Archives for August 2020

August 21, 2020 By Phillip Retuta

Coming Home.

Day 157 of self-isolation and Day 18 of being displaced.

Some good news: the other tenants and I were given the okay to move back in (except one unit, who has water damaged in their basement bedroom). The city finally sent an inspector after 15 days, and he/she said we can finally return to our apartments.

It’s a great relief, but we won’t have gas in our apartments — that means no hot water, use of our stoves and ovens, or have heat. Our landlord wrote that a plumber is coming to install an electric water heater and would supply hotplates to each unit. As someone who cooks and bakes a lot, having no gas is a bit of a hindrance. Thank goodness I caved in a couple of years ago and bought a microwave.

Of course, the heat does worry me. It gets cold in my apartment in the winter, and after reading a bunch of Reddit threads, NYC has a habit of not turning on the gas for months on end — and this is pre-pandemic. New York requires a “Master Plumber” to turn on the gas or authorize the local gas company to turn it on. However, after looking at the Department of Building’s website, a lot of Master Plumbers on their list were discredited and had their licenses revoked for “incompetence” or “shoddy work.” Additionally, after talking to my real estate friend, turning on the gas is a slow and bureaucratic process. Add COVID-19 to the mix, and who knows when I’ll have heating and cooking gas again. Honestly, for one of the greatest and most expensive cities in America, how is New York so fucking shitty in helping its tax-paying residents?

By the way, still no response from my council member.

The one saving grace in this entire situation is that our landlord is pro-rating our rent for the time we were evacuated. He even mentioned that he’ll reduce our rent until our gas gets turned back on. Now I’ve dealt with a lot of landlords while living here, and I have to admit my current one is pretty decent. My other landlords refused to fix leaky holes in the ceiling or a burst water pipe or even the building’s door — all the while increasing my rent. I’ve lived in my current, rent-stabilized building for 4 years, and my landlord has yet to bump up my rent.

Overall, however, the picture of living in New York isn’t as dreamy or as ambitious as when I first moved here. My years are limited in this city, and I’m waiting for that final straw that will make me go, “Fuck you, NYC”, pack my bags, and move West.

August 18, 2020 By Phillip Retuta

The City That Never Is Helpful (At Least Its Officials).

My Furbo dog cam is powered on, and I can see my vacant apartment.

Day 154 of self-isolation and Day 15 of being displaced.

So I’m still stuck here at Tien’s apartment after we were evacuated. Back at my own apartment, the power is on, but the water and gas are still shut off by the city. I’ve been on a text thread with my neighbors, and we’re all wondering when the hell we’re going to be able to get back in our apartments.

We’ve all been in contact with our landlord, and he says it’s up to the Department of Buildings inspector to come to our building and say it’s okay to move back in. I’ve been on a personal quest to contact the department myself, but the phone number they supplied never picks up and their voicemail is full.

At this point, I decided to email my district’s councilman, Robert Conergy Jr., to see if he can help. I explain the situation, that we’ve been displaced for two weeks in a pandemic and are at the mercy of NYC to send an inspector. I wanted to know if there’s anything he can do for us, as constituents. 4 days pass, and I don’t get a response. Needless to say, I’m very disappointed at my hyperlocal local government now, and I will not be voting for him next time he’s up for reelection.

I’ve even tweeted at and DM’d Mayor DeBlasio and the official NYC Department of Buildings Twitter account, with no response. I shouldn’t be surprised; the DoB Twitter has like no posts or doesn’t follow anybody.

The good thing about this situation, though, is that I’m closer (distance-wise) to my friends’ apartments and more bars, restaurants, and coffee shops. My social life (well, socially-distanced social life) is a bit better, though I do miss my quiet neighborhood. It’s a trade-off, for sure: in my own apartment, I’m able to concentrate on hobbies and personal projects. However, I am physically distant from friends and super popular bars and restaurants. Here, it’s the opposite: a 5-minute walk to everything and everyone. Still, in this temporary living situation, I feel like I’m a guest at someone else’s apartment — which, technically, I am.

My apartment is my home.

Fingers crossed that the city will get off its ass and finally let us back in.

August 16, 2020 By Phillip Retuta

Camping in Friendsville.

…or Escape from New York City.

Despite the pandemic spreading across the United States, New York City and New York State’s number of hospitalizations and deaths have stabilized and gone down. Unlike the South and the West Coast, the rate of infection in NYC has subsided to point where it feels okay to take a road trip. And since I’ve seen the same people in-person sporadically (as they’re also counting the days of self-isolation themselves), we’ve created a bubble and decided to go camping at the Maryland-Pennsylvania border, in a little wooded hamlet called Friendsville.

