The Year of Hell - Part V - Promises, Promises...

Greetings and Salutations, Brave Reader!

In previous entries of this series I've talked about where I was living prior to July 12'th, 2022, the subsequent fire that forced me from my home of 25+ years as well as the immediate aftermath of that traumatic event. Last time I warned y'all about how building owners have zero responsibilities to help tenants after a disaster...even if they housed dangerous people.    

In the midst of all this chaos was one mental oasis: the promised support of my insurance company. Within a day, they'd put me in contact with the head of the removal and warehousing team, who from this point on I'll be referring to as "Yahoo Calamity"...for reasons that will sadly become painfully obvious.    

I was still pretty stressed out and shell-shocked when I spoke to Ms. Calamity the day after the fire. At that time, her introductory message to me was incredibly hopefully...like a balm for my ragged soul: 

"We store all your salvageable items once processed and cleaned at our large processing facility. We return back to you once ready and repairs to the structure are completed. Hang in there, your (sic) in good hands for your contents.”

Given the large amount of "handle-with-care" valuables that I own (collectibles, antiques and artwork), I felt compelled to ask how the recovery team treats such delicate things. This was Yahoo’s reply:

“We specialize in all contents. We have a (sic) electronic division, art work, textiles, hard contents and soft textiles.

“Try not to stress. Your contents will be handled with care when we start the ‘pack out’ and be put back to same spot with the ‘pack back’.

“Also anything that is non-restorable we supply a detailed list to you and your insurance company so they can price and reimburse you for any damaged items: losses.”

Encouraged and reassured by this, I slept relatively soundly that night, despite being faced with imminent homelessness. We were approaching the weekend, a weekend - I'll remind you - that was smack-dab in the middle of tourist season when COVID restrictions were finally loosening up. The Chateau Bedford staff wouldn't be able to Tetris my reservations for much longer and every single hotel in the immediate area was already booked solid.

That's when I remembered that my parents would often stay in residence at Mount Saint Vincent University whenever they came to Halifax to visit me. In a Hail Mary play, I showed up on their doorstep with all pf my earthly belongings in tow and, after spinning my sob story, they were able to accommodate me. 

I gotta say, the space they gave me was quite generous:

Hell, just seeing this thing strapped to the wall made me feel better: 

Despite the fact that my insurance company had given me a $12,000.00 resettlement fee, I knew that it wasn't going to last very long. This was made abundantly clear when I checked out of the hotel and paid a whopping $701.46 for only two nights accommodations. And for a tiny room that looks like this:

I mean, it's nice and all...but it's not exactly the Ritz Carlton, is it?

On the 14’th we got special dispensation to be on site to recover certain items. By that time, a security guard had already been assigned, and traffic into and through that section of the building was being closely monitored. We were also instructed to keep our doors locked at all times when unoccupied...a directive we followed religiously.

During this time I took considerable video and stills of the apartment. Despite the fact that the stairwell (which we'd fled down two nights ago) looked like this:

...my game room actually looked reasonably intact:  

In fact, if not for some pronounced water damage in the ceiling, things actually didn't look too bad:

Now, when I say "water damage" I wasn't just whistling Dixie. Anyone who follows my other blog knows that I'm a huge board game nut and, at the time of the fire, I had about 130 of the damned things. And, as any board game nerd worth their salt knows, cardboard and water definitely don't mix.

Even though my game library hadn't been noticeably soaked when the apartment above was flooded, the water-logged ceiling and regular ol' summer humidity was causing moisture levels to spike to potentially destructive levels.

If I didn't get my stuff out of there ASAP, the threat of box fart would be absolutely nothing compared to every game turning into a poison gas spore whenever I lifted the lid.

As such, I expressed my concern to Yahoo before bedding down for the night...concerns that were actually addressed on the morning of the 15'th:

“Good morning. Just touching base with you to let you know that we have been notified that the building has been released.  I’ve been in communication with the superintendent... and we will start our process on Monday morning.”

At this point I told her that I'd been given access to the unit on the previous day just to grab some essentials. I also told her that the removal team had to put priority on saving our plants and fish. This was her reply:

“Ok, I will note your file that you grabbed rush yourselves. We will have access Monday for the pack-out and notable items of urgency  are plants and fish for getting restored and in a safe place.”

Fast forward to July 18. Once again I was granted closely-monitored access to the unit. Since I was still homeless for the foreseeable future, I thought I had to pack light. As such,  I didn't want to salvage any framed art, jewelry or collectibles from the unit. Where would I put it? Plus, the email updates from the salvage team and the presence of security on sight made me feel like my things weren't in any immediate danger. 

That same day I got the following question from Yahoo:

“My project manager (let's call her, um...'Dixie', I guess?) is on site at the units today assessing. To confirm you do not need any rush now? I want to be sure to advise correctly to my PM.”

After confirming that I needed no rush items, she replied:

“Wonderful, thank you for clarifying. I am passing along to my Project manager Dixie right now. If you need anything please do not hesitate to reach out. We are actively working to get all restorable out of the affected units within a few days.”

On July 19, I got the following message from Yahoo:

“Good morning. We are on site today again. I confirmed with your adjuster this morning (that) he doesn’t want us to touch the fish. It’s a liability, such as a pet dog or cat, (so) it’s up to the insured to go retrieve the live fish and we will deal with the tank. I hope this is ok. I just confirmed with your adjuster, so I wanted to pass this along right away.”

Even though I fully expected the 18'th to be my last one on site, I rushed in to dismantle the aquarium. Thanks to the intervention of some friends, the fish were saved! Thanks again to Alison and Randy!!!

I took advantage of this unexpected chance to take more video and stills. For those keeping score at home: as of 1:30 pm that day, everything seemed to be in place and accounted for.

From Yahoo later on the 19'th:

“They took all clothing out yesterday. Now focussing (s.p.) on boxing any restorable items.”

In hindsight, I guess I could have personally done more to safeguard the more - shall we  say - traditional valuables in the apartment, things like jewelry and artwork. Who knows...maybe I was still in a state of shock? I can see now that I had tunnel vision when it came to protecting my beloved collectibles, but I also felt as if I could trust both the building security as well as the seemingly-sincere efforts of the recovery team. 

