No amount of windshield washer fluid would get that off.

My upstairs people are really loud. Particularly the upstairs lady - she walks like an elephant. Actually, I think elephants would walk way quieter because they have those cushy pads on the bottoms of their feet. She does not.

When I first moved in here, my landlord (during the interview) gave me the heads up that the upstairs lady is a particularly heavy walker. I said that it was okay because my mother is also a particularly heavy walker and I lived with that for 19 years, so how bad could it be? Turns out, really bad.

I have the ability to tune things out, or zone out, if you will. And this worked for the first while that I lived here. After that, I started becoming increasingly agitated by her presence. I would yell things through the floor at her, congratulating her on her ability to annoy the fuck out of me. I knew this behaviour would ultimately lead to my demise, or jail time when I went postal and murdered her, so I forced myself to reign in the negative energy and use it towards something productive.

I managed to keep this up for some time. I hardly noticed when she walked around her bedroom (directly above my head) for an hour and a half on Sunday morning, in high heels. Even though I 'hardly noticed' I started acting out spitefully.

I started playing guitar, loudly, at all hours of the night. Listening to loud music whenever the hell I felt like. And singing loudly, off-key, to the most annoying songs I knew. At some points, even I hated myself and yet that satisfied me enough to keep at it.

Eventually, I got complaints. She would come down and tell me that I'm far too loud. I decided that these uses of my energy wouldn't really be 'productive' if I got evicted; I reigned it in once again.

I recently got a phone call from my landlord; his voicemail said for me to call him because he had something to tell me. Being near the end of the month, I anticipated him telling me he sold the house and I have to move. I was a bit nervous. Turns out, Loud and Louder gave their notice and they're moving out. I'm pretty happy.

I drop my rent off with my landlords cousin every month (they live where my landlord used to live). When I dropped it off, Cousin D asked me if I had heard the news. We start chatting about it a bit (how did I find out, when did I hear, what do I think).

Anyway, at one point, I told Cousin D that they complained to me about being too loud. The look on her face was priceless; she couldn't believe it (pot-kettle-black, much?). So anyway, the point of this post is to say that now that I see the light at the end of the tunnel, she is annoying the fuck out of me again. I'm yelling through the floor and it's only a matter of time before I start playing guitar at midnight, blasting music and singing badly. It's going to be a fun three weeks. Take that, Stompy!