RULE #33

All dogs must be kept on a leash at all times.

A resident walks in with her dog and when she gets to the front of the
elevators she let's go of the dogs leash and walks into the mail room
to check her mail.

Bad move.

The dog takes of towards the open lobby doors I try to step on the
leash as the dog runs by me.

I was to slow.

I yell to the resident your dog ran outside!

"OMG go run after it!" she said.

I run to the front of the doors and come to a screeching halt
realizing I can't go running after this dog I can't leave the lobby
unattended.
She gets upset because I didn't chase her dog and she starts running
after it herself. She comes back about an hour later with the dog and
tells me she is going to tell the board that I didn't run after her
dog. I told her don't forget to tell the board you didn't have the dog
on the leash. So she writes the board a letter explaining what
happened and the board sends her a letter stating she violated rule
#33 ALL DOGS MUST BE KEPT ON A LEASH AT ALL TIMES. Furthermore the
doorman is not to be blamed for your irresponsibility of walking away
and leaving your dog unattended in the lobby.

CLOUDS OVER NYC

I took this picture with my iPhone while standing outside my building.

"Clouds over New York City."

They look like giant cotton balls I don't remember ever seeing clouds
like this before.

MOVIE

This unsanctioned movie production we have happening in a residents
apartment in our building is getting out of control. Now the board is
involved and letters are being sent out to the resident in question.
Fines might be issued to the resident. It's a complete mess. The
resident did not inform the board the superintendent or the doormen
about what was going to happen.

First a movie crew, to many people coming in and out makes security a
nightmare we have to be able to control the amount of people entering
the building.

Second the amount of equipment they brought with them. Like I said
this production was unsanctioned so there is no insurance to cover any
damage that can happen to our building (elevators, hallways, lobby,
etc).

Third we were receiving complaints from other residents such as a
bright spotlight shinning into ones apartment, to much banging to the
residents apartment underneath and people wandering the floor the
movie was being filmed etc.

This could have all been avoided.

All the resident had to do was go to the superintendent and tell him
that he wants to do a film in his apartment and he has some equipment
and a crew coming how can we do this. The super would have had him
bring the equipment through the basement where no one would see the
equipment coming into the building and we would have told him how to
control his crew, by sending one person out every time they needed
something instead of everyone going on there own, walking softly so
you don't disturb your downstairs neighbor, not allow anyone to wander
the halls. In other words keep everyone quite and out of site.

HAPPY FATHERS DAY

UK

One night I saw through our security monitors a person run and leap to
the ladder leading to a lower roof of our building. I run outside and
I catch the person hanging from the ladder. I told him he better get
down or I will call the police. He gets down and I ask him what the
he'll are you doing try to climb up there he said he was from the UK
and he doesn't like to sleep on the street because he always gets
robbed by other homeless people and so he looks for places like our
rooftop to sleep on at night for protection.
I told him I was sorry to hear that but you have to move on and if I ever catch you trying to
climb up this ladder again I will call the police.

NEED HELP

Yes I do!!!!!

There is a resident who sold her house in the country and instead of
hiring a moving company she figures to use me to help her unload a U-
haul rental truck. Boy was she wrong. The president of the board just
happened to walk into the building as she started telling me to help
her unload the truck. He pulled me aside and asked me,
"what does she have in the truck?"

I said "she has a lot of stuff."

"does she have furniture?" he said.

"A few pieces" I said.

Tell her you can't help her with the furniture. You can't stay helping
a resident for an hour unloading a truck full of furniture, that's not
part of your duties as a doorman. There are other residents who might
need your assistance.

Need I say how upset she was when I told her I couldn't help her
unload the truck.

PARKING

Beware of parking garages in NYC.

These parking garages could be bad for your car.

A resident parked his brand new SUV in a parking garage adjacent to
our building and a parking attendant backed up into his brand new SUV
with a pick up truck and caused $10,000 dollars in damages. They
couldn't deny this accident.

