There are twelve townhomes running south from Burke Ave along York Road in Towson. When Cha and I bought #2 our entire row of six units, and half of the other row, were owned by the same folks who lived in them. Now there are only three of us homeowners left, because each time one of these houses goes up for sale an "investment firm" based in "Ohio" snaps it up and turns it into a rental property. As a result the neighborhood is going to fucking hell because each of these once-lovely four-bedroom townhomes has 8 TU students crammed into it. Every Sunday our "neighbors" have some sort of competition to see who can play the worst music loudest and for the longest time. The bruthas in #5 (our pitbull buddies) play shitty hip-hop (JayZ or however you spell it? Never worked for me. Nor .50 Cent [though I do like the line "I love you/like the fat kid love cake"]). The honkies in # 7, mostly hippies, play Led Zep and Pink Floyd and The Doors--OVER AND OVER AGAIN. The preps in #6 (who hung a big blue Bud Light banner on the front of their house two weeks ago--it's still there) play really lame easy-listening "rock" like DMB or Hootie and Blowfish, and when they decide to rock out it's to Creed. The TU women's dance team lives in #1; how can I complain, you ask? They play the worst music of all: Brittney, and what's-her-name the blond TV show/lame movie/Go-Go's cover "singing" vacuous nitwit all the 12-year olds love to death, and John Mayer. I'm actually glad I work Sundays so I can escape this dread cacaphony and get some reading done.
Even worse, no one trims their ivy or tends to their property fronts along York Road anymore (even the two homeowners in #1 and #3 ignore theirs). Because of this, there's a fucking rat-infested jungle of four-foot weeds growing along the brick wall, and because there's a bus stop there, all the people who wait for the bus have now taken to throwing their trash into the weeds and stairwells because it already looks like hell, so why not? My poor 15-foot length of brick wall is kept clear, but I'm beginning to think "What's the point?"
Last Friday evening I was driving down the alley trying to get out and there were the dancers, showing their tits to passing cars, leaning on each other in the middle of Burke Ave, one young lady holding another's hair as her friend puked in the gutter. A pickup truck of frat boys was PARKED on Burke and the driver was out of the truck dancing with one of the dancers who had her shirt up over her breasts. I honked, honked again, and then got out of my car and started yelling gibberish like some sort of madman. The light at Burke was green and other cars were honking as well because they were trying to drive east and were blocked by these morons. This is the third straight weekend I've seen this behavior.
I love my house, and don't really want to sell it because it's convenient, but something's gotta give here. I'm going to be teaching class with bandaged knuckles soon because my patience has run out. Saturday there were two SUVs and a Lexus parked in the alley and I couldn't get IN. I banged on three doors before one of the bruthas told me the preps in #4 owned the Lexus. "What about the SUV's?" I asked. "They ain't blockin' nuthin'" was his reply. "Uh, yes they are. The Lexus is blocking one side, the SUV's are blocking the other. Next time I see ANY cars parked here, I'm calling the police immediately." I banged on the door of #4 for ten minutes (it was open, and there were three kegs on the porch) before realizing no one was even home--they'd parked illegally and walked to the pub or something. Two years ago a neighbor had a confrontation with some girls who blocked the alley--the next day they put a lit can of Sterno under his car's gas tank and Cha discovered it before the car went up, but his tire caught fire. He sold his house and now it's--you guessed it--a rental property. I'm worried that people will try some funky shit with us if I keep complaining. Somebody stole our recycling bins last weekend and threw a bunch of trash in my flower bed.
Did I party and raise some hell when I was a youngster? Hell yes, but I never ever did so without respecting other people and their rights. Keep the noise down, don't block traffic, don't ruin other people's shit, and have some respect for those around you. Jesus.
4 comments:
That is all so fucking insane and disgusting. Where is the respect?! People suck.
Do you want to form a commune with two lesbians. Be advised that you would have to buy this commune.
The guy in #1, bless his heart, trimmed his ivy today! At least our little corner maintains some dignity.
The commune idea is appealing--perhaps November 3rd we'll get further enticement to head down that road. I'm thinking Costa Rica, or a medieval Italian hill town with dwindling aged population?
Hillary Duff! That's the name of the Go-Go's cover-singing abomination!
Count our family in--I'll tend the gardens! Jesus H Christ, I sympathise with you--we had to put up with that crap for 5 years at our old place. We were so relieved to get out of there-- but of course we didn't own the place so I can see your conundrum. I get the willies just thinking about how it used to be--and you know the both of us aren't "party" people in the least. I did call the cops once, it just got too much because that place was the worse--three frat houses in a row, and basically on the corner of York and N. Pkwy where two taverns/liquor stores existed. JLO wouldn't let me go over and tell them off because she was scared they'd kill me (they probably would but I got so mad) so I would just stay up for hours and watch them to make sure they didn't destroy our car or something.
One night I awoke suddenly and looked out into the apartment parking lot behind our house. I observed this horrible mass beating--like 30 guys on two, just kicking when they were down, railing on them grunting. It was like that scene in Full Metal Jacket when the guys in the barracks creep up in the middle of the night to beat Private Pyle with soap bars in their socks--everything tinted blue the music going MhhhhUUUUUWWWRRRHHH WHUUUUUUHHHHH...
then the police came and the mob vanished into thin air.
One more--after some huge snowfall I dug out our car and went to work. Getting back late at night you know some college fuck parked in the space. So after I dug out another spot for our car I shoveled their car in and then brought down 3 or 4 bucket of water three flights of stairs so I could pour it all over and ice their car into place. Fantastically I was able to enjoy the fruits of my labor as the next day it took them an hour and four guys pushing to extricate their car.
Ah, fuck them.
That sucks--I knew it was noisy down there but had no idea it was that bad!
The first time I really had trouble we stopped at the light at Burke and York heading home and I saw three TU drunks pulling on a tree branch in front of my house. I jumped out of the car and started chasing them--they took off, probably thinking I was crazy, but I had no idea what I would have done if they'd stopped and confronted me. Maybe I actually would've punched one of them, or perhaps I would've just told them off. Who knows. TU thought they'd stop the drunken nuisance crime by cancelling the free shuttlebus service they had which took kids downtown and brought them home liquored up but safe. Now the kids are driving home drunk, or just walking to Casa Mia's and then wandering up our alley all piss blind.
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