Hissy Fit

Not me. I’m not the one generating hissy fit energy. It’s Head Maintenance Guy.

Returning from dropping off flyers to the Baker on Tuesday, I saw him parked in the walkway by the stairs, removing from a box on his cart a new toilet.

"I thought the vacant unit was all finished", said I. Meaning the unit vacated by Next Door Neighbor.

"It’s not for that unit", said he. "It’s for your downstairs neighbor. She’s been having trouble flushing".

My downstairs neighbor is the weird girl with the dark aura that said, when I went to introduce her to the quad five years ago, "I DON’T LIKE PEOPLE!!!" and scared me away.

Unbelievable, thought I, saying to him "She’s getting a brand-new toilet, when you wouldn’t even give me a replacement toilet seat?".

"Did you request one?", said he.

"A long time ago, I put in a workorder, showed you where the enamel was peeling off the seat, asked for a replacement, and you gave me the runaround".

That was almost two years ago, and the runaround he gave me at that time was to tell me I’d have to purchase a seat, then make a work request to have maintenance install.

I didn’t know anything about choosing a toilet seat so, though I’d given it a try …… looked online, thought about it every time I looked at the seat, I eventually just said the heck with it.

His response was to angrily say, "YOU WANT A NEW TOILET SEAT! I'VE GOT PLENTY OF THOSE IN STOCK. THEY WITHHELD MY BONUS, SO I'LL GIVE YOU WHATEVER YOU WANT".

Then he came up to my unit to check on the workorder I’d submitted LAST WEEK, about the blinds covering the patio window being stuck, not sliding open to sunlight.

Checking the track he said, "THESE BLINDS ARE SHIT! I'LL GET YOU NEW ONES; AND I DON'T LIKE THE LOOKS OF YOUR CARPET. I'LL SEE ABOUT GETTING YOU NEW CARPETS".

Head Maintenance Guy is big mad. He’s ready to give away the farm.

I declined the new carpet …… too much trouble/a headache because of moving the furniture, but he said something about "my company” being able to work around it.

"My company???"

He's got something going on outside that, he said the way it worked, was to move all the furniture from one room to another room, install carpet, then move all the furniture from that room to the newly carpet area, do that area.

Sounds like a plan, but no way will upper management allow him to hissy fit his way into new carpeting.

As for why he was denied a bonus, I’d like to know more about that but have no way to probe into it.

I saw him today when I headed out to the market. They had him putting fresh paint on the red curbs.

Seems something he should not be tasked with, and his body language read he's really not a happy man right now. His aura has dimmed.

I had an appointment with Manager this morning to help me with Rent Café all of a sudden not recognizing my password or email address.

Arriving on time, I found a "closed" notice on her door.

Before I could get pissed off, I saw the Assistant Manager in her office …… only it wasn’t the regular Assistant Manager, but a young Black girl helping out during Assistant Manager’s pregnancy leave. A young professional looking Black girl that has managed to already get on my bad side.

Why is it always my own people who disappoint me, like Kesha; piss me off, like the new (temporary) Black staffer ???

A resident was exiting after just having submitted a workorder with this new staffer. She didn't look happy, but stopped to look at me, said, "Your face is so pretty".

I can’t for the life of me recall how a conversation started but, during the brief conversation, I learned she's lived here three years and angrily spat out "and I’m looking to move".

"Tread carefully", said I. "Think about it because I’ve been here fourteen years and this is good …… considering. We’ve had some really rough patches here, gone through hell, but right now is good, as many have learned because they leave and come back.

"They come back???" said she looking very interested, "And you’ve lived here for 14 years??? Maybe I should think about it. We need to talk".

Turns out she lives upstairs, around the corner in my building, but I’ll never visit to get into what her actual issue is that makes her want to move. Instead, I invited her to tomorrow’s Memorial Day BBQ.

Our conversation over, I go into the office, run my Rent Café issue by Temporary Assistant Manager Nicole.

Again, I don’t know how a conversation started but, while resolving the Rent Café issue, I mentioned Head Maintenance Guy had looked at the blinds, said they needed to be replaced.

"We don’t like the guys being interfered with and bothered while they are out on the property handling other workorders", said she seeming to come from a lofty place.

In my head I was thinking …… Bitch! How dare you chastise me like I’m a child.

What I actually said was, "I wasn’t annoying or bothering him. He had a workorder. Was in my area doing something downstairs and came upstairs to see what the actual issue was".

She just kind of smiled at me sweetly in a way that made me want to slap the black off her face; then she went into her computer and actually looked up the workorder, asked me for the specifics …… what actually was wrong with the blinds.

She didn’t need to know any of that as Head Maintenance Guy was handling it. What I think she was doing was trying to flex her power, establish superiority.

She has no idea.