Goodbye, Downstairs Neighbors!

I was sitting at my desk with the living room windows open yesterday, when I heard a masculine voice outside saying, "Yeah, well Carol got a U Haul... yeah... there are three really heavy things; there's a king sized bed..." I practically snapped my neck I turned so fast to look out the window! Carol is my downstairs neighbor.
I looked and saw Carol hugging a gigantic cardboard MOVING BOX. Yes indeedy - my downstairs neighbors are moving out!

I've always said I wish they would - they annoy me. They have two televisions (at least) on which they seem to only play war movies, and both TVs are on all the time. I always hear gunshots coming from my floor. I WANT to hear the waves crashing outside... that's why I moved to the damned beach. They never go outside and exercise, so they have all this pent up energy and they wrestle, run and stomp like a herd of elephants late at night, which wouldn't be so bad, except that they rumble our apartment, too. (Plus I go to bed super early because I have to be at work super early.) They drive a huge-ass Chevrolet SUV and they scraped my car door with it and neglected to tell me, so I had to confront them about it and tell them they were sneaky and dishonest. Oh, and they leave their little dog alone and it barks and barks out of loneliness, which I think is just cruel.

On the other hand... there's always a worse neighbor***, and at least I'm on speaking terms with these two. I gave them ornamental pumpkins for Halloween (unacknowledged) and a big plant at the new year. To our shock, they reciprocated with a bottle of wine. When I got mad at them about the car, Carol said she wanted to fix the situation and offered to pay for the damage, and she made her friend (who apparently was the one who hit my car and didn't tell anyone)march upstairs and apologize to me. And when we once had to tell them to please shut up they apologized and said they were trying to clean house (it was 1 am!). So, at least we're on decent terms.

Well, the unit will be vacant for months! That's MONTHS of utter peace, and months that I will get to hog two parking spots and not have to park my car one inch from the wall to give them their much-needed SUV space!

*** Worse neighbors - like the lady with dementia who lived next door to us when we lived in Oakland, who would scream "Goddamned F*ing Shit!" over and over again through the adjoining walls... and the guy who lived above me who would watch the same porn movie over and over again and creak his insanely creaky bed while he jacked off to the movie... even on Thanksgiving morning at 5:30am...oh yeah, and we can't forget my old roomie in LA who had months worth of fast food trash on his bedroom floor and who spent my half of the rent at Gucci one month. (I came home and found an eviction notice on the door.) Oh, yes... there are worse people to live near and with.