"Living Room"

On my radio show,(wbai.org), a listener pointed out the near impossibility of life in a studio apartment. For those of you living in civilized countries,..Canada or maybe Idaho. A NYC studio apt. is a 'very' small place.

It's about the size of a living room not counting the kitchen, and bath areas. Small. They sell for maybe quarter a million dollars if you can get a deal. They rent for $1k to $2k a month,...depending.

My listener said that one could never maintain a relationship, and certainly not a marriage in so tiny a place.




No privacy, no personal space whatever. You'd be at each others throats in days.

I mentioned that I doubted one could even live amiably with a parrot in so tiny a cell.

I can picture it now. Me, and my parrot "Chucky" slowly get on each others nerves. The little buzzard reads my priceless first edition R.Crumb comix's, and tears'em up with his claws. That bat watch's my porno dvd's, and don't put'em back where they belong. He sheds feathers, farts, and craps all over the place!

One night the flying rodent goes too far!

He comes home fucked up on whiskey, and angel dust. He's got some crack whore pigeons he'd picked up at some dive in the Bronx, and starts fucking'em on my bed. My Bed!!

...then he throw up!

That frigg'n did it! We go at it! We're rolling around on the floor trying to murder each other! The sleazy bar pigeons strip the apartment of valuables during the confusion, and split.

The evil winged rat has a broken beer bottle in his beak, and is trying to cut my throat! I grabbed a butcher knife. The dump is so small the kitchen was at arms length from me. I grabs the shank, and starts slashing!

The battle turns vicious as the little shit claws at my nuts even as he swings the jagged bottle at my throat! I grab him, and attempt to gut him on 12 inches of jagged steel!

We're blinded by a flaming rage only a tiny overpriced apartment can ignite!

The booze, and drug addled parrot hacks with his razor sharp claws, and rips off my left ear. I'm stunned, and off balance. He soars to the far side of our tiny cell to get some traction. Chucky dives at me digging his talons into my profusely bleeding head.

There's warm blood in my eyes so I'm blind, and lose balance. We stumble about our tiny shabby'n expensive digs. Him dug deep into my bloody scalp screaming curse's in Yiddish, and me flailing at him with the steel butcher knife!

I trips over my banjo, and we crash's butt first through the window. Shredded, and dazed we plummet to the congested street below! Our impact cracks the pavement in front of the abandoned "Latin Kings" pipe bomb factory.

Next day the front page of the "New York Post" says,..."Feathered Friends take Leap!"

"An obscure communist radio host, and his parrot "Chucky" died last night in an grisly apparent "murder suicide" tryst. Neighbors were awakened at 3:00am by cold blooded shrieks, and sounds of desperate struggle.

What must have begun as your typical, and routine "studio apartment domestic dispute" clearly turned ugly then deadly."

"Friends, and relatives of the victims said they saw it coming. Stated one at the scene,..."At first they was a real nice couple, but after a while you could see things was going south fast."

Another told our reporters,..."It's them tiny expensive rat hole apartments that's the real culprit here." "Nobody can live in them crummy things, and stay sane."

"The building's landlord could not be reached for comment."