The Divorced Dad Magnet

Mr. Wonderful is my tenant in Alabaster. He is a prominent business owner (so I hear) and seems to be an an all-around great guy. I really like him in a professional, Southern-friendly kind of way.

Recently, the City of Alabaster tried to extort money from me. I asked Mr. Wonderful about the legitimacy and he assured me that yes, they could do that. If you are so inclined, you can read about this experience here.

Fast forward to some random time in recent memory. Mr. Wonderful e-mailed me. Apparently the City of Alabaster has changed their minds and is no longer in the business of extorting landlords. He sent me a link to the aforementioned extortion page. Lucky for me, our LLC hasn't had the money to pay anything, and I hadn't complied anyway. At least now I am officially off the hook. 

However, I found it interesting how the dialog went with Mr. Wonderful. He sent me the story, with a brief explanation about why he was contacting me.

I thanked him for thinking of me and told him I was relieved this new rule had been enacted.

He wrote me back, re-iterating how awesome this is.

I thanked him, once again.

He wrote me back saying, once again, how this is just totally ducky.

I re-read our correspondence, making sure I wasn't missing anything huge, like there is a water leak, rent will be a day late or there is a herd of wild hedgehogs inhabiting the attic that need my immediate attention. When I didn't see any reason other than he is just being totally nice, I again thanked him and went into detail about the depths of my gratitude, but this time I cc'd Marty Sunshine.

Marty Sunshine's solution to said correspondence was to snicker. You see, for what ever reason, I am a divorced dad magnet. No, no--not in a home wrecker sort of way. But divorced men seem to gravitate to me in a sisterly, girl next door kind of way.

And, to make matters more awkward, Marty Sunshine thinks this is amusing and doesn't have a problem with these folks striking up friendships. I think he is totally ok with it merely for his entertainment. In fact, as Marty is reading this post over my shoulder, he is telling me this blog entry really doesn't convey the level of divorced dad magnet that I really am--whether family, friends, church or Alabama. They find me.

They always find me.

Which brings me to a few weeks later. Mr. Wonderful called. He has a possible steal on a home and wants to buy it--which translated to he is actually in the process of buying it. I gleaned this last nugget as Mr. Wonderful kept me on the phone for about 30 hours going over how carefully he will honor his lease if he buys this house. He also filled me in on ever single neighbor in his caulde sac.

He reiterated all of the above about sixteen more times as I stood on a rickety farm chair with a bic lighter desperately trying to make the smoke detector go off so I could feign another excuse to get off the phone. Hey! Don't laugh, short of hanging up on the poor guy, I was totally out of legitimate ways to cut off the conversation.

As a rule, brought to you by years (YEARS I tell you!) of experience, I don't make friends of my tenants. Mr. Wonderful is a top-notch tenant, quite fascinating and I actually have some legitimate business items I would like to discuss with him if he weren't my tenant. But right now he is my tenant. And, it is time to let Marty start answering my phone.