Crapartment Update - The Landlord strikes back!!!

Cue Imperial Death March here....

Well I thought the battle was over, but it turns out the owner of the crapartment had other plans and has retaliated by taking $280 out of our deposit for "unpaid March rent" and $200 for repairs for a hole about the size of my fist! He charged us for sheetrock! As if HE WOULD USE ANYTHING AS HIGH QUALITY AS SHEETROCK in the crapartment. I swear, if he had been in front of me when I got that letter I would have gone POSTAL! Fortunately for him I was A) Hundreds of miles away from him B) Forced to return to class after I got the news and had an hour of literary analysis to calm my rage. So after a quick return to small claims to amend my "lawsuit" against him Arnold called him to explain to him one last time how "disappointed we are about the situation" My husband was so BRAVE, he was heroic as he sat there calmly talking to our lunatic ex-landlord about our "disappointment" and "unfair treatment". He was like a poster child for non-violent conflict resolution. Unfortunately ex-landlord just grumped at him that he "doesn't agree" etc. etc. If I had made the call, I am sure it would've escalated within, oh about 5 seconds.

So my friends I'm soliciting your help on two points...

1) What should I call the landlord on the blog? I am tired of calling him landlord, it's too dignified a title? All suggestions are welcome in the comments area.

2) Help me figure out how to do this and not go crazy?

How do you sue someone and not hate them? How do you ask for justice with vengeance? How do you pray for your enemies when all you want to do is punch them IN THE FACE! I'm no Daniel, in my bad moments I just wish el landlord was here so I could kick him where it counts! And as my brothers know, I am not above that. In my better moments it seems like the wrong thing to do but how do you stay calm when others are coming at you crazy? All advice welcome! Thanks in advance for your help.

And as a reward for your loyal readership and support I share this fantastic link courtesy of Vega...

Indian Pool Party http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7942583370526412&q=Indians

I think my GAD might have been in this video, and GAD-in-Training Chhimi has apparently been to many-a-party like this one.

BS Recap - Dreams and Visions

Last night Scando bravely led us through Daniel 7 which marks the end of the fun "story telling" and starts in on the apoclyptic dreams Daniel had during his life. It all is getting very revelationsesque like with winged beasts, monsters and talking horns etc. Seriously, I had no idea how we were going to have a discussion about this chapter, it was so weird, but Scando did his homework and led us through unscathed.

So this is what I'm thinking: In the bible dream interpretation was a very common way for God to communicate with people. Do our dreams still have meanings greater than just working out the events of our day? Or is God talking to us? How would we know the difference? In Daniel 7, Daniel asks a saint for an interpretation while he is still in the dream. It's kind of cool, he asks all the questions I would, like "What the heck does this all mean?" A couple of years ago we were studying signs in bs and decided to start asking for them, the results were a bit alarming. Should we start asking for interpretations to our dreams? Will we start receiving them whether we ask or not? Anybody have any opinions about dream interpreation? I only know one person who knows how to interpret dreams. We have about five more chapters of Daniels dreams left so I guess we'll see where it goes.

"Thank God I married you off so I could get rid of you!" - BWM Maghanoy
"Whatever, you kicked her out to Grandma's house when she was like 12" - Remus Maghanoy

To this expression of family affection I say, "True dat, Grandma is my peeps."

Adventures in Maghandiego (More pics available in the photo album)

Lest you think I had forgotten about the Maghanoy family reunion here comes the recap of our San Diego adventure. The thing is I had forgotten that for the most part my family is not good at having "original" conversations. Don't get me wrong, Maghanoys love to hear themselves talk, but the actual words we speak tend to come from other sources, movies, songs, strangers we heard talk on the street. Also, although we make a lot of noise, it seems that we are more adept at shouting out one-liners than responding to what other people in the family might say. While this type of interaction is entertaining and enjoyable it makes for some difficulties in blog land. For example, here is a snippet of table conversation...

GAD Maghanoy - I think I might have parked in a red zone, I couldn't tell if it was red or green. (GAD is colorblind) We can't stay too long, I might get a ticket.
Zeus Maghanoy - Genke Deska. Blah, blah, blah speaking various foreign languages to himself.
Remus Maghanoy - I'm a man, made of brawn. Man who built the Eiffel Tower! (From Anchorman)
BWM Maghanoy - Look I drew Wee Willie Winkie! (There were paper tablecloths at the restaurant)
GAD - "What did I order for dinner?"

