…… sometimes life just sneaks up and bites you once in awhile to make sure you’re still ticking.

Or at least that’s how it feels.
To me.
Sometimes.

To be honest, it’s just “first world” problems. Which means that I really shouldn’t be complaining.
But this happens to be my blog so there you go.

I am on day six (6) of having no internet or cable. That’s because I have (had) Verizon. Which broke last Wednesday.
That would be the same day that their repairmen/repair people went on strike.
Don’t you just love it?

Verizon and I parted ways last night, much to the dismay of the poor foreign man on the phone.
I really didn’t leave him any room to negotiate. I told him that he had to either send me the boxes to put their equipment in so that I could send it back …… or I would throw it out of my window.

He totally gave in at that point.

If you live in a house full of people, you can’t possibly understand how isolating it is to have no tv.
No news.
No weather.
No company.
Nothing.

It’s down right depressing.

Last night I decided to take the bull by the horns (so to speak) and went next door to Best Buy and bought a TV antenna.
After hooking it up I decided to become a rebel/cord cutter.
Which makes me feel free and kind of scared all at the same time.
I mean, I’ve grown to love having a DVR.
And the ability to watch whatever I want to watch whenever I want to watch it.

But I’ve gone off the grid.
And am going to attempt to live with free TV channels, even if that means I can’t always get NBC and CBS (because I can’t, for some odd reason).

I still don’t have internet but am hoping that will be resolved soon with another provider.
Thankfully I can go up to the top floor of my building and use the free internet there.
As long as I can stand the heat.
For some strange reason (money, maybe?), they’re not turning the AC on up there yet.
Even though the temps were in the low 80’s this afternoon.
Which makes a floor totally surrounded by glass a bit on the warm side.

But there I go again …… complaining about first world problems.

Other than that, NY has been great.
I’ve seen a few shows, hung out in the Park with Gracie, spent time with friends, and done a couple of volunteer shifts at the theatre.

I’ve also spent an unholy amount of time waiting in my apartment for Verizon people to not show up, but I won’t go there.
Totally.
But boy, did that suck.

And then there was tonight.
I was cooking one of my Blue Apron meals, which I just received for the first time on Friday.
I had to bake chicken and mushrooms at a rather high temp (in my opinion …. 475).
It wasn’t long before my smoke alarm went off.
Wonderful.

But then it stopped.
And went off again.
And stopped.
I opened the windows (the stove vent was already on full blast) to try to alleviate the problem.
I’m not sure how much time passed before I noticed something …… the smoke alarm on my floor was going off.
I opened my door to check it out and saw a couple of people down the hall, looking like they were trying to make sense of what was going on.
And trying to decide if they should flee the building.
I shut my door.

About 20 minutes later (with the alarm going off that entire time) there was a knock at my door.
One of the maintenance men was checking to make sure I hadn’t been burned to a crisp.
Although it’s kind of funny that he evidently wasn’t in that much of a hurry to check on that.
He seemed to know that I’d been “cooking”. He asked if I was alright. I thought about pausing for a moment to look myself up and down before I answered, but I didn’t.
I told him that I was fine. And that the apartment was fine.
Which he then relayed to the people standing out in the hall.
Which now means that I will have to check the hallway before I leave my apartment.
Because I’m totally embarrassed to be seen by any of those people who stood out in the hall for 20 minutes, wondering if they should flee the building.

There you go.
Life in the big city.
First world problems.

Kind of stupid and very silly on the grand scheme of things.
But totally stressful and very embarrassing when you’re right in the middle of them.

Two things are apparent because of all of this:
1. I am a rebel (duh!)
And …
2. I still (really) hate to cook.
Even with Blue Apron.