And man, with a name like that, it’s nice to be with dear friends!

This past summer has been full of hardships, to the point where I’ve become anxious and depressed. In fact, I’m still going through the difficulty of being displaced from my apartment with no idea when I can return home. I think a road trip somewhere outside my apartment and this city is what I needed.

I returned to my evacuated apartment to get camping supplies, hurriedly searching through my closets for a tent and dismantling Nico’s/Dusty’s outdoor dog bed from the backyard. With my bags and a cooler packed, I took Dusty to meet up with Brian and Morgan. This would mark Dusty’s first camping trip, and as a puppy and in my care for only two weeks, I felt it was great bonding experience for both of us.

We escaped NYC on a rainy morning, and drove a rental car down — getting food in incredibly long drive-thru lines and entering gas stations with masks. Surprisingly, especially because we were heading deeper and deeper into Trump territory and getting gas in rural areas, a lot of people were wearing masks themselves. I guess a lot of people who need to fill up their cars just have some common sense.

Several hours later, we arrived at the campsite. It was by a lake, but because they use this particular lake’s water to fill the locks of Lake Erie, the water had receded, leaving behind a muddy field with grass trying to sprout up. Brett and Vi had arrived about half an hour earlier, but our friends Amanda and Rustine had camped there the night before. Amanda and Rustine are good friends to all of us (we went to Oaxaca with them), and they moved from Brooklyn to North Carolina about a year or two ago. It was so nice to see and hang out with them again and simply catch up.

Overall the trip was a good respite from my problems and being shut in my apartment for months. The food we each made was great, and I was even able to do a Pie-Solation livestream. I learned that Dusty doesn’t like to swim, and was too excited by nature to eat and take her puppy medication (she chewed on a lot of sticks, though). It was rainy the second day, but with the makeshift canopy city we constructed, we sat beside the fire and chatted.

By the time our long weekend was over, we parted ways with Amanda and Rustine, and all got tested for COVID within the following week or two. And good news, all of us are negative. And I’m positive I feel emotionally recharged.

Here are some photos of the trip:

She might not like swimming, but she loves sitting on inflatable avocados.

An Asian-inspired dinner: fried rice, braised shortribs, kimchi

I earned a few Nick Offerman points for chopping wood.

Brian holds an umbrella over the campfire.

Building a canopy city to shield us from the rain.

Amanda and Dusty totally shop at the same raincoat store.

S’mores Pie. Check my IGTV for the broadcast.

Dusty is all tuckered out from her first camping trip.

August 10, 2020 By Phillip Retuta

A Facade Falls In Brooklyn.

Day 146 of self-isolation (and Day 7 of being displaced).

So a funny thing happened earlier this week: a piece of facade fell from the front of my building. Earlier, contractors started construction on the abandoned building next door. I think they’re renovating the ground-floor church into a residence and adding a penthouse condo to the roof. At first, I was worried they’d tear down the entire building, which includes the wall in my backyard; essentially my garden and my yard would be unusable for god-knows-how-fucking-long. I mean, who wants their basil with a touch of possible asbestos or grill next to a pile of masonry rubble? Anyway, the early morning drilling and hammering would constantly wake me up, and I could feel the vibrations shaking my bed. Truly, there was no need for an alarm clock when you hear the drumming of a jackhammer and your floor is vibrating.

According to the NYC Department of Buildings, they concluded that the piece of facade that fell was due to the construction next door and my building being old as hell.

As I’m about to walk Dusty, I see a bunch of firetrucks on my street and blocking traffic. Firemen and police officers, masked because of the pandemic, said they might have to evacuate the building. Across the street, I see all my neighbors wondering what the hell is going on. A police officer walks up to me, says to contact Red Cross, and gather whatever you can because our building might be condemned by the city.

FDNY and NYPD block off the entire street.

Awesome, right? In the middle of a pandemic, just when I started working full-time again, and I just adopted a dog literally the previous day.

I call and text my landlord, tell my parents and friends, and exchange my number with a bunch of my neighbors. It’s funny how — despite living in my building for almost 4 years — I’ve never really interacted with my neighbors, and it’s remarkable how a minor disaster could bring us all together. I even get interviewed by a CBS cameraman; I didn’t see him attached to any reporter, but he had his camera and a press badge, and I’m certain this wasn’t a big enough news story to get on air.

I wait at my friend Mark’s apartment and take a few work-related Zoom meetings, with just Dusty, a water dish, and a few dog treats. I figured, since this was just the facade, we’d return to our building and all will be good. Nope. I get a call from my landlord saying you have a 15-minute window to get some clothes and any important things before the Department of Buildings comes and restricts anyone to enter the building. As a precaution, they need to inspect the structural integrity of the building. Power is off, water is shut down, gas is stopped.

