i put a case for thousands in claims on hold, was admittedly outmanoeuvred (albeit trivially, from my perspective, as i could not have claimed any winnings and there could not have been another outcome) and ended up getting evicted. so, i lost pretty badly, right?

well, it must have cost her at least five thousand dollars to evict me - plus whatever money flowed around under the table (i'm pretty sure some did.). added up, i may have spent $20 on printing costs. maybe. and, any money i would have "won" would have had to be returned to disability. i lost a plum spot, but i didn't lose any money on the move. further, it did become clear over time that she wanted me out, regardless - there wasn't anything i could have done to reverse the situation. even if i had won the case, she would have kept trying to get me out. i was fighting it on the hope that she was planning to sell..

i was clear in all of my communications with her that the purpose of the fines was to act as a disincentive for the continuing harassment, not as a means for me to make money from the situation. i even offered to donate the money to charity, at one point. what i wanted was for the harassment to stop. so, i was actually using the money as leverage - i didn't expect to ever see it. and, the other option was to just sit there and let them harass me, which was unacceptable...

but, the reality is that i didn't incur any losses, so i didn't have any grounds for action.

this is a different scenario. i might not be able to keep rent money, but i should be able to keep damages, and i should be able to apply moving costs. so, this case is worth fighting, and i intend to follow through one way or another.

so, i've got the facebook part of this updated now, and it shouldn't have taken nearly that long, but i was occupied by other things, too.

the next task will be to copy the rest of the music vlog into the master document.

i'm getting there.

really.

it's the society that is sick.

i get it.

that said, i could look at it the other way, too - i should be excited if i can find a landlord with the foresight to advertise with sufficient notice.

it's june 22nd, and there are still listings coming up for july 1st.

and, i've been told by one property owner that if i want to apply for august 1st then they won't take my application until after july 1st. of course, they are requesting first & last.

so, what is the expectation, then? are they expecting to rent solely to people moving away from parents? from break-ups? from eviction notices?

or is this just a good example of the short-sightedness of capitalism & the self-destructiveness of accumulation?

i don't know, but i'm learning the lesson: by following the rules, i'm getting burned.

you'd think they'd stop making the same mistakes and begin to realize that if they want a good tenant then they should advertise a month ahead, but that's going to mean losing a month's rent - or taking a bad tenant to court. so, the bad tenants set the rules, and the property owners follow along, out of greed. what ought to be a way to determine a stable tenant from an unstable one gets abolished; the idea may have even been largely forgotten. the market here operates entirely on the last minute. people live week-to-week. tenants get evicted mid-month, and move in on random dates. it's complete anarchy in living arrangements...

allowing my landlord to hold last month's rent, then, puts me at a disadvantage, as i can't compete with people getting evicted, or students saving up deposits. or, not unless i take matters into my own hands.

it needs to be one way or the other: if we're going to have first & last, it ought to be enforced. and, if we're not going to enforce it, we ought to get rid of it.

i can't afford to give my landlord a $700 gift for negligence in maintaining the unit. sorry. so, i'm going to have to take a bold stand, and argue the point in court: in order to be a serious participant in the market, i need to reclaim my last month's rent deposit. otherwise, i'll be here forever.

i'd suggest that the landlord write her mpp a letter requesting stronger enforcement of this rule on the market. so long as i continue paying rent regularly, such an action should not affect my credit.

the air quality in here tonight was horrific, and i spent the evening sleeping as a result. i think i'm alert, now, and ready to get some work done over the quiet hours of the night & the morning.

it took a few hours to clear my sd card off. i'm clearly not going to make the july 1st deadline, but i am still vlogging.

i'm going to have to make some calls in the morning, but the non-response from my landlord regarding july's rent suggests to me that it isn't coming - which means i won't be able to move on july 1st, even if i find the perfect spot. but, it also means i might have to withhold rent, without a clear intent to move.

there is some possibility that i could convince somebody to let me sign a lease for august 1st on an empty unit, but it's not likely.

the way this is supposed to work is that you're supposed to sign a lease for the next month, and then use your last month's rent for it. that way, everybody has proper notice and can plan. but, this doesn't seem to be reality at all. the units on the market are either available immediately or for july 1st. i have every reason to think that i'm going to run into the same problem next month - meaning that, by being responsible and following the rules, i'm just going to get burned. i could even be in a situation where the unit sits empty because the landlord would rather gamble, and we all lose - stupid, sure, but that's capitalism for you.

so as long as i'm not staying here for free at any point, i think that, if the situation comes in front of a judge, i'll be able to win the argument. and, if i can't find anything for august, i may even be able to get away with keeping august's rent for moving costs, so long as the issue eventually comes up in court.

but, keeping july's rent means i'm going to have to fight the case on the 5th, unless i fax in a request to move it forward.

yeah...

i'll think this through properly for monday.

right now, i want to try and finish what i didn't finish yesterday.

how is the air quality in here? well, the pothead appears to have reappeared, unfortunately. i'm feeling tired and drained from it, it always hits you between the eyes, but i'm hoping i can blow it off for a few hours at least.

i'd like tonight to be an all-nighter, to get these loose ends tied up early in the morning and to sleep next in the afternoon. we'll see if i can struggle through the drugs and accomplish this or not.