That's Right Neighborly of Ya!

(September 30, 2003)

Okay, I've been fuckin' doing things for other people all goddamn day. What about MY needs? Now I'm cranky and mean. Not as cranky and mean as Hub. For the second time in as many weeks he's just yelled at a neighbor of mine...

...last week it was Dave. Dave started freaking the very week I moved in and hasn't stopped since. Dave lived with his mother down there until she died. Dave is a sad old shut-in who thinks I'm "bowling" in here when I'm just vaccuuming and that I have "elephants running around" when I'm just going to the kitchen for a cup of tea. Dave comments on the packages I leave for Rainmaker to pick up, and on the packages Rainmaker leaves for me, and on the fact that I work from home, and just about anything else he feels the need to advise about. I'm not the only one he instructs about to live, either. I hear him outside telling the gardeners how to do their job, and the rug cleaners, and one night I heard him yelling at a woman down the hall because her kid was crying.

Because of Dave, I make all my visitors remove their shoes, I put MINE on in the fucking hallway, I exchanged my springy, rolling desk chair for a straight-backed chair from the dining room, and I walk crooked through the hallway because there's a loud floor squeak in it. If I'm just peeing I don't flush.

And still. "Hi Dave, nice day isn't it?" is met with "I DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH MORE MY CEILING CAN TAKE!"

Dave has clearly never had an upstairs neighbor. I'm NOT DOING ANYTHING. I hear my upstairs neighbors ALL the time. At the old place on Marion, I could hear my upstairs neighbors. I can hear Joe's upstairs neighbors. You know why? BECAUSE YOU HEAR UPSTAIRS NEIGHBORS.

Dave started yelling in the foyer the other day about "...my ceiling..." and "...two o'clock in the morning..." and whatever. I know he's boredv and I also know he's lying. Because I've only spent about, MAYBE, five nights at home in the last month. I feel like saying "You fucking retard. I'm not even goddamn HERE at 'two o'clock in the morning'". But I don't. He's just some guy who needs to complain.

So the guy went off again. Blithering. And I just walked away from him. Ignore, that's the only way to handle such misplaced vitriol. Hub, on the other hand, turned around and yelled stuff like "Get a job!" and "I'd KILL you if I lived upstairs from you!"

And then today, Hub yelled at some chick who was all uptight because he'd parked our car in the handicapped space for four minutes. It was real quick, and the hazard lights were blinking..."You parked in a space reserved for bla bla bla" I just looked at her and was ignoring her just as I do Dave. We're not PARKED there. I know it's a handicapped zone. Clearly, with hazard lights on and Hub loading a shelf into the back of the damn car, we are not STAYING. Her opinion is worthless to me.

Hub though...he, uh...okay, he's clearly a little stressed.