DFW tells us repeatedly that essays are for the reader. He argues that it is not the reader’s job to figure out why she should be reading a certain writer’s work, but the writer’s job to show the reader why she should be spending her valuable time reading what a writer has to say. Essays, he explains, are not to serve the writer, but the reader. And this is something that I find a lot of internet writers either forgetting or completely oblivious to.

Writing for the internet is all about being funny. You are mostly writing for people who are bored at work and want a quick pick-me-up over the salad they’re eating for lunch at their desks or because none of their friends are responding to them on Gchat. The mark of a good blogger/internet editor has become funniness. The funniest are regarded as the best, and with good merit in many instances since it’s hard to be a funny writer. You might be hilarious when bantering with groups of friends, but when it comes time to put your hilarious witticisms into printed words that are just as funny, it becomes a daunting task. This hasn’t stopped a whole league of writers from fitting their blog posts into the “funny” category. With the right italicization here and the right — oh, ha ha! — sorts of asides there, you can fit into the de facto “funny internet writer” voice. I’m guilty of this. I can’t resist sarcasm, italics or unnecessary capitalization (a former editor once called this immature). I’ve worked hard to make things I’ve written funny without actually making them funny, but just laboring over adding asides that I thought would give my work a voice, which is what seemed to be necessary to be “funny.” But this isn’t great writing, this was merely my own fervent desire to fit into the “funny woman writer on the Internet” category playing out in earnest.

One of the problems with the Internet is that you don’t always have time to really work on something and make it meaningful and useful to your readers because you always have to post the next thing, and the next thing, and the insight gets lost. And you end up with a mish mash of inside jokes and ALL CAPS HE HE! and superficial humor that lacks insight. I think the writers that are the funniest are the funniest because while they dash off throwaway jokes and play with the physical manifestation of their type (itals, caps, etc.), their jokes get at a deeper thing about humanity and life that isn’t funny until an astute person like that writer names the funniness with the printed word.

Internet writing has moved into a new place where it’s not just for quick jokes and cheap laughs. The Internet has been, for a while now, a place where readers can go to find writing with insight and depth and real journalistic value. Only, a lot of the essays haven’t caught up. A lot of us writers are stuck in the same rote place of trying to be funny for the author’s sake — to get into the funny club — but not for the reader’s. The funniness, the cutesiness, the HILARIOUS ALL CAPS (and they ARE sort of hilarious!) is for us to be funny and for people to find us funny. It’s not to serve the reader, though they may be amused by what we have to say. Great writing is not about amusement, or inside jokes, or asides that allegedly add voice to a body of text. Great writers give readers an argument to carry into their conversations with friends and colleagues, to pass off as though it’s their own. And hopefully it is, because you’ve gotten into their brains and either convinced them or forced them to think about something differently. Great writing is about insight, depth, a takeaway. Great writing is not about the writer, it’s about the reader. 

2. Because that’s SUPPOSED to be my new MAGAZINE bin. For MAGAZINES. It’s not a CAT bin — I didn’t go to the Container Store and spend eight hours combing bulletin board aisles trying to find the perfect receptacle for my cat, who has never slept in any bed I’ve ever bought for her in the seven years we’ve been roommates. I know this magazine bin is dark and enticing and seems like just the vessel to make you look really cute and help you “get away from it all,” but you have to get out of it because I don’t subscribe to paper magazines so that they can die in a fur-lined overpriced fake leather basket.

3. I let you sit on the bed all the time. Almost whenever you want to sit on the bed, you get to sit on the bed. As a sensible human who has decided of her own free will to be owned by a cat, I have stopped trying to keep you from doing 80 percent of the things you want to do, furring up my bed or attacking my boyfriend’s feet included. However, we won’t have nearly as comfy a bed to sleep on if every time I try to put the sheets on post-laundry you come and police the chore as though the sheet is our beloved bed’s worst enemy — a thing that must be stopped with the agile too-sharp claws of a house cat that’s never scratched real bark! Leave the outdoor cat fantasies to the pink feather that hangs off the plastic stick, kk?