This was no more evident in Yahoo's next message to me:

“You can trust you (NOTE: I think she meant to say 'us.' Maybe this was a Freudian slip). (You) are in very good hands. We are aiming to have everything out by Friday.”

That same day I met with Dixie to try and put my borderline-OCD / superficial hoarding behavior into context. She seemed sympathetic and accommodating, writing the following to me later on that day:

“Was nice to meet you and have a conversation on things important to you. Any questions just message or call me. I'm starting your place tomorrow so if u (sic) have any questions or anything u (sic) can reach  me here or at your apartment. Have a good night.”

Given all of these recent assurances, I actually did sleep well that night. On the morning of July 20'th I woke up to the following note from Dixie: 

“Just an update: your living room and kitchen is done. Just a couple odds and ends - work in progress.” 

Messages like this did wonders to assuage my shattered nerves, but it did little to divert the Mack Truck of reality swiftly bearing down on me. Even though I'd found more affordable housing at The Mount...my extended stay was just as tenuous as it was back at the hotel. Reservations were arriving constantly and the kind folks at the front desk were quickly running out of places to store me.

And that's when a major miracle happened. Immediately after the fire my superintendent started making these cagey comments to the effect of "I may know someone with a basement apartment. Stay tuned!"

With the last possible available night in residence being July 25'th, I soon found myself  "gently" pressing him on the subject.

"Oh, yeah!" he said. "You're good to go...I just had to clear it with the wife! You can move in on Saturday!"

And that's how I came to stay in my superintendent's basement apartment on July 23'rd, 2022...eleven days after the fire drove me out of my long-term abode.

Oh, and for the record, my final accommodations bill for the Mount was $1213.01.

Next time: As I learn to live in a well-appointed Hobbit hole, I start to suspect that the recovery and warehousing team that I entrusted with all of my earthly belongings may not be quite as competent as I originally hoped.   

EPIC: I gotta thanks Mount Saint Vincent University for absolutely saving my bacon during this rough time.  

FAIL: Due to climate change, disaster claims have quadrupled over the past 15 years!  

 

   

The Year of Hell - Part IV - Know Your Rights...Or Lack Thereof

Welcome Back to the Galactic Shit Show, Persistent Readers!

In previous entries of this series I've talked about my prior residence of 25+ years, the fire that drove me out of there back on July 12'th 2022 and the scary days of uncertainty, shock and fear that followed.  

But, before I go any further with this story, I feel compelled to talk about something that happened to me back on July 14'th, literally two days after the fire. On that day, while blearily trying to salvage whatever scant belongings I might need from my ruined apartment, I was required to sign this charming document:

At the time, I signed it with scarcely a second thought. Why? Because:

1. It was presented to me by a trusted source.
2. It was self-evident that the fire had indeed rendered my apartment uninhabitable.
3. I was still in shock.
4. I thought it was standard practice.
5. I wanted my damage deposit back.
6. It was my first fire. #noobmove

But, if I had my time back (or any time at all for that matter) I would have consulted with a lawyer before I even looked at this fucking rag. Because, by signing it, I pretty much pissed away every single earthly right I had to the place where I'd lived for over a quarter of a century.

I'm not going to bury my lead for this story quite yet. Just suffice to say that I received a piece of news on August 3'rd of 2022 that made me feel like a fool for signing this document so cavalierly. To the point where I sought out help from provincial Legal Aid at the end of October. 

Here what they told me:

"Thank you for your email. Legal Info Nova Scotia is a non-profit charity.  We provide information about the law in Nova Scotia.  We do not give legal advice. Legal advice would include recommending the best option for you - telling you what you should do. Only a lawyer can do that.  The following general legal information may help, although we're afraid we don't have good news. 

"In some cases a fire (and the associated clean up and repair) can be so severe that it has the effect of rendering the entire building uninhabitable. It sounds like that might have been what happened in your situation. In those scenarios the landlord is allowed to evict all of the tenants by giving them Notice to Quit in Form F. That has the effect of ending all of the tenancies. You didn't mention whether your landlord provided you with notice in Form F, but even if they didn't it would be too late to contest that eviction as it has been greater than 12 months since it happened (that is the limitation period for contesting an eviction at Residential Tenancies). 

"After a fire the landlord is not obligated to relocate the displaced tenants. If the landlord does relocate tenants to other units in other buildings then those would be new leases with new terms. The rules about rent increases wouldn't apply to those new leases and so the new lease terms could include a new, higher rent and the new leases could be fixed-term, rather than periodic. 

"Overall, although you obviously have a very sympathetic situation, it wasn't actually clear from your email that your landlord has done anything that you could successfully dispute at Residential Tenancies." 

Look, I'm not one to overshare on social media. If I share anything at all, it's usually about my interests, never personal details.

So consider yourself forewarned: I will definitely be oversharing during this series, as well as for a one-shot entry dealing with a completely separate (though no less infuriating) issue. 

I'm not doing this for attention: I'm writing this as a warning. A warning to let you know that your life can be annihilated within the span of a few short hours due to the reckless act of some crazed psycho. 

And, despite the fact that you have clearly been victimized, people who have the power to help you will still do the wrong thing. People will take advantage of the situation and of you. You will discover - the hard way - that the rules aren't in place to help you...they're in place to help rich people get richer.

Sadly, there seems to be precious little empathy, recourse, safeguards or compensation in our society to assist people who have been wronged by circumstance, even if only to  restore the status quo.

Apologies in advance. I didn't want to be the one to tell you these things.

EPIC: More sound legal advice if your find your tenancy interrupted by fire. 

FAIL: Property owners like this galloping prick don't even need fire or similar catastrophe as an excuse to reno-evict people; he just wears his greed like a proud badge. But the good news is that people are fighting back! 

The Year of Hell - Part III - Cast Adrift

Greetings and Felicitations, Persistent Reader.

In the two previous installments, I talked about how I was contentedly living in the same modest apartment building for over 25 years, how the quality of tenants in the buildings started to go downhill circa 2015 and how a resulting fire drove me from my home on July 12'th 2022 at 2 AM in the morning.

