it's weird, because it's less that i need two bedrooms, and more that i don't need a kitchen - or, don't need a living room.

so, when i see a unit with a big kitchen, it lets me imagine using the living room as a studio - and the kitchen as a living room.

the reason is that the only thing i actually do in the living room is eat, right?

there's actually one place i'm going to call tomorrow that has a really big kitchen, that may be useful as the studio space - and a very small living room to eat in.

it's just total floor space i'm after, and the ability to section it properly.

i am appalled at the premise of having a white side of town and a brown side of town. i would not support this, in any way, or seek to uphold it at all.

but, i need to make the point clear: i'm not white.

my father was of mixed jewish, native american, italian & french background. he also seems to have had some deeper ethnic ancestry, which may have been african american or southeast asian. it's not clear. we just know there was some very dark skin in there.

my mother is finnish & celtic (irish/scots/welsh) - technically white, but not really considered it through most of this continent's history.

for 10 months of the year, i am full on brown.

under the wrong public policies, hundreds of years worth of progress can be wiped out in a matter of weeks.

is it because god?

lol.

like i say: we've very quickly reverted to a far more primitive time.

with every passing day, the depth of this sudden backwardsness just serves as a reminder of how fragile what we used to have really was.

you know, there seems to be a group of people that think single people are in some kind of conflict with families.

i'm not even going to try and get my head around this, other than asking for further clarification. but, is the idea really that deciding to be single is some kind of an attack on families or....?

i dunno.

i suspect this is one of those things that you'll need to explain to me very slowly before i'm able to identify the fallacy in it.

is the fact that i don't want a family somehow seen as threatening to people that do want families? how so?

do we all have to make the same choice, is that it? do we all have to be the same? is it the 50s again?

by the end of all of this, i could end up teaching your kids. how'd you like that? and, at the least, i'll make sure that they won't make these kinds of errors in reasoning, if i do.

i just have better things to do than raise kids. sorry.

fwiw, the date for payment of the court order was yesterday. so, they now owe me interest on the $650 they still owe me.

the official response from the paralegal is that the landlord claims she didn't receive the documents in the mail.

that's right - they're claiming they didn't receive the documents in the mail.

obvious bullshit, of course - but a good demonstration of why i know they're not going to follow any order at all.

i may have won a larger settlement if i was out before the court date, but i wouldn't have seen a dime of it.

i just want to make the point clear.

i don't know exactly how many places i've seen. 30? 40? 50?

i've put in three applications and have not heard anything back. these have all been with management companies, and i understand that these people operate like actuaries - they just crunch numbers. i don't know what the ratio they want is. 30? 40? i can correctly argue that i'll live happily with 60-70, but you can't argue with a robot. 60>40. error.

of those three applications, two of them were in buildings with smokers. one of them was over top of a storefront, and i think it would have been ok. the other was in a corner unit and, while away from the smoking traffic, much more of a gamble. the third application was a ground floor unit. so, none of these units were what i really want.

and, only one of the actual applications i've put down has been in a smoke-free place.

in fact, of the 40 or so places i've seen, only three have been non-smoking. i saw a non-smoking unit in july that i couldn't secure last month's for. there was the aforementioned ground unit. and, there was an attic north of tecumseh.

37/40 = 93%.

do i believe that 93% of the buildings here have smokers?

no.

even the most pessimistic estimate would have to be in the 70s or 80s. 93? no way.

so, i'm going to argue i'm undergoing some bad luck.

there's two deductions from this:

1) it's not like i'm rejecting spots. i would have moved into the non-smoking building in a second, but i would have thrown away last month's rent and probably the $1350 settlement along with it. this landlord is not going to obey any court order whatsoever. $2000 is a lot of money to me. i couldn't pull the trigger on that. the attic was...it had a lot of features, so it probably wasn't over-priced in a closer analysis. but, it didn't make sense - not for me. and the manager for the ground floor unit wanted to rent to a "professional", which is sort of laughable. i actually think the unit is still available, as i saw an ad for it come up and then down again in the first week of august. so, of the three, two aren't my fault, and the other just wasn't a good fit.