4. The only time I get up at 4 a.m. and do something more than go to the bathroom is when I have to go to the airport or drink water because I got drunk at happy hour and passed out early in my shoes. All other days you can expect me NOT to prioritize your feeding over my last few precious hours of sleep, especially on the weekends okay?? Because OMIGOD 4 A.M. IS THE WORST HOUR OF THE DAY FOR YOU TO BE ANNOYING. And by the way, when I do pass out wearing all my clothes and my winter coat, why don’t you raise hell THEN so that I can have a proper non-post-collegiate sort of sleep in my bed bed? Where are you at then, huh?

5. You see, cats eat on the ground. That’s one unique feature about being a You: every meal is like a picnic. But for humans, it’s different. Our meals tend not to consist entirely of no-cook food pre-prepared and packaged in a big yellow sack that can be scooped and devoured dry. They tend to require some preparation, pairing with other foods and seasonings, slicing and dicing, wrapping and unwrapping. For this we have counters. No no, not cat shelves — counters. And once we’ve finished organizing our food into things we call meals we tend to transport the food from the counter to the table where we will enjoy said dish. Part of enjoying food — and as one whose tongue is the shower, I wouldn’t expect you to understand this — is consuming it without the presence of stray cat hair on the surface beneath the plate off which we eat. This is why cats don’t make humans happy when they sit on counters and dining tables. And as a big-fured cat — one who is of big and luscious and long and easily detaching fur! — it’s even less desirable to find fur hairs that have grown on you littered over surfaces that were intended to support food. And yes, I realize that when you’re as fabulous as you are, you can’t help but reminding me of it.

I took a not-necessarily-brief hiatus from writing under the yellow sideways pineapple to launch a new section on BuzzFeed called Shift. It’s full of inspiring stories; fancy cats; Beyonce clothing commentary (okay fine: it’s not commentary so much as PRAISE because I’m Beyonce biased); analysis about the intersection of the internet, pop culture, and feminism; and much more.

I hope you’ve been reading and enjoying Shift and apologies for the recent technical difficulties at amyodell.net and absence from this space lately! More posts about nothing in particular coming soon.

Oh and I guess I could say something about Raf Simons’s debut Dior Couture collection so that this post is actually ABOUT something?

1. I found it appealingly simple yet awkward enough to be interesting.

2. After spending my Sunday evening at a Fourth of July party where one of the female guests wore three outfits that all perplexingly managed to display her entire lower ass, I have to say that anyone who’s encouraging ladies to wear MORE PANTS these days is a good thing.

3. Who am I to scoff at a tie-dyed couture ballgown? It’s like they’re trying to get a Dior-inspired infographic trend on the DIY Pinterest boards. (Another fantastic recent attempt of trying to get an unexpected craft project trending is here.)

Another highly appealing thing about the series is the fact that it’s an English period drama, obviously. English period dramas are like crack. If I’m going to watch something on a screen, nothing beats an English period drama. I believe women like me like them so much because: they have an excuse for being sexist (the olden days, bla bla); the people dress up princess-like all the day long; horses and beagles are common animal guest stars; and the women have little else to think about aside from when they can finally marry and get laid, which forces the stories to be unabashedly romantic. (Even The King’s Speech, what I’ll call a progressive English period drama because it did not center around young women trying desperately to marry themselves off, was terribly romantic, with Helena Bonham Carter babying foxy Colin Firth over his speech lessons and whatnot.) (Oh, that’s another thing: the men are commonly foxy and don’t have the option of dressing like slobs, which is so lovely you can forgive the screenwriters for not giving them much bare pectoral time.)

But one of the most thought-provoking things about Downton Abbey are the servants and their relationship to the rich people. Like, isn’t it awkward for them to sleep in twin beds in the shabby parts of the house and serve the richies their richie things in their fancy richie rooms? And isn’t it awkward for the rich people to keep the servants on flimsy mattresses, two to a room, in the underbelly of their fabulous mansion, and summon them to help them put their starched vests on and pin their matted curls into place, only so they might go downstairs and eat the expensive and fancy food and many kinds of wine the servants don’t get to have but have prepared for them as thought they deserve it? And the servants’ ball? Where they allow them into the nice parts of the house and force them to engage in awkward dancing and socializing in only a semi-servant-y way? WTF is that??

