To continue the story from yesterday: condo management association sent an email at 8:30am this morning that there would be people onsite to clean dryer vents AFTER the workers were physically there had woken me up by being on a ladder outside my window banging around in the vents just above my head and AFTER my downstairs neighbor had already started some laundry she couldn't do all day then. I had also been planning to do laundry today but when I couldn't, I just shrugged and figured I would do it another day. We're in changeover weather season so I have a lot of laundry to wash but also a lot of things I can wear for the upcoming temperatures between now and whenever I do get laundry done. It was comical except for the ways that it inconvenienced everyone in the entire building to not get any warning whatsoever and to get the email as an afterthought..... And thankfully I hadn't been sleeping in the nude or anything.... Terrified the cat though who felt like the skies were falling. Still, it's ridiculous that Emily never even sent the email until AFTER they were physically onsite so nobody had any warning whatsoever. (There's supposed to be at least 24 hours warning so people can make plans PRIOR to suddenly not being able to do things like walk on hallways floors or dry their laundry....)

Then later, in the evening when I decided to head to work because I needed to take care of my plants, even through my kn95 mask, when I left my condo tonight and walked out into the hallway, the ammonia smell was stronger than it ever had been and this time mixed with new paint VOC odors. It was awful, but also it made me laugh really hard that yet another thing the Beans had insisted on doing had made things worse rather than better like when they insisted on tearing out the new carpet because they thought the brand new carpet might be holding/retaining the scent in our hallways even though it didn't in the stairway or the downstairs hallway. But they were loud and aggressive and finally when the condo management caved despite the illogic of it -- and once the carpet was removed, they started complaining about the smells getting worse AND the echoing in the hallway from every time anyone entered/left and from Wookie barking. The smell today was stronger than ever in the hallway, and it's strongest right by their door meaning it's coming form in their unit still, despite how they blame it on the disabled man across the hall who has cats. (since the pandemic started, I always wear in the halls of my building because small enclosed space with little moving air + neighbors who us synthetic fragrances that cause instant migraines for me = breeding ground for respiratory viruses and a migraine minefield for me; for me it's mostly to protect me from people's perfumes/chemical products that make me sick that I wear a mask rather than the viral load risks. Knock on wood, I've never yet had covid or symptoms, though I still test myself after known exposures, increased potential exposures (such as when I went to Lambeau Field), or when I'm around people who have covid symptoms but insist it isn't covid but don't test so I can't necessarily believe them it's just allergies.)  

So yeah. That entertained me a lot, miserable as the odors were. I expected it though, because NH3 is commonly released FROM the oxidation of VOC chemicals such as formaldehyde, especially on sunny days.  So everything new they replaced for flooring and repainting walls etc after they flooded their unit bursting a pipe by turning off their heat for an entire Wisconsin winter EVEN THOUGH their condo is on the northeast corner of the building, every time sun hits the chemicals off gassing, it creates ammonia as a byproduct. It's why certain types of home owner projects result in 6-21 months of a room smelling faintly like animal urine even if animals never go in there or never pee in there same as it smells slightly of formaledhyde.  So every time they try to tear out new things that are still off gassing to replace with new products off gassing or to repaint, it just increases the duration of time that the concentrated ammonia smells will occur. I tried to explain this to them one time when she was raging about how "toxic" the smells are and she just yelled at me told me it couldn't be anything they were doing because at least they were trying and it was obviously the disabled man not properly taking care of his cats. Even when I pulled out my organic chemistry textbook and quite literally showed her and her husband the reactions and how/why it occurs that gaseous ammonia is released whenever you repaint or lay down glues/adhesives in new carpet/pressed boards.... but they asked me what I know about it (as I'm standing there with an actual college textbook that explains it) because they're older than me and they know that ammonia is associated with cat pee even though they've never had cats themselves.  They're also maga trump supporters and trying to give them evidence just makes them get more angry soooooooo.... yeah.....

I miss the couple who lived there before the Beans but retired back to his hometown in southern France. They were so sweet and nice and I had someone to talk in French with while they lived there.

Another funny story about the Beans, from their first summer after moving in is the time that they went on a rampage about how unlivable it was that there was (what they alleged) to be cat poop but maybe dog poop in the hall and they went knocking on everyone's doors who owned pets (all three other condos on our floor) and the two of us who were home (the dog owners) were presented with a bit of dried brown something on a paper towel while she loudly bitched about dinging it in the hall when she came home and he sheepishly stood there behind her IN HIS BOXERS because she'd dragged him out because he's on the owner association board and she needed him there to threaten and browbeat us. I looked at it calmly and said, "Well it's unlikely it's from a cat since there's no litter attached to it and it's lighter in color than most cat poop. It could be dog if digested fast or excess bile produced. May I see it?" They handed over the paper towel and I sniffed it, "No odor, so it's unlikely poop." I then flipped it over in the paper towel and said, "It clearly has a shoe print mark on the other side -- this came in on someone's shoe not falling off an animal. May I see your shoes you most recently wore outside?" They brought them and I looked at them said, "Well, his shoe matches this print pattern, right here you see? And hers still have mud of the same color stuck to it on the side... Let me put them side by side for you." The Beans turned bright red and had nothing to say so as I handed them back their shoes I asked, "Right. So. Can I throw out this mud and towel now? Or did you want to keep it for some reason?" They said yes and went back to their condo and my other neighbors, the couple who own Wookie though this was before they adopted Wookie, just looked at me and I looked at them and we all just shrugged at the same time which made us laugh and then went back into our separate condo units to go back to what we had been doing before that interaction happened. Sometimes you just have to laugh because it's not worth the energy of tears of frustration or letting it make you angry. Because they're not worth giving them that sort of power over you to destabilize you into negative emotions or toxic behavior patterns.

It was after that failed attempt at claiming that the mud was some form of animal feces that they ruined their condo over the subsequent winter by turning off their heat completely in a Wisconsin winter to save on electricity while they were in California. And the ammonia smells in the hallway started immediately following the reclamation project to fix the flooding damage in their own unit....

But hey yeah sure, it's the disabled man who works early mornings at the hospital and has lived there longer than any of the rest of us not taking care of his cats who is the source of the problem..... Sure. not the anti-science MAGA trump voters who loudly rage at everyone about how the shared hallways of a condo is toxic and unlivable....They're retired and used to live in a house

Like I said, I much preferred college drunks when I lived downtown on campus near State Street and the bars over living with the Beans owning the other condo since they moved in...They are just so loud and full of misdirected anger and not interested in facts or logic just in blaming and punishing other people. Honestly nothing could make me happier than if they decided it was truly unlivable conditions and just sold their condo moved to L.A. permanently.... (I know I know, be careful what you wish for, I could end up with someone even worse... Or at least differently bad. Still. the Beans are the most horrifically awful neighbors I've ever had anywhere I've lived. And that includes when Nancy lived downstairs and had gotten used to not having neighbors and brought up a nasty acrylic rug because I had a friend living in my spare room who walked heavier than me because she weighed more than me....I wasn't there for it, my very embarrassed friend had to tell me about it and showed me the rug which I couldn't even touch without breaking out in a reaction from it. But as rude as it was, at least Nancy was polite and trying to be nice and provided a solution to attempt and after she saw how much larger/heavier my friend is than me, Nancy just accepted that there would be louder steps upstairs than when it was just me and a 30lb dog and an 18lb cat.....)

O but in happier news! we do have Hadestown tour tickets for Jan 26 now!! Which makes me happy! Excited and happy!