Jabba the Hutt

The new guy moved in downstairs on Friday while I was at work. When I got home from work, all I could hear in my apartment was REALLY LOUD NOISE from downstairs. I figured the new guy probably had some friends over helping him move, they were probably having a few beers and playing some CDs, and I let it go.

I woke up Saturday around 2 a.m. to REALLY LOUD NOISE from downstairs. It wasn't music playing; although there was occasionally music, there were voices and other noise. It sounded like someone was playing a video game with the volume set really high.

I woke up again on Saturday, around 7 a.m., to REALLY LOUD NOISE. I got up, took a shower, read the paper, made the bed, all to REALLY LOUD NOISE. Finally, around 10 a.m., I went downstairs to see what was up. I knocked on the new neighbor's door, he opened it up, and I was face to face with

JABBA THE HUTT. I swear, this guy looks like Jabba the Hutt. Around 5'5", around 400 lbs., wearing a pair of sweatpants that were just about falling off his butt, with oxygen tank thingies in his nose, smoking a cigarette. Oh Dear Lord.

And the noise? It's his tv. Tuned to CNN, cranked to ear-bleeding volume. I introduced myself, and told his he needed to turn down his TV. "Oh!" he said. "Is it too loud? It doesn't sound too loud to me!" Here we go again. I went through the usual spiel for too-loud tenants, that it was so loud it was giving me a headache, that he would need to get headphones or turn it down, blah blah blah. And I went and did my usual Saturday errands, came back in the afternoon, walked into my apartment, and heard the REALLY LOUD NOISE all over again. Now this guy is the old building superintendent's father (not the landlord's uncle, as I had been told). So I called the old building superintendent, Joe, and left a message on his machine about the REALLY LOUD NOISE coming from his dad's apartment. Then I went back downstairs and told Jabba that he needed to turn it down. "Oh!" he said. "Is it too loud?" But he did turn it down, and Saturday night and Sunday it was blessedly quiet. Joe, his son, called around 5 p.m. Sunday and I explained the situation. "I was afraid of this", Joe said. "Dad really likes to crank his TV. Everybody was loud in his old apartment building, so nobody cared. But I really wanted to get Dad out of that environment, away from the riff-raff. Looks like it's Dad who's the riff-raff, huh?" Yeah. That's right. So anyway, we discussed headphones, etc., and I said that all had been quiet since yesterday, and I was so glad, blah blah blah.

And about five minutes after I got off the phone with Joe, the REALLY LOUD NOISE came back. And stayed until about 10 last night. And started up around 7:20 this morning. So I called Joe and left a message on his machine and I sure hope I hear from him today and this problem gets fixed. Because? If I get home from work tonight and hear REALLY LOUD NOISE, there is going to be one dead Jabba the Hutt downstairs. I am going to lose my mind if I have to listen to that noise one more time.

So if you don't see any more posts here, it's because I'm in prison. For the murder of Jabba the Hutt.