Not Coming To My Chocolate Room.

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chocolatetubChocolate Bathtubs. A few months ago, I heard that a company was making chocolate bathroom fixtures. At first, I thought it was a joke, but I was wrong. There actually is a company that makes chocolate bathroom fixtures, including sinks, toilets, and bathtubs; however, you aren’t going to find them at Home Depot. A chocolate bathtub costs $80,000. See picture below. The bathtub is edible for up to six months, but if not eaten, it can be used for bathing for years. You have to be careful not to put hot or even warm water into the bathtub or it will melt. What sort of people buy chocolate toilets and bathtubs? I don’t know. Probably internet billionaires. Here’s a link to their web site. Bathroom Sweets. Please do not ask me for a chocolate bathtub. I am not making them.

Craigslist Rental Scams.

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I recently received an unusual request from a prospective tenant He said he was interested in renting an apartment I had listed on Craigslist, but first, he wanted me to show him written evidence that I owned the building. He said he had read several articles about scam artists who claimed to own apartments and collected rent and security deposits from would-be tenants and then disappeared with their money. I told this guy that I have also read articles about this.
If 10 years ago an applicant for an apartment asked me to show him evidence that I owned the building I was renting, I would have thought that he was some kind of nut, but Craigslist rental scams are now so common that I don’t think that a request like this is unreasonable. I told this guy that I would bring a copy of my current property tax bill with me when I showed him the apartment, which I did. I think requests like this are going to become more and more common in the future. I am sure that there are landlords who would be offended by a request like this, but not me. Craigslist provides a wonderful service for both landlords and tenants, and a free service at that; however, Craigslist does not vet the listings on their web site, and unfortunately, there are a lot of very smart people in this world who spend their lives figuring out new ways to cheat and rob other people, and it seems like almost all of them know how to use Craigslist.

Freebie Of the Month.

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appliancebulbAppliance Light Bulbs. When the light bulb in your refrigerator, stove, or microwave oven burns out, you have to replace it with an appliance light bulb, not a regular light bulb. Appliance light bulbs are designed to withstand both high and low temperatures as well as vibration. Never put a regular incandescent light bulb or CFL in a stove or refrigerator. That could lead to a very nasty accident!

Protecting Your Car From Break-Ins.

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The single most important thing you can do to protect your car from a break-in robbery is to leave nothing of value in the visible area of your car. Put everything in the trunk or glove compartment where it can’t be seen. Last month, someone I know parked his car on the street in a residential neighborhood in San Francisco. His laptop computer was sitting on the front seat of the car. Instead of putting the computer in the trunk, he left it on the seat and covered it with a hoodie. When he returned to his car, a window was broken, and the computer was gone. Successful car thieves have keen powers of observation.  A professional car thief can look at a hoodie, a jacket, or a sweater lying on a car seat and can tell by the height and shape of the pile if there is likely something underneath. Successful thieves have good instincts about these things. A professional thief isn’t going to risk going to jail for nothing.

Don’t leave anything in your car that a passer-by might think is valuable, even if it isn’t. For example, a closed box sitting on a car seat might contain nothing, but a car thief has no way of knowing that without breaking a window and looking inside the box. A tenant of mine found that out the hard way several years ago after leaving an empty iPhone box on the back seat of his car. A thief broke his window, picked up the box, and when he realized it was empty, he dropped the box and left. Do not rely on car burglar alarms. In an urban area like Berkeley, they are completely useless. False car alarms are so common that nobody pays any attention to them. Have you ever called the police because you heard a car alarm go off? Do you know anyone who has?

About U.C. Berkeley Parking Permits.

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A new school year is about to begin at U.C. Berkeley. If you are considering buying a campus parking permit, there are 2 things that you should know before making a decision to get one.

1. A campus parking permit does not guarantee you a parking space. U.C. Berkeley does not assign specific parking spaces to students. Your parking permit merely gives you the right to hunt for a parking space at university-owned garages and parking lots. The fact that you have a prepaid parking permit does not mean that you will actually be able to find a place to park your car on or near campus. I think the university should make it clear on their web site that a perking permit does not guarantee you an actual parking space. Parking Permits.
2. If you live off campus, a Berkeley student parking permit costs $344 a semester. If you live on campus, a student parking permit costs $1,224 a year.

