tiaras optional

"My only argument is with those who do not view the world as cynically as I do." Michael Korda

Friday, March 02, 2007

Getting to Know the Neighbors

My neighbors are an interesting bunch. There’s the crazy lady downstairs who likes to complain that we hammer all the time. And then there’s the dominatrix upstairs. She hasn’t been too bad lately, although the sound of chains clanking against the floor does get old. I wish she would get some foam padding for them. At least we never hear the screams of her clients. I assume she’s all about the ball gag.

My next-door neighbors have been a mixed bag. Many people have cycled through that apartment in the last four years. Most have only lasted a few months and didn’t leave much of an impression. For a while, there was a 60-ish father/twenty-something son pair living there. The son was a total douchebag who fancied himself a “musician.” He enjoyed practicing his guitar in the wee hours of the morning. He only knew three songs, and one of them was an eardrum-puncturingly awful version of “Free Falling.” He had a girlfriend who lived in the building too, and I used to see him in the hall taking his guitar over to her place, presumably to serenade her. That relationship didn’t seem to last very long. She probably couldn’t stand the guitar playing either.

He and his father used to have very loud fights. Then the son moved out. The father stayed there on his own for a while after that. He was a little crazy, but totally harmless. He used to corner Lord Kissington and me in the halls to discuss the state of contemporary fiction. Not that I wasn’t interested in the topic, but I was way too polite to cut him off after a couple of minutes and I would get stuck talking to him forever, so I took to ducking into the stairwell if I saw him coming.

After he moved out, we had a couple of phantom neighbors. And then the screamer moved in. I first noticed her one night in December. I had woken up around 3 a.m. as I do most nights (insomnia’s a bitch) and as I was trying to fall back to sleep, I heard some strange noises. At first, I thought there was dog next door, which was odd since they don’t allow dogs in the building. Then it dawned on me that this was no dog.

I looked over and noticed that Lord Kissington was now awake too. This is unusual, since he’s a very heavy sleeper. But the dog-like noises were really loud.

Lord Kissington: Is that what I think it is?
Me: Yeah, I think so.
LK: Wow, she totally sounds like a panting puppy.
Me: Not so sexy.
LK: Yeah, not so much.
Me: Does it sound a little weird to you?
LK: How do you mean?
Me: Like sort of, I don’t know, artificial?
LK: Yeah, she’s totally faking.

This continued pretty frequently in December, so I figured she was in a new relationship. Things got quiet in January, so perhaps the December relationship didn’t last. There were a few incidents in the beginning of February, but nothing much recently. I can’t say it really bothers me that much. I usually sleep with earplugs on, so it’s not that bad (although she really is a screamer if I can still here with the earplugs on). Our major dilemma now is that we’re both afraid to see her. She’s lived next door for months now, and neither of us have seen her. Every time, I get off the elevator with a young woman, I’m afraid she’s going to stop at the apartment next to me, but she never does. I just don’t want to see her, because I really don’t want to have a mental image when I hear her yelping. Shudder.

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