Friday, February 17, 2006

Angry Steve

I woke up last night at about 1am and I heard strange noises...
As I came out of my slumber, I realized it was Steve talking to someone.
At first I thought he was sleep walking/talking.
As I started to become more awake sitting up in bed in the dark,
I realized he was talking to Thadeus!

It seems that Thadeus had pulled one of his Thursday night walkathons
over our bedroom and Steve's sleep was disturbed for about an hour.
I had slept through it this time, but Steve, he had had it about up to his eyeballs.

Many times we've laid in bed staring up at the ceiling wondering what on earth he could be doing at 1am in the morning walking back and forth opening drawers and just basically walking around and around a 10'x11' room.

Well, last night we got an answer, but we don't believe it. See what you think.

Steve calling Thadeus....

Thadeus: Hello?
Steve: (read extreme accusatory tone here) What are YOU DOING???
Thadeus: Steve, I don't think that's an appropriate question.
Steve: It's 1:00 in the morning. What could you possibly be doing?
Thadeus: I'm studying.
Steve: Well, what do you have a book in your hand and walk around? I thought people sat in a desk to study.
Thadeus: Well, do you want me to walk on air?
Steve: Can't you at least take your shoes off?
Thadeus: I don't have any shoes on. You want to come up and see for yourself?
Steve: No. The point is that from 10pm until 7am there shall be no noise in the building that disturbs any other tenants as outlined by the Chicago Multi-unit Noise Ordinance and that is to benefit both of us. And that is in your lease- read your lease.
Thadeus: blah blah I work nights blah blah Eugene leaves for work at 3am blah blah. I don't complain that the garage door is frozen shut.
Steve: Well, when you have freezing rain, which happens occasionally, sometimes locks are frozen. We can't control the weather. You should tell us when the lock is frozen and we'll de-ice it.
(My feeling is that if it were me renting the garage, I'd keep some de-icer on hand but then I'm a DIYer)
Thadeus: I don't complain when your dogs are barking.
Steve: Well out dogs don't bark after 10pm at night. And we're working on training them.
Thadeus: Well I guess it's probably not appropriate that my Mother and her 3 young adopted children who are moving to the US should move in upstairs?
(Steve is thinking in the back of his mind they have no legal right to move in)
Steve: You're absolutely right Thadeus. The building cannot support that level of usage.
(If you recall, when they had 6 people over there during the holidays, the toilet backed up several times and the plumber was out twice)
Thadeus: I guess I will have to move out early because they are coming here.
Steve: Well we have a rider in your lease and we can discuss a specific time later.

We just flat out don't believe he was "studying". You sit still when you're studying. The problem here is that we and they are on completely different schedules. Not to mention, I don't know when this guy ever sleeps. I think he's sleep deprived. He gets in all these car accidents, which to me indicates sleep deprivation.

This is great news though IF THEY ALL LEAVE. We have to see about getting them ALL out.
If not, we'll have to serve 30 day notices to the other occupants who are not on the lease and maybe even evict them. But we have both decided that if Thadeus leaves- they are all out no matter if we have to evict them or not. The other 2 living up there are less considerate than Thadeus in general and less responsible. Oh what fun.

7 comments:

Greg said...

Oh man. Unbelievable. When I was looking at houses I almost bought an old Victorian that was cut-up and still an active 4 unit apartment. The one I bought was cut-up but had no renters in the main house. I was going to have to continue to rent to at least 2 of them to make it work. I know I would have ended up killing somebody.

I thank God for the 2 tenants I have out back. They are the perfect tenants.

Greg said...

Oh, I should have added Good Luck. It will be so nice to get them out!

Emerld said...

you TOTALLY have my sympathy. We are SELLING THE CICERO building!!!!!!!!!! I can't wait. I think it's better for our finances too. No more taking these big hits when things break etc. And the building is getting very old and needs updating again and we don't have that kind of money.

And the quality of applicants for the apartments is very poor.

Jocelyn said...

Thanks- cross your fingers we can have them out by Spring and have a peaceful and happy summer!

Anonymous said...

That sounds really annoying. But overall, good for you!

Anonymous said...

Maybe it's because I'm a renter myself, or maybe it's because I have unusual study habits, but I'm a bit sympathetic to your tenant. I've had cases where I was studying, especially if I was particularly anxious about an exam, where I would pace back and forth as I was reviewing my notecards. I'm not saying your tenant was doing that, but I'm just trying to offer a different point of view.

On the other hand, my upstairs neighbors walk around a lot. I'm can't say when they can and cannot walk about in their own unit, though I appreciate when they do their walking without shoes on.

Jocelyn said...

Elizabeth,
I am not without sympathy for them, but they are just not a good fit for the building. In fact, we let them pay the rent in 2 installments for an entire year because of their financial problems. We have done alot to help them really.

I've been a renter and a student and in one apartment I had trouble with my downstairs neighbor because of my noise. I now am a very quiet person, have a very stressful job, and need to get a good night's sleep to deal with my life.

He's a PHD student so I doubt he was reviewing note cards, but who knows...