Riveting, I say.

But it is not the only show on television like this. Oh no, it is not the only batty ensemble cast that pays perfectly good people to be undermined servants. Why, that happens all the time on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, too! In fact, the programs have more in common than just that. Just consider these similarities between them:

1. Servants. Lisa and maybe Adrienne might even employ full-time, live-in housekeepers, which is terribly awkward and retro-feeling. But also, even Kyle has a chef that comes through from time to time, even when all she needs to serve the non-eating Housewives is some guac and hummus with a couple celery sticks and a Triscuit. And Adrienne has that grumpy chef Bernie, who we witness instructing his staff of waiters to “serve from the right” at dinner parties, where guests are greeted by a young tux-wearing waiter holding a white gold tray of champagne flutes. That waiter seems to be treated no better than a piece of furniture or decorative entryway tablescape (or, perhaps, worse than that depending on whether or not these people are the type that seek out a coaster before setting a glass down).

2. Dressing up for no reason. At least two out of every three Housewives at any given moment is wearing stretch satin. Whether the cameras are there or not, I imagine. No matter where they are — a little league game, the beach, their own toilets, the deli counter — they are wearing platform peep toe pumps, enough diamonds to pay of 25 people’s student loans, and a taut, shiny gown that doesn’t make us wonder how low their belly buttons and breasts are sagging. They dress up to go over to each other’s houses, to ride in a non-convertible car to fetch someone from the airport, to go from their beds to the bathroom in the middle of the night. This makes no sense. Have these people not heard of denim? Of cotton? Isn’t the point of being fabulously wealthy to not have to dress up when you don’t feel like it? Because your wealth is enough to command respect and awe, whether or not you’ve remembered to place your 142-carat diamond bracelet on your wrist before going out to play tennis on your private court with your hot private instructor? The well-preserved look created by all that plastic surgery should remind everyone within at least a few yards how rich they are, anyway.

3. Misery. All Housewives series, but the Beverly Hills installment particularly, is infused with an underlying sense of misery, numbed by too much white w(h)ine and Champagne served by a never-ending slew of young men wearing white bow-ties. It’s no different from Downton, where only the granny can say what she really thinks at any given moment, and the rest of them just sit at the dinner table hoping the fake politeness and booze will make them all forget about how miserable they shouldn’t be considering how rich they are. And then you end up hating them even though you don’t, because they are so rich and so miserable and such bad people in so many ways, and they never stop to consider how selfish they are. But before we can get too mired in our quiet hatred of all of them, numbed by too much of the boxed wine we poured for yourselves alone in our apartments, someone has an awesome fight or meltdown, and you love them all over again, because they remind you how much you don’t want money if it makes you like that.

Table runners! Bright patterns!

These socks!

This fannypack!

But I wasn’t as enthralled by the very stereotypical view of a certain place and its culture as I was at the prospect of finally leaving it. After layovers that long and an airline staff as uncertain about your flight/future as many of us are about why everyone is making so much clothing with cats on it these days, just realizing that you finally get to return to the Motherland is as momentous as actually momentous things are, like salary increases and getting engaged.

But I learned a lot on this 15 hour layover. About other people (annoying, elitist, bossy)
About myself (able to endure it without yelling at anyone or acting in a way that I’d
later find embarrassing). About airport lounges (free food, free booze, and — so awkward but necessary – showers).

It’s funny what happens to people who find out, amongst a group of strangers, that their seven hour intercontinental flight has been canceled at 3 in the morning, after four hours of delays, with no discernible answers to any questions like, when can we get on another flight? Will we retrieve our luggage? How do we get the fabled voucher for the mythical hotel? Is there even time to go to the hotel? Why is this happening to me? WHINEBITCHWHINE?! Etc.