So, what you do when you're rendered homeless by fire? Well, if you're Canadian, you retreat to the closest Tim Hortons that's open. 

While distractedly munching on an egg-and-cheese-on-a-biscuit breakfast sammich and gingerly sipping on a cup of coffee hotter than the surface of Venus, I felt an odd rush of exhilaration. Let me tell ya, there's nothing like a near-death experience to activate your twisted sense of humor. Witness this image I sent to friends upon first spotting the Tim Horton's fireplace:

And then there's this l'il chestnut:

For the record, the irony isn't lost on me that I was trying to sell the Flashpoint: Fire Rescue board game at the time. Huh. 

Okay, so, what's the second thing Canadians do when they're rendered homeless by fire? Well, they call their insurance company! 

You have insurance, right? Riiiight???

It's my understanding that none of the three people directly affected by the fire that night had tenant insurance. None!

For the record, I feel a modicum of sympathy for two out of these three people, but the S.O.B. who provoked the attack on our building can get heckin' WRECKED for all I care. Dirtbag. 

Side note, since that night, I've been consistently stunned by the number of people - mainly Millennial and Gen Z folks - who tell me that they don't have tenant insurance. But, then again, a lot of these folks are being crushed under a tsunami of debt and / or they're hideously underpaid. Faced with these "non future me" challenges, it makes sense that they opt to sink their fleeting funds into less hypothetical and nebulous threats, like staving off malnutrition or exposure.  

But, listen up, kids, I'm here to tell you right now: YOU NEED TO GET TENANT INSURANCE. LIKE RIGHT NOW. I promise...I will present Exhibits "A" through "Z" shortly. 

With my brain now approaching the consistency of cottage cheese, it took forever for me to track down the contact number for my insurance company and call them from my car. Suddenly my stomach turned to ice and my testicles shrunk up into my body cavity as a horrible thought crossed my mind.

'What if they can't help me?'

Now, I don't know about you folks, but I don't call up my insurance company every few  months for a casual chin-wag. I have an auto-payment system set up on my credit card, they take money away from me every month, and society tells me that this transaction should pay for some semblance of mental peace. 

But, since I was raised by a pessimist and I always look at every glass as half-empty, I was fully expecting the conversation with the insurance agent to sound like the following Monty Python skit:

Ergo:

ME: I'm sorry, did you just say that you "aren't satisfied with the grounds of my claim"?

INSURANCE AGENT: Yes, well, Mr. Pretty, in your policy...one moment please. Ah, yes, here it is...in your policy, specifically in section four, paragraph eight, sub-section twelve, it unequivocally states that any claim you make will be ignored.

ME: What?!?

INSURANCE AGENT: Yes, well, you opted for the 'cold shoulder' policy which, honestly, is a great value if you never make a claim, buuuuut you had to go ahead and make one, so here we are...

ME: Oh, dear.

Needless to say, the brief wait to speak to an agent felt like the longest five minutes of my entire life.

Fortunately, my fears were soon assuaged and the agent on the other line was incredibly helpful and reassuring. I soon discovered why I'd been paying into an insurance policy for all these years. I was told, in no uncertain terms, that the following would happen over the next few days and months:

• I was given a $12,000.00 relocation budget. I just had to save my receipts to claim any expenses, such as food, accommodations and - presumably - counseling. 
• An insurance adjuster would be dispatched to the site. They would appraise the damage and, if required, dispatch a recovery team who would be tasked to remove all salvageable items and warehouse it. 
• At the warehouse, everything would be inspected and we'd be compensated for everything that is non-recoverable.
• My stuff would be warehoused until the unit was repaired, then shipped back to me and put into place.

This provided just enough mental solace for me to focus on the next step: temporary shelter.

Unfortunately, this turned out to be more difficult than I expected. 

Y'see, this all happened back on July 12'th, 2022, smack dab in the middle of tourist season, with COVID restrictions finally loosening. After calling around to a bunch of places, I quickly realized that there weren't many, if any, options.

On the verge of growing despondent, I decided a more direct approach was in order. Barely dressed, still jittery from shock, sleep-deprived and smelling like a pile of half-melted spatulas on a wood chip barbecue, I stumbled into the Château Bedford Hotel & Suites and explained my plight. By some miracle, the lovely staff took pity on me and they were able to accommodate my request. I finally had a place to sleep, at least for one night.

After a fitful nap and a shower, I decided to return to the scene of the crime around 5 pm that evening. This probably wasn't the smartest idea.

Upon arrival, I immediately spotted the daughter of the building owner, so I decided to bend her ear. During the resulting conversation, my sleep-deprived brain managed to retain the following:

• She seemed genuinely upset by what had happened.
• She pledged to try and get us into alternate accommodations as soon as possible. 
• She feared that the damage was so extensive that it would take at least six months to a year to repair everything.

After this last, genuinely upsetting little piece of trivia, I spirited off to work. Now, I already hear you asking 'Work?!? You went to WORK??? Why???' 

Well, I have three rebuttals to that:

• I'm fucking Gen X, of course I went to work! I'm programmed to go to work if 35% of my body is missing. 
• $12,000.00 might seem like a lot, but with a hotel costing over $140.00 a night, I knew that this money wouldn't last very long. 
• I actually relished the diversion that work provided that evening.

Despite the spiritual balm provided by that last point, I was also duly distracted at times. 

'Six months to a year without a home?' I thought to myself. 

I literally had only one night booked in a hotel! With waaaaaay too many people in the city right now and rental vacancy rates hovering close to 0%, where the hell was I going to go?

NEXT UP: We survey the damage, rescue some fish and rely on the kindness of (relative) strangers. 

EPIC:  I can't stress this enough people!      

FAIL: The depressing reality. 

The Year of Hell - Part II - Up In Smoke

As a weird shut-in kid who was practically raised by movies and television, I always looked at apartment living as kinda cool and vaguely anti-establishment. Consider the examples set forth in such real-life fare as WKRP in Cincinnati, How I Met Your Mother, Friends, Sex in the City, The Jeffersons, Seinfeld, Frasier, Big Bang Theory, and Rosemary's Baby. 

