At Long Last, my nyc experience is complete

I've battled roaches, and won.

I've fought with mice, and lost, then won, only to lose again.

I've melted into a puddle on the sidewalk in the middle of the summer when it's 95 outside and 92% humidity.

I've frozen my a$$ off in winter.

I've experienced an epic snowstorm.

I've navigated the City and subway on crutches.

I've seen the marathon, several parades (Thanksgiving, St. Patrick's, Mermaid, Tartan, etc.), watched the tree lighting at Rock Center, seen the ball drop at Times Square, dancing at Lincoln Square and the Winter Festival.

I've been to holiday markets, and green farmers markets.

I've listened to pipes rattle, squeal, hiss, ding, spit, and howl when the heat comes on in the winter.

I've fallen asleep to the hum of air conditioners on a summer night, only to be awoken later when people at the sports club a block away cheer at the latest touchdown.

I've watched the fireworks from the FDR.

I've been trapped in an elevator. (Not for very long, but still, it counts.)

I've awoken early in the morning to a woman screaming from the middle of the street, "Call the police, call the police, call the police."

So I did. (The domestic dispute, eventually ended. She was fine.)

I've seen the garbage and construction crews work the tunnels in the subway, and have wondered and read a book about Mole People.

I've been stuck on a subway and waited hours for the A train late at night.

I've learned to sleep through sirens of all sorts unless the stop at my building.

I've attended protests, seen the Central Park Skate Dancers, and been harassed by rent-a-cops for taking pictures.

I've walked past accidents where a bus and a semi-truck have run over people, and seen a body covered with a sheet.

I've had a neighbor in the apartment across from mine, die, then decompose in his apartment for three days. In the summer.

His relatives succeeded in dripping his oozing decomposing bodily fluids along the hallway into the elevator, then back along the hallway and down three flights of steps, then across the lobby as they removed the mattress from said apartment.

I've lived on a fourth floor walk-up and hauled my laundry, down the stairs, around the corner, past fancy restaurants and café's a couple of blocks away to the Laundromat.

I've arrived home late at night to find Amsterdam Ave blocked off at 79th street and filled with fire trucks and ambulances, only to discover that said fire trucks were responding to a now gutted building that just so happened to be right next to mine.

I've peered out my window and looked at the shattered windows and blackened rooms across the narrow chasm between buildings, and slept in a room that smelled like smoke for days, with a broken front door (thanks firemen, No, REALLY! Thank you!) because I had no place else to go.

I've walked from the very tip top of Manhattan to the other tip (Inwood to Battery Park) mostly.

And yet, until tonight my NYC experience wasn't complete.

You see it all started with a leak.

Or should I say drip.

Yes, drip. Or several or hundreds of them. And bulging bubbles of paint that hung from my bathroom ceiling over my sink.

Resulting in me vacating the medicine cabinet and moving all my skin and hair care products into the hallway.

And a couple of calls to my Super. (He lives upstairs from me.)

Tonight when I arrived home from a night out on the town, (book browsing, dinner @ Whole Foods, and the movies (Twilight, it half-way sucked)) I found disaster.

The only thing that remains of half my bathroom ceiling are the original lathe (as in lathe and plaster) slats from 1920.

Oh, and creepy dark crevices that make me scared that roaches will begin to invade again, or that mice will drop between.

I'm just glad I had the foresight , or shall we say intuition, to close my bathroom door today when I left.

Oh, so happy that the resultant mounds of dirt, dust and plaster chunks were contained to the bathroom.

Although, I am saddened to know my hesitance in removing my trusty, fluffy, cozy bathroom rug led directly to its demise.

-Bitter

No, I didn't take a picture, I cleaned the mess up, sanitized, and disinfected quickly, since the facilities were needed immediately.