Access Points

It has been a year and some change since I moved out of my parents' house and secured a lease on my own apartment (the reason I didn't write this update when the anniversary actually occurred is that I forgot). Life here is pretty peaceful, even though today--which, of course, is a Saturday, the national day of unhindered sleep--I was awakened at 7:12 by the familiar sound of bass coming from the apartment next to mine. For some reason, my next-door neighbor seems to seriously think his system is louder than mine and that I should become acquainted with his favored brand of utterly predictable bass thumping.

Normally, I would play something out of my copious stock of bass-heavy music to scare him off, as a big dog scares off a little dog by showing his fangs, but I like my neighbor on the other side and thought it beyond rude to awaken him in the same way that 1227C awakened me. In addition, I was frankly unsure that my delicate constitution could handle 100-decibel "Only Built 4 Cuban Linx" or some such at 7:12 in the morning. I put on some Sibelius fairly loud (my neighbor is a classical violinist, which means that at least he would enjoy what he was being woken up by), but every time Jean had a woodwind play a solo it was backed by the drumbeat from 1227C. Finally, I heard a door slam and then the music came off, at which point of course I could not return to sleep. I just hope he tries it again at a more reasonable hour. "You want to play?" I'll say to myself. "Perhaps you should taste some of Wu-Tang's finest Shaolin drumming."

But I really don't get that worked up over it. In fact, life in the apartment has been uneventful, except for the constant phone calls from people asking for "Mario," "Samir," and of course the one woman who called for someone whose name started with "e" and then continued in ways foreign to my occidental tongue. I cannot even hope to pronounce this person's name, much less transliterate it. Although I have been in the apartment for a year, and thus at this phone number for a year minus two weeks, people are still quite convinced that other persons than I am living here, and that I am hiding them. These calls are basically benign, although it is a bit of a pain in the rear to explain repeatedly that (a) Samir does not live here, (b) Samir hasn't lived her for at least a year, and (c) I will not suddenly start to understand you if you start speaking Arabic. Also Mario apparently kept very strange hours, although I must admit to being awake the time they called at 2 am, so I really have no reason to complain. It got to the point with Mario one time that I changed my answering machine message to the following:

"Hi. This is Andrew Malone. If you would like to leave a message for Andrew Malone, please leave your message for Andrew Malone after the beep. There seems to be some confusion about who lives here. It is Andrew Malone. Again, this is Andrew Malone's number. Thank you."

Of course, I doubt my friends and family exactly missed my phone-message roster of Smokey Robinson parodies, and this was not too much of a pain either, and it did stem the tide of Mario-seeking calling.

No, I don't have much to report from the apartment, other than that the fire alarm bell has been going for the past half-hour. Why, you may ask, am I still in the building then? Because it has not been going at full stream, but spastically sputtering, ringing single stuttering rings for a while, occasionally going for two to three seconds and then clamming up entirely for a full minute. Kind of like Bill Gates being cross-examined, now that I think about it. Also, none of the other fire alarm bells are going, which leads me to believe that this is the autonomous action of my section of the floor's fire bell. Why is it doing this? Is it lonely? Is it bored? Are its electronics feeling the effects of the recent bout of oppressive fog? (Lately, if someone on the phone has asked me what the weather is like, I've taken to saying "I'd tell you if I could see any of it.") As I am writing this, it has just acted like it was really going to go off and then suddenly settled down as I got up to get my shoes on.

I'm trying right now to drown it out with Prokofiev. I'm having mixed results. Perhaps if I put on "Only Built 4 Cuban Linx" I might have more success. Of course, then someone might really be convinced that Mario is living here.

Three more months on the lease.

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