Um, okay...well, maybe scratch that last one. Though, you know, if the rent was reasonable enough, I'd be totally cool if my neighbors were all secret Satanists. As long as they weren't also business executives and corporate lawyers, we're gravy.    

Oh. Whoops...spoiler alert!  

Anyhoo, beyond these frivolous motivations, there were a few more realistic ones. Even at the height of my economic earnings, the only way I could really afford a house is if it was  in the boonies, about thirty to forty clicks away from whatever tenuous place of employment I was calling a "career" at that point. As a young buck from a small town, I didn't want to live in some remote, cut-and-paste suburban hell! I wanted to be in THE BIG CITY, (reasonably close to) downtown. You know, where all the action was!   

Growing up, I also saw my parents periodically clobbered by the sort of unexpected   expenses that only home ownership can provide. Need a new roof? Cracked foundation? Basement flooded? Well, say goodbye to five to ten thousand dollars of your savings, you starry-eyed optimist, you!

Oh, and snow. I don't wanna fookin' shovel snow.  

Content in the knowledge that I wasn't going to have to re-shingle or shovel anything anytime soon, I settled into a contented snooze late on July 11'th. I was only asleep for about an hour or two before the fire alarm went off. 

Now, if you've either lived in a university dorm or in an apartment building, you know to  completely ignore these things. They randomly go off so often it ends up being the fire safety equivalent of the The Boy Who Cried Wolf. So, unless it keeps clanging away for a good ten to fifteen minutes or you start smell smoke or you look down and notice that your genitals are on fire, you generally turn a blind ear to that cacophonous shit.

That night was like any other night. In reaction to this angry, persistent false alarm, I just groaned, looked around, muttered in frustration...and then promptly put my head back down on the pillow.

That is until the banging on the door started.   

 "GET OUT!!! GET THE FUCK OUT!!! THE FUCKING BUILDING IS REALLY ON FIRE!!! GET OUT!!!"

Like a cat roused by pouring (purring?) scalding water on its ass, I went from a reclining position to standing bolt upright in 2.6 milliseconds. 

ACTUAL FOOTAGE OF ME ON THE NIGHT OF THE FIRE

Oh, confession time: I've never been one to wear Ward Cleaver-style pajamas to bed (or anything for that matter), so my first inclination was to cover myself up as best I could. 

'KEYS! WALLET! CELLPHONE!' my barely-conscious brain barked at me. Even though I usually kept all of this stuff together in one place, my "decapitated chicken" impression was well on point that night. A renewed volley of fists on the door nearly caused me to jump out of my finally-covered skin.

"GET OUT!!! GET THE FUCK OUT...NOW!!!"

I needed no other encouragement. I tore open the door and was immediately hit with a horrific stench of smoke and a minor stampede of my fellow somnambulistic residents.

A quick word about the smoke: it smelled like a the contents of a fireplace had spilled out of onto the floor if a Barbie factory. Hey, if in a few years I come down with a pesky case of black lung, look no further for the culprit...just sayin'. 

As I stumbled out my front door, I could finally see who our guardian angel was: Gabrielle, who had thankfully replaced Mr. Mail Order Bride across the hall from us a few years back. Instead of dragging as much of her stuff out of her burning apartment as she could lug, she'd taken it upon herself to rouse and evacuate as many of her neighbors as possible. Bless her heart.        

Mercifully, as soon walk out my front door and turn ninety degrees to the right, my nose is practically touching the exit to the side stairwell. As I whipped it open and stumbled down the steps, I distinctly remember someone standing in the lobby shouting at the escapees.

"DO YOU HAVE PETS??? DON'T FORGET YOUR PETS!!!"

'I don't recognize you,' my unconscious brain mumbled at me as we vomited out into the side parking lot. Immediately, my still-dulled consciousness was drawn to the side of the building closest to me, which was engulfed in a wall of flame. 

Ever sit too close to a campfire and immediately realize that you done fucked up? Well, take that to the power of ten and you'll know the heat I felt that night. 

The other thing I can't do justice to is the sound. It was like a ravenous, crackling roar, implacable and all-consuming. It sounded like something otherworldly, nightmare fuel. I'm telling you, there's a reason why the Greeks considered the element of fire to be equal parts destructive and intelligent.    

I can't describe the gut-wrenching horror of seeing your home on fire. Your primitive lizard brain immediately tells your body to flee, post-haste, or just freeze up like a deer in headlights. Thankfully, someone infinitely smarter than me suggested that we move the car out of the side parking lot to ensure we didn't get trapped behind a bunch of emergency vehicles. After re-positioning to a side street, we watched with dread as the flames grew increasingly ravenous.

I didn't take any video during those first ten to fifteen frantic minutes. Partly because I was having a really hard time dealing with reality, and also because the whole situation felt, well, embarrassing. Given the human detritus that the building owners had been letting in lately, a part of me wasn't surprised that this was happening. And, as such, I didn't want to document this abject humiliation, the culmination of all my prescient fears.

In reality, the fire crews arrived blindingly fast but, to my shell-shocked brain, it felt like an eternity. The truth of the matter is, if they'd gotten there any later, the fire probably would have reached the roof. And, given the fact that the building was a wood-heavy structure built in the 60's or 70's, I'm convinced the entire edifice would have foundered if that had happened. And if you don't believe me, just check out the EPIC at the end of this post.  

As soon as the fire crews arrived, I finally gained enough presence of mind to start taking some video. Even in my dumbfounded state, I was pretty impressed by how quickly they brought the blaze under control.

It's so strange for me to watch this now. Taken at 1:55 am, you can see that the ground floor unit is still completely engulfed in flames. There's a fire engine already on site, with more approaching sirens wailing away in the distance. 

I would love to know the identity of the people milling around out front in this video. Could the person responsible for the fire be somewhere in this shot, perhaps chowing down on a big ol' bowl of regretti spaghetti? Also note that someone runs in from the right and approaches the occupants of a car parked directly across from the burning unit. Is that the wayward occupant of said unit? To this day I still have a million questions...and no source for answers. 

