Getting it together

Many of you may be waiting for some pearl to be coming in this long overdue post. The truth is that I have been pretty tired. I spent most of last week catering for a small company based in Brooklyn. I decided to take the work because after many months of commission only living, some guaranteed hourly money was pretty welcome. Cooking (and its corresponding lessons) has never been something elusive for me--not like my current form of employment, real estate. As much as I know in my heart I don't want to be a cook for the rest of my life or ever again full time, it is a skill I have for which I am grateful, and it is a career I don't get tired of visiting.

The next day after finishing my catering gig with a bang (13 hours cooking at the NY Bar Association building) I swiftly returned to my Union Square office for some appointments I had set up the night before. That was Wednesday. It snowed. I was wildly unprepared for the day, most notably in my choice of outfit. Walking to work I was talking myself into being warm enough, just wearing a denim skirt, v-neck shirt and aforementioned kelly green poly trench. When I got into the office, I had about 45 minutes to firm up all my appointments before venturing out to meet the new wife of a good friend who was also my new client. Before long, huge, giant, almost cartoonish snowflakes filled the sky and hit me on the bare knees as I skip walked over to Sixth Avenue.

I had no choice.

I had to go buy myself an outfit at Old Navy in the 10 minutes I had before the first appointment.

A symphony in khaki, feeling MUCH better, I ran my ass over to the apartment where, fortunately, Mrs. Nacho was late too. Things went well from there, we chatted easily, even though the weather was uncooperative and Mrs. Nacho was finicky about the apartments. We ended our day together at the restaurant where her new husband works, a warm and cozy Nolita place. I went back to the office for a bit then home.

Most of Thursday is a blur, except that I woke up exhausted. I dragged myself to the morning meeting and then around on some appointments. I planned to go home mid afternoon when it became clear that I wasn't functioning like a normal person, but at the last minute I arranged an appointment for a Garment District loft showing with one of my many picky (somewhat unpleaseable) clients. She could only make it at 6pm. To be honest, I was surprised she even agreed to meet me, given the neighborhood. But in an effort to save us both time and energy, I was forthright with her about the location of the apartment.

By the late afternoon/early evening I had rallied and was even trying to make plans with an out-of-town friend, who ended up showing at my house hours later. At least I hadn't put the clay mask on yet.

She didn't like the one I selected for her at all, but there happened to be another in the same building, two flights and $1600 higher that she said she was actually interested in, even though it had no official outdoor space, something she told me was non-negotiable. It goes to show that sometimes listening and responding to the clients is not the best thing to do, and knowing the inventory is ALWAYS the best thing. If we could get her boyfriend to OK the space, she might put in an application. Unexpected and also possibly unlikely, given that there was already a strong application on the more expensive apt. from another agent in our office.

We agreed that I would call her to inform her one way or another if the other deal would go through, which I did. Meanwhile I was attempting to find out if the listing agents (also from my office) would show it to her anyway and consider taking her application anyway. We made an appointment for 8pm, Friday night. She canceled, citing the lack of light as the (understandable) reason. We rescheduled for 10am today.

I woke up this morning around 9 without having heard from her, so I called her then the listing agent to inform them of my clients' possible disappearance. She called me half an hour later to say they were going upstate for the weekend, leaving right now, she forgot they were going when she made the appointment with me. Right. Ok then, if the place is still around when you get back you can see it again then. In my limited experience, people move ahead right away when they want something and when they don't, they come up with excuse after excuse not to see it, not to commit, not to hand over cash. That's what I think is going on here. The other application fell apart, by the way.

I took Friday and today to get myself together at home, conducting whatever real estate biz I had on the phone and internet. Starting not to feel so exhausted. Eating vegetables again.


A year ago, in Michigan.