I just sat staring at them, it's really hard to make fun of all of them at once, so I have to plot out my strategy carefully. I can't pick on Zeus or Remus because they are too quick with their retorts, GAD was behaving so peacful and sweet that I felt it was unfair to take advantage. So I decided to start with the weakest link BWM Maghanoy. Not one to let an educational opportunity pass by, BWM was very busy drawing an array of characters on the table including "Old Mother Hubbard and Jack and Jill"

Me - "Hey Mom, maybe you should stop hanging out with five year olds since all your cultural references are nursery rhyme characters"
BWM Maghanoy - "Wee willie Winkie is cool!"
Me - "Don't you every watch movies or the news or something?" (This is of course a stupid strategy because BWM falls asleep the instant a movie comes on, she has movie-induced narcolepsy)
Remus- "Em, If you opened up Mom's head, you would see candyland"

In awe of Remus' burn I decide to let up on BWM for awhile to set myself up to the important task of rearranging everything on the table. I believe this opsessive-compulsiveness is a reaction to the chaos of dinner conversations during my formative years. Imagine living through an hour of this lunacy every night. All dysfunctionality aside I must congratulate the Maghanoys on several areas of personal growth...

1) My GAD did not yell at anybody the whole night. I was anticipating him to come back exploding like Mt. Helena after it took him more than 20 minutes to park, but he came back extremely calmly and ate his ahi in peace. Also he let us all eat our food without limiting our intake so that he could save our meals for his lunch the next day.

2) Zeus Maghanoy was quite generous with his filet mignon - or as he says fill-it-mig-none. Giving out a piece to each of us with very little complaint. And I was very impressed with his use of French at our quasi-french restaurant.

3) Remus Maghanoy has started listening to Shakira. What more could I ask?

4) BWM Maghanoy made it through dinner without bossing anybody. It was a miracle worthy of vatican recognition.

Congratulations Maghanoys! I have hope for us yet!

Postscript - Zeus and Remus are my younger brothers, Zeus being the elder of the two. My brothers have been nicknamed Zeus and Remus because these are two of the names my father, in the tradition of wildly bizarre Filipino naming, had originally suggested when we were born. It's horrifying, if I was born male, I could have ended up being named Zeus.

Latin Kings of Dramedy - Running towards 2009!

So these are my two friends Mariachela and Pedro Garcia. They are in love, blah, blah, blah. Actually it's a really good, sweet, uplifiting story, but I am grumpy right now and as they both well know, I have almost nothing nice to say while I am grumpy.

So I'll go to the aspect of their relationship that I most love, how it relates to me! I met both of them in 1998 seperately at our Alma Mater UCD! They met each other a few times and apparently according to Char, Mariachela was digging on Pedro in a kind of 3-second crush sort of a way, but nothing ever happened, hmmmm? I believe in literary terms this is called foreshadowing. Anyways, last spring I got the idea to set them up, but then I was a bit slow acting on executing the idea, and then intervening events made me think that maybe there were more important matters to attend to then my matchmaking plans. And then... I was hanging out with both of them seperately and they were both hanging out with romantic propspects that I felt were UNSUITABLE! And since I am queen of the world I decided that I would set them up so that they would fall in love and stuff and I wouldn't have to worry about them hanging out with people that I dislike! And to my shock, despite multiple barriers, family tragedies, bad timing, Mariachela living in another city and Pedro's inability to follow my directions on how to act right they still FELL IN LOVE! FOR REALS! Seriously, I couldn't believe it actually worked. Apparently I am far better at this then I thought! And they are still in love and now Mariachela is going to move back to the Capital City and force me to make tamales every Christmas! It's almost too good to be true! Sure there are annoying side effects like Pedro's inability to stop swooning about Mariachela but I suppose if two of your closest friends are happy together and have committed to helping you raise your possible future children then it's probably worth it, right? Besides Mariachela said that I can still dress Pedro and boss him around. What more could I ask for?