BUT

Yesterday a guest of one of our residents went to pick up his car and
it had a dent (a big dent) on the bumper with fresh white paint (the
support columns in the parking garage are painted white) on it. He
brought it up to the attention of the parking attendant the parking
attendant said to him "you brought the car In like that we didn't do
that. You didn't show us the dent when you gave us the key to park
your car." The guest called the police and when the police arrived
they told him because it happened in the parking garage there was
nothing that they could do, it was a civil matter.
This isn't the first time I hear of something like this happening.
Now the guest has to prove that he didn't bring his car into the
parking garage with a dent.

500W

A resident asked the handyman to replace a light bulb from his floor
standing torch lamp with a 500w halogen light bulb. But on the
package of the 500w halogen light bulb it clearly states to don't use
with standing torch lamps. If you look at the left side, right under
the bright orange WARNING sign of the package (see picture above) you
will see a picture of a floor standing torch lamp with a big X across
it.
The handyman refused to replaced the 500w halogen light bulb and
suggested to the resident that he speak to the super about the
installation.
The handyman will not be responsible for replacing the light bulb.

FALLING

So what's the reality?
Are Co-op prices drastically falling in New York City.
Prices in my building were holding fairly well no drastic drop in
price but a drop nonetheless.

But today a resident called me from the bank, he was applying for a 30
year fixed mortgage (refinance) and they appraised his apartment
$300,000 dollars less than what he actually paid for it (that's the
largest drop in price I've seen in this building.) he called me to ask
me if I knew what a small one bedroom went for. I told him the price
of an apartment similar in size to his that sold a few weeks ago and I
told him the price and it was a $100,000 more than what his apartment
got appraised for. So I told him to call a broker that we (doormen)
recommend to residents who want to sell their apartments and has sold
a few apartments for well over the asking price in our building for a
second opinion.

That's a huge drop in price I hope that's not the case for NYC co-ops
because if it is we're all in trouble.

A resident said to me "the best thing to do is sit on the apartment
until the dust clears."
In other words don't sell until the real estate market fixes itself,
and it will in time.

GROWTH

Humans are not the only population growing in our building. When I
first started working as a doorman in this building almost twelve
years ago there were hardly any kids or dogs as a matter of fact there
were no more than two or three kids and about two dogs. Most of the
residents were elderly with their children already adults and not
living in the building.
Now there are so many kids I say about 30 kids and there have to be
anywhere from fifteen to twenty dogs. With the dogs comes (oh-oh)
dogie accidents in the lobby, you know what that means, that means we
have to be alert so that if there is a dogie accident the dog owner
or the dog walker will be told by me to clean up after their dog
because I don't do doo!!!!!

BOTTLEMANIA

I am getting tired of people complaining to me about bottle scavengers
(people who go around the city collecting bottles for the 5 cents
deposits) usually homeless unstable people.
What people don't realize is that we can't stop them from taking the
recycled bottles without creating a volatile situation for ourselves.
All we can do is tell them to don't rip the clear plastic bags the
bottles are in.
What they usually do is open the bags take out the bottles that have
the 5 cents deposits and leave the ones that don't and tie the bags
back up.

TIME WARNER CABLE

Why is it that whenever Time Warner Cable has an outage all of a
sudden I become an unpaid Time Warner operator. When my cable goes out
I call Time Warner, now I don't have a doorman but if I did why would
I call him. He's just going to tell me that no one in the entire
building has cable and to call Time Warner.

Oh and by the way if you have RR-road runner and digital phone
service through Time Warner well your in for a long night cause that's
also out :(

THE GALL

Why do people assume that when they call the resident they're visiting
on the phone while entering my building that they can just walk
through without being announced.

NOT HAPPENING!!!!!

That sign on top that's in every lobby of a doorman building is there
for a reason!!!!!

NO SMOKING

Our building is a none smoking building. You are not allowed to smoke
in any of the common spaces of the building.

But you can smoke in your apartment if you wish.

The problem we have with smokers is when a resident throws a party.
The smokers go to the stairwells to smoke and they leave all the
cigarette butts on the floor. This is a problem especially in the
stairwells. Our porter leaves at six in the evening and there is no
one to clean the stairwells after that time. So the cigarette butts
won't get swept up until he arrives the next morning, but by that time
we'll already have a dozen complaints of cigarette butts in the
stairwell.
The doormen will tell the super who threw the party and the super will
tell the management company about the complaints we received and the
management company will write the host of the party a letter reminding
the host that there is no smoking allowed in the building and in the
future to keep the guests inside the apartment. Sometimes the
management company will fine the host of the party and bill them for
the clean up.

