Maytag Man

This is the first time in years that I've lived by myself. I would rather suffer through 3 root canals and a 10 ingrown toenails than live by myself. Needless to say, I don't do it when I don't have to. But...I am living by myself now. Which means I have to buy everything myself from scratch. I just bought a sofa last weekend, and will be getting a dinette set this weekend.

My fridge should be stocked, since no one will stock it if I don't. However, currently an old bag of grapes and a Brita filter reside there. Nothing else. I would grocery shop, but I am lucky enough to find a guy who is willing to house me, feed me, and let me play with his dog. I really am never home.

However, before all this, I had the lofty goals of cooking myself. I bought a brand new set of pots and pans, and went to Costco and bought enough Cascade to clean a few rounds of cruise ship dishes. After the dishwasher was loaded, I turned it on, and nothing happened. Now since there's only a dial on the dishwasher, its not like I had much to fiddle around with. So I popped the door open, and all the dishwashing liquid had already fallen out. Fantastic. So I unload everything, head out to the leasing center, and fill out a maintenance form. Simply put: dishwasher does not turn on.

Went and ran errands.

Came back, and the maintenance form left on my kitchen read: need to flip dishwasher switch.

Huh?

Since when did dishwashers have a switch that needed flipping? See? This is what happens when I live with someone else. All this stuff is already done and spoken for. No worries. Re-load dishwasher, made sure switch is flipped, put in more dishwashing liquid, and off it goes!

Three days later I find myself in my apartment for more than half an hour, and decide to unload the dishwasher, as well as do a load of laundry and break down boxes (this is about as domestic as I am going to get). Opened the door, and shit-the bottom of the dishwasher is filled to the brim with water. WTF. Half an inch more, and it would have spilled out onto the kitchen floor.
After I unload the goodies, I head out to the leasing center, and fill out another maintenance form. Simply put: dishwasher flooded.

So now the problem is that I have to run the sink disposal at some point to make sure there's no excess water in the washer. Huh? I am baffled. Do I run it before I run the dishwasher? While the dishes are being washed? Afterwards? I have no clue. Maintenance claimed it had to do with the sink being backed up, which will backup the dishwasher. Which I find scary because hello, I havne't done anything to back up the sink. I haven't cooked or eaten anything because I don't have clean pots or pans (duh), or clean silverware, and don't even own a set of plates yet. Maybe the person before me was grinding body parts in the sink...