Time for a Superhero

             To say the busy corner outside where I live is extremely noisy would be the understatement of the century. In addition to the crackling of the subway tracks, there's racing 4x4 tow trucks with their high-powered engines, constant flow of emergency vehicles with loud sirens, loud trucks, horn-honking cars, and of course, the super-cool drivers who need to blast their car radio at full power so everyone within five miles knows that they're listening to Ludacris. I've become almost immune to all the outside racket as well as the loud TV noise under me from the elderly lady downstairs who is near deafness and has to have her volume on to the max. The only real unstoppable force which can't be reckoned with is a car alarm at night in which there's no other awakened sources of noise to help drown it out.

             A couple of months ago in the Fall I had one of these situations in which across the street there was a car parked and in the middle of the night, its alarm went off and continued into the sunrise hours of the morning. As a result, I nor likely anyone else within shouting distance was able to get any sleep that night. I find car alarms to be a complete waste and nothing more than a noise hazard for decent folk. Some alarms work the correct way in which they don't sound off unless the car is hit very hard, has its window broken, or gets forcefully opened. The problem is the bulk of these alarms sound off at the slightest vibration such as a passing truck or a gust of heavy wind. If the owner isn't aware that their alarm is going off, then that car is honking an beeping its brains out for who knows how long. There's no justice in these situations, the car owner can simply turn off their alarm from afar and there's no payback from the minutes or hours of noise pollution. In the Fall incident across the street, luckily a no-nonsense lady living across the street zeroed in on  the car and was waiting for its owner to return that morning to give him the business on how his vehicle was a  constant annoyance the whole night. I couldn't hear the entire exchange since I was half-asleep in bed from not getting a good night's sleep, but I heard her screaming a complaint in the ballpark of, "It was on all night and I couldn't get any sleep - I have to go to work in the mornings!!", something like that. I frequently see this lady screaming at other people for other things all the time, but this car alarm owner certainly deserved it. She has a mean-looking dog and I was somewhat hoping she would sic' em on the guy for making me have a sleepless night, but I guess the situation never got that out of hand.

             Last week there was a night in which the weather was a little nasty. Nothing too crazy, the rain was nothing more than a light mist, but the winds where very strong. Outside I heard recycling cans getting knocked over, causing bottles and cans to clinked their way down the streets. Heavy winds howled against my windows and once in a while the entire building would vibrate. It reminded me alot of those two long days from about two months ago during Hurricane Sandy. Just like that time, the weather conditions knocked out my cable and Internet connection. Through the evening the cable would try to fight its way back, but then after a few minutes it would just go out again. The Internet showed no signs of life at all and never even made an attempt to come back. Without television, I entertained myself a by watching some old episodes from the television show "Columbo". It was roughly 11:00 pm while I was still watching an episode when I first heard a car alarm sounding off. With the heavy winds and objects been thrown all around outside, I wasn't the least bit surprised, but I figured it would shut off in a minute or two. Ten minutes go by, then twenty, but the alarm kept going. This alarm was centralized around a honking horn and flashing lights. I kept hope the owner would eventually find out and shut it off, but it wasn't stopping. It got so irritating to the point that I couldn't watch the Columbo anymore and my only other choice was to try to go to bed. I knew it would be impossible to be able to fall asleep with the constant racket just had it been back in the Fall, but I tried nevertheless. After about fifteen minutes of tossing and turning the noise was drilling into my head and there was no way I was going to be able to fall asleep.

             Curious on which vehicle was responsible for the noise pollution, I left my bed and returned to my livingroom to look out the window. There it was - a late-90's model white jeep with flashing lights. Worst of all; as the night grew on, at certain points the alarm would turn off for thirty seconds, giving a false hope that the nightmare was over, then all of a sudden it would start up its cadence again. It was about 2:00 am at this point, the alarm was still going strong, and I was surprised nobody at this point had called the cops (or smashed the window with a brick). The jeep was right in front of someone's home, I couldn't understand how they were able to put up with three hours of pure torture. There was no way I was able to fall asleep with this thing, apparently nobody else was going to call the cops to complain, and I myself had no interest calling any police, so I thought of the next best thing: 7-11. Down the block there's a 7-11 convenience store open 24/7 and there's always at least one NYPD squad car there in the parking lot while the officers are inside getting coffee, Red Bull, and a bottle of water. People stereotypically think cops always take their breaks at Dunkin Donuts or other donut-related businesses, but the best place to most likely find a cop is a 7-11 store. Every time I'm in there I see them, as well as FDNY EMS workers. It seems like the cool hang-out spot for emergency workers. My plan was to walk over there and if there were cops around, I would tell them about the never-ending alarm so there would deal with the matter (with towing it away the ideal solution).

