MuseMedley

As I said in my previous Apartment Living post, living in a brand new apartment building is like being enrolled in a beta program of some software. Even the real estate developers don't know what 'bugs' you may find. My apartment whistles. Yes, no kidding! Specifically, it is the front door that whistles whenever the cooking hood or the bathroom extract is on, or if it really windy outside, but the noise is so loud that there is nowhere to hide from it in the apartment. There are plenty of things, such as storage space and water pressure, that I knew intuitively to check at inspection time. This is definitely not one of them. Strangely, it started off as just a mild lower frequency vibration noise, similar to the noise from a fridge, but it gradually morphed into a screaming pitch as more apartments on the floor become occupied. There was high wind a couple of days ago. I sat here in my study nook at the farthest point in the apartment from the front door....

Settling in a new city is not necessarily an easy thing to do. So far we have been very lucky, finding an apartment we like and in the area we like. It is a brand new apartment building. We were among a handful of first residents to move in, three and a half months ago. Apartment living is easy - no lawns to mow or gardens to tend to - but we do miss our house in terms of space and storage. Brand new is definitely good in a lot of ways. For one, you don't have to deal with any undesirable remnants and effects of previous tenants. However, getting a brand new apartment is like being in the beta program of some software. We were the first to find out the bathroom's extract fan didn't work and, with the bathroom away from external walls, i.e. no opening windows, we had to suffer sweltering-bathroom-itis for nearly a month before the developer company sent someone to fix it. Without the distraction of any previous tenants' undesirable remnants, it has also made me take ...