FRIENDSHIP

Friend (frend) n. one attached to another by affection and esteem;
intimate associate; supporter;

Can friendship truly exist between a doorman and a resident?

There are some residents I consider friends but that friendship has
never been tested outside the lobby. Which is why I am questioning is
it a true friendship or is it some sort of role that we doormen and
residents act out with each other throughout the years.

How about this situation,

when a resident gets a sofa delivery on a weekend and we don't allow
the delivery people to make that sofa delivery to the apartment
(because furniture deliveries are prohibited on the weekends) will our
friendship become strained.
You see its because of situations like this that I question a
friendship between a doorman and a resident.

As long as I am a doorman I will never know if I've actually made a
friend for a resident.

As long as I am a doorman I'll accept the relationship we have with
each other. Friend or not because that's my job.

STROLLING THE CAT CHASE

We have a cat in the building that gets strolled through the
neighborhood in what looks like a baby stroller but in fact is a cat
stroller. So one day this cat is being taken out on a stroll. On the
cats return from the stroll it (the cat) starts to act in a way that I
believe to be crazy, jumping in the cage, going in circles in the
cage, and making this weird noise. So the cat handler reaches down and
opens the cage door, I guess, to try to calm the cat down. The cat
sees the door opening and leaps out. (I am in awe of all this. I'm
still trying to get over the cat being in a stroller.) so the cat
takes off running down the street and unto fifth ave.

The cat handler yells across the vestibule into the lobby "can you go
after my cat!"

I replied "what! That cat is already on fifth ave (that's a whole city
block away from where I'm standing, in disbelief) I am not allowed to
leave the lobby!"

So the cat handler takes off running in the same direction the cat did
and returns about two hours later with the cat in hand.

HOT TOPIC

Governor Spitzer's hooker encounters are the hot topic in my building.
Here are some comments floating around.

"I'd like to know if he ever paid for sexual activity with a minor."

"His wife should have not stood by his side during his resignation
speech she would have made a bigger statement by not being there."

"Spitzer is a sick puppy."

"Imagine what freaky sexual acts he made those women do."

"He would have still been Governor if he would have had an affair."

"He was a hypocrite for prosecuting people for the same thing he
was doing."

PARANOID

Today, Sunday March 9, 2008 I am feeling paranoid. Every person that
walks by the building, I feel is first walking directly towards the
entrance of the building and when they see me at the door they turn
and continue on their way.
Then a homeless man collecting bottles (today is recycling day for our
building) walks by the front entrance and when he sees me he walks in
(the opposite of what the people above were doing) and starts talking
about why he didn't hit the lottery. I'm just contemplating how to get
this guy out of the building.
Then there was the guy at the end of the building looking very
suspicious, he placed a bike by the curb and it appeared to me as I
watched him on the camera screen that he was asking people as they
were walking by If they wanted to buy it.
With the exception of the homeless man I could have been just
overreacting but just in case I wasn't I placed my friend Louisville
slugger (who happens to be on steroids) by my side.

DOORMAN

What am I exactly?
I am a therapist.
I am a babysitter.
I am a friend.
I am a companion.
I am a wake-up call.
I am a weather reporter.
I am a dog walker.
I am a cat sitter.
I am an apartment sitter.
I am a mailman.
I am a conversationalist.
I am a a sponge for complaints.
I am a link between the super & residents.
I am the first line of defense.
I am the last to leave in an emergency.
I am a New York City doorman.
But at home I am what I am, just a man.

DOG WALKER

There was an incident in my building today with the morning doorman
and the dog walker.
The dog walker comes into the building with a friend and asks the
doorman for the keys and the doorman gives the keys to the dog walker
but tells him your friend has to wait for you down here in the lobby.
That's all it took for the dog walker to get angry and get out of
control. He started to curse and yell at the doorman as residents of
the building were leaving. I have to say the doorman really restrained
himself from physically throwing this dog walker out of the building.
Well because of the dog walker's rude behavior nor him or the company
he works for are allowed in the building anymore. And because that
company is not allowed in our building anymore three other residents
now have to find another dog walking company.