Certain people like to claim a ranking status amongst the group early on. First to make a small scene of himself is Joe the Adventurer, wearing a safari hat, loose khaki pants, and an army green button-down, and growing a pretty lush beard. He wants to show off just how adventurous he is and, being so adventurous, unmoved this whole ordeal. We had flown from Chile, but now we’re in Lima and he doesn’t need schedules or rules or answers to more than one question: “Just tell me where the hotel is and when I need to be back and I’ll get a taxi and get there on my own,” he announces, grinning, to an airline employee but really, everyone within earshot, as though he wants us all to know he’s loose and cool enough to hang with Peru, skin an alpaca, climb the Machu Picchu. He wants us to think, “Ooh, maybe he’s been here before ooh!” But forgets its 4 a.m. and, oh right, no one cares.

Next to seek distinguished status in the distressed crowd is Patty McBossy Pants who wants to be at the center of “whats going on” so she can announce it to people and complain loudly about it for all to hear, as though she’s the trumpet blaring from deep within the exhausted semi-consciousness of all of us. “They don’t know if we’re getting our bags,” she practically shouts, throwing her head back and hands up dramatically for the benefit of people nearby, who she wants to trick into believing that she has real knowledge and facts about the situation at hand. You know this character – one or two followers will typically crowd around and kvetch with her, conferring authority on her where none exists, totally getting her off on this crisis that has already made a 20-something girl start crying in the corner.

Eventually Patty McBossy Pants loses sight of her voice — that of the people! — and
reveals her fatal flaw: an interest solely in herself. “Can you at least get the bags of business class passengers?!” she moans, realizing that even she can’t pretend to know the answers to all the unanswered questions. Well this why no one liked you in high school, lady.

And then there are the translators, eager to interpret Spanish for anyone who doesn’t
speak it ( like me) and who fall somewhere between showoffs (those who want to translate for people so badly, that they interrupt any white person talking to a Spanish person and start translating the English into Spanish, even if the person they’re talking to speaks English) and actually helpful people (who translate only when asked or when they detect a particular difficulty communicating).

After a few really super fun hours of waiting in lines around people like this, I wrangled a pass to the Lima airport lounge, which wasn’t nearly as nice as the one in Santiago, though they do have a bartender that will make you a pina colada in a blender, which is nice. But it’s like a daycare, because there are a lot of loud children and adults with no inside voices in there, probably because there are so many missed connections in the Lima airport, and maybe everyone whines and bitches about lounge access until they get it since it’s so annoying to miss flights there.

Yet the lounge must be nice if you just have an hour in Lima. They have free endless food, a machine that makes fresh orange juice (but good luck finding an orange in the basket next to it that isn’t green), and the bar, as I mentioned. And, if you’re situation is really dire, showers! It’s incredibly scary to use the shower, because it’s like a bathroom for one person with a door that you think is locked but there’s no way to know for sure. So, if someone walks in on you while you’re taking a shower in the stall with the glass door, you’re in front of the airport (just the lounge, yes, but still) and god, embarrassing.

But once my flight was about to leave, and I moseyed through the gift shops on my way to the gate, I started to warm up to the idea of Peru again. All those colorful fannypacks and socks and alpaca stuff! I’m like a cat that sees a sardine hanging at the end of a fishing pole, really — it doesn’t take much to get me excited about something and yet, it does?

When I finally walked down the jetway, I felt spirited enough about Peru (but mostly leaving it) to play Chariots of Fire in my brain.

Horses!

1. In Mendoza, I rode a horse through the “foothills of the Andes,” which are not to be confused with “the Andes,” as one wine-tasting tour guide corrected a travel companion who, looking pensively off in the distance out the bus window, asked, “Are those the Andes?” It was a question that seemed all-too-obvious, but alas merited one of the most memorable question-answers of the whole trip.