BS Recap Returns - Daniel Part 6

In the Lions Den. Well our lazy BS has returned from hiatus to finish the last of the Daniel "stories", with the most famous of all the Lions Den. So now that the last king died after that whole "writing on the wall" incident, there is a new King, Darius, who apparently loves Daniel and wants to make him adminstrator over all of Babylon, except that all the other adminstrators are jealous and hate Daniel. Instead of killing him or kidnapping him they develop this elaborate plan in which they get the King to agree to this irresversible decree that anyone who prays to anyone but the king for the next 30 days gets thrown into the lions den. Seems like a little bit of a disproportional punishment, don't you think? Salsuna had this theory that King Darius was partying drunk when he signed the decree, because seriously, that makes no sense.

Predictably Daniel is not intimidated by this pray and die edict and goes up to his room as scheduled and prays "with the window open facing Jerusalem". Daniel is way brave/crazy! The bs as whole agreed that as faithless wusses we would be praying in the closet under a blanket. So all the other adminstrators catch him praying and the King is forced to throw him in with the Lions. After a sleepless and "entertainment" free night the King runs down and says "Hey Daniel, did your God save you?" And much to his relief Daniel is like "Yup still here, praise be to God!" Wow, so having complied with the decree the King lets Daniel out and throws the adminstrators and their families in there instead. The Lions eat them all. Harsh. But they kind of asked for it, I guess like many evil people, they didn't really think through the consequences of what if God does exist and is powerful. Sure it all works smoothly if Daniel is praying to a pretend God, but what if he isn't? Then you get eaten. Note to self: Think about all contigencies when plotting evil. Anyways, then Darius writes a LETTER TO THE WORLD... this seems to be very popular in Babylon at this time. The LETTER TO THE WORLD is quite poetic in my opinion. You can find it at the end of Daniel 6.

Lessons?: We all decided that Daniel was far more heroic than we could imagine being, but it's nice to have someone to look up to, like an MLK, Cesar Chavez or a Bishop Romero. And it's good to know with God, it is possible that you might just be able to stand up for your beliefs when the chips come down.

To come: Maghanoy family get-together in SD Here's a preview via e-mail from Mommy Maghanoy "Sharpen your pencil--because not only will all the Maghanoy men be there but the "true" Maghanoy threatens to "PAINT THE TOWN RED" and remember it will be St. Patricks Day and that's all about green, but what does "he" know being color deficient!!!!!!

Quote of the Day: “If people only knew how I dread hair and makeup and anything that feels like getting dressed up, how hard it is to get me into anything formal. I’m just basically the rattiest person you’ve ever seen. My inner slob is really the governing personality. I’d like to know what it feels like to be someone who is perfectly groomed, and who stays groomed. Because I grow progressively more deranged as the day goes on. I usually end up with paper clips in my hair and things stapled to me and those Post-it things on my shirt. At the end of the day, I am my own personal freak show.” -Diane Sawyer

Wow, it's like Diane is inside my head! Well, actually I take that back, I love being dressed up and wearing pretty clothes, I just abhor the process, I'd rather spend my time sleeping in. My poor mother, she tried so hard to get me to wear makeup and such. To this day my mother will volunteer to dry my hair when she comes to visit, simply because she likes to see me cleaned up. I let her do it, because I am a big baby that likes to be coddled, although I am not sure that the violence my mother enacts with a blow dryer and brush counts as coddling. Seriously she is small but merciless. "Stop complaining it doesn't hurt!" "But Mom, your leaving scratch marks on my face with the brush!" Let it be a warning to you all, the Maghanoys might be afraid of roller-coasters, scary movies, the dark, street parking etc. but if you give one of us some kind of utensil or tool, you better watch out because we're not above a little physical violence with styling products or fishing supplies.

First weekend at the new non-crappy apartment!

It's so big! I feel like I'm living in a freaking magazine apartment, like the unrealistically large ones you see on sitcoms. Obviously the quality is not as good, but still, it's like a house. As we were hammering away last Saturday at 11 p.m. at night I realized, wow, this is the good life. Make noise when I like, have things quiet when I like. I was starting to forget that living in these conditions was possible.

All apartment philosiphizing aside, I would like to state the obvious. Moving is extremely hard physical labor. After all this up and down the stairs with heavy boxes I will be extremely irritated if I don't at least burn off the crepes I ate with my Grandma this weekend. Hmmph!

Coming attractions - Wednesday BS Recap returns, plus a special treat. St Paddy's day in San Diego with the whole Maghanoy clan, it promises to be an event filled with unreasonable amounts of food, quotes from Anchorman, nonsensical conversation and verbal abuse. Can't wait!

