Category — carnivals and linkage

Disclaimer: All text in this post is my opinion.

Less than a week ago the Bumblefucked household moved back across the country to the Parkland View apartments in Breinigsville, PA. This west Allentown apartment complex bills itself as a luxury apartment complex. I found this complex on the web. They had ads on Craigslist as a new complex and the prices were reasonable so we signed a lease without ever seeing the place thinking that it was brand new, so how bad could it really be, right?

I had a few conversations over the phone and via email with people at the apartment complex and never once did anyone mention that the majority of the complex was still under construction. Imagine my surprise to arrive and find my building surrounded by other buildings in various stages of construction. Heavy machinery, building materials and construction workers are my daily view thus far.

Today I awoke to see that a paving crew is paving the road and parking lot at my building and that I am blocked in.

The only way out is to drive through the construction debris and chance getting nails in the tires. Oh, and there actually isn’t a road out through the debris, you have to scale a pile of dirt to get out. No one has called or stopped by to let me know they were paving today. And no one rang the buzzer this morning so that I could move the car. Shortly I will be driving through the construction and praying that no nails get in the tires.

The frustration is not limited to just this though.

Each time that the gas stove/oven has been turned on since we have been here the carbon monoxide/smoke detector goes off. Did I mention that there are a total of three of them and they are hard wired together? So when one goes off all three of them go off and it’s not like the old school smoke detectors where you can just take the battery out. At first, I just attributed this to the fact that turning on gas stoves creates carbon monoxide and that some idiot had put one of these detectors less than 10 feet from the gas stove/oven. I found a fix online of putting shower cap over it. So I went to Rite-Aid and did just that.

Unfortunately, it still goes off. After looking up the model number (SC9120B) online I found a user manual that told me that this should never be this close to a stove/oven and if it constantly goes off like this then it is in a bad location and needs moved. I can’t wait to tell the apartment office about this and see how they react.

I also get to tell them about the faulty plumbing in the bathroom that is leading to soggy drywall each time we shower.

Oh, and if you look at the apartment website it boasts on the first page:

The 5,000 sq. ft. private clubhouse features a fitness center, swimming pool, hot tub, business center, putting green and recreational areas.

Yeah, that is still under construction as well. But they did install a gazebo outside yesterday!

In my opinion, Parkland View Apartments in Breinigsville, PA is a major FAIL thus far. Shortly I am attempting to drive over the dirt pile to get out of the path of paving and will be visiting the leasing office to have some words with them regarding all of these things.

Disclaimer: All text in this post is my opinion.

Welcome readers of the Carnival of Personal Finance #203 and thanks to Weakonomics for including us in the carnival this week.

Highlights from this weeks’ carnival:

• Why Is It So Much Harder To Thrive in America Today
• Is Budgeting Keeping You Poor?
• We are debt-free! (Except for the mortgage – here’s how we did it)
• Three Ways Credit Scores are Used Against You
• Blogging Becoming a Serious Money Business
• At What Point Do You Consider Yourself to Be Rich?
• Filing Small Claims Court: Basic FAQs.

Many thanks to J. Money over at Budgets Are Sexy for including us in this week’s Carnival of Personal Finance. In case you missed it, here are some articles from it that caught my eye…

• Interesting Money presents Make Your Own Granola From Scratch: A Guide, Plus Cost Breakdown.
• Greener Pastures presents 10 More Money Saving Websites With Ongoing Big Fat Deals.
• Your Optimal Blog presents Depression Proof Your Money
• Tight Fisted Miser presents My Bankruptcy Experience
• My Wealth Builder presents Passive Income is not Effort Free
• Ready To Be Rich presents How To Make Friends Pay Back The Money They Owe You
• Indebted 2 You presents Remarkable Failure
• Chief Family Officer presents Reacting to the economy again: Cutting back on retirement savings in favor of reducing debt

Many thanks to Sound Money Matters for including us in the Carnival of Personal Finance this week. In case you missed it, be sure to have a look at this week’s carnival. There are some great articles in it. Here are a few that caught my eye:

