Tired of my diet ranting yet?

Fine then, I will give you a break.

I've spent the last week looking at apartments in the ghetto, reading apartment listings on every website available, driving all slow and creepy like down neighborhoods I like, and getting frustrated.

I'm getting absolutely no where in the apartment hunt.

Technically I only have two requirements: Safe and must have washer/dryer in unit. You would be surprised how hard it is to find these two things combined. My current place, while cute on the inside, really is in a don't go out after dark neighborhood but is a bit safer because it is an enclosed building. Well, it was, until someone drove into the lobby through the wall of windows just this week. Now I suppose if you really wanted to get in you could just push aside the caution tape, step gingerly around the shattered glass remnants and spray paint the interior of the elevator all you want. Because yes, in the time that I have lived here, people have tagged the elevator. The tagging luckily is usually confined to the outside of the building but still, this isn't the super best building, you know?

Technically I may only have two requirements but the list of hope-fors is longer. I want high(er) ceilings. My current ceilings are low and of the popcorn variety. My friend just moved to a fabulous place with vaulted ceilings and moulding and windows on more than one wall (my place only has windows on one side of the unit). I was drooling over the place until she pointed out her one problem: No closets. There is a tiny, shallow closet in her bedroom and that is it. She doesn't even have a pantry in the kitchen. I don't understand where she is supposed to store her sheets, towels, and shoes, much less coats for guests and her vacuum cleaner. She's paying the same price for that place that I am paying for mine and while mine feels like a dark, sad little dungeon after seeing her bright and airy domicile I must be grateful that I have no less than three closets, including a walk in! Plus I have a balcony that I have classily decorated with rubbermaid boxes full of crap covered in a tarp. So I guess I have to add must have storage to my list of needs. I really don't have that much, but this place is really small (all of it went to closets, methinks).

One question though: If you were building a beautiful development of swank loft two story townhouses what would make you decide that two bathrooms, one per level, was a smart idea for a space less than 600 square feet? Why wouldn't you put in a washer dryer in on of the twee bathrooms? Why would anyone think that a space than small would need two bathrooms? WHY? Because I tell you, I would have snatched that place up in a second. Apparently many people would save for the idiotic bathroom deal. I think the lease people are tired of being asked why there are two toilets per yet no washer/dryer. Common sense people: It ain't so common.