             I slipped on my jacket and began the walk to 7-11. The rain was all about gone and the winds had died down, but the heartbeat of the alarm was still pumping strong. As I walked passed it I stared at it with all the hatred in the world. I probably could've found something to smash the window with and likely would've gotten away with it, but ultimately you never know who's looking out their window, even if it was 2:00 am in the morning. If the car was keeping me up at night and looking out the window for the culprit, I had to imagine there could be others. Even though my effort would likely be received with applause, there's always the risk of an informer, so I felt it was best for the authorities to handle it. Once I reached 7-11 I saw there were no police cars in the parking lot, to my disappointment. I went inside anyways just to make sure and the store was empty, except for two employees. I didn't want them to think I was crazy, so I bought a bottle of iced tea and was back on my way home to decide upon my next method of attack. I passed by the jeep again and gave the rock-to-window option another thought, but had just been recorded on the surveillance camera from inside 7-11 from buying the iced tea, I would be a suspect of people in the area at the time of any incident. A good sleuth like Columbo would've been able to track down a window-breaker that way, so now that option was completely off the table.

             While I sipped on my iced tea, I considered whether I should call the police or not. My cable and Internet were still out, so I couldn't look up the phone number of the local police precinct. The official number for noise complaints is 311, but I always felt 311 was for more long-term solutions, just as a constant noisy neighbor or a nearby construction site. I needed short-term relief and this was way too small a crime to dial 911 for. I went with the middle ground and decided upon calling the police station so there can determine where a car alarm weighs on their emergency scale. Without Internet, I dialed 411 on my phone to find out the number for the precinct. When I called it I expected to reach a desk officer or some type of switchboard operator (human), but instead I heard an instructional recording to the tune of, "Press One for Domestic Disturbance-Press Two for Robbery........". There was a mentioning of noise complaints and it said I should call 311 for that. I had a feeling they would make me call 311 eventually, so instead of trying to speak with someone at the station and wasting further time, I hung up on the police station call and dialed 311. After selecting English as my language to continue in and pressing a few other options, I finally found myself communicating with a human being. The time was roughly 2:30 am. The lady operator asked me to confirm my phone number and the spelling of my last name. After providing her with my complaint, she actually apologized that I was being disturbed and informed me that Mayor Bloomberg is on the cusp of putting law into effect that will ban car alarms within city limits, which sits just fine with me. I have to say the operator was very friendly and courteous. She told me she was going to transfer me to 911 so they could  take immediate action. Although I would be happy about the immediate action part, I felt a little leery about getting involved with a 911 emergency, that's usually for life or death situations. I never been on a 911 call before, and there was no turning back now.

             The 311 operator had me on hold (although I was allowed to listen in) while she connected with a 911 operator (also a female). Both operators identified themselves by their serial numbers and I was finally turned over to the 911 lady. I specified that it wasn't actually a "911 emergency", but told her about the evil jeep anyways. She ran through the same phone number and last name confirmations, plus asked me for a description of the noisy vehicle. She told a police car was on its way, but I really took that with a grain of salt. I felt there was no way a cop car was coming anytime soon for just a car alarm. Perhaps by the morning if two or three other neighbors also complained, but not right now. Once the call was over, I mean within seconds of hanging up the phone, the jeep's car alarm started to fade out. The alarm went from a loud honk to a muffled hum. Then after a few seconds of humming, the noise from the alarm completely died out!! All that was left was the jeep's flashing lights. I'm guessing what happened that after three and a half hours of the alarm sounding off, the acoustics must have finally fizzled out. That, or the 911 operator destroyed the alarm with freakish psychic powers. I was happy in some regards that the torture was over, but what if the cops actually arrive? With no more noisy alarm, it could seem as if I filed a false 911 report. Instead of seeking out the owner of the jeep, the cops would be after me, and they certainly had my name and phone number to track down. Worst of all, there would be no justice against the owner of this jeep. I wanted the cops to see this noisy vehicle for themselves while the alarm was at full strength, and either use their nightsticks to break a window in order to get inside and turn the alarm off, or tow it away at the expense of the owner having to pay for the towing-fee of about three hundred dollars.

