I was up until midnight last night cleaning the apartment, and I still have miles to go. At least this is a timed activity, over by August 31. Otherwise I could be there for another weak detailing the apartment. This has become my personal odessey to discover whether deposits are truly a racket, and whether I should ever try to get mine back again. Yes, it’s as desperate as trying to fit an elephant through the eye of the needle. But I will try.

Things I have left to do:

• Scrub the tile in the bathroom
• Mop the hardwood floor
• Wax the hardwood floors
• Get one of those white grout pens and touch up the yellowing grout in the bathtub
• See if I can find a cheap replacement shower head and install it (the current one leaks)
• Scrub out the clay pot stain on the bathtub
• Soak and scrub the kitchen blinds
• Dust the crown molding in the bathroom, bedroom
• Clean the inside of the radiators
• Scrub the toilet, inside and out
• Spackle the remaining holes in the closet — I need to find my putty knife for this
• Oxi-clean the carpet stains
• Pack up the ladder, rolling cart, cleaning supplies into the truck

I’m not going to clean the carpet all the way. I figure they’ll probably hire someone to do that regardless, so I’ll certainly lose about $75 dollars there. That puts me at $775.

I am unsure whether I should remove the plant hook I hanged in the kitchen. I had to make a huge hole to get the anchor bolt in. I can spackle over this, but it might look worse than before. However, if they decide to remove it anyway, it will cost me time and materials to repair it. I removed all the other hooks in the place, because they told me to, even the nails that were there already. So, what should I do?