it's just one of those days/weeks/months/years
sophomore slump or comeback of the year? probably a slump.
once upon a time, there was a person who had a bad week. they kept trying to make it better, holding on to their superstition that life balances itself and this will be followed by good news, and care for themselves as well as they could.
and just like that, they spent a whole week feeling hungry constantly because they had no energy to make food and a broken tooth and they ate all the snacks in their house and feel too anxious to go grocery shopping. in a city like vancouver, with so many options for stores, delivery services and more, why is it so hard to leave the house to get something essential like chips or a mickey of vodka?
that person, dear reader, is me. please throw a mcdonalds 10 pc chicken nugget meal at my window, i will take the bug screen out. i’ll be watching sex and the city in the mean time.
my cat is biting my knee as i write about housing
yeah, so, for my second newsletter where i talk about things going on in online culture, i have nothing because i have consumed nothing. i’ve gone on tiktok a few times this week, saw one video, and closed the app. i’ve posted depressing close friends instagram stories to whine. everything on twitter is about covid. so instead, i’ll talk about the thing i have been doing all week: looking for housing in vancouver.
i live in a tiny 1 bedroom with my boyfriend and our cat, and while it’s been nice living here with all the apartment’s quirks (hot pipe in the bathroom, no range hood or bathroom fan, west facing windows on the top floor in a heat wave, no elevator, only canada post can really deliver here, no intercom, loud neighbours downstairs, malicious evil bad guitar playing neighbour beside us, nobody wears a mask in the hallway, bad shared laundry, etc etc etc), we’re looking for a change.
so we thrust ourselves into the vancouver rental search where we try to find something pet friendly, 1 bed 1 bath, in a nice location, in suite laundry, and affordable for our combined income. this, obviously, presents a challenge.
vancouver’s rental situation has not changed in the few years i’ve been comfortable in my current place: it’s hellish! it sucks!
everything is overpriced, applications take so long to fill out, realtors and landlords are not very good at communication, some refuse to do video call tours despite the ease of doing so in a fucking pandemic, and before you know it, someone else has snatched the apartment you actually really liked.
one thing i’m glad to see is a lot more pet friendly housing than i had seen before, but that might also just be that i have a bit more money to spend than i did as a university student looking for a $800 bedroom where every landlord writes “NO PETS. NO SMOKING. NO PARTIES. NO HAVING PEOPLE OVER. NO LOUD TALKING. DON’T BREATHE AFTER 8PM” in their craigslist listing.
anyway, how fucking depressing is it that looking for housing is incredibly hard, even when you start to live above the poverty line? housing is a human right. it shouldn’t be this hard for anyone.
i have nothing else to write about, so here’s my crush of the week
like any reasonable person, i cycle through obsessions from time to time. when i’m feeling extra anxious or depressed it can be harder to feel passionate about anything, but last night i was watching the fear and malding episode with tony hawk and jason ellis and i realized something… tony hawk is really hot?
i don’t know what it is about him. i guess lanky has always been my type, i’ve dated my fair share of skateboarders, he has a good smile. his gaze reminds me of owen gray. i don’t know what’s going on in my brain, i promise i’ll fix it.
(no i won’t, all my celebrity crushes make no sense, one of the biggest ones is felix biederman)
track of the week
another throwback! my friend darren showed me cobra starship in 2009(?) and this song is great. it’s dated, it was produced by patrick stump, it makes me happy. so sue me! also, gabe saporta is another one of those celebrity crushes i think about from time to time. fueled by ramen shaped me, okay?!?
the signs as bands signed/formerly signed by fueled by ramen
aries - gym class heroes
taurus - sublime with rome (lol)
gemini - 3OH!3
cancer - paramore
leo - twenty one pilots
virgo - dashboard confessional
libra - cute is what we aim for
scorpio - fall out boy
sagittarius - panic! at the disco
capricorn - jimmy eat world
aquarius - cobra starship
pisces - lights