             My eyes were peeled out the window to see if the cops where going to pass by, and what would they do if they showed up. The front and back lights of the jeep kept flashing, so at the very least the cops should be able to determine that the complaint isn't completely wrong. About a good twelve minutes after I hung up with 911 and the alarm died out, I saw a pair of bright headlights slowly approach from down the street. I had a feeling it was coming from an oncoming cop car canvassing the area, and I was correct! It was a NYPD squad car and it drove at a slow pace until it reached parallel with the parked jeep, where it stopped. With the description of the jeep and its lights still flashing, they must have known that was the vehicle in question. The cops didn't get out of their vehicle, they didn't check the license plate or registration on the jeep's front window. After a few seconds of pause, the cop car carried on until they reached the corner, in which it made a large U-turn and returned from which the direction they came. They didn't give the jeep a second look when passing it again, they just disappeared down the block and were gone.

             They came from the direction of 7-11 and towards 7-11 they returned....

The Walls are Thin

             Three weeks ago the high volume of a neighbor's television began invading our apartment bedroom and made it near impossible to fall asleep. Of all the rooms to have this issue at nights, it had to be the room we need quiet to sleep in. The odd part about it was that the neighbor that lives in the apartment next to where our bedroom wall is, has been relatively quiet since he moved in a little more than a year ago. I only physically saw him a handful of times, and just spoke to him once last Christmas when he both exited our apartments at the same moment. There was an awkward silence between us as we both locked our doors, so cringing inside, I blurted out, "Merry Christmas", to kill the silence, and took my time locking my door so he would finish his sooner and be on his way before me. At night, his snoring does echo through the wall, but its not loud enough to be considered a nuisance. In fact, its near comical that its worth him doing it. A loud television set it a completely different story, but we couldn't figure out why this usually quiet neighbor would all of sudden have his television set blasted all night long into the morning hours the next day.

              We came up with a number of theories to help explain the bizarre behavior; needs noise to make it seem like he is home to fool police surveillance, needs noise to drown out the sound of cooking meth (if there's any noise involved with that creation process), gets drunk or high at nights and falls asleep with the TV on, he's deaf, recently lost his job and stays awake at night in a depressed state, just bought a TV and there wasn't one in that room until now, overdosed or killed himself weeks ago and the TV has been running since, or finally the universal - I'm going to do whatever I want without any consideration of others around me. Most people renting an apartment might go immediately to the landlord to make a complaint, but we had contacted him recently regarding our broken door bell/buzzer, and to pile on a loud TV coming from a neighbor only a few days after would've overloaded him and we could possibly forget about ever getting the buzzer fixed anytime in the near future. With three weeks of unsound sleep, she proposed the idea that we give the neighbor one more week to shape up, otherwise we ask the landlord to get involved. The noise was brutal, it would go on from 9 pm at night to 10 am the next morning. Who could watch television that continuously at nights? When we would turn off our television before trying to fall asleep, the silence would make the outside noise even more of a nuisance. The only way to drown out the noise would to turn our set back on at a low volume to balance it out.

             Then came that one night that really started to push things over the edge. It was so loud we had to abandon the bedroom and make for the couch in the living room around 4 am. Although it was nice to have quiet at night for the first time in many weeks, two people trying to sleep on a couch isn't the most comfortable thing in the world. Seeing the noise was bothering her more than it was me, I volunteered to go back into the bedroom so she could have the couch and I would have the bed (and noise). I heard the TV as if it was my own, and actually turned mine on with the sound muted, so I could figure out what channel he was watching. It took only a few minutes to pinpoint it on an infomercial about buying jeeps. He watched another one after that. I felt it a bit odd that someone would be watching infomercials all night, that's usually something only elderly people do. This guy is in his late 20's or early 30's, and come to think of it, the noise we hear is usually news shows or infomercials like the one I was hearing this night. It didn't add up. Should this guy be watching MTV or movies at least? It only increased belief in one of my theories that he's getting drunk or high and falling asleep without any awareness of the TV being on or what channel its even set to. Although we were going to give the neighbor a week to change his ways, the night was so bad that she wanted to slip a note under his door that morning to ask him to lower his television set at nights. I agreed, and after several drafts, this is the final version we came up with that explained everything without seeming too combative:

November 19, 2012

Dear Neighbor,

Could you please keep the TV volume to a minimum during the overnight hours (12am-8am)? It has been difficult to sleep at night during these past two weeks since these walls appear to be thin and the very loud TV sound is coming through. The TV volume was never so loud before from your side, so I’m not sure why it’s coming through the wall so much as it has been, but it’s quite loud now.  I hope everything is OK.