But back to the horse ride: This was my favorite part of the trip, because I love anything involving animals, especially all the pretty horses. Also, one assistant to our horseback riding guide, who brought up the rear of the group, was a child who was probably around four feet high and could already ride a horse better than I can drive an automatic automobile, play checkers, or do most things that involve even a base level of skill, really, so that was a really charming addition to our journey. I also enjoyed how my boyfriend, who had never ridden a horse in his life (I had at summer camp many times as a kid, thank you Texas), wound up on a horse that kept stopping to eat, which I think kind of freaked him out since he didn’t know how to control the animal, but was also endearing, because he eats more than anyone I’ve ever met. “I’ve found me in a horse!” he beamed from his saddle, that yuppie in his fitted Deisel jeans.

2. I ate more red meat in a two-week period than I’ve eaten in a two-month period. As Boyfriend put it: “I feel pregnant with cow.”

3. By the way, if I had birthed that cow, its udder would dispense not milk, but Dulce de Leche, which I ate constantly (did you know hotels have that at breakfast down there in packets the way American diners serve jam?).

Best eaten plain, I can't lie.

Oh and if I had birthed said cow, it would be in a private suite with a bullet-proof doors that had been renovated and secured by a private earpiece-wearing team of burly men months in advance. And I would have named this bovine Orange Palm Frond.

4. Again on the subject of consuming caloric things, because it was such a big part of what we did down there, we had a bottle of wine at dinner every night, because in restaurants they only cost like $9 or a little more, so about the price of a drink or two in New York. Our wine-tasting guide told us that Argentinian wine consumption used to be about 90 litres per person, per year, but has dipped to about 40 litres per person, per year (sissies!). The Internet tells me in the USA, it’s less than 10 — and yet, we’re the ones who have the reputation of going to foreign countries and acting like drunk ass holes, which is totally, unbearably perpetuated by the likes of beer pong and other drinking games. Since when was drinking so un-fun it needed to be done in a game format??? That’s what I always say (well, along with EW THAT PLASTIC BALL WAS ON YOUR DIRTY ASS FLOOR YOU FRAT-TASTIC LOON).

5. I had to tell some — and I say this sincerely — really kind and well-intentioned business school students at a wine-tasting that included other people not to talk at shout-level about “what $26 million can buy you in the San Diego real estate market.”

6. In Uruguay, I saw pine trees growing next to palm trees. It felt like the horticultural equivalent of seeing a husky walking around Miami in the summer with a dog coat on.

7. I spent about a week searching for the perfect pair of palazzo and/or harem pants, which are great for the hot weather and look, frankly, just plain snazzy on a lot of the girls down there. I bought a patterned and a black pair, and am thinking the patterned pair either look legit chic in a hippie-ish sort of way, or silly enough to get me photographed at Fashion Week (a thing that should rule any good fashion person’s wardrobe choices these days, obviously), or just like they’re from Chico’s and I’m a dumbass.

8. I stayed on a beach about four times as wide as any beach I’d ever seen in my life.

Punta del Diablo.

This was in the town of Punta del Diablo, a fishing village that swells to a population of 25,000 in the high season (now). It was an odd, underdeveloped place on which to seek out beach time, but teeming with late-teen/early 20-something people who stay mostly in hostels. They moved around the main part of town in large animalistic hordes, leering at people and openly drinking beer and laughing, making the non-horde people like us generally uncomfortable. Our hotel was thankfully removed from the hostel nonsense, and we actively avoided the center of town by our last day there once we realized it reminded us of Jersey Shore.

9. A cab driver gave me a counterfeit 100 peso bill (only about $25, but ugh, it still sucks to get conned because you’re an ignorant foreigner). Apparently in Buenos Aires counterfeit money in all denominations is a big problem at all kinds of establishments, from cabs to tourist depots, so you have to be careful all the time. One way you can tell if money is real is by the way it feels (it shouldn’t feel like plain paper), so after we Got Screwed we felt each bill up like a cheap hooker.

10. I visited Evita’s grave, and the Pink House (presidential residence) which is positively palatial and beautiful inside, so definitely take the tour so you can see it, even if you don’t speak Spanish. If you’re vain, you can keep yourself busy with the many reflective surfaces and mirrors, which are everywhere, which makes it easier to imagine that you are Madonna.

Pink House.