2) it's gotta turn over, soon. even the worst case analysis of an 80% rate means i'm getting a bad sample. as t--->oo, this should even out. i don't have infinite time, here, but i'm going on three months looking, now...

the greatest geniuses in the history of the world - from socrates through to turing - have all been attacked and killed by the societies they inhabited.

i'm not saying i belong in that list.

i'm just asking you to think carefully about what the outcome of this situation implies.

i still don't know if i wanted to stay in that basement or not. the fact is that the smoke was awful, and the landlord was an idiot. but, it's clear enough that they didn't want me there, and they would have figured out a way to get me out of there, eventually. i think i reacted the way i had to. i can't and don't want to stay here.

but, the basic truth is that when you force a smart person to exist amongst stupid people, the stupidity usually wins. you could even argue that intelligence is very actively selected out...

if the muslims had their way, we wouldn't have any diversity here at all, would we?

only in a backwards, orwellian reality would we speak of muslim immigration as creating diversity.

muslims are the least diverse in thought and most conformist people on the planet.

i was citing orwell.

maybe you might want to think about what i was getting at a little more carefully.

there's "diversity", in this religious or corporatist context where you have these categories of retrograde conformists that have no ability to think for themselves whatsoever, and then there's diversity in the actual sense, which is synonymous with individualism - and in complete contradiction to any kind of organized thought control, be it religious or capitalist, at all.

but, none of that creates housing where there is none.

there's too many poor people in canada, right now. and, it means something for me to point out that i was here first.

as an anarchist, i actively encourage you to reject your culture and learn to think for yourself.

i can help, but only to a point - you have to do this work on your own.

i'm not interested in a debate about diversity v. homogeneity in the way that bourgeois liberals want to define the terms; i'm an anarchist, i reject culture altogether in favour of individualist expression. i don't care where you're from or what you look like; i'm going to treat you like an individual, either way.

but, that's just it - i'm not going to interpret you as a muslim or a hindu or a sikh or a christian, because that limits your individuality and restricts the amount of diversity that exists.

nor am i going to let you use your religion or your culture as an excuse for oppressive attitudes towards gays, women, animals or anything else. diversity does not imply a rights hierarchy.

a more coherent understanding of my critique of religion - as well as my critique of capitalism - is that it destroys individuality and replaces it with these cookie cutter concepts of identity.

a black woman from jamaica should be free to listen to rachmaninov and dress like a german aristocrat, if she wants. an indian male should be free to eat beef as he curses the gods and tries out for the local hockey team, if he wants. a muslim woman should be free to work in the pornography industry, have multiple partners and reject motherhood - if she wants. and gay & trans people of every background exist, whether anybody likes it or not.

that is diversity.

a sea of hijabs and yoga mats, made by children in guatemala, is not.

when somebody calls to ask you a question, regardless of context, you should always shut the fuck up and let them ask it, not try and steer the conversation somewhere else.

i can never understand these property managers that want to take control of the conversation on the phone.

i'm calling. i'm initiating the question. and, i don't want to hear your fucking sales pitch - shut the fuck up and let me ask the question.

"but, it's big, and there's no noise, and..."

...and, i don't fucking care. i didn't call to get a recording. i called to ask a question. i'm calling you to ask about whether you'll be enforcing non-smoking requirements, not to hear about what colour the fucking walls are, or when the kitchen was redone, or....

and, then, it's "i don't have time for..."

well, you're the one wasting my time, you fucking idiot.

you don't think fags and losers should have the right to safe, healthy, smoke-free housing?

why not?

i will escape your barbarism before i participate in it.

yes, i am dealing with depression right now.

and, i'm depressed because i can't find a healthy place to live.

and, i shouldn't have to compete on a market for an apartment. that's barbaric.

you want to be better? you can be better. i don't care.

you can win and i can lose. fine.

just give me a nice corner to read in, by myself.

if you force market conditions on me, i'm not going to adjust, or try harder, or change myself to fit the market - i'm going to get up and leave.

i don't want to 'win'. i want out.

yeah.

i'm looking at 50-100 people applying for any given apartment. i can't - and don't want to - compete for a place to live. it's just a shitty way to live, and a shitty way to organize a society.

i mean, do you want to race me to the corner for the apartment? ugh.

i've argued repeatedly that what i want is a way to escape from a market-based society, so i don't have to deal with this. that's a big part of the reason i moved here...

i knew it would disappear, eventually.

so, i'm going to have to get out of here...and find some other place where the market has collapsed, for at least a little while...

how does it make sense to say "i smoke drugs because i have anxiety", if your habit is to sit in your room and smoke by yourself?

"i smoke because i have anxiety" only makes sense in the context of social interactions, does it not?

it's a bullshit excuse for a drug addict...