Love thy Neighbours

     We have a new neighbor in our apartment building.  I met him the other day-I was leaving the apartment with my stroller full of recycling and garbage-strollers do double as garbage ferries (Lily was in the apartment with Dave) and he passed me by.  I was wearing my old faded mat pants, rubber boots and a PJ top-basically Maple Ridge formal wear.  He peered inside the stroller briefly when he walked by and gave me a quizzical look-like who let the bag lady in?  I met him a few days later when Dave and I were in the elevator and we introduced ourselves, a little less awkward (because there is nothing awkward with Elevator chit-chat).
     I already know that we may have some neighborly difficulties in our future.  This is because us and the new neighbor are from two different worlds.  We are family folks and he is a older single bachelor never married and never had kids.  It's like a version of the odd couple.  We have all the making of a corny late night sitcom, fake laugh track and all.  What's even better is his living room shares a wall with Lily's bedroom.  He must be enjoying the midnight shrieking-with our baby monitor in our small apartment it actually plays in stereo (he must wonder how many kids we're hording here).  We're sure enjoying him playing his TV at the ungodly hour of 9PM when we're trying to put our cranky kid to bed.  He also probably appreciates it when he catches an elevator with us and I'm carrying a bag of steaming dirty diapers to the garbage.  I can tell he feigns interest in the family life as he silently thanks god for not being married as I have to kick my husband who is all googly eyed that the man is going to his nice, quiet apartment to drink a beer instead of spending the evening telling Lily not to chew on our furniture or lick the glass patio door. 

I'm sure he'll get use to us. I mean he joined the ranks of all the other characters in our apartment like:

• The Mystery Vaccuumer: Someone, somewhere insists on vacuuming at 5am in the morning, every morning.  I can't figure out which direction it's coming from, but I shudder at what exactly makes a person need to vacuum so often, maybe there's a petting zoo I don't know about?
• The door/cupboard slammer: May be the same person as above.  When they are getting ready for work they insist on slamming every door and cupboard in their whole house-like they're angry at the world for having to get up at 6am.
• Herd of wild elephants: They reside in the hallway and and charge around 7am and 5pm, sometimes shaking the floorboards.
• Mr. Multiple Parking spots: Seems to be renting/owning every spot in our garage.  Wouldn't be as offending if he didn't violate the visitor parking area with more cars.  We live in Maple Ridge, why can't he just put them on blocks and park on the street like everyone else.
• Mr. Green: Works at a local community college, met him when I was looking into courses in 2010.  Tried to sell me on how the college was going green and how important the environment is (I don't know what I was wearing that day that made him think I was a hippy).  When he noticed we lived in the same place we had a chat and he slipped that he drives to work every day-the college is a 10min walk from our place.  Also violates the visitor parking.
• Drunken Patio Fighters: Gets drunk on work nights then fights...on the patio..so everyone can hear.  On a slow TV night sometimes its a benefit.
• Mrs "Fight the man": convinced strata is evil and trying to rip us all off.  Sends angry, insulting letters to the strata members and passes around a newsletter about how crooked members of the strata are.  She's so bad that she's earned a rep with the realtors.
• Others: Such as the neighbor we found drunk and pant-less in the hallway.  We noticed socks by our doorstop and followed the trail of clothes to find him passed out in all his glory in a corner(think he moved) . The mystery pooper who on rainy days lets their dog out to do its business in the hallway. When they got caught their solution was to  prop the security door open a crack so when they let the dog out in the hallway it can get outside.  Techno Techno Dance Party: would blast techno music-at 11am in the morning.  It is never okay to blast techno music, in the morning its a hate crime against my ears (I also think they moved out). 

And of course, there is us-the breeders.  I moved into the apartment pregnant 2 1/2 years ago and am still pregnant.  Now that we are proud owners of a big ass truck, we still park it downstairs even thought  it barley makes clearance-seriously the radio antenna hits the pipes as we drive.  I pity the lady who shares a parking spot next to us, she gets to navigate her nice 2seater sports car between the truck and a nice pillar. 

There are a lot of nice people in our apartment-like the person who gave me a gift certificate for mat clothes, the neighbors across the hall that gave us toys and muffins when Lily was born, the building manager that gives Lily toys.... Maybe I'm just a jerk for judging the few that annoy me.  I think when you all share a small place, everyone's crazy is out on display and when you live in a veal pen its all the more obvious.