Having said that, this is sorta important.


Some people have zero communication skills.

"You wouldnt' have the answers. You wouldn't know what to do. You wouldn't have the patience to do this"


My mother is coping with serious problems, these days, in my grandmother's old house, in Perth Amboy. Some asshole mayor is on an urban renewal kick, and forcing all the old-timeys out. He wants strip malls, where houses and old main streets were. He wants waterfront condos, rather than an old wharf, and he has a good buddy who owns a development company.

This is all bad news for the people that live there, obiviously. My grandmother's house was built in 1899, and the moved into it in 1952, as a two family. In 1962, the last time it was inspected, it was declared a 3 family. Now, it's a huge house, with 2 smaller houses in the back, 3 big floors, and a huge yard. My mother had 5 families living comfortably there.

Here's where it gets sticky. My mother rents to illegal aliens. People from Poland, Russia, The Czech Republic, and other eastern block nations. She has one legal hispanic lady, living in the back house with her two kids. That house hasn't been inspected properly since 1962. My theory, is that she rents to illeagals, so that no one will sue her if something goes wrong, and if need be, she can just evict them. The house is clean, and well maintained, there's no doubt, she's there every week, almost every day. Her tenants are good, quiet and clean, and the rent is low. SO FAR it's been a good situation, though less than legal.

Then came the lawsuit. The neighbor was visiting someone, and tripped on a piece of uneven cement on the property. He sued. The insurance company is handling it, but this sparked all sorts of problems. First, my mom had to replace all the uneven stonework in the back yard, and rather than hiring a paving company, and doing it right, she hired day-workers to haul bags of cement back there, and do it half-assed. The job was a big one, and took all summer. It looks good, and they did a passable job, but do you think any permits were aquired? Haha, my mother never gets permits for anything. Then, one of the neighbors tipped the town off about all the work being done, and an inspector showed up. The job was fine, and all, but the guy inspected the houses, too.

Found two more apartments than there were permits for (one of the back houses was an apt built in the 70's over a shed, and the other was a converted attic). NOW, my mom could finally get her head out of her ass, and stop dancing with the law, and do it the legal way, by making the whole place up to code, and therefore infallible. She could get a loan, make it all *right* and do it up. It'll be costly, but then they can't bug her about the house.

Or she could fight the town, with a lawyer. Which she is. Which is entirely stupid. Rather than spending the money on righting the wrongs, she's hiring a lawyer with some convoluted idea of trying to prove that the third floor was an apartment long before 62, and that the inspector was sorely mistaken.


After I listened quietly to her rant, I was like, ah, well we all have issues with the town (more on my problems in a future rant) best to just spend the money now, and make everything perfect, so that they can't get to you again about things. Make them happy, or they'll force you out, somehow. She argued with me, and challenged me to do better than she is. Hence the above quote. Blegh.

It sounds narcissistic, but I know with 100% surety that I could do better, given the experiences I'm having with my own domiciles.

I know it's been awhile since I posted here, but I decided not to clutter things up with daily drivel. This is only for things I need to write about. Stuff that seems important to me.