Why Don’t I Make Sugar-Free Chocolate?

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I am often asked this question. Sugar-free chocolate sounds appealing to dieters, but you are not going to lose weight eating this stuff. ‘Sugar-free’ does not mean ‘low calorie.’ Sugar-free chocolate contains almost as many calories as regular chocolate and often contains more fat. For example, 1.4 ounces of Ethel M sugar-free chocolate truffles contains 185 calories and 15 grams of fat vs. 210 calories and 12 grams of fat for Ethel M’s regular truffles. Most sugar-free chocolate is sweetened with sugar alcohols, like maltitol. Sugar alcohols are indigestible chemicals. I don’t know how these chemicals are made, but because they are indigestible, sugar alcohols frequently cause digestion problems, such as gas, constipation, and diarrhea. My chocolate is sweetened with cane sugar. I never use artificial flavors or colors, and there are no preservatives in my chocolate. I am not going to make chocolate out of indigestible chemicals. If you want sugar-free chocolates, they are easy to find in stores. They sell sugar-free chocolate at all Walgreens stores, but why would you want to buy this stuff? Common sense should tell you that eating indigestible chemicals is probably not a good idea.

Berry Kitchen Tip.

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Berries rot and get moldy very quickly. To keep berries fresh longer and deter the growth mold, rinse your berries in a mild vinegar solution as soon as you get them. Put your berries in a mixture of 1 part vinegar and 3 parts cold water. Dry the berries on towels and store them in an airtight container with a paper towel in the bottom. Your berries will stay fresh much longer.

 

Free Hyenas. FREE!

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hyenasI know people who will take anything – anything at all – if it is free, even if they have no possible use for it. I once had a tenant who lived near a glass store. When the store threw out broken window glass, he would bring the stuff home. Eventually my yard was full of broken glass. Some of the glass panes were huge and obviously came from store windows. This guy also brought home a lot of other useless stuff. One time he brought home 50 old railroad ties and stacked them up in the front yard. The pile was 7 feet high. Railroad ties should never be reused. They are preserved with creosote, a carcinogenic chemical. I asked my tenant: “Why did you bring these railroad ties here?” He said: “They were free!”

U.C. Berkeley is giving away hyenas, and they have a lot of them. Hyenas are nasty, vicious animals. They cannot be trained or domesticated. A hyena can kill an animal 4 times its own size and can eat 30 pounds of raw meat in 10 minutes. A hyena may not seem like the ideal pet, but if you want one, they are available, and they are free. FREE! If you want a free hyena and have a good home for it, contact the U.C. Berkeley Hyena Project at the Field Station For Animal Behavior. It is near the botanical garden on Gayley Road.

Free Marijuana For The Homeless.

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Last week, the Berkeley city council voted unanimously (9 to 0) to require that all marijuana stores in the city give free marijuana to the poor and homeless. The law requires that the marijuana that they give to homeless people must be of the same quality as the stuff they sell for cash. They can’t give homeless people second-rate marijuana.
A few days after the city council passed this law, I ran into one of the law’s sponsors on Shattuck Avenue in downtown Berkeley. I asked him: “Have you considered requiring that supermarkets in Berkeley give free food to homeless people?” He looked at me like I was crazy and said: “No. Of course not. Why would we do that?” He didn’t see my point, and I didn’t try to explain it to him. My point was that homeless people need food a lot more than they need marijuana. What do you think?

Worst Application Ever.

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E-mail Applications. Last month, I rented an apartment to a group of graduate students. I received several good applications for the place. Most of the applications came from people living outside this area and who applied by email. It is always awkward for a landlord to rent an apartment to people who he has not met and who have not seen his apartment. In most places, landlords will not rent apartments that way; however, in college towns like Berkeley, this is quite common, especially at this time of year, just before the start of a new school year. Taking rental applications by email can be tricky, so I am always on the lookout for suspicious questions from applicants. Here are some questions I got from email applicants last month that raised red flags for me:

  • “Your ad says ‘4 bedrooms.’ Are they all inside the apartment?”
  • “It says on your web site that you require photo I.D. I don’t have a photo I.D. Would you accept a letter from my parole officer instead?”
  • “Where is Berkeley?”