Realismo Magico - Magical Realism

Magical Realism is a literary style mostly found in Latin American literature. The style's signature is the combination of realistic and magical elemnents, such as children with green hair, crazy generals, angels that fall from the sky and clairvoyant grandmothers. Magical Realism is pretty much a description of daily life in Colombia and other Carribean countries. The most famous author in the genre is Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a Colombian novelist who won the Nobel Peace Prize for literature. If you ever have the chance to go to Colombia you will realize that magical realism is just real life there, because in Colombia everything is crazy, mostly in a fun way. Anyways I don't know if it is Arnold's Colombian presence at Chateua Cookie Monste or what is going on, but a little bit of Magical Realism visited us last night. A piano fell on Da Bruce's car. That is not a typo! One can imagine trees or light posts falling on your car, but pianos? This is the kind of thing that happens everyday in Colombia, but East Sac? I guess it just proves that the magic is everywhere and maybe we just don't notice it, that is until a piano falls on your friends car.

Crapartment Update
We moved in today! Keys are securely in hand! I cannot describe how happy Arnold and I are now to be crapartment free and moving on up! Since our new place is amazing, huge and most importantly has a HEATER we will be naming in Macondo after magical realisms most famous Colombian myth.

Hey everybody, thanks to one of our favorite future GAD's Mr. Chhimi, the blog is now sporting a brand new feature:

Dum, da, da, dum.... We now have a Photo album!

The first pics are "BS Gone Wild at IKEA" To access the album click the link to the right!

The Crapartment Liberation Squad eats Punabji pizza & discusses the merits of pineapple.


Right to left:
Commander Cookie Monster
Seargent Scando
Liutenant Lolista
Arnold of the Airforce Division



Our self-proclaimed "Master Packer" strategizes for how to move the "great white whales" i.e. the IKEA Wardrobes







This pic tells you everything you need to know about how Captain Ahab-Arnold feels about facing the "great white whales".

Quote of the Day: "Don't give up tv during lent! What would we talk about?" - Cookie Monster

So despite the fact that I twisted my ankle falling down the stairs the other day I am in good spirits! Today I received an actual time and date to pick up the keys to our new home! VG News! On Friday we will be moving on in and upstairs to our new apartment! Yay! I cannot describe to you how excited I am. It is the light at the end of the crapartment tunnel! While I am thoroughly enjoying watching WifeSwap and SuperNanny at the Chateau it will be good to move into the apartment and have an actual address! Yay! And another double yay because next week is Spring Break so I should have more time than usual to prepare, unpack and feather our new nest. I'm thinking of incorporating more orange into the decor. You know, kind of like a renaissance from my college days. So far Arnold has only agreed to using brown but that's okay we have lots of time to work out a compromise and peruse the model rooms at IKEA. :)

To come: Pics from BS adventures at IKEA and the Liberation from the Crapartment

Liberation from the Crapartment!

Quote of the Day "So do you think if I googled crapartment that your website would come up?" -Salsuna

Well, I tried it my friend and I am glad to say that yes if you try googling crapartment maghanoy.com is the first site to appear! Another significant moment for the website.

In other extremely significant and joyful news I am happy to report that Arnold and I are one step away from being fully liberated from the crapartment. After much hard labor by a dedicated team of friends Cookie Monster, Scando, Lolista and Sonia Vega we are free from the freezing, infested terror that has been our home for the past four years. I won't lie, the process of moving was horrifying, I can't even go into all the details because it's exhausting just thinking about it, but the finale is that Arnold and I are currently residing, not at our new place, but at Chateau Cookie Monster because our new apartment was not ready for us on moving day. Our stuff is in the garage of the new apartment, we however haven't made it in yet. This should be a temporary setback and I must say that at Chateau Cookie Monster the accomodations are deluxe! Not only is there heat, but it's very clean, lightrail adjacent, comes complete with two other twenty somethings for me to gossip with and there is cable tv! Best of all are the things it comes without, crazy people who scream obscenities at three in the morning, elephants tromping up and down the stairs by our heads, and weirdos who come to feed the stray cats by our front door. Fantastic!

And now in the tradition of boring Oscar speeches and teary wedding toasts: a heartfelt thank you from Arnold and Amelie...

