There was a tenant in a small two-story office building.  He sold advertisements in off-brand phone books and was really angry that no one used phone books anymore. He’d tell me off about it every time we talked like it was my fault that no one wanted his funky phone books.

Phone Book Guy wanted to install a shower in his office.  The Landlord refused this request for several reasons.  First was the cost.  It would involve getting plans drawn up and a permit from the City as well as all the construction expenses.

Another reason was Phone Book Guy only had a short-term lease and wasn’t able to commit to anything longer due to his precarious financial situation.  This meant that we could possibly end up removing the shower later when Phone Book Guy moved out since most businesses wouldn’t want a shower in the office.

But the biggest reason was the Landlord didn’t want Phone Book Guy to illegally live in the office and in his experience that is what happened when people installed showers in their offices.

A few months later I got a call from the tenant on the floor under Phone Book Guy.  They reported that there was a reoccurring leak from upstairs that was staining their ceiling and they were worried it was finally going to collapse.

I went to check it out and sure enough there was evidence of a pretty big leak.  The ceiling tiles were stained and some of the tiles were drooping down full of water.  When I moved the ceiling tiles out of the way I didn’t see anything in the area that would have been an obvious source of a water.  There were plumbing pipes above the ceiling but they were dry and didn’t show any signs of any leak of the size that would have caused the mess.

I went upstairs to talk with Phone Book Guy to see if he had any plumbing problems or if he noticed any leaks?  He said everything was fine. He had this oddly blank expression on his face and didn’t say much, which was totally out of character for him.  I asked to take a look around and he said I could go right ahead and look but there not any leaks.

I checked around the break room sink and it was fine.  I went into the restroom and while the plumbing all seemed okay there was a huge blue plastic tarp attached to the ceiling and walls.  The tarp was carefully folded up so that someone could use the restroom if they stooped over but there was no way to stand up straight in there.  It was like an enormous blue plastic balloon or tent was hanging in the room.  Of course I had to ask what was going on with that.

When I asked Phone Book Guy about big blue tent situation he seemed surprised that I noticed it.  As though it was a perfectly normal thing to find in any office restroom.

I wasn’t buying it.  We just stared at each other for a while and finally he gave in and told me what was going on.

He admitted he was living in the office and the tarp tent thing was a shower system that he had rigged up.  He had installed hooks on the walls to hold the tarp in place like a big upside down umbrella.  He would lower down the big blue tarp bowl system and then would climb inside and stand on the toilet.  Then he would fill up a bucket of water at the sink and pour it over himself as a shower until the hot water ran out.  The tarp would fill up with water, as you would expect, and then he’d carefully lift up sections of the tarp and tip it towards the sink to drain.  All of this taking place while he was wet, while standing on a sliding wet soapy tarp and balancing on top of a toilet that he couldn’t see under the tarp.  Luckily for him the times he had fallen had only resulted in flooding the bathroom, which is why the ceiling below was leaking.  It was a wonder he hadn’t seriously hurt himself during his crazy shower balancing acts.

This ended up in a big issue with the Landlord evicting him for the leak damage he had caused and because he was living in the office.  I asked Phone Book Guy why he didn’t just get a gym membership down the street?  For $40 a month he could have had access to their shower facilities 24 hours a day with plenty of hot water and without breaking his neck?  He said he didn’t want to join a gym because they’re full of germs and weird people.

Yeah.  Weird people.  I know the feeling.