A weird holiday season
This... is a really weird year. I mean, it should be joyous and wonderful, but... we live where we live right now.
And just to explain a part, the only reason we're living in *this* place is a) Abby had to find a place quickly a few years ago around covid because the place where she was, the owners came back to the country and wanted the room back, so she had to find a place *fast*. During covid. Secondly, the landlord here plays nice when you first walk up to him looking for a place, and very shortly after you move in, after you've established yourself and it's expensive and hard to move again, then turns face and becomes the terrible person that he is. He learned what my wife made at work, and increased rent to the point that she can *barely* make payments, and can't save money, effectively trapping her in here. And then after that said that if she continued to use the oven in the kitchen, he would increase her rent, effectively saying that the kitchen is no longer allowed to be used.
And there's black mold everywhere, and most of the "furnishings" in our room were broken when we moved in, there's a chandelier with a single working 40 watt bulb socket, the radiator doesn't work so we have no heat aside from what finds its way in from the rest of the house, and if we complain, out on the street, get out.
And he SCREAMS and he screams and he's violent! In the 8 months that I've been in the country, four families have been made homeless in the room next to ours. Four. And he doesn't work, he literally lives off of his tenants, and then treats us like absolute garbage, and knows that when he kicks one out, he just needs to play the nice guy to the next people for a week, and they are essentially trapped in there until they can save up and move out. It's a terrible, vicious, horrible cycle. And if we complain, or make any requests, or do anything whatsoever, we are homeless.
I could go on. I could go on and on and on, I've photographed the mold and everything wrong with the place, reported him to the local council (for what little that does), but on that note I directed them to not contact the landlord at any time until after we move out, because if he found out that we complained, we will be made homeless. So once we move to a new room, I'll be going back to them and asking them to proceed with any investigations they may be able to carry out.
So we sit here, in our dim 10 foot by 10 foot room with a highly inflated rent, without access to a kitchen, oven, yard, and only a 1 foot by 2 foot by half foot shelf of a dormatory-sized refrigerator that must be shared by three families (he gets a full family sized fridge to himself downstairs), and that's it. It's unbelievably depressing, and it's downright common to hear him screaming at the top of his lungs at one of the tenants at 2 in the morning, evicting them for... coming in late or making sound or who knows what. So many families have become homeless as a result of him.
And that's our Yule/Christmas this year, wooooh, we're stone broke, refusing to spend an extra pence on holiday anything (not that he would allow us to spend extra electricity on christmas lights if we wanted) until we save up enough to move out. Optimistically, that'll happen by the end of January, more likely the end of February or later.
So it's a weird year, it's a weird season. I guess on that note, my Pagan friends still call the season Christmas, so we're just kinda running with that too, I'll just call it both it's all fine and good, general celebrations at this time of year. "Celebrations".
2023 has basically been "survive moving into the UK" for me, and that's honestly about it. Hoping for a better 2024!
I really, really debated whether to make this comic or just stay silent and let it all ghost by, but, I dunno, it feels good to get it off my chest a bit. Living in absolute horror silently is just pain, just pain. Opening up at least makes our pain feel a little bit less, so thank you for listening.
Kabutroid and Abby
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Merry Christmasyule, WOOOOH!
I've gotta say, I've had a hard time deciding whether to make this comic, or to not make this comic, since well, this is simultaneously the best Christmas ever, and the worst Christmas ever.
For the obvious good, it's my first Christmas with my beloved Abby. For the bad, we're stuck in a nightmare rental room with a nightmare landlord who forces us to do his private chores, or else be made homeless.
Yah, yah it's that bad. We must mow his private lawn, that we're not allowed to go onto, or else be evicted. Clean his private shower that we're not allowed to use, or else be evicted, and clean his kitchen, that he's disallowing us from using, or else, you guessed it, be evicted.
He has already been reported to the local council, which honestly I doubt will do anything. They've already told me that he can do almost anything, because he does not use a tenancy agreement. We are saving up to move.
So it's Yule with my love, but we cannot even have boiling water. We cannot cook, we have only cold sandwiches, and oh man there is so much more, I could go on for like half an hour. It's a true nightmare.
So yaaaaay, holidays and stuff, they kinda exist, oh man I wish we could eat a warm meal for the first time since moving to the UK. It's.... that right now.
Saving saving saving, need two months rent ahead for the next place, as well as save for my next visa. And we don't have an oven. And only a single 40 watt bulb in our room. And if we complain we are homeless. It's... a weird holiday season.
Most sprites are property of Nintendo, who are awesome and and amazing and stuff, and also this is a parody and also it's free and stuff.
Comics, ideas, Kabutroid, and other custom content owned by KatieLynne Jackson. I'm pretty easygoing, and really don't mind all that much if you make content based on my content and stuff. Just don't go impersonating me and we're cool.
