Two strikes

It's been one of those days. It started with allergies, cleared up in the middle, and is ending with some sort of nightmarish sequence of stupid events and unhealthy levels of failure at anger management. Perhaps I should just start with some of the good bits, and let it progress from there.

Today is my sister-in-law's birthday, an occasion that my mother used as an excuse to test the waters of my brothers' new tolerance for each other. It's a long time since they would be able to be in the same room with each other, let alone the slight thawing of their demeanour which has seen them both participating in the same conversation - although still not talking directly to each other. Between them cracking jokes at either end of the table, and my two year old whirlwind of a niece playing up for her audience, the night was going pretty well. Some quiet chat with Mum and Dad afterwards - yes, I know, it's sad, but when you're single and broke you have to make the most of all interaction, not to mention the free food that comes with one of Mum's cooking spectaculars - and I was ready to head home and throw my phone on the charge. A bit of light reading before bed while I got some juice back into the batteries, to make sure it would last the night and wake me up in the morning. It just flashed at me with a battery warning light when I tried to make it do something. Note to self: leaving the MSN app running in the background all day chews through batteries like nothing else.

So I packed my many bags of goodies and headed homewards, feeling pretty safe in the knowledge that the flatmate would have arrived home before me and, if not warmed the flat, at least put the bins out. Sadly, no. As I parked my car, I drove past both of the bins which should have been on the nature strip. A quick check of the letterbox revealed that it was also not as it should have been. Thinking flatmate mustn't be home yet, I trudged up the stairs and rummaged in my bag for my keys.

Not there.

A vision came to me of throwing them on my desk at work, and another, later vision, of them being under a pile of papers. Still. And my phone was dead. But when I reached the top of the stairs, thinking to have another good rummage in my Tardis of a handbag, I noticed that the security door was ajar. Flatmate must be home, thank god, I thought, willing to overlook transgressions of bin and letterbox maintenance in return for being let in. I pushed the button for the doorbell, and waited.

Fine, I thought, when two more pushes had failed to yield a flatmate. She's probably in her room - where else would she be, actually? - so I'll just knock. Now I have a truly fearsome rap when I'm trying to get in somewhere. Not only has it terrified schoolies into quietude in beachside hotels, it has brought the rowdiest of neighbours to turn down their stereos. It's a knock worthy of the old ladies who live downstairs and sit in judgement on the goings on of the flats. A truly fantastic weapon to have in your arsenal when you're locked out and your apparently partially deaf flatmate is inside. Make that completely deaf. She didn't come to the door. OK, I told myself. It's 10:30, she might just be security conscious. I called out. Nothing. I thought I could hear running water inside, so I waited for it to stop and then tried again. Nada.

By this point I was fuming. Not only had she not put out the bins, but she was leaving me locked out on a bloody cold night. And this following hard on the heels of the Great Cooking Mess of 2011. Not going well at all, here. I knew what I had to do, but I was dreading doing it. Finally getting angry enough, I stormed downstairs and back to my car, bag of leftovers over my wrist. Throwing the car into gear and speeding onto the roads, I headed back to Mum and Dad's to pick up my spare keys, just hoping that they hadn't gone to bed yet, and that a knock on the door at 10:45 wouldn't give them heart failure.

An angry rant and a serious risk of speeding fines later, and my spare keys let me into the flat. The only sign that flatmate had been home, other than the unlocked wire door, was the firmly closed bedroom door, as opposed to the slightly ajar state that it gets left in when she's not home.

Banging and clattering around for a bit to get my own back, I decided to open the mail. One of the letters was a warning about an outstanding amount of rent, which I had tried without success to chase up before. This time it was different, and I felt like screaming. The amount listed as the rent we should be paying is $4 a month more than the weekly calculation suggests it should be. That's the difference in the rent that they are chasing. If they really want the extra 84 cents a week, the bastards can fight for it. I'm in no mood to be trifled with, and, based on the mounting headache, it's a mood that will linger through until morning. That this is the second time they've attempted to extract the cash from me has made me think that, as much as I love the flat, I may be moving on come September when the lease is up. Heaven help them if they fight back against the logical arguments I will attempt to make. Because I sure as hell won't.