Saturday, June 26, 2010

The Building Next to Mine

As I drive in and out of my underground parking garage, I can see the building next to my own. For about four months, I noticed one window had an air conditioner in it, with an extension cord running down to the floor below, looping through the patio railings of two other apartments, and up a floor to an outlet on the patio of a third apartment. This, to me, was ballsy. Obviously, anyone venturing onto the patios of the two apartments below could see this cord. The apartment the cord was plugged into seemed deserted, but even then, anyone surveying the apartment for rental would likely come across this cord. If it was deserted, wouldn’t that mean that the power should be disconnected? Was someone away for an extended period of time? Why were they still paying their electric bill? Had someone actually agreed to this arrangement? From my experiences living in Abbotsford apartment buildings, I can tell you that 70% of the people living in them are Japanese exchange students who treat the building like a dorm. They constantly wander from apartment to apartment building like gypsies in a confined space. Could a similar situation be happening there?
I’ve seen people out on their patios in the two lower apartments. Obviously, they saw what was going on. They did nothing
A week ago I saw the cord had become unplugged. A few days ago I saw the air conditioner had been removed, which is strange because it’s now the summer. The cord had been left in place for the winter and spring months where one traditionally does not need an air conditioner. The whole scene followed some type of Bizaro logic that I can’t follow.