Available immediately:It's a totally shitty apartment but it's technically two bedrooms and way under market so I figured the only way I was going to rent it was being funny in my ad. I put in new carpet and vinyl and painted every square inch of the place, but it's just eyeliner and I know it. I figured with a Depeche Mode reference in the ad I'd get someone that sees the place for what it is and is happy. Sure enough, a couple of 21-year-old girls are the first ones to show up and they take it.
I have a small ground floor 2bd apartment with brand new carpet/vinyl. All the windows face west so it's a pretty sunny little place. Here's a video that I took in 2007:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVmNNWtFKmo
I gotta say, 2007 was a long time ago so it looks a lot better to me these days. Watching old videos makes me sad and now I wish it really was 2007. So many things I would do differently. Last week's episode of Community has made me a little too introspective for my own good, I think. You can watch it on hulu if you want. Sometimes now I think that going to the Nightlight Lounge on March 27th, 2007 created a whole different timeline and now I'm "Evil Martin" complete with goatee. And in the REAL timeline--the timeline I'm supposed to be in--I'm happily married and in love and I'm not listening to old Depeche Mode albums so much. Don't get me wrong: Violator is awesome and all, but I bet that in the real timeline my musical tastes have evolved a little. And now I'm realizing that this ad for an apartment is getting kind of...awkward.
Okay. Let's keep it together here.
$735/mo on a 9-month lease includes water, sewer, garbage. On-site laundry, free off-street parking.
Cat deposit is $150.
Small dog deposit is $250.
Apt. deposit is $300-$700 depending on your credit and rental history.
Application charge is $40 per person.
Email is best, but you can also call me at 503.771.4040.
Normally, I'd call it good and move on. But as I'm signing paperwork with them, one of them flat-out asks me, "What did your ad mean?" I was a little taken aback so I asked her to elaborate. At this point I was still assuming that my awesome marketing technique was what brought them in. She responded honestly and truthfully, "What's a depeche mode?"
Once, in the summer of 2001, I wasn't paying attention while hiking and I fell off a small cliff. I slipped on some gravel and hit my chin on a sharp rock on my way down before landing in a ponderosa pine sapling. I thankfully didn't break any bones but ended up bleeding all over the place. When I extracted myself from the tree and realized that I was in the middle of the Oregon desert, alone, bleeding profusely, and nowhere near a medical facility, I had a "moment." I remember how quickly the drops of blood disappeared in the sandy floor beneath my feet and thinking, "Wow, life is so fragile. I'm a tube of blood and meat and sausage and if I don't take care of this soon I'm going to get absorbed into this desert as easily as anything else." And the weird thing was, I was kind of accepting for a minute. It was amazing how quickly the sand drank up and soaked up the the steady stream of blood that I gave up. It seemed like an hour but it was probably less than minute, but I remembered that I always keep a supply of maxi pads in the car so I eventually crawled the sixth tenths of a mile back to my car and taped a bunch of feminine hygiene products to the deep slice in my chin and drove to the medical center in Prineville.
And so ten years later, some random 21-year-old is asking me what a depeche mode is. The scar on my chin immediately starts to itch and I'm completely out of maxi pads.
