16 July 2008

By-laws


I hate authourity

And I hate the law

And I want

No rules!


I like my neighbours just fine. It would be nice to have old punk rock neighbours like me instead of the ones I have got but I would probably have to go to jail for that to happen. Most of us have been watching television 63 feet from one another for years. Unfortunately one of my neighbours pissed me off last weekend. They pissed me off by pissing off one of my other neighbours who were having a summer wedding party. There were about fifty people and no one was throwing up over the fence, snorting coke out in their cars or staggering around the neighbourhood like you would expect at a summer wedding party.

At precisely 10:00 PM the neighbours who pissed me off showed up on my partying neighbours front porch. The wife led the assault. "It's ten o'clock," she shrieked. "I'm trying to sleep! The by-laws say no noise after ten o'clock. I need my sleep." On and on she went like a fat cow taught to talk by a bored farmer who forgot to teach the cow when to shut the fuck up.

My neighbours having the party, solid Steepletonians all, would have been appalled if they had to answer the door to a policeman so they shut the party down. The groom and the bride both shed tears. But at least the by-laws were obeyed.

7 comments:

ib said...

Ten PM, and a wedding party ? That bitch has some bare-faced un-neighbourly cheek!

I have been known to become excessively irate myself on occasion as the result of intrusive noise, but only when it's directly overhead or beneath my unadorned floorboards and well after midnight. Or when it wakes up the kids.

On such occasions it's usually Techno which is the culprit, with the sub woofers turned up to the point that it sounds like a convention of amateur carpet layers has seized possession and are going at it specifically to noise me up.

I have been known, too, to march up or down to complain ; but given that these flats are rabbit warrens full of people who come and go without notice, it pays to be completely on one's guard. Even a polite request to turn that fucking shit down can all too often result in physical maiming or worse.

Great pic, Beer. I was on the cusp of enquiring if that might not be yourself and Sonya, but the bloke wielding the bottle in salute does look suspiciously like Charlie Harper, mind you.

Mr. Beer N. Hockey said...

Charlie the Good.

ib said...

Is there a 'Charlie the Bad' ?

Actually, I was once very rude to Charlie and his girlfriend about sixteen years ago. My only excuse is I was very drunk at the time. Coincidentally, I was also probably excessively loud, and I believe they were trying to sleep in the next room at the time. I would like to think I apologised, but I really don't remember.

All this of course is oddly appropriate to your post on noise pollution and peoples reactions or overreactions to it.

Nicole said...

I too got a little excited that it was a pic of Mr & MRS Beer....

I think this pic kinda suits you...although seeing pics of people kind of takes away some of the mystery eh?

Nicole said...

My neighbours are moving next year...sometimes I think it's because of the latenight hottub festivities and noise ( but not too noisy we try) coming out of our back yard...but I tell myself it's because he's retiring from the RCMP....and in some ways it'll be nice to see a copper move away from next door....not because I feel I ever do anything illegal so much...just the rebel in me kind of resents the LAW next door! :-)

Mr. Beer N. Hockey said...

I like to think there may just be a little Charlie Harper still in me.

Your driver said...

Oh shit, is that you and the wife? (the famous wife subject of so many fine poems?) You're both so damn cute.