I lived in Edinburgh at one point
And was gruesomely poor. I'd just graduated from uni, and feel obliged to take take the first job I was offered. This was a crappy job temping in an office in Edinburgh's Sighthill (unaffectionately known as Shitehill). I'd stupidly spent my overdraft on drugs and general fucking around, and after a few soul-crushing weeks living in a hostel (no money for a flat: no, not me) and humiliating rejections for flat-shares (think: Shallow Grave), I evetually found a bedsit off Leith Walk. "Grubby" doesn't even begin to describe it: it had that horrible itchy wallpaper, a TV with a fucked tube (all distorted colours at one corner), and a bed. I shared a shower room with a horrible manky damp carpet and a kitchen stocked by the remnant of charity shops from the 1970s.

This was paid weekly with a week's deposit. Just scraping that together left me absolutely broke, living off cornflakes and toast. But anyways, after a few months the job was about to end, and I couldn't find another one in Edinburgh worthy of the name (it was just coming up to Xmas), so I gave up and decided to move back home at the end of the week.

I told the landlord this and said I'd like the deposit back. He said I had to give 2 week's notice. I said I couldn't, as the job would be ending; I'd be leaving at the end of the week. He said he was "sorry" but there was "nothing he could do": he wouldn't give me it back. Knowing full-well that notice periods are usually the same as the payment period, I felt diddled and conned and cheated. It wasn't like I had any money to spare.

I happened to notice that the width of the room was the same as the length of the bed. And my room was on the first floor, but as there were basement flats, there was a gap in front, and a small walkway to reach the main door. (I hope you know what I mean - basically the ground fell away in front of my "ground-floor window" to the basement flats underneath). So, in a desperate search for a petty victory, I put my bags into the hallway, put the bed up against the door, climbed out the window, climbed along the fence to the walkway, went in the front door, got my bags, left my keys behind and left the landlord to try to figure out how to get in.

I'm not proud of this. But it had to be done.
(McChinaman banned, Fri 11 Feb 2011, 2:54, Reply)