At the very end of that segment you can see the firemen (firefolks?) repositioning the hoses and getting ready to soak the same patio where the fire started, which you can see in this next clip, taken one minute later. Note that a second fire engine is now on the scene.

In this third clip (taken at 2:29 am) you can really see the scale of the response. By then there were no less than four vehicles on Braeside. Clearly concerned about possible hot spots in the attic, the fire fighters ensconced in the side parking lot prepares to access the roof. 

How they did that caught me completely by surprise: they actually used a chainsaw to cut a phreakin' hole in the eave of the building! 

This next photo is of particular interest to me. Can someone in the know tell me what's going on here? Are they looking for hot spots? Is this evidence that an investigation of the fire was already well underway? I have no clue.

Taken at 3:54 in the morning, this next clip shows our street completely cordoned off and choked by an entire fleet of emergency vehicles:

Then, finally, there's this clip from a minute later, which shows the fire crew finishing its thorough soak of the attic.

And what did we do while we watched our homes go up in smoke? Well, we... 

• Gossiped with our across-the-hall neighbor Gabrielle about how the fire started and why. I have plenty of thoughts about that, but I gotta keep it to myself right now. At least for the time being.
• Tried to stay warm. Even though it was a night in July, it was still pretty cold.
• Tried to stay hydrated. At one point, Gabrielle's partner materialized from out of no-where, distributing well-appreciated bottles of water. Thanks, my dude. 
• Considered hanging out in bus Metro Transit had parked on Lacewood drive to act as temporary shelter. I hate to sound ungrateful, but since I despise doing that at the best of times, I opted instead to alternately freeze my ass off outside or huddle in the car for hours on end.
• Tried to get some information from the cops, but they were all universally unsympathetic, cocky and / or surly. Not sure if this is relevant, but the average age of these guys looked to be about sixteen to seventeen years old. One cop looked so young I had to resist the urge to put him over my shoulder and burp him. But I didn't cuz dat bebe was packing HEAT. 

I also spoke to our neighbor who lived above us. Picture Santa Claus if ol' Saint Nick was from the Irish Loop in Newfoundland. Within seconds, I regretted talking to him because his words cut me to quick.

"OH, SHE'S GONE, B'Y," he lamented, pulling absolutely zero punches when it came to my visibly-fragile mental state. "DIDJA SEE IT? MY SON, THEY SOAKED THAT FRIGGIN' ATTIC! EVERYTHING'S GONNA BE FLOODED! THE ARSE IS BLOWN RIGHT OUTTA 'ER!"

That may indeed have been the case with Santa's digs but, when the fire department graciously let us back into the building later that night, we felt the tiniest flutter of hope. My apartment actually didn't look all that bad. Granted, in the half-light, I could see some pretty sizable dark spots in the ceiling and water was pooled in the entrance, the kitchen, the dining room and the hall leading to the bathroom. But, from what I could tell, most of my collectibles, including hundreds of games, toys, movies, books and whatnot, looked reasonably intact. Was this a miracle?  

"You know, you might have gotten off lucky," one of the firemen observed as he escorted us around.

After gathering up some key valuables and enough clothing and supplies to keep us sustained for the foreseeable future, we were asked to evacuate for the second time that night. But this time we had no idea when, or if, we'd ever be allowed back in.

That's when an even more disconcerting thought barged into my brain. 

You are homeless.  

Next time: as the initial shock wears off, shelter becomes the main consideration. But where do you go when COVID restrictions are lifting in two years and there's literally no room at the inn?      

 
EPIC: The fire was reported in a bunch of media releases, including CTV, Saltwire and CityNews. The best take-away, by far, from all of these articles is the following quote:

“Crews arrived and found the east end of the building was well-involved in flames,” explained district chief Pat Kline. “They got a fast knockdown on the main bulk of the fire, it did extend into the roof and was a little bit of extra work.

“The first couple of crews did an incredible job stopping it or we could have easily lost the whole building.” 

 

FAIL: The worst thing about apartment living: you can be a model tenant but you have no sweet clue what kind of morons you're sharing a roof with. As George Carlin famously said: “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.”

   

The Year of Hell - Part I - The Coming Storm

Howdy, strangers!

Been awhile! Howzit hangin'? 

Sorry I've been a negligent blogger. I've been a bit distracted lately. But, hey, I'm back! Back again! Davey's back...tell a friend!

♫♪Guess who's back...guess who's back...guess who's back...♫♪ 

Sorry, sorry...I'll behave. 

So, for those of you keeping score at home, I fired up this Emblogification Capture Device waaaaay back in April of 2010 to help me through a rough patch. I'd just left a lucrative, but soul-destroying, job that was making me feel as if I was dying inside and frittering my time away while doing it. Armed with a nest egg of "fuck you" money, I quit that pointless toil and struck out on my own in a GRAND EXPERIMENT.

At that time, I was feeling pretty sanguine about my future. Over the next four years, I used this space to develop my writing and editing skills, cheer-lead the publication of my first novel, explore opportunities in the local film community and generally keep my morale up. The end goal of this GRAND EXPERIMENT was always the same: to get paid to write and / or edit. 

Slowly but surely opportunities presented themselves to me. In 2013, I started a part-time job that was incredibly fulfilling, but also woefully non-lucrative. In 2016, I started to get freelance writing gigs and, since then, I've written over forty articles for a variety of sources. Then, in May of 2019, I became a staff editor for a small publishing house in Ontario.

With that, I considered the mission of Ye Olde Emblogification Capture Device to be largely complete. This blog went to fallow and I switched my focus to more immediate things that. Like y'know, making money.

Behind the scenes, the thing that really sustained me during this GRAND EXPERIMENT was my miraculous living situation. For over twenty-five years, I've lived in the same place and, during that time, it became a magical realm frozen in time. As a model tenant, the price for my two bedroom apartment never rose above $840.00 a month. 

When I first moved in there, it was a quiet little place, mainly inhabited by senior citizens. In the mid 90's I fled a louder, noisier chicken coop of a building and put my best foot forward to move into my current place. I actually had to undergo an interview with the family who owned the building back then and, to ensure a good impression, I dressed up and constantly underscored much how I wanted a "quiet place to live." 

