My roomie and I have been living in our pretty little apartment since July. Aside from some generally crappy neighbors (no really, it’s perfectly reasonable for you to allow your eight year old son to stalk around the parking lot, shooting a bb gun rifle at the cats— oh, and it’s also ok to stand on your patio TOTALLY NAKED and smoking), thinks have been lovely.
But starting two weeks ago, the strangest thing has been happening: neighbors complain to us that we are being too loud. Let me explain the context and then the two times this has happened.
Our apartment complex is filled with lots of little rectangular buildings. Each rectangular building has two stories and each story looks something like this (thank me later for my badass diagram). Anyway, we’re apartment one at the end and we have our own private staircase (those green lines), apartments two and three share a staircase in the middle, and apartment four has its own staircase on the other side.
The first time, it was 8 PM on a Saturday evening. My roomie was in her room quietly watching South Park DVDs (so quietly that I couldn’t hear it standing directly outside her door) and I was sitting on the couch talking on the phone to my friend. KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK And there was a man standing there. Our exchange went something like this:
Him: Yeah hi, I live on the otherside of the building and someone is playing music so loud that it is shaking my walls. I’m trying to find out who is doing that, is it you?
Me: (looking back at completely silent apartment) No, it’s not. Everything is totally quiet here (gesturing back towards the apartment).
Him: Are you SURE? (glare)
Me: Uh, yeah. My roomie is in her room quietly watching TV and I am sitting here on the phone talking to my friend. If the music is so loud that it is shaking the otherside of the building, I most certainly wouldn’t be able to talk on the phone if this is where it was originating. Plus, it’s totally silent here. See?
Him: (obviously not believing me) Well, I GUESS. But just make sure you don’t do this in the future.
Me:
(Roomie walks out)
Me: Uh, Lauren are you playing music so loud it’s shaking the other side of the building?
Lauren: No. . .
Me: Ok, there you go, sir. It isn’t us. I’m sorry you’re being disturbed, but I need to go now.
Seriously, wtf? Our apartment was totally silent and had been for the last 3 hours. Prior to that, she and I were out running errands for 3 hours. We’re on the END of the building and only have one shared wall and the people below us. Aye.
Cut to today. I had been out running errands (thanks for not telling me we were out of dish soap, dear roomie!) for a bit and I got back home. I brought my laptop into the kitchen and was playing some music out of my built in laptop speakers. The sound was up about halfway, but I couldn’t even hear my laptop’s music in the hallway. DINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDING.
I open the door and there is the BB gun kid. This is the same kid that had been climbing up our private stairs, being really loud, and hanging off the stairs- when we asked him to not do that, he rolled his eyes and said we were stupid. Nice kid. Anyway, he’s got two branches he’s broken off of some tree and is whacking the side of our patio. I ask how I can help him.
Kid: Uh, I live downstairs and my mommy said you’re being way too loud and you need to be quiet because she’s trying to sleep and it’s rude of you to be so loud because she’s trying to sleep and you need to be quiet right now.
Me: (again looking back at the silent apartment, save the laptop quietly going and the dishwasher) I’m sorry, but I’m not being that loud. Tell your mommy I’m sorry she’s being disturbed, but it is also a Sunday afternoon at 2 PM and I will be cleaning my apartment soon. That means I will be vaccuuming and stuff. But yeah, tell her I’m sorry, but it isn’t me.
Kid: WHATEVER :rolleyes: .
So this is an eight year old kid, mind you. But then I thought about it: the only people below us are two mentally handicapped women and I know he doesn’t live there. So now I’m even more confused.
I’m just scared that we’re going to get in trouble for something we clearly aren’t doing. Roomie and I have considered everything: are we accidently stomping? Nope. Are our appliances too loud? Nope. We even just left my laptop on and walked down the stairs to see if we could hear anything from the apartment- nothing.
What should we do?