Sticky doors and I

Trying to finish off my TWO problem sets that are due tomorrow. One of the questions for my entrepreneurship class left me totally clueless. So I asked a guy who was in the same class. Except as shown below.

me: for qn 4 of the hw right, what are the risks for the model ah?
me: i can't think of a single one leh
me: in the end i cooked up some story about how they are very specialized but then that's still only one. any ideas?
him: i looked up "the succesful business plan" p126-7
him: in the end, i had competitive, technology and capitalization risks
me: oooh good idea. i'll go look at it.
him: 3 boooring reasons
me: heh heh boring better than no answer :P
me: i cannot find the successful business plan thing leh...it's in the allen book right?
him: that's the title of the book! the successful business plan
me: oops.......
me: hrrm hrrm did i not bother to buy the book? okay book-hunting time
me: can i go to your place and borrow your book? *sheepish grin*

So darling drove me over to his place. I was gonna walk since it was just a couple of minutes away.

me: So you want to go with me?
darling: Yeah. (with the duh! flex to his tone) Otherwise how are you going to get to his place?
me: Err okay.
.... Minutes later....

me: Eh, I think that's his house.
(zooms past)
darling: I didn't know it was so close.
me: I thought you saw the map when i mapquested it.
darling: Guess we'll have to turn around then.
... minutes later...

darling: hmmm how to get in.
(The house faces one of the main roads and has no obvious parking space in sight)
darling: You want to get off and then walk back yourself?
me: okay.

Bah, should have just walked out by myself in the first place. Can save up on fuel. Esp in view of the fact that oil prices have crossed the sacred $50 per barrel mark. (darling is looking at me type this with distressed look.... *stopping for a moochie break* *mushiness advisory: May be nauseating to most*... ... ... ... ... ... okay back)

So yeah, I walked up to his house. The front door was not locked so I went in. I *think* it's apartment #4. Bingo, found his name on the mail box. So I walked to the *second* front door (these are popular in America coz it insulates the house by trapping a layer of air between the house proper and the wintry air outside.) The doorknob was pretty much useless. It just turns round and round like a headless fly. I tried pushing the wooden door but it didn't really budge. I saw the lock above the knob. Maybe they have to use a key to enter.

Then I saw these 5 buttons to the right of the door. 4 regular black ones and one bigger white one. One for each apartment? But they weren't labelled. I'm guessing apartment 4 should be the bottom right one among the black ones. I pressed it twice. Imaginary doorbells are ringing in my head. *pause* did they hear me? *press press* *pause* Still no response. Maybe I'm getting the wrong apartment. I went through the whole series of buttons. I even pressed the last one which I thought either meant it was for apartment 5, or they had 5 people in the apartment, or it was the main bell for the whole house. *press big white button* Still no response. Great! I glared back at the washer and dryers that were outside, watching my antics. (queer place to have them really. Are they so useless that no one would steal them?)

Getting frustrated, I pushed the door harder. It swung open. Stupid sticky wooden doors.

P.S: I should have known. My own apartment door is sticky too. Do these Americans build their own freaking homes?!? Somebody needs to learn some precision engineering...