A friend who had been had told me before I went to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, that the city was “fucked,” but I did not think that could mean “fucked” in the sense that they were might themselves to the ground all around my boyfriend and me, who stopped here for the night of New Year’s Eve on our way from Argentinian wine country to Uruguayan beach country.

After watching a guy in a tuxedo tee-shirt and blazer on a Spanish television program
counting down to the year 2012 on the empty streets of somewhere, presumably in
Uruguay, acting as though there were a party all around him when actually the only
thing going on was him talking into a camera all by himself, with the illusion of
having company thanks to his friends, two more yammerers who appeared in a split screen from a TV studio somewhere, presumably Uruguay, and also wore tacky party outfits. The show felt not-ironic in that way that almost makes you feel bad for the people sitting home and watching it — like us.

We were weary from a day of traveling and our inability to speak fluent Spanish to the
staff downstairs, who, when we asked for a restaurant reservation, were about as helpful to us as a pair of wet socks on a snowy day. Once the countdown had been counted down, we headed up to what U.S. residents might regard as the Danger Zone, but, to everyone around us, was just the roof.

Either Uruguay is a country carefully attuned to trends on the runways of the Northern Hemisphere, or — and I have a hunch this is more likely — it’s one of those places that wears white on New Year’s to bring good luck. Everyone was wearing it head-to-toe or close to it, and honestly, if I lived in a place where fireworks could be set off with less regulation than office workers running for the free donuts in the kitchen, I’d probably go for that sartorial meme, too. Naturally no one told us that was A Thing there, though even if they did suggest we wear “blanco”, I probably would have misunderstood and replied, “Yes, I am quite white, but don’t worry, I’m pretty sure my sunburn awaits me on the beach.” (And in fact, it did, but as a year-round New York resident I can’t get mad at a January sunburn.)

Standing on the roof of our hotel, with a pretty expansive view of Montevideo, we
watched fireworks shoot from the earth from every visible point in the horizon, like anti-gravity exploding sprinkles. These were not organized fireworks sponsored by such great American companies as Macy’s as we’re used to in the States, but fireworks coming from the many Joe Bobs and Mary Sues who had bought them and felt like firing them off. We could see people lighting them in the sidewalk down below us, leading me to believe it wasn’t safe to peer over the balcony, lest a reveler blow your face off: Welcome to Montevideo, we’ll show you fucked!

My boyfriend and I have seen random, probably illegal fireworks go off here and there, but agreed that everything going on around us was totally strange. I am not the MOST well traveled individual, but I have been to a number of foreign countries, seen MC Hammer perform at the California State Fair to a half-empty pit of chairs, watched half a dozen people do more drugs in a few hours than many people do in their entire lives, and been to a lot of fashion shows and even Sister Act the Musical. But this — watching fireworks shoot into the sky with nothing but abandon, joy, and white clothes all around in the nostril of South America — this was a singular experience.

Yet, it was extremely valuable given that it was New Year’s Eve, and expecting great things on New Year’s Eve is like expecting to have a really fun time when you’re in the airport. At least this one was not only memorable, but worth remembering.

Just before the horizon quieted, a small clan of staff from the hotel restaurant, wearing chefs’ hats and whites, filed onto the balcony. I forgot about them until a thunderous CRACK emanated from about 15 yards away, in the corner of the patio that made a right angle with the building. Lest we roof revelers not be left out of the fun, they set off a few fireworks of their own, right there, harming no one in the process.

First, if you’re really looking for a bargain, you might enjoy a studio in Soho, that costs just $1600 a month because it’s rent-controlled. It’s really pretty! It has TWO windows that real sunlight shines through! The building is old so everything outside the apartment looks grimy and like it might attract pests like roaches or mice. But the apartment is completely gut-renovated and has hardwood floors! And two closets that, if you combine them, just about make one closet that you might find in the entryway of most dorm rooms in the nation. Also, you probably eat every meal out, being a  young professional, right? Which you can keep doing with this apartment because the kitchen has no oven, no counter space, and only enough cabinetry to fit four pairs of shoes. Flat shoes.