• My Dollar Plan’s 29 Steps I Took to Leave the Workforce at Age 29.
• Freedom from Broke’s Personal Finance In One Simple Equation.
• FruGal’s Would you ever move back home to save cash?
• Are You Going To Be This Way the Rest of the Time I Know You? on Dinner or a Coffee Table…what’s your choice? (Bumblefucked note: Our coffee table came from Target and was $14.97 not $200!)
• Distilled Rose’s Prosper Lending Update
• The Dough Roller’s Are You a Millionaire in the Making?
• Debit vs. Credit shares The 3 Dumbest Financial Decisions I’ve Made.

Many thanks goes out to Broke Grad Student for hosting this past week’s carnival of personal finance. And also thanks for including one of my posts in the carnival!

You can check out all of the great entries in the carnival at Carnival of Personal Finance #167 – Highlights from the Beijing 2008 Olympics.

Many thanks to the carnivals that included us this week. Check out the following carnivals for some great reads:

• Money Hacks Carnival #15 – French Open Edition
• Carnival of Money Stories #62: A Week of Money Stories at Finance Gets Personal
• Carnival of Personal Finance #155 — Time With Family
• Carnival of Wealth, Money & Life: June 2nd edition (note that the author name is wrong for us on this one though)

Check us out in this week’s Carnival of Personal Finance!

Carnival of Personal Finance #152 is live at Money Under 30 this week. Many thanks to David at Money Under 30 for including us!

Articles I enjoyed:

• Focused on the Future at Dreaming of Ferraris
• How to have fun and stay frugal at basicfinancial
• CVS: Why roll over ECBs? at Chief Family Officer
• Millionaires drive minivans at Wide Open Wallet
• Roadmap To A Better Financial Health at Moolanomy
• Your Money’s Guide to the 2008 Presidential Elections–Taxes at Dough Roller
• Easy Ways To Track Travel Expenses and Stick To Your Vacation Budget at Delicious Baby

Somehow I managed to miss the fact that we are cool enough for The Broke And Need Money Carnival 2 last week. And they totally are not scared of our name. A fun carnival with a fun name and a hysterical theme. Check it out if you also missed it last week. Many thanks to Hook Me Up! for including us!

Also check us out in this week’s Carnival of Personal Finance up at the Alpha Consumer blog at US News & World Report. By not being able to print our name they made us appear very mysterious. Or very naughty. You decide. Regardless, many thanks to Kimberly for including us this week!

And also find us at Tax Carnival #36: A Cinco de Mayo Tax Celebration at Don’t Mess with Taxes. And at the 58th Carnival of Money Stories at Free From Broke.

Be sure to check out all the great articles in the carnivals this week!

Many thanks to Money Under 30 for including us in the Carnival of Twenty Something Finances for April 21, 2008 yesterday.

And thanks to Can I Get Rich On A Salary for putting up in the Carnival of Money Stories #56—Once Upon A Time.

A big shout out to Credit Card Lowdown for including us in the Carnival of Money, Growth and Happiness #41. Not only did they include our article How much is your time worth? It is a cost that needs considered. but they also did not censor our good name.

From this carnival I enjoyed the following articles:

• the cheeky “Up Yours Mother Teresa” at Hennie Grove
• Barcelona on 10 Euro Per Day For Two People at Me, My Kid and Life
• Which is Better Roth or Traditional IRA? at David Makes Cents (I just added this blog to my reader)
• Debt and Depression at Debt Prison
• Are You Happy? If Not, Here are 25 Ways to Get There at Slow Down Fast

The Carnival of Personal Finance is up today at The Happy Rock. They did not love our submission apparently, but there are still some article worth reading from that carnival…

• How much interest do you earn on one million dollars?
• Should you Pay off your student Loans?
• How To Create An Alternative Source Of Income Part 7
• The 9 Or So Paths To Getting Rich—And My Purported Analysis Of Them(Part 2 of 2)