Soggy September

It was raining outside this morning. It also rained indoors. My studio flat is on the top floor and I woke up to the sound of steady dripping from three areas of the ceiling. I jumped out of bed and started dashing around with towels and used the only two pans that I have. I phoned the landlord about five times, who annoyingly wouldn’t pick up. I went to knock on my neighbours door to find out if their ceiling was weeing itself. They were dry but came to have a look at mine and ‘assessed’ the situation and told me it looked “really bad” …you don’t say! I tried to call the landlord again and my neighbor told me he was on holiday in Italy and that he had told him not to get in touch with him unless it was an emergency. He then turned to me and asked “Do you think this is an emergency?” I laughed right in his face…”Well, yeah! Duh!” He hesitated and then goes, “Let me ask my girlfriend.” and dashes of back to his flat and I could hear them talking. Meanwhile I tried ringing my landlord again, to no avail. My neighbour came back with his girlfriend who also assessed the situation as ‘bad’ but then goes, “is it really an emergency though?” - and she was a FRIGGIN BRUNETTE!
I thanked them and shoved them out of the door. I ran up and down the stairs knocked on the doors of my other neighbours to see if they had any idea of what to do but no one was in - or they looked through the peeping hole noticed a deranged woman in pjs and dishevelled hair and thought it best to not answer the door. About fifteen minutes later my neighbor and his girlfriend knocked on my door again accompanied by towels and another pan - which was sweet I must admit. They said the “discussed” the “situation” (I was tearing at my hair literally) and they came to the “conclusion” that it was indeed an emergency!!! And they gave me the landlord’s emergency number…how come they had it and I didn’t, I don’t know. Oh and guess what…apparently the last tenant that had rented out this studio flat had the same problem of rain water leaking in!
Needless to say I’m moving out! My brother came with his car to help me take all my stuff back to my parents house so that the builders can move in. The most annoying thing is I wanted to be close to SOAS when lectures start. I don’t want to be to be travelling from Acton and having to be stuck on the tube with people. I wanted to walk everyday to Russell Square and be five minutes away from the uni library. I had everything planned. I was going to start exploring the area and become a local. I was going to exhaust the British Museum and all the restaurants and coffee places in the Brunswick Centre and along Southampton Row. I was going to pop into the local news agents to buy my weekly copy of The Economist. I was going to be a Central Londoner!
But alas, I’ll be a commuter instead, coming in from the London ’suburbs’ with its rows of semi-detached houses and quiet streets.