If you like Soho, you might also like a slightly more expensive apartment on Spring Street! It’s a real one-bedroom with a real sloping foundation. Why, I’m willing to bet if you held a marble at one side of the room and let it roll down to the other side of the room, it would pick up quite a bit of speed as it rolled down the hill-shaped floor. In real estate we call touches like that “charming” and “pre-war.” Another wonderful aspect of this $1750-a-month apartment is the back yard, which is made from concrete instead of grass and soil. If you wanted a view, just wait til you see how the sunlight hits the rusting bikes and clotheslines out there in the morning. The word for that in real estate is “rare.”

And if that apartment has already been rented by the time I get around to calling and asking the landlord about it for you, I have another gem in Soho on Thompson Street. Let’s call it “cozy.” For the bargain price of $1770 a month, you can have your very own one bedroom that’s just on the second floor of a walk-up building. The door to the apartment opens directly into the kitchen, which is big enough to fit a shower too! That’s what I call convenient. You can wash your dishes in your shower while you wash yourself. And there’s no closet per se, but! If you put a rod across the small room where the toilet is, you can absolutely hang your clothes there. It’s really perfect for someone creative like yourself. And the room that comes after the kitchen is definitely big enough for a full size bed. The wall is even big enough to mount a flat-screen television on. And don’t worry about people watching you sleep or wash your dishes in your shower through the windows, because those face concrete walls. Talk about practical.

If it’s sunlight you seek, I have a super sunny studio on 15th street. TRUE East Village, I say (never mind the rule about east Village not extending above 14th Street). Walk-ups can be a pain, but this apartment is on the first floor, which is great! You’ll love the feeling of all the Baruch students walking past your many street-facing windows at all hours of the day. The way the apartment is set up, the natural place for you to put your bed is at the windows at the end of the room. The last tenant told me that waking up to people looking in at her naked really forced her to get out of the house and have a thriving social life. Who couldn’t use more friends and fun times in their lives? You can even fit two of them in this apartment at one time.

But let’s talk about uptown for a moment. I have a great studio on the Upper West Side that has two spacious closets, a kitchen with an oven, and a bathroom big enough to fit a toilet and a bathtub. If you ever got fat you wouldn’t be able to fit in the kitchen, but you won’t be able to afford to do that to yourself anyway once you hear what my exorbitant fees are for the very, very small amount of work I plan to do for you. (Just 15 percent of one year’s rent, which is only a few thousand dollars!) Hell, with my fees — which I will never honestly list in all my postings online about apartments — you’ll end up losing weight since you won’t be able to afford to eat. You’re welcome.

And if you want something REALLY big, I have a great place in Chinatown for $2100 a month. The landlord added so much storage space to the apartment she actually managed to shrink it down by a lot of square feet. Also, there’s no buzzer on the front door, but there is a sign warning of rat poison on your way in, so you know the landlord cares about safety. Also, you’ll find a washing machine in the kitchen where most people might put a dishwasher. The apartment is more than big enough for entertaining, not that you’ll ever want to since there’s a window in the bathroom door, so you can see everyone in full as they use the facilities. But there’s a word for that, too, in real estate: “transparency.”

Remember how I was dating that guy, Eric? He lived in Hell’s Kitchen and I stayed over one night. I guess I was pretty drunk the night before — we must have just stumbled into his apartment and passed out because I didn’t remember that he had a situation with his bathroom. So the next morning, I wanted to go to the bathroom, so I ask him, “Where’s the bathroom?” He says, “Oh, it’s just down the hall.” I’m thinking, “Uhhh… down the hall?” He goes, “Yeah, I just share it with some people on this floor.” So I take the key — THE KEY — and go down the hall to the bathroom. And I go in and there’s no toilet paper. So I walk back down the hall and I say to Eric, “I didn’t see any toilet paper in there, do you have any?” And he says to me, “Oh actually, I ran out of toilet paper but I’ve been using coffee filters–” and he starts going for the box of coffee filters and I’m like “I have to go.” So I left and never spoke to him again.