Thank you for your understanding,

Your next door neighbor 

             It's a very tricky thing to send a note such as this. Since we really don't know this person, there's no telling how he may react. Plus, it could open an entire can of worms of back-n-forth games just to be spiteful for calling him out. Even though we were in the right, sometimes that doesn't mean justice will prevail, and it could end up making things worse. With no end in sight, in this case we had no choice but to try the note. It was placed sticking out the side of his door, and twenty minutes later we saw that it was gone, so we knew he got it. The funny part is that even with the letter, it didn't seem like the television volume was getting any lower. This same day, she was having a friend staying over for the night that I needed to wake up 6:30 am the next morning to drive to JFK airport. With the couch in the living room now occupied with her friend, we had no choice but to stay in the bedroom and put up with the racket. Besides, having to get up early the next morning for the airport run and having to go to work, I really needed a good night's sleep. This would be the first night after we had delivered the letter to our neighbor and it would serve as a test if this letter was going to do any good. Defiantly, as a car splashing a puddle of water onto a pedestrian waiting at the bus stop, the television noise was as loud as it had been all the other nights. What I was afraid was going to happen, did happen, the letter fell on deaf ears.

             With only a handful hours of sleep, I work up early and drove her friend to the airport. When I exited off the highway at Hillside Ave., I was stationed at a red light and saw a city bus was creeping up behind me. The bus came to a stop and all the vehicles in my lane were standing still waiting for the light to turn green. Seconds later, something smashes us from the back and jolts the car forward. It was turning out to be a really great week! I spun my head around to look at the bus driver and he gave me one of these 'my bad' gestures to his chest. The bus hit my back bumper from a stopped position, so it wasn't like he rammed me while he was in motion. It didn't sound like I had any damage beyond a possible dent, I was at a busy highway exit with the light about to turn green, there was a city bus full of passengers behind me on their way to work or school, plus I had to get her friend to the airport in time for her flight. I wasn't in the mood and it wasn't necessary, so once the light turned green I took off on my merry way instead of going through the routine of getting out of my car, looking at my bumper, putting my hands in the air, holding up traffic at a busy exit, waiting two hours for a cop to finally show up, I just wanted to get out of there. Once I dropped the friend off at the airport, I did get out of my car to check the back bumper, and as I suspected, there was no damage than what was there before. When I finally arrived home, I inspected the bumper even further and realized if you put alot of pressure on it, it's a tad bit loose, but nothing that some Krazy Glue could fix.

             A couple of night later there was another powerful batch of noisy soundwaves entering our bedroom from a neighbor's television. Clearly the letter was having no impact, and we were giving this neighbor a week to redeem himself before we go to the landlord, but it was so loud she wanted to knock on his door the next morning and tell him in person to lower the television. While she proposed that solution, I was going over other more sinister remedies to solve the problem. One of them being calling the landlord the next day and suggesting maybe he's dead so police and EMS workers barge in on him while he's cooking meth. Another was taking a piece of electrical tape and taping his buzzer down 4 am so it rings loud in his apartment until he comes downstairs himself to remove the tape. The last devious attack plan was using Krazy Glue and inserting it in his key holes so he would have issues locking and unlocking his door and mailbox the next day, combined with stealing his door mat. The problem with these sinister ideas was that since we gave him the letter a few days previously, obviously he would know who did it and then that whole situation could turn ugly. That's the reason I really didn't want to send the letter in the first place, it actually took away our ability to retaliate, but at the time she was going nuts and we needed to do something, so I just went along. The only other option besides telling the landlord, would be filing a complaint with 311. Who knows how long before someone shows up for that(if they even do show up), and calling a cop on someone also falls into that tricky area of opening a whole can of worms. Someone could dig up an insignificant reason to return the favor and then the whole thing just gets stupid. Then there's also the chance the landlord could get upset with us for bringing cops around (nobody wants cops around), and we could forget about ever getting our doorbell fixed.