"Welp, the loudest it ever gets here is if a card game gets out of hand," the building owner at the time told me, without a hint of irony.

The place was absolutely lovely for many years. I remember my parents first coming to visit me and they legit though I was the sole tenant in the entire complex. My cute octogenarians neighbors, clad exclusively in ployester slacks, sweater vests and dresses, would decorate the common areas for every occasion and host Christmas and Easter parties with their doors thrown wide open.   

But, as we all know, nothing good ever lasts. About twelve years ago, the building was sold to a new owner and, as the more respectable senior residents died off, things slowly started to go downhill. Since then, we've had to contend with mice, silverfish, pot / cigarette smoke and a wall that leaks like a sieve whenever it's hit by direct rain. 

It's hard to believe, but there was a period of time, circa 2012-2020 when renters held all the cards in Halifax. Our building had a slew of vacant units, which I think the owner was desperate to pack with bodies, so long as they could sit upright and had a body temperature of 37 degrees. As a result, the complexion of the building changed from "ersatz seniors home" to "borderline flophouse." 

Oh, the stories I could tell. How about time the mail-order bride who lived across from me pounded on my door in the middle of the night seeking asylum from the crusty old fuck who requisitioned her? How about the time six months worth of my checks were stolen from the lobby suggestion box by a resident dirtbag? This dumb fuck then proceeded to cash all of them at once, resulting in five of the checks bouncing around town like little rubber balls. 

Oh, then there was the sedentary piece of shit who took it upon himself to single-handedly lower the property values by sitting on his porch all day and night, regardless of season, smoking dope and playing video games through the patio door? Thanks to this charming prick, our parking lot would often become a late night arena for verbal sparring matches between Mr. Charisma and some jobber he'd clearly fucked over in a drug deal. I remember coming home late one night from a friends place and I couldn't even get back into the buildings because the cops had cordoned off the entire street due the latest dispute instigated by this asshole. 

Sadly, there's gonna be lot more about this fucking organ donor coming in future entries. Stay tuned.  

Regardless of how bad things got, I'd always tell myself that things could be worse. Especially when I'd talk to my 20-something co-workers about rent, and they told me that they were paying anywhere from $800.00 to $1200.00 a month...often just for a single room. The implication of this never failed to chill me to the bone. 

Holdupaminit! I'm picking up on your psychic signals, Dear Reader. I can actually hear you asking: why didn't you do what everyone else your age did and buy a house? Welp, that ain't easy when your first job abruptly vanishes and the subsequent fire you were forced to leap into was so stressful and / or rage inducing that you thought about walking off the job every hour of every day? 

Oh, and, spoiler alert, don't even try and approach a mortgage broker unless you're working full time. They might be able to get you into a house but your rates will be so ridiculous it'll be the equivalent of highway robbery.  

When COVID hit in January of 2020, I really started to worry. What if I was forced out of this place by some sort of calamity beyond my control? I'd be lucky to find any place, let alone a spot where the rent was vaguely comparable. If my rent suddenly jumped, the GRAND EXPERIMENT would come to a screeching halt.

This paranoia struck me so badly one day during the lockdown that I remember sitting in my room  looking around at forty years worth of collectible detritus and thinking: 'What the fuck would I do if this place catches on fire?' 

Looking back on it, I'm reminded of folks who live in some tropical paradise, tentatively looking out across the distant horizon at a wall of dark clouds bearing down on them. What do you do when a storm is coming and you don't know where to go or what to do?

Well, back on July 12'th 2022...I actually found out.

NEXT UP: Have you ever wanted to know what its like to wake up from a dead sleep at 2 am with someone pounding on your door and telling you that your building's on fire? For the record, I don't recommend it.  

EPIC: Can anyone please confirm that this place is as great as this article seems to indicate?

FAIL: Grim, grim stuff right here. 

Thanksgiving

 

“Yo, Jay-cob, stop hoarding the squash.”

He sat transfixed, staring into the gold-hued, butter-and-brown-sugar-laden mound of gourd innards. His sister’s words scarcely registered amidst the clatter of silverware on plates and the collective sound of intense gluttony.

“Mom, can you poke Jacob? I think he’s buffering.”

Jennifer smiled awkwardly and reached out to shake her son’s forearm. The pristine fork slipped from his nonexistent grasp and clunked onto the draped table.

“Jake, honey…are you okay?”

The young man shook his head and looked up from his side-dish reverie.

“What?” he mouthed.

“Your sister asked you to pass the squash,” Jennifer intoned, nodding incrementally towards Emily, who was now making grotesque faces at her brother.

“Oh, sure…here.”

The precious cargo was delivered and Emily ladled a disproportionate amount of baked acorn squash onto the hinterland of her already-crowded plate. She craned her neck in an exaggerated manner, took note of her brother’s sparse portions and immediately flashed a devilish grin.

“I thought weed was supposed to make you hungry,” she mock-whispered to her older sister.

A look of anger flashed across Jacob’s face.

“Yeah, you should know, you annoying bi…” 

Like Thor’s hammer, a fork-armed fist came down on the table, causing any cutlery close to the epicenter to jump upon impact. Immediately all eyes were on Michael, the family patriarch.

“Are we still incapable of having a single Thanksgiving dinner where we don’t end up yelling at one another?”

Jacob was immediately moved by the sight of his father. Like a flash, his anger was spent, replaced by the sort of knowing melancholy that was undeniably relatable.

“Sorry,” the young man whispered, making a show out of spearing a few planks of turkey onto his plate while glaring at his sister.

“Sooo, Jacob,” his uncle, Jason, tentatively ventured, “how are things at Carthage Academy?”

“Good,” the young man replied.

“'Good’,” parroted his father, casting a side-eye at Jason. “Forty-five grand in tuition and all he can manage is ‘good’.”

After ladling a tsunami of brown gravy onto his plate, Jacob put down his utensils, linked his fingers together and then fixed his uncle with a plaintive stare.

“I’m sorry. Seems I haven’t answered your question to my father’s satisfaction. Carthage Academy is wonderful. The Political Science program is great. The class sizes are small, and I never feel like just an ass in a seat. My professors are patient, learned educators who seem genuinely interested in guiding my future career choices. All told, five stars out of five…would learn there again.”

