i'm writing ya'll from NYC tonight...

our first week in SF has not exactly gone according to plan. :(

first of all, let me clarify by saying that work is going extremely well. i really like my colleagues, am pleasantly surprised by the cool stuff that our office is doing, and they are so dang glad to have someone in my role that i'm veryverymuch appreciated.
so all of that is good.

what's sucked is my apartment situation.

as mentionned previously, we spent sunday night at the airport.

monday i went to walgreens and picked up the provisions i needed to stay in the new apartment for the first time: toilet paper, paper towels, shower curtain, detergent, soap, etc. i was really excited. i got everything from our suitcases unpacked and on various shelves throughout the house and was feeling really good when i went to bed.

i got up around 2 am to use the bathroom and found over an inch of water on the bathroom floor, and water seeping into the carpet all around it. there was water dripping into the kitchen (which is almost directly underneath the bathroom) via a lighting fixture. needless to say, i freaked out.
building maintenance was extremelly fast at responding (thank god) and was able to shopvac up the standing water in the bathroom. apparently the toilet had overflowed. the water appeared clear, but well, nobody knows just how clean and clear it was.

luckily the water didn't seep into the bedroom, so i was able to try to sleep that night. i did set my alarm to go off every couple of hours (although i was awake both times) so that i could feel the floor around the mattress and make sure the water hadn't somehow crept that far.

at 7:30 am the water removal experts came, with large fans and lots of other miscellaneous equiptment. they put plastic runners down the hallways and cautioned me not to walk around barefoot until they had water testing experts come in to see if the water was contaminated. they hooked up their fans and then i went to work.

i got a call from our landlord that afternoon. he told me that there was debris (specifically, wads of kleenex and a qtip) in the toilet and basically accused me of causing the mess. he said there was damage to 4 other apartments and that although he was going to file a claim with his insurance, they would reject the claim because he was renting it. he asked if we had renters insurance...

well now, normally, we would have renters insurance. and we do have our property insured, but since it's en route to san francisco (in a truck somewhere, heading west) i hadn't insured our place in san francisco yet. i simply didn't make it one of the first things that i did that one day i'd been in san francisco (instead i focused on getting the electricity and phone hooked up and some addresses changed on our chicago bills).

argh.

so our landlord basically tried to get me to admit to wrongdoing (when i suggested that it was the previous tenant, he said "we had no problems the whole year she was there") and said that he'd keep me posted as the costs were determined.

arrrrrgh.

today i was on a flight most of the workday, and then finally spoke with building management this evening. not only was the building manager (perry, who seems like a good guy, and -- if my memory from 2 am serves me well -- is quite good looking) very responsive and nice the night of the disaster, but i wanted to get the scoop from them since i figured they don't have any skin in the matter of who's paying for it -- they know that the bill will go to the owner.

perry confirmed that there was indeed a qtip in the toilet (he also said he'd send me digital photos). i was *relieved* to hear that it was one with a blue 'stalk' since it confirmed for me that it couldn't have possibly been me that caused the flooding. i only have q-tips with the white paper 'stalks', and while i'd been 99.9% sure that i hadn't even used one that evening it was great to get that burdent of potential responsibility out of my head (seriously, who cleans their ears at night? i do it after i shower, and i didn't even shower there until the following morning, in the downstairs bathroom). it's little solace though, since i know that i can't really prove my innocence, and i'm still really freaked out because perry also confirmed that there was damage to multiple units in the building. he said the costs could be as high as $20,000. that made me almost drop the phone.

i don't know what the next step is, if i have to get a lawyer or what. i am really freaking out and am wishing steve was here (he's in japan this week).

originally i wasn't looking forward to traveling this week (first here to ny, then to utah for a weekend at sundance) but now i'm extremely grateful not to be in that apartment with the whirling fans and the potentially contaminated carpet.

argh.

everyone reading this: please cross your fingers for me that justice will be done and they'll realize it wasn't me, but instead the previous blue q-tip using tenant who caused my apartment's plumbing catastrophe.