My Crazy Neighbor

In my previous post, I posted a picture of my screaming yellow kitchen. That photo was taken after I had removed everything from the countertops, drawers, cabinets, scrubbed it down and replaced everything.

Normally, I’m not that fastidious with cleaning my apartment, but in this case, I had to remove everything from the countertops, drawers, and cabinets because I had some major repair work done in the kitchen.

For the past few months, I kept smelling cigarette smoke in my apartment. Sometimes, it would be so bad that my eyes would itch and it would make me nauseous.

I began keeping a log of it and notifying the maintenance department in the building. Strangely enough, it would only occur during most of the weekends.

It turns out that my neighbor is this crazy, middle-aged woman who goes on these smoking binges during the weekends. I can honestly make that claim because I’ve had maintenance up to my apartment and they determined that the smoke is coming through our common wall where the plumbing connects.

In turn, the maintenance department contacted the condo association who wrote to the my crazy, middle aged neighbor and requested that she do something about sealing her wall where our plumbing connects.

She got mad at me and has knocked on my door three times in the past few months, ranting and raving.

First, she wanted to know why I was blaming her for the cigarette smoke.

“I’m not,” replied I. “The maintenance guys said it was coming from your apartment.”

Then she wanted to know why I didn’t call maintenance when her ex-boyfriend was trying to break down her door late one night.

(“What the hell?” I thought)

I replied, “Why are you associating with people who have a proclivity for breaking down doors?”

However, I don’t think this woman has the capacity to understand words like “proclivity.”
Or “people” for that matter.

Anyway, each time she has lit into me, I end up saying, “Listen, if you have a problem with me, take it up with management.”

During our last encounter when she cornered me in the elevator, I finally had to say, “Look! I don’t want you talking to me! Do you understand? That’s it!”

I’ve been documenting these encounters in writing with the building management. They’ve told me that they’ve had problems with her for years.

If any of you could see this woman, you’d know what I mean. She looks like she had been a waitress on an offshore oil rig - - one that was fired years ago for being crazy and irrational.

Anyway, I finally got my landlord to have the counters and cabinets removed so that the wall can be sealed off.

He had previously bought and expensive air purifier for me but that didn’t work.
Lots of citations to my crazy neighbor worked for a little while, but she’s started up again.

So, here is my little yellow kitchen last week. They plugged up four big holes with that sealant foam stuff and so far, so good.
Oh, and the crazy neighbor has left me alone for over a month now. I won't say her name because that would be indescreet.

It's Joanne.