             As she said she would, 9 am that morning she went to the neighbors door and knocked. I stayed in the bedroom and waited for gunshots. For a good five minutes she was out there and I was wondering what was going on. Maybe he invited her into his apartment to show her his television set in perhaps an attempt to explain how and why the noise was coming through the wall so much. She did return eventually (without any bullet wounds) and sprang a bombshell - it wasn't him!!! This neighbor, who I though was rude and cooking meth, was actually quite nice and even had kids. I did recall hearing the occasional footsteps of kids running when he first moved in, but not a peep since of any kids running or crying, etc. As I figured he might, he even invited her to check the room out herself to prove its not his television set making the noise, but she declined and took him at his word. He stated he rarely even watches any TV in the room that shared a wall with our bedroom, and he was going to write a return letter explaining all this to us, but he didn't find the time yet to do so. Once we had this revelation, things started to make sense. We always assumed the noise had to be coming from next door because it made the most sense, but originally we both felt as if somehow the noise was emitting from the outside, like a car radio passing by on the street but never going away. That turned our attention to the fact that the noise had to be coming from an apartment underneath our bedroom.

             I was going out to grab an egg sandwich for breakfast, but before leaving the building I decided I should do a little detective work. I went to the floor beneath mine and honed in on two apartments that lie under the area where our bedroom is located. I put my ear on the door furthest left and heard what sounded like a really loud television set tuned in to news show - the M.O. for our perp. I know an older lady lives in this apartment, she's friendly towards me, so I felt bad having to knock on her door to hurl accusations whether right or wrong. Recently, it seems her daughter and grandchildren have moved in with her for whatever reason and I heard them all in there. I took a few breathes and calmly knocked on the door, the older lady answered. Before I had a chance to speak, her phone rang and she picked it up quickly. Her daughter came over to me holding a baby and asked what I wanted. I mentioned the loud TV, and within a split second she pointed to the apartment next door, which is the apartment directly under me. With the other lady done with her phone call, they both gave me the full story. There's a very old lady next door to them who needs healthcare workers to come in and care for her around the clock. I always thought the lady I saw going into that apartment was someone who lived there, but she was just a home healthcare nurse. I never seen the real tenant who actually lives there. Basically the tenant is very old and has to turn the television set very high in order to hear. It all made sense; the news shows, the infomercials, it had to be an old person. If I thought my bedroom was a disaster at night because of this hard-hearing woman, these two ladies who live right next to her have it even worse. They said they too can't sleep at night and its a real nightmare. They knocked on the neighboring door to get the nurse to perhaps do something about it, but the nurse gave a response that there was nothing she could do. The ladies even reported the problem to the landlord, but apparently that wasn't going anywhere I either (as I figured).

             They suggested I too knock on their door so that maybe if more tenants complain, maybe someone would finally lower the noise. I gave the door a knock and seconds later a nurse opened the door. As soon as I saw she had a stud pierced into her nostril, I knew I'd be wasting my time, but I went through the motions anyway and explained my situation. I can't say she was exactly rude or nasty, but her attitude was a little sassy, and more or less she gave me the same 'there's nothing we can do about it' response the two ladies next door got. The main problem is she really doesn't sleep a normal six to eight hours at a time during the night like normal people. I'm guessing due to health issues, she can only sleep a few minutes at a time and then wakes up, so that's why she pretty much watching TV all day and all night. The nurse claimed she'll make a note about it on the sign-in sheet which apparently the nurses use to log after their shifts. I asked her to try to see what she can do and just left it at that. Now that I had positive identification on who the culprit was, I went back up to my apartment to report to the story. Then there was a knock on my door. I wonder if it was the nurse, so I ran to open it, only to find it was the landlord - perfect timing! He was there by coincidence making his usual monthly sweeps for apartments that may have any infestation issues. We waived him off about that, but he did have some updates regarding our inoperative doorbell/buzzer. Since the building and doorbell system is quite old, they need to rewire the whole system beyond just our apartment. He told us someone should be coming in next week (although I won't hold my breath on that) to fix it. While he was there, I told him about the loud TV issue with the old lady downstairs and he confirmed he knew about it issue, probably from a call from the two ladies next door. He told me he was going to contact the tenant's nephew to see if he could intervene and somehow get her to lower the TV at nights. So doorbell/buzzer issue possibly solved, loud TV issue defined but not solved, and car's back bumper loose.

              I'm just glad I didn't Krazy Glue my neighbor's locks........