Scando-For taking charge of this whole packing project as Amelie was so obviously incapacitated by the process

Lolista-For not only packing for six hours but offering of your own free volition to return and clean, also for saving me when I was about to be crushed by my IKEA wardrobe

Sonia Vega - For coming to pack with a sinus infection!

Chhimi and Tabitha - for making a baby and then making lots of food to celebrate the baby, and then letting me take lots of the food home for a starving and slightly dispirited Arnold

Tatay and Mama Maghanoy - For amusing me by continuing the tradition of leaving bizarre, urgent phone messages for un-urgent reasons.

"Hi Amelie, this is your Mom, I am calling from Dad's cell phone ( my Mom likes to announce where she is calling from). Call me back on Dad's cell phone. -Mama Maghanoy

One hour after I receive my Mom's call

"Hi honey, this is your Dad, okay? Call me back. Okay? Call me pronto." -Tatay Maghanoy

When I call my Dad...

Amelie: Hey Dad what's up?

Tatay Maghanoy: Oh, nothing, I wanted to take a nap but your Mom said no, so we're driving somehwere... How was the move?

Salsuna & Glenido - For making us dinner and lending us the keys to Chateau Connerly

and last but certaintly not least... to Cookie Monster and Da Bruce who not only generously took in their suddenly homeless friend and her husband, but also cleaned the bathroom for their use and helped pack.

In my life I have been fortunate to blessed with a great, insane, loving family, I mean I am a Maghanoy! How much better could it get? But I have also been fortunate to have friends who I love as if each one of them were Maghanoys. You are all blessings to us and despite all the technichal problems of moving, when I think about this weekend I can only think about how blessed we are to have friends like you.

The Cast of Characters!

Okay well the only way to get my friends to read the blog is to make it about them. Soooo... I introduce to you, the bs cast of characters, complete with a visual represenation and bio for each of my bs peeps.


Lolista is apparently very tall and a special Ed teacher. She is the owner of the magic potato bag. Also she looks good in green and owns the same exact bible as me. We are bible twins.

This is Salsuna, reina of the bs castle. She is from the south. She is the bs' resident party girl and world traveler. She even went to a very exotic and forbidden country, I won't say it's name, but it rhymes with Flooba. She is an engineer and spends lots of time talking with Pedro about boring things I don't understand.

This is Scando. In this picture he looks well-behaved, but I believe if you look behind the eyes, you can see him plotting his next manic misadventure. He's an engineer too, the bs seems to attract engineers and teachers. Also he is "intense", his words not mine! :)

This is Arnold, ocassionally referred to as SCH. He married me and I'm pretty sure it wasn't an accident because he married me three times. He seems quiet but he'll burn you good when you aren't expecting it. Also as his pic attests, he's not afraid to drink at bs. He brought his Catholic traditions to this group of evangelical miscreants in the shape of renaming prayer requests "intentions".

Oh Miranda! Yet another teacher in the group, Miranda attempts to herd this motley crue only to find that we are much less well-behaved than her fourth graders. She's famous for having the bible with the weird translation, but where else would I get quotes like "And then his thighs went slack..." She makes potato stir-fry on her food night, we love it!

Don't worry! Pedro Garcia is not mean, he's just cranky cause missed out on orange chicken and IKEA! His job is computer heavy so sometimes he forgets how to smile, but his novia Mariachera cheers him right up!

Ash Wednesday

Quote of the Day: God does not want to turn your life upside-down and cause you anxiety, He wants to transform you from the inside out. - Father John

So today is the start of lent, the 40 day season that precedes Easter when Christians celebrate the rising of Jesus Christ and our salvation from sin and death. I have to say, although I'm no Catholic, I love lent. I love the idea of a time of repentance, renewal and contemplation in preparation for an exciting event. A special time dedicated to remembering that every day is a second chance, a chance to make things right, a chance to sit still and rest for a moment, a chance to love more, a chance to be transformed from the inside out. Lately life has seemed a bit chaotic, overly-busy and anxiety producing but lent is that time of year to remember that hope is always just around the corner that even in life's worst moments there is something better that we are constantly preparing ourselves for and lest I become too lofty, serious, dramatic and impersonal, a moment to let go of the rage one has towards one's neglectful landlord.

So that's that, I wish you all forty days of peace, joy and second chances!

Tomorrow: BS report on our hijinx at the Sacramento IKEA opening.