Comedy of Errors
Nov. 23rd, 2004 11:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pjthompsonOh, how I wish this was Shakespearean, but it isn't—unless you count the low farce aspects of his plays.
So, anyway, you may remember that I've had a series of adventures involving my post-Soviet apartment manager and the Boyfriend and Girlfriend who live upstairs from me. Many times my friends and I have engaged in What If scenarios involving the strange nocturnal habits of Upstairs, often to hilarious effect. Made for good stress relief, too, when they were seriously getting on my nerves. You may also remember that some of my adventures were definitely Not Fun, involving as they did my car being broken into twice in two weeks. This caused Yuri, my manager, to be deeply suspicious. Perhaps due to a fondness for American crime shows, Yuri concluded that the break ins were an inside job and asked me if I'd had any problems with anyone in the building. I told him that the only folks I'd had trouble with were the ones who lived upstairs in 207.
"Ah, 207," Yuri said, nodding and looking appropriately squinty-eyed and contemplative. "I have had a lot of trouble with him."
"Oh, really? The boyfriend?"
"Yes, Benny. He is much trouble. And she has broken lease. He moved in after she signed, and he is not on lease, and he's trouble, so I evict them. They will be gone by end of the month." (Yes, he really does talk like Boris Badanov.)
"Really? 207?"
"Yes!"
"Great!"
I didn't wish harm on anyone, but as these people have been extremely noisy, spiteful, and inconsiderate for over a year despite my pleas to them to play nice, I was a happy camper. My spirits were further bolstered (if you'll pardon the furniture pun), when I saw their couch in the back of Boyfriend's truck and a couple of other furniture items. When the couch gets packed, that's a significant sign of moveage. I was somewhat mystified that they left the couch in the truck parked on the street in a neighborhood that is hardly crime free—and in the rain. And really scratched my head when anything that was loose in the back of that truck had been stolen overnight. What chuckleheads. But much hilarity ensued between my friends and I.
My ebullience was tempered somewhat when the end of the month came and went and Upstairs were still there. Some of the people in the building moved in on the 15th rather than the first and I thought perhaps that was the case here. This view was bolstered (again with the furniture puns) by an argument I overhead between Yuri and a young woman tenant. I couldn't help overhearing since it was right outside my living room window and in the atrium which acts like an echo chamber for the building. The blinds were drawn and I wasn't going to do the full-on Gladys Kravetz routine and flick the blinds, so I just listened. She wanted an extension on the time to pack up and move out, Yuri was standing firm, and it got quite nasty. I was trying hard not to feel glee because it's just so tacky, but these people have given me such grief that it was hard not to gloat just a wee bit.
So imagine my chagrin when I came home from work one day and found a cleaning crew busily scrubbing and a mound of possessions heaped outside the door of apartment...107. Yes, that's right. Yuri heard what he wanted to hear and so did I. Hoist on my own What If petard yet again.
I said to Yuri later, "I thought it was 207 that was being evicted."
"Yes, that's right."
"No, insert Girlfriend's name here in 207."
"Oh." This would have been the perfect time to clarify the situation, but Yuri just looked shifty, said, "Oh," again and walked away.
The good news is, they've been very quiet and considerate lately. But they've had quiet spells before. It never lasts, and this one won't either, I suspect.
So now I'm back to concocting more What If scenarios about Upstairs to explain their strange behavior. "I guess they got a new couch and were taking the old one to Goodwill," said one of my friends. "I guess that's why they didn't care if it got rained on and vandalized."
I guess. And Boyfriend's truck came home the other day with the whole backend filled with dirt, right up to the gunwales. He'd covered it in black plastic, but since he'd driven through rain and wind to bring his load of dirt back to the apartment building, the plastic had gotten blown around and rather intricately involved with the soft squishy load of mud it covered. The truck has sat for about 5 days in the garage draining muddy rainwater while the mud dries and hardens.
"Maybe they were going to do a reconstruction of that scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind where Richard Dreyfus's character builds a replica of a mountain on the dining room table," I told a friend.
It makes about as much sense as anything else I could What If at this point.
