Jokes about “upstairs neighbors” somehow always being the type of people who are constantly rearranging their homes, or are otherwise up at odd hours of the night doing strange activities, are older than the internet. Much older.
I’ve often joked in the past about how our most recent upstairs neighbors must have had a bowling lane in their apartment. Due to the rolling sounds that sounded uncannily like a bowling ball on waxed hardwood, and crashing sounds that must be… bowling pins? Honestly, I have no idea, and I never bothered to ask and find out.
But I have a confession. I, too, have been “that” upstairs neighbor. In university, my friend and I lived in an apartment that came with a pool table. It literally came with a pool table. That alone is a story for another time. Where this thing had originated from is anyone’s guess, but the previous tenants and the landlord, obviously, couldn’t be bothered to move it out of there.
And why would you want to? It was a pool table. Those things are heavy.
And the only way in or out of the apartment was up a treacherous, rickety flight of steps. I honestly can’t tell you how someone got it in there in the first place. But even with all our youthful strength and try-first think-later attitudes we had at the time, it was easy to see that you’d be taking your life into your own hands to get that thing out again.
So, the pool table stayed. Many a late-night game of pool was played on it after getting home from the bars… after they closed.
Now, it was an old brick building with sturdy thick walls and great soundproofing. But the floors were hardwood. We never realized that every time we “scratched” the cue ball (which was often), the downstairs neighbors basically heard what can only be described as a car backfiring. I only know this because when we were moving out, I bumped into them (for the first time) and they dropped this bit of information on me that they had been sitting on, without any complaint, for an entire year.
They even invited me to come down and listen while my friend dropped a ball upstairs. Yeah, it was LOUD. Not to mention that you could hear basically every stike of cue-on-ball or ball-on-ball on the table itself too. Sorry guys.
The bowling alley upstairs neighbors of mine were just my penance for that, and I served my time as the downstairs neighbor solemnly.
Oftentimes these types of disputes arise from misunderstandings or unrealistic expectations. And while the expectations here are certainly unreasonable, it’s the lying, and extreme escalation that makes you wonder if there isn’t something else going on. At any rate, the only thing they can really do is:
- Move
- Document enough counter-evidence (via their own internal security cameras) that can be recalled to defend against supposed times that they were being loud.
See the original story, outlined, below.
Author: Kayitsi.com