I return with Dusty back to my apartment building, and I see several of my neighbors exiting with suitcases. They say the Red Cross offered them to stay in a motel in Sunset Park (coincidentally, the latest COVID hotspot in NYC), but I was lucky to get in touch with my friend Vi. She said I can stay at the vacant apartment of her friend, Tien, who’s currently in Los Angeles. The apartment was nearby — just a few blocks from my current and apparently condemned apartment — and was fully furnished. I was so thankful for that, especially since my neighbors said the hotel was fucking filthy and next to a rehab center. One of my neighbors is a photographer/cinematographer and went on the roof of the hotel to take photos of the NYC skyline; he was chased back inside by someone on the rehab center’s roof because the guy thought he was taking photos of him.

Anyway, wearing a hardhat given to me by a police officer, I pack some clothes, my laptop, Dusty’s dog food and bed, and toys. Knowing that the power is out, I took some food out of my fridge and freezer. I stuffed them all in a rolling suitcase and hurriedly walked to Vi’s apartment to get access to Tien’s. With a suitcase, a duffle bag, and a dog on a leash, I looked like drifter.

In the midst of the chaos, I somehow drop my cellphone within a block of my apartment; it was a matter of minutes when I realize my phone is no longer in my hand or pocket — thank god I constantly play Pokemon Go, even during an emergency. I search the street and retrace my steps, and my phone is nowhere to be seen. I ask people along the street if they’ve seen an iPhone or if they can call my number, but it just keeps on ringing till it goes to voicemail.

This was perhaps the most stressful and I’m-About-To-Breakdown moment thus far. Like this is hell. I accepted my fate, and journeyed to Vi’s apartment.

She did a lot of walking that day; she needs a makeshift dog bed.

I tell her and her husband Brett that I also just lost my phone, and I unpack my laptop to use the Find My iPhone app (Dusty decides to use the open suitcase as a bed). Through the app, my phone keeps ringing and alerting whoever has it, and on the map I see the phone start moving around Bed-Stuy and Crown Heights. Vi concurrently keeps calling it until someone actually picks up. Apparently a cab driver found it after he was done praying at the nearby mosque and was willing to return it. Vi arranges the driver to come near her apartment, and I rush to an ATM to give him a $50 reward. When I get my phone back, a sense of relief comes over me, and I’m so happy that there are good New Yorkers out there.

The apartment I’m staying at is definitely much nicer than mine, or at least cleaner and less cluttered (I admit, I like gathering supplies and equipment for videos, cooking, and design work). There was no TV, so I relied on Twitter to get the news, and I somehow returned to binging podcasts, Netflix, and now HBO Max (The Doom Patrol and Indian Matchmaker are great shows). All my cooking stuff was at my apartment, so I sustained myself with a lot of takeout. I also learned that Dusty — who’s getting used to the city — only likes to poop on Citibike docking racks. Work is a little difficult, considering my laptop isn’t as powerful as my iMac, and a lot of my work files are stored there.

Three days pass since the facade fell, and my landlord was able to get a protective netting, the scaffolding up, and get everything fixed. The power gets turned back on this third day (like a biblical reference), but the water and gas are still off — this means my aquarium’s filter will run and my freezer food will probably be okay, but everything in my fridge has to get thrown out, and I have to buy water for my plants and fish. Also, with the modem powered, I’m able to send work files to myself. The other tenants and I are merely waiting for the NYC Department of Buildings inspector to come and give the okay to come back into the building. Mind you, the landlord fixed everything, and I’m writing this 4 days after the fact. Again, I’m relying on the steadfastness and mercy of New York City officials to return home.

If it’s anything with the unemployment fiasco, I’m not holding my breath.

Everything is done, now it’s a NYC Department of Buildings waiting game.

August 3, 2020 By Phillip Retuta

Meet Dusty Valley Doggerton.

Day 139 of self-isolation.

I’m sure I had mentioned it before, but I wanted to give myself a full year after Nico’s passing before I would ever adopt another dog again. Despite my love of dogs, I would wait until April 2020 to even consider getting a pet. Then, of course, COVID-19 hit the world, and we were all pretty much forced into our homes.

During the onset of the pandemic and subsequent quarantine, I would look online at adoptable dogs at animal shelters and wonder if now was the right time to get a new pup. I live alone, and although I enjoy my solitude and independence very much, it would have been nice to have a companion. It was mid-July when I realized I’m a little lonely, and despite COVID-19 and the financial hardships I’ve experienced since getting furloughed, I was ready.

