Apartment Living

I get those.

 

I hope you're not using those with your freshly pierced ears!

 

At least if IJAG sticks the earrings in the pads, it doesn't hurt as much.

 

Nope, slept without them the past two nights. Been OK, because I've been off work. But I can't wait for my neighbors' dogs to wake me up at 7 a.m.the rest of the week.

 

I've never met a boy named Avery.

As for apartment living, I rent a house now, but I've had my fair share of bad apartment neighbors. I lived on the second floor, and one time I saw a couple of people climbing down from the deck of the apartment above mine during one of their many parties. I think I was very lenient with them too. They had parties all the time, but I never called the cops before 11:30. I had to be at work at 5:00, so I had to do it at some point.

Friends of those same neighbors walked into my apartment one time (I had left the door unlocked), thinking they were on the third floor already. Thank God I was dressed.

The next tenants abandoned a mama cat and her seven kittens outside their door when they left. I brought them downstairs and took care of them until management came by to pick them up, DAYS later.

 

This Avery takes offense.

 

I went to middle school with a boy named Avery. Kind of a pain-in-the-a$$... Maybe it's the name.

Anyway ... I've lived in apartments nonstop since junior year of college ... been an interesting mix of neighbors. And I've always, always, claimed the top floor when possible. I'd rather trek the stairs than hear the folks above me.

One apartment in college was actually a quad -- you know, shared kitchen and shower between four people, but everyone had their own "bedroom" and half bath (toilet and sink). Shared it with a girl from Taiwan who spoke very little english and never interacted with us and a couple that I knew (had worked with the girl at a food service job the year before).

Moved there in September, they broke up in October. Spent October through August (end of my lease) alternating between sleeping with ear plugs and trying to stay out late enough that they'd be asleep by the time I got home. About two nights a week were quiet -- the other five ran the gamut from loud, disgusting makeup sex to her sobbing in the kitchen against his door to probable domestic violence (I swear I heard him hit her multiple times) and shouting/cussing. I contemplated calling the cops, but was told early on to stay out of it when I offered to take her out for a drink the first time he brought another girl home.

I swore off large-ish apartment complexes after that, but am in one now. It's actually not too bad, since I'm not a loud, late -night partier and most of the folks here have, apparently, lived here for years. However, next time I move, it will be back to either a very small complex, a split house or something similar.

 

I've lived in two apartments.

The first one in Lexington wasn't bad, although we were surrounded by three Mexican families who had at least 10 people in each two-bedroom apartment. You couldn't really hear anything when you were standing inside the apartment, but as soon as you opened the door to the outside, music and loud TVs, kids, parents yelling, etc., hit you.

The apartment above us had a really squeaky floor, but it was vacant almost the entire time we lived there (a little over a year). We had to use that apartment's bathroom for 2 or 3 days once while maintenance redid our bathroom/tub.

The apartment in Frankfort was a nut-house. All kinds of crazy folk living there. There were three separate buildings, with a courtyard in the middle that hardly anyone used because it was just a bunch of grass and one tiny pavilion with a grill.

You could hear EVERYTHING in this godforsaken place, too. No matter if the fight going on was 20 doors down or two. One night when I got in from covering a game, I was pretty sure I heard two or three guys doing a drug deal. I wasn't sure which apartment they were in, but I opened my door and the cops were there. Guys got busted, and one of the cops who I had become pretty good friends with told me they had about 500K in drugs in the place.

Then there was the night a guy beat the living shit out of the girl he was seeing or married to or whatever. Me and a few guys went down to his apartment and had to literally carry him out of the room and away from the lady. One guy stood out in the hall and called the cops, who were there within a few minutes and arrested the guy.

And then there was the guy who decided to build a fucking camp fire in his BATH TUB. Yes, he wanted to go camping, but instead of going somewhere like a lake or whatever, he decided to go camping in his apartment. Brought all kinds of twigs and shit inside and build a camp fire in his tub. Cops were called, and by the time I got there firemen were canvassing all three buildings to make sure there was no damage. The "fire" was put out in time before the sprinkler system went off.

Landlord repeatedly said the guy would be evicted soon, but it never happened. God, I'm glad I got the hell out of that place.

 

Lexington apartment out near Alexandria Drive, KY?

 

Yes ma'am.

About a block and a half down from Harrodsburg Road.

 

Most of my apartments have been great. The only times I've really had problems have been in the big complexes where the neighbors are basically roommates because you can hear everything.

Now I live on the top floor of a 12-unit condo building and I only share one wall, with a neighbor I've neither seen nor heard in the three months I've been here. I'm probably paying more than I should be, but since I work from home 90 percent of the time, I feel like I'm getting my money's worth.

If the stock market ever goes up again, giving me the money for a down payment, I might even buy the place.

 

I lived in the ones almost down to Versailles Road. Little Mexico I called it. It was nearly close enough to the plasma place to walk.

Ah, those were the days.