Some people just don't like dogs.

I sort of hate my new apartment. I hate that my phone doesn't work there even though it did two weeks ago, I hate the fruit flies that love my still-fresh bananas, I hate the way it smells, I hate that on my lease the landlord said they'd be by to fix the "starred items" and have done no such thing, and I really, really fucking hate the guy who lives below me.

Nay, lives in his garage.

It's difficult to explain this. My apartment is a four-plex. Next to the four-plex are three individual garages, and I have the middle garage. I live on the top left corner. A nurse-in-training named Olive (who I heard has kids but have not seen them) lives across from me. I don't know, nor have I seen, the person who lives in the bottom right (or even if anyone does), and the man who lives below me, whose name I have forgotten, is a disgusting, annoying old man who smokes disgusting, shitty cigarettes and has turned his garage into a shop where he houses his old carpentry tools, a TV, and a stool that sits on all through the evening and night so he can watch his TV. He is Nasty Downstairs Guy.

He has a mustache and he ways about 100 pounds. He has disgusting fingernails that are hard and yellow and look like they should be the exoskeleton of a desert beetle. Whenever he smokes in his apartment, the smoke crawls through the vents like an apparition, permeates my room, probably weaves itself into the fabric of my curtains.

An order of events about what has happened with Nasty Downstairs Guy:

1) When I was looking at the apartment to rent, NDG was in his garage with all of his shit; it only made sense that I assumed that garage belonged to the person who was moving out. Plus, as I later found, the lease says garage may only be used for parking cars and not for storage.

2) When David and Matt came over to see my apartment in a brief visit, NDG was in his garage watching the Twins. When they pulled up, NDG stood up from his stool, in the middle of the garage, and stared them down. He didn't stop staring, and David and Matt said that with the light behind him and his hands on his narrow hips and his staring that he looked like Michael from the Halloween movies. He should've been holding a machete or a chainsaw with that looking-down look.

3) At first things, were fine and I was friendly--I asked him about where he got his cable and internet service, he gave me some information, I asked him where the garbage went, he told me where and that the recycling comes on Mondays. Good to know. If you need anything, I'm a carpenter, he said, and let me know if you have any questions about the place.

4) The mailboxes in my building are really complicated with the key. One day I ran into NDG in the tiny foyer and asked him how to open the mailbox. NDG tried to explain it to me as I worked the key, but the box is really crappy and I couldn't get it. For some reason, then, NDG decided to put his hand over my hand so I could get the feel of it. He said, no, no, let my hand do it, just get the feel of it and I was so in shock and close to throwing up that I didn't know what to do or say, and as he stood behind me, I contemplated whether this was harassment or some social problem or some NDG trying to be nice but instead being, well, nasty as his name implies. I felt dirty all day. At one point, he was even frustrated with me when my hand wasn't working with the key and he said no, no, no get the feel of it and then turned my hand again. This is when I noticed his beetle-backed fingernails, so hard it seemed that two other nails had just grown over the first nail.

I will ask for nothing else from NDG.

5) NDG told me that he was getting kicked out of the four-plex after having lived there for seven years. He said that if I read the lease, I'd see the rules he'd broken--not supposed to have a boat, not supposed to have a dog over 30 pounds. He said he was looking for another place. I wondered whether this was true.

6) NDG has a German Shepherd that digs holes in the front lawn. It's a pretty dog, but it's huge, and I'm not scared of German Shepherds normally, but I am scared of German Shepherds that are owned by NDG. I think the dog's name is Buddy. NDG says he found Buddy when he was up in the Boundary Waters and couldn't resist bringing him home, even though he knew the lease wouldn't allow such a large dog. He ties Buddy to a rope outside, so everytime I back out of the garage I'm afraid that I will run him over. I also fear that Buddy will trip me up in his rope, or bite me, or scratch my car when I leave it outside because I'll only be home for a little bit before I leave again, anyway. I also don't like that he is a crotch-smelling dog, and that when he crotch-sniffs the lipstick of his penis shows, which disgusts me more than it should, because he's just a dog and probably does not tend to be a reflection of Nasty Downstairs Guy.