Everyone froze mid-chew and was now intently staring at him. Immediately, the dinner scene from Troll 2 flashed in his brain and it took all of his willpower not to jump up on his chair and bring this charade to an unconventional, but definitive, halt. Instead, Jacob opted not to piss on hospitality, choosing instead to stifle an outburst of laughter and skewer his father with an intense stare.     

“Will that do?” he asked pleasantly.

There were no eyes to meet. His father had already gone back to rooting around on his plate with his fork.

“Better,” he replied, barely audible. “But you didn’t have to be so snotty about it.”

“Are you still thinking about going into journalism?” Jason pursued. By feeding the fire of civil discourse, he hoped to divert attention away from the palpable bad karma, a presence so real it might be caught stealing the last of the white meat.

“Probably my best bet,” Jacob replied.

He was suddenly aware of a slight headache coming on, likely triggered by the two (three?) glasses of cheap moscato his mother always to seem to buy in bulk lately. Of course, the conspicuous absence of the elephant not in the room was an equally-feasible culprit.

“It’s pretty crazy,” he idly continued after briefly massaging his temple. “Two or three reps from some pretty big media outlets have already come to the school to guarantee jobs for journalism majors.”

“Wow,” Samantha exclaimed, interdicting a morsel of sausage stuffing that threatened to leap out of her mouth. “God, when I was in college, journalism wasn’t even an option.”

Jacob pulled his plate in close, picked up his utensils and then loaded up a gravy-marinated forkful of turkey and mashed potatoes.

“Yeah, well, as soon as the T.A. got rolled back, there were a lot of new upstarts.”

 “The T.A.?,” Jason asked, cocking an eyebrow above the borders of his tortoiseshell glasses.

Jacob paused and chewed diligently, rotating his unburdened fork in front of him in a gesture meant to expedite the process.

“Telecommunications Act,” he finally managed. “Clinton deregulated the media back in 1996. It was supposed to open things up for competition, but all it really did was let corporations buy up a shit-ton of independent newspapers and television stations.”

“Language,” Michael muttered, giving his son a brief Kubrickian stare, which was promptly ignored.

“Oh, yes, I think I read something about that,” Jennifer ventured, cheerily prospecting for nods of approval around the table. None were forthcoming.

“Thirty years ago there used to be over fifty different media companies,” Jacob continued. “But after deregulation, it went down to about six or so.”

“You kids are too young to remember, but back in the 80’s, the news was so simple,” Jennifer observed, looking pleasantly surprised that she now had the floor. “It was just some guy sitting at a desk reading stories with some plain-looking graphic in the background. No spin, no editorializing, just reporting the facts.” 

“Yep, I remember that, too,” Jason concurred. “Everyone seemed to be on the same page back then. With the whole ‘truth in media’ movement lately, I think we’re finally getting back to that.”

Jacob nodded vigorously, stalling so he could speak again. His mother hated it when her kids chewed with their mouths full.

“Yeah it was pretty bad there for the longest time. Kind of a feeding frenzy there for awhile as corporations snapped up all of the competing voices and then set up their own 24-hour cable news networks. Between that and social media, it pretty much kicked off the whole ‘customized reality’ era.”

“Haw, good name for it,” Samantha barked, pouring a fresh goblet of wine for herself. Jacob was suitably impressed; his sister was probably two glasses ahead of him by now.     

“Seriously, that’s what my profs are calling it now. If you were right-wing, you had Fox News, and then Rush Limbaugh, Parler, Info Wars and QAnon for the real wing-nuts…”

“Jesus Christ!” Michael suddenly blurted. “Are we seriously talking about this? Now, of all times?!?”

Everyone’s heads collectively snapped around to look at him, risking group whiplash. Immediately Jacob felt a powerful stab of regret.          

“Sorry, Dad,” he mumbled, and then instinctively cast his gaze downward.  

He was immediately lost in the monochromatic landscape that was his dinner, a muddy mish-mash of gravy, turkey and mashed potatoes, punctuated by a clementine-hued asterisk at the edge of the plate. Something from this gastronomical tableau was missing, however, and he spent an inordinate amount of time lost in examination. Even the palpable sensation of his little sister staring a hole in the side of his head failed to dislodge him.

“Looks like the good stuff’s finally kicking in,” Emily whispered to Samantha, who admonished her with a playful slap and non-committal frown of disapproval.      

But it was recognition, not chemicals, that finally triggered Jacob’s dulled synapses.

“Cranberry sauce!” he blurted, more audibly than he intended.

He spun his knife in his hand, like Tom Cruise with a whisky bottle in Cocktail, an old movie that his Dad and Granddad used to inexplicably watch every Thanksgiving. For years, its precious one-hundred-and-three minute runtime seemed to douse the fireworks without fail. At least until his grandfather stopped coming to dinner.

That purplish, gelatinous cylinder, ridged from its aluminum prison, quivered half-way across the table as if openly mocking him. Instead of giving his annoying sister the satisfaction of asking for her help, Jacob used his simian-length arms in an attempt to reel in a cross-section of that tart prize.

“And, Emily, how’ve you been lately?” Jason queried, casting a quizzical look towards Jacob as he struggled to separate, balance and secure a limp slab of cranberry goodness.

“Alright,” she shrugged, violently mashing her squash to destroy even the slightest hint of particulates.

“’Alright,’” Michael scoffed, shaking his head. “Roof over her head and good food to eat whenever she wants it. A bit better than ‘alright’, I’d say.”

Jacob didn’t see the storm blowing up in Emily’s eyes, nor the expectant grimace that flashed across Sam’s face. He was completely preoccupied with the Herculean task of transporting that trembling disc of cranberry jelly back to his plate.

“Yeah, well, we’re can’t all be like the ‘golden child’ over here,” Emily spat, jabbing the handle of her fork in her brother’s direction.

Jason was starting to have regrets for inadvertently stumbling upon this conversational landmine, but Jacob was completely oblivious. He stuck out his tongue, like a Shaolin monk adopting the forward stance to reinforce stability and concentration before launching into a miraculous display of agility.