I applied to several adoption agencies and explained my background and my life with Nico, and I was a surprised I was pre-approved by nearly every shelter. I also told myself that I’d get a corgi or corgi-mix, but as someone who loves dogs so much, any puppy would do. Of course, I wanted a young pup (preferably female since I felt they’re easier to house-train), and I knew I’d devote many, many years to this new companion. I wanted a lifelong commitment from the get-go.

One shelter, Second Chance Rescue NYC, had this 3-month old puppy that they found in Mississippi. She looked like a pitbull-mix, tiny enough to carry around on the subway, and had one floppy ear and one upright ear. Her name was Valley.

Valley was found abandoned as a puppy and had mange.

I applied to adopt her, and lo-and-behold, they were more than willing to give her to me. I had a few Facetime calls and various text messages with Valley’s fosters, and she seemed like a really chill and relaxed dog. Still, I was on the fence to adopt her: apprehensive that I’ll lose that care-free, independent lifestyle I had after Nico died, I wondered if I was truly ready. Nevertheless, I scheduled a socially-distant, outdoor, in-person meeting with her foster in Vinegar Hill.

On a beautiful Saturday afternoon, I rode the subway for the first time since March (it was weird and empty and quiet). I walked to the fosters’ apartment, repeating to myself, “This is just a meeting, no need to fully commit to anything just yet.” In fact, I called Brett, Morgan, and Brian to see if they wanted to meet this puppy themselves; surely, their sage advice would help me with my indecision to welcome another dog in my life. As I approached the fosters’ building, I saw a woman step out of her car with this happy-go-lucky puppy on a leash; it was Valley.

I yelled hello, and Valley immediately came to me to greet me. I noticed she had a slight limp and a wonky leg — a result of having broken it when she was a baby but had fully healed somewhat incorrectly. Brett, Morgan, and Brian eventually came, and the foster asked me if she wanted to walk around the block with Valley. As the foster went inside her apartment to drop off some things, my friends and I commented at how cute and small she was. She was relatively relaxed and just so curious to smell everything. Brett, Morgan, and Brian felt this dog was a good choice.

When we returned to the foster’s building, I called Second Chance Rescue to say that Valley was the dog for me. I Venmo’d the adoption fees, and requested to the foster if she can drop Valley the next day; I had to puppy-proof my apartment and get the necessary supplies (food, leash, collars).

Walking back to my neighborhood with Brian and Morgan, they reassured me that this was the dog for me, and I laid out my plan for the rest of the day: go to the pet store, remove anything in my apartment that Valley can reach, find all of Nico’s old stuff, and clear out and clean Nico’s crate (it had all of her beds, blankets, etc.). A lot of Nico’s stuff had her scent on it (especially when she was dying), so I did a lot of laundry. I spent the rest of the day cleaning and organizing.

The next morning, I woke up incredibly early and felt very anxious. I was awaiting for that call or text message from the foster to say she was here. After grabbing some coffee and (admittedly) smoking a lot of cigarettes, I sat on my stoop with my mask on. 15 minutes pass by, and I see the foster and Valley trotting down the block. The foster said her goodbyes to Valley, she and I exchanged elbows and Instagram handles, and she left — Valley is officially in my care.

I loved the name Valley, but I named Nico after the singer. I wanted to continue that trend, so I wanted to name this dog after Dusty Springfield.

So everyone, please welcome Dusty Valley Doggerton.

Dusty’s been really good so far, and she loves running around the backyard. Her appetite is okay, and she’s still unsure about treats. Curious about my neighborhood and her new home, we’ve been taking long walks so she can get acclimated with all the sounds and scents. My local coffee shop is dog-friendly and open for takeout, so each morning she’s greeted by my baristas and given treats and ear/neck scratches (I feel bad that they have to wash their hands each time, especially when it gets busy in this pandemic). Dusty loves people and always tries to go up to them, but she really loves to meet other dogs: each time a dog passes by on our walks, Dusty lays down and waits for them to come say hello.

Her energy is still at puppy-level, but she remains relatively calm and independent. I’m currently reinstating my pet insurance, and I’m going to take her to my old vet for her first checkup. I don’t even know how it’ll work considering no one is allowed to go inside the building, but it’s best to get all her preventative medications now.

Sure, these times are so fucking weird and so fucking stressful, and I hope Dusty gets used to all the social-distancing of others and me wearing a mask all the time. I hope we, as people, get through this fucking horrible and unpredictable year together, but at least now I can take solace that once again, I have a companion.