09.21.10

I woke up one beautifully, sunny morning, palm trees outside my window, nice comfy bed, and John had just left for work. I cleaned up around the house and walked down stairs to take out the garbage. At the same time, our land-lady, Bluebird (keeping her identity secret), comes out of her room and says “ "Geeze Autumn, I don’t know how to tell you this, but I have a friend that I want to have as my roommate. He will be here on Tuesday night, so I’m going to need you guys to make sure your out during the day".” It was a Saturday.
Before I continue, let me tell you something about Bluebird. She is about 5 feet tall, with skin like a Pug. She is missing a few teeth, and with the amounts of alcohol she drinks, its no wonder I felt tipsy just by breathing next to her. She was probably in her 50’s but looked well into her 90’s. Our first mistake: Trusting an alcoholic. If ever there were a guideline to backpacking dos and don’t, this would be a top 5 rule.
We would see her wake up every morning at 7:30 to rider her bike to the pub. Retired, she had all the time in the world to spend drinking. She would come back to the flat around 12:30. Totally blitzed, she would make herself and often times, her (mirror image) boyfriend lunch. They would sleep, wake up, and head back out to the pub after dinner and we wouldn’t see them until 9 or 10 at night. We kept the place clean, and tried to be conscience of our use of electricity and such. We worked most of the time, but when we did see Bluebird, it was hard to understand a word she slurred, or to keep a straight eye on her since her wobbling around could easily make you seasick. She was nice, I will give you that, but her priority was drinking, which easily explains her need for renters.
When she told me we had to leave, I was in shock. I had been spoilt the last week and a half and didn’t want to leave our modest, but comfy abode. I just gasped, over and over to myself, trying to think of what to say to her, and all I could manage at the time was “ "well, I guess I will just have to talk to John about it when he gets home".” I walked back upstairs and she left for the pub.
I jumped online, tried to find some other places for rent, but we are only here for another 3 weeks. It simply isn’t enough time for anyone to consider us as even short-term renters. No luck with that.
Our tent we did have, as well as our air mattress, we had given to Lisa. So our only other option was to spend the next three weeks in our tiny, 1 man tent. I immediately cancelled that out as an option, and waited for John to get home so we could talk to Bluebird. Surely she had a heart and could at least work something out.
I quickly filled John in on the news when he arrived, and Bluebird was back at the house at 5, just like clock work. She saw John was home, so she came upstairs so she could make sure we both understood the circumstances.
We told her we had no where to go, and that we gave away our tent and are only here for another 3 weeks so it was impossible to find another living arrangement. We said that we didn’t mind sharing the upstairs with this third person, and would even sleep on the futon. She kept telling us that she thought we only were there for another week. However, we had told her, a minimum of five times, that we would be in PD till October 12th. If she hadn’t been so trashed every time she asked us, or every time we told her, she would have remembered this simple fact.
I could tell she felt intimidated and became quickly flustered and uncomfortable. She kept her head low, knowing that what she was doing was wrong, said she would try to figure something out and ran down the stairs like a puppy who just got his butt smacked for chewing on a shoe. We gave her the benefit of the doubt, and figured that she would make sure we could stay there without a problem.
The next morning I woke up early for work (Sunday) and found a letter on the counter. It read:

Autumn and John-
I’m sorry, but a permanent friend is more important to me. He will be here tomorrow, so I need you out today so I can clean up.

Bluebird

ARE YOU KIDDING ME! I showed John, we talked about our plan of attack, but had to leave for work. When I left, Johns bike, as well as Bluebirds, was sitting in the garage, as always.
Around 11, I see John walk by work and he asks me if I took the bike to work. “"Nooooo…. Why?"” His bike is missing, and Bluebird isn’t home. He said he was getting ready for the day and he heard Bluebird, and her male friend downstairs. They had left, and when he went to the garage, the bike was gone. (John works at a resort that is about a 30 minute bike ride, so this is a big deal! Not to mention that he bought the bike for 70 bucks, and we had hopped to sell it before we left.)
Enraged, I angrily finished my shift at work, and went back home. John had grabbed a grocery cart and it was already filled with all of our belongings so we could easily push everything back up to Dougies.
Not only was the bike stolen, but she also owed us 45 dollars for kicking us out before the week we paid for was up.
We pushed our stuff, 15 minutes, back up to Dougies, in a complete torrential downpour. Everything was soaking wet. We were going to just stay the night in a dorm room, but decided to save on money and set up our tiny tent instead. That night, everything in our tent was wet, and we didn’t have any pillows. Back on the ground, wet, with the bugs. I didn’t get a wink of sleep that night.
The next day John went back to Bluebirds to ask for our money. She said she didn’t feel that she owed us any money, so John just turned and left so that he didn’t do something that would get us in any trouble.
That night after work, we walked by the flat to see if the bike was there, and it was! It was locked up (she never locks up anything because she gets so drunk she is afraid she will loose the keys, so this was odd to see), so John took off the back tire and the seat. He said if he had tools, he would had done more, but he couldn’t. (While I was gone, he had grabbed a bike that had been sitting at his work, and no one claimed it. It was missing a back tire and a seat, so this worked out for us!) We have not seen or heard from bluebird since.
That night was our last night in the tiny tent. Someone at Dougies was selling his large tent that came with a light and an air mattress, with some pillows, sheets and a nice fluffy blanket.
I spent some time on Tuesday moving all our things into our new tent. Its turning into summer here so the days are so hot its unbearable. Besides, when I do split shifts, I just want to come back and relax in the tent before I have to go back. We needed a fan, and the closest place to a fan was a 15 minute bike ride to IGA super stores. I rented a bike from Dougies and started to peddle. It started to rain on my way there, but I didn’t mind since it was so hot. I got the fan and headed back. On my way home, I noticed a bunch of trees full of bats. I looked up and then all of a sudden, felt something smack my head. At first I thought it was a giant rain drop but upon futher investigation, realized it was bat poop! HAHAHA! Apparently, that means good luck, so I couldn’t help but smile. At least I got us a fan!
The next day there was a jungle party at Dougies, and it was also the night before my birthday. Having become a little more cheerful, we celebrated and hang out with friends at the jungle party. We rang in my birthday at 12 o’clock with a jager bomb, and went to bed on our comfy air mattress.