“Well, at least he has some focus,” Michael blared, almost relieved by the opportunity to be combative. “He’s planning for his future, and your sister had her pick of good jobs out there now. But what are you doing? Absolutely nothing!”

“Michael, please!” Jennifer said, her look pleading and pained, not angry.

The sight of that jiggling payload precariously balanced on Jacob’s fork suddenly reminded him of his grandfather. Every time his mom cracked a tin of the stuff, he could hear ol’ Bob fly off the handle, regardless of what room, or state, he was in.

‘Jesus Christ, Jenny!’ he could hear the old man bellow, as if he were sitting to his immediate left. ‘All you gotta do is boil some sugar water and throw in a few damned cranberries. Even frozen ones are good. Ten times better than that friggin’ abomination.’

The yelling in his memory was immediately eclipsed by his sister screaming right into his left ear.

“Yeah, well, at least I didn’t sign off on murdering my own father!” she screeched.

With that, Jacob lost his concentration and the glistening, maroon-hued puck slipped off of his silverware, cart-wheeled in mid-air, slapped into the side of the turkey platter and half-landed on his mother’s pristine white tablecloth with a wet “thlup” sound.

Immediately Jacob felt everyone’s stern regard turn on him. He glanced incrementally to the right and saw that his mother had cupped her hands to her mouth in shock, either because of Emily’s declaration or the growing patch of cranberry blood that was rapidly spreading out on her gilded tablecloth. He calmly placed his knife and fork down and slowly stood up.

All eyes watched as Jacob paced around for a bit, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hands and combing his hair back with his fingers. It’s not like this was a revelation. He knew what had happened, but to hear it uttered out loud had a certain crass awfulness to it. It was the equivalent of digging a dead pet out of the back-yard and using it as the table’s centerpiece. Eventually Emily reeled in his gaze, stopping him dead in his tracks. She looked devastated.

“She’s right, you know,” Jacob intoned, gesturing at his younger sister and looking at each of them in turn.

“Jake,” his mother said, exhibiting unearthly patience. “We did everything we could.”

“Really? Did we?” he returned. “Did you ever think that maybe, just maybe, after Nana died, that those people were the only company he had for the better part of the year?”

That’s when his father shot up, the chair groaning in protest as the back of his legs sent it skidding along the hardwood floor.

“He did that to himself, Jacob,” Michael growled. “All of those toxic beliefs he had. It got to the point where I couldn’t even stomach being in the same room with him. My own father.”

“Well, you should have talked to him!” Jacob countered. It was a decent bluff. Inside he felt like he was flailing.

“What, do you think we didn’t try?” Michael shot back, sounding incredulous. “He wouldn’t even listen. His mind was 100% made up. Nothing would budge him…nothing.”

Samantha suddenly cleared her throat and took a deep, bracing gulp of wine.

“Jacob, do you remember last April when he went in for gall bladder surgery?” she ventured.

“Yes.”

“He asked me and Em to look after Troubles because he said he ‘couldn’t trust Dad anymore.’ As soon as we got back to his place we blocked every one of those stupid fringe cable channels, cleaned up his Facebook feed and unsubscribed him from God knows how many email chains.”

“Yeah, well, we all know how well that worked, huh?” Jacob snidely observed.

“You’re right, Jacob,” Michael said. “It made him even more pissed him off and paranoid than ever. Every voice mail he left for us, every DM, every email…nothing but ‘snowflakes’, ‘sheeple’ and ‘libtards.’  Whatever conspiracy-du-jour the underground rabble was still crapping out at the time - the dumbest, sickest shit you can possibly imagine about Jewish global conspiracies, cannibal pedophiles, 5G cell phone towers, monitoring chips, fucking lizard people - he’d regurgitate all of it without question.” 

Jacob winced as if stung and Michael collapsed back down in his chair, seemingly drained after being forced to evoke all of this again.  

“He was a smart, critically-thinking man once,” he mumbled. “But, towards the end, the shit he was peddling made absolutely no sense. For the love of God, if not for the vaccine, we probably wouldn’t all  be here today.”

He fell silent, giving his wife an opportunity to pick up the invisible conch.

“We thought all of those new media regulations would clean things up and give him a chance to decompress. And, when that didn’t work, we called the Department of Continuance to get him into the clarity seminars. We hoped that would bring him around, but it just made him more angry and obstinate.”

Jason sheepishly glanced around the room. He looked as if he’d been clubbed in the head with a piece of driftwood.

“You guys never told me it was that bad.”

“It was awful,” Michael resumed. “But the worst thing was getting that call from the DOC. They flat out told me that he was too far gone and they recommended quietus.”

Except for the faint sound of Socks the cat whispering between the chair legs in search of dropped morsels, the room was suddenly very silent.

“So that’s it then,” Emily hissed, lowering her voice incrementally as if suddenly concerned that there might be monitoring devices hidden in the green beans. “We just give up on people now.”

“It was the hardest decision we’ve ever had to make, Em,” Michael responded without a moment’s pause. “We’d just suffered through four years of the worst backslide this country has ever seen, in part, because of people just as deluded and ill-informed as my father was. If forty percent of the population flat-out refuse to accept reality, what can we do?”

“I dunno,” Emily said, sounding venomous. “Maybe help them?”

“They can’t, or won’t, be helped,” he replied. “There’s no way we can progress if half the population is grossly misinformed, willfully ignorant or flat-out regressive. If we have any hope whatsoever of moving forward as a nation, people like that have to go.”

Jacob felt sweat beading on his top lip. He picked up his napkin and dabbed at his face. He suddenly felt very sick and had to sit down.

“Uncle Jay?” he asked, introducing an inaugural sip of water to his body for the first time today.

Jason looked away from an unfocused point somewhere mid-table and perked up.

“You asked me what I wanted to major in,” the young man said, scraping the increasingly-formless burgundy blob off the table and slinging it onto his plate.

“Yes?” his uncle asked, leaning forward expectantly.

“I think I figured it out.”

An endless beat of silence.

“Do tell,” Samantha said, sounding impatient.

“I think I’m gonna go into law.”

This time it was his father’s turn to drop a fork.