7) Yesterday, the cable guy came to install cable at my house. After he left, I had to drive myself to urgent care* and when I went outside, NDG was fiddling with the spot where the cable is tethered. He said to me YOU NEED TO CALL YOUR CABLE GUY BACK and I said why, and in a rushed way because I needed to get to the doctor and he said BECAUSE HE LINKED YOUR CABLE INTO MY CABLE and I said, fine, even though I didn't know what that really meant, and then he said and another thing--when you leave your car in the driveway, you need to pull it up a little further because people can't get in the roundabout and I said, sure, fine, and drove off, remarkably pissed the fuck off. When I came home about three hours later, my cable wasn't working anymore, and even though I can't prove NDG fucked with some cable that he wasn't supposed to, I'm pretty sure he did something to it. And now, I have to wait until Monday to find out what the fuck is going on with it, and I'm really, really getting tired of this technology bullshit, especially since my phone doesn't work in my apartment and I've been to Verizon 4 times in the last couple of days and they say that can't do anything, but if I want, I can first 1) purchase wireless internet and then 2) pay $100 for a signal extender. I say that I had phone service in Elgin, Minnesota, and it doesn't work in Wayzata? and they say we don't guarantee service, ma'am, or well, a phone tower costs $5 million dollars, and we can't just put one next to everyone's house or they just text their boyfriend the entire time they're supposed to be helping me and say oh, just a second, my boyfriend wants to know if we can get food later.

8) When I got home from the doctor yesterday, NDG had the same visitors he normally does--someone with a hefty chocolate lab that chases Buddy around the yard and all over the driveway (have I mentioned how fucking trashy all of these garage parties and dogs with rope for chains looks? I live in a pretty nice neighborhood next to lots of ginormous houses and this guy is killing property values all on his own) and a couple who have a giant bulldog/lab (?) that's as large as the other dogs except is seriously obese. When I got out of my car yesterday, sick and tired and frustrated, I walked straight to the four-plex door without making eye contact. The bulldog ran toward me, and I walked out of its path and didn't say anything, and the bulldog's owner pulled back his chains and said, now, now, some people just don't like dogs.

Excuse me, I fucking love dogs. I just don't love your dogs because of all the abovementioned shit and because I have no fucking reason to interact with your stupid fat dog. However, what I really "just don't like" is fucking NDG sitting in his garage all day making my apartment building look trashy when it's not, or making me feel really uncomfortable whenever I come home, or telling me how or where to park my car when he is the one breaking all of the rules of his lease. What I don't like is old men harassing me in the foyer or giving me dirty looks or thinking they own the place when they've just been leasing for seven years; what I don't like is my apartment and the entire building foyer stinking like smoke so that I fear when I leave this place all of my fabrics will reek. But I fucking love dogs.

*In addition to the stress of my phone not working and nobody being able to fix it, and the first-year teacher's workshop (so stressful) and NDG and my cable not working, yesterday I had a severe allergic reaction (or stress reaction?) and broke out into the worst case of hives I've ever had. I feel like a leper (except I just Google-imaged that and feel guilty for that hyperbole) and my body is covered in red splotches that itch tremendously. Plus, I couldn't breathe through my nose. This happened after teacher training yesterday. When I was at Verizon, the splotches were beginning to form on my face; when I got home it was out of control. I imagine that the flirting with the cable guy would've been much better if I wasn't covered in a severe rash that was finding its way up my neck.

Anyway, after much stress about trying to figure out which clinic to go to--after getting "office not open" messages from Medica and the phone internet not working to guide me on the website, (I had to run two blocks up the street to make a phone call) I found that the closet urgent care would see me. And that my insurance through Hutchinson will hang with me for another week, until next Tuesday, when I've made a "normal physician" appointment to see if I can get tested for allergies. Good to take advantage of my insurance on the last day of the policy. They said they'll take the claim; we'll fucking see.

I have to take a lot of Benadryl to get rid of this, but it's not really working; the doctor also gave me a steriod and said it should be gone in two days; still I have new splotches (although others have gone). So, I'm tired, I'm supposed to be putting my classroom together, but I really just want to go to bed. Also, I would like to get to the gym, but I don't think they want rashy people all over their machines.

Argh! said Charlie Brown. And then his head fell off his neck.