And people wonder why I'm an ironist.
So, anyway, you may remember that I've had a series of adventures involving my post-Soviet apartment manager and the Boyfriend and Girlfriend who live upstairs from me. Many times my friends and I have engaged in What If scenarios involving the strange nocturnal habits of Upstairs, often to hilarious effect. Made for good stress relief, too, when they were seriously getting on my nerves. You may also remember that some of my adventures were definitely Not Fun, involving as they did my car being broken into twice in two weeks. This caused Yuri, my manager, to be deeply suspicious. Perhaps due to a fondness for American crime shows, Yuri concluded that the break ins were an inside job and asked me if I'd had any problems with anyone in the building. I told him that the only folks I'd had trouble with were the ones who lived upstairs in 207.
"Ah, 207," Yuri said, nodding and looking appropriately squinty-eyed and contemplative. "I have had a lot of trouble with him."
"Oh, really? The boyfriend?"
"Yes, Benny. He is much trouble. And she has broken lease. He moved in after she signed, and he is not on lease, and he's trouble, so I evict them. They will be gone by end of the month." (Yes, he really does talk like Boris Badanov.)
"Really? 207?"
"Yes!"
"Great!"
I didn't wish harm on anyone, but as these people have been extremely noisy, spiteful, and inconsiderate for over a year despite my pleas to them to play nice, I was a happy camper. My spirits were further bolstered (if you'll pardon the furniture pun), when I saw their couch in the back of Boyfriend's truck and a couple of other furniture items. When the couch gets packed, that's a significant sign of moveage. I was somewhat mystified that they left the couch in the truck parked on the street in a neighborhood that is hardly crime free—and in the rain. And really scratched my head when anything that was loose in the back of that truck had been stolen overnight. What chuckleheads. But much hilarity ensued between my friends and I.
My ebullience was tempered somewhat when the end of the month came and went and Upstairs were still there. Some of the people in the building moved in on the 15th rather than the first and I thought perhaps that was the case here. This view was bolstered (again with the furniture puns) by an argument I overhead between Yuri and a young woman tenant. I couldn't help overhearing since it was right outside my living room window and in the atrium which acts like an echo chamber for the building. The blinds were drawn and I wasn't going to do the full-on Gladys Kravetz routine and flick the blinds, so I just listened. She wanted an extension on the time to pack up and move out, Yuri was standing firm, and it got quite nasty. I was trying hard not to feel glee because it's just so tacky, but these people have given me such grief that it was hard not to gloat just a wee bit.
So imagine my chagrin when I came home from work one day and found a cleaning crew busily scrubbing and a mound of possessions heaped outside the door of apartment...107. Yes, that's right. Yuri heard what he wanted to hear and so did I. Hoist on my own What If petard yet again.
I said to Yuri later, "I thought it was 207 that was being evicted."
"Yes, that's right."
"No, insert Girlfriend's name here in 207."
"Oh." This would have been the perfect time to clarify the situation, but Yuri just looked shifty, said, "Oh," again and walked away.
The good news is, they've been very quiet and considerate lately. But they've had quiet spells before. It never lasts, and this one won't either, I suspect.
So now I'm back to concocting more What If scenarios about Upstairs to explain their strange behavior. "I guess they got a new couch and were taking the old one to Goodwill," said one of my friends. "I guess that's why they didn't care if it got rained on and vandalized."
I guess. And Boyfriend's truck came home the other day with the whole backend filled with dirt, right up to the gunwales. He'd covered it in black plastic, but since he'd driven through rain and wind to bring his load of dirt back to the apartment building, the plastic had gotten blown around and rather intricately involved with the soft squishy load of mud it covered. The truck has sat for about 5 days in the garage draining muddy rainwater while the mud dries and hardens.
"Maybe they were going to do a reconstruction of that scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind where Richard Dreyfus's character builds a replica of a mountain on the dining room table," I told a friend.
It makes about as much sense as anything else I could What If at this point.
And people wonder why I'm an ironist.
Re: *sigh*
Date: 2004-11-23 10:50 pm (UTC)