Marco Polo

I think I'm beginning to grow weary of my apartment building. I've been here for about two years and while I've certainly enjoyed some great times within these walls, I've come to find the oddities of the other residents quite unpalatable.

Recently, I've changed careers and I've found myself working in the evenings rather than the more typical 9-5 schedule. My mornings are spent doing what most in my position would do; I run errands, work out, paint pictures, trade stocks, and many other stimulating activities.

Sometimes, however, I will skip these activities, which often take me out of the house, and sleep in until 11 only to sluggishly mosey over to my couch to watch crappy movies on the netflix account I should have cancelled months ago. Quite honestly I've been doing that a lot more than the activities afore mentioned.

The life of a loafer can be truly wonderful if one is alone in his loafing. However, my apartment seems to be filled with weirdoes whose daily doings are something more than unusual.

Let's begin with the land lady. Her name is Andrea and she calls me Drew. Whenever I talk to Andrea she seems utterly busy. She always has some sort of major apartment project in the works.

This summer I woke up every day at 7 am to the pounding cacophony of the Mexican workers drilling holes into every single balcony in the building. On the first day I was excited to practice a bit of Spanish and I even thought about offering them beers, but after two weeks of the horrendous drilling noises I began to consider how easy it might be to simply push each one off the balcony in the hopes that at least he might be able to claim worker's comp.

This project then facilitated the painting of the newly drilled balconies by Driller Jorge's cousin Gustavo y los Amigos. These guys took even longer and for another two weeks I awoke to ranchero tunes only to stumble into the patio furniture inconveniently scattered around my kitchen and living room. It was a feng shui nightmare.

Her new kick has been remodeling the "lobby" of the "elegant" Marco Polo Apartments. The new floor tiles have a New Mexican orange rust look that contrasts delightfully with the black and white Swiss-villa-inspired walls. It looks terrible.

Her husband/boy friend/concubine/dude is an odd ball too. He's got long dirty hair, loves him some sweat pants, and he thoroughly enjoys reminding my roommate that his truck is, "the fucking tits man." Aside from that I don't know what he does except have crude conversations with people on a walkie talkie. No joke. A walkie talkie.

There's one guy who I always see throughout the day. It used to freak me out because I would sometimes see him in the laundry room and then only moments later he would be walking down the stairs towards said laundry room. These kind of things happened quite frequently and it wasn't until I was told of the existence of his twin brother that I was able relax and stop carrying my air soft gun with me to the laundry room.

These twins are really twiny. You can't tell them apart. I assume they are from some eastern European country because...well I have no justification, but they certainly have weird accents. All winter one of these guys, or both, who the hell knows, will do "spa" treatments where he sits in the sauna for an ungodly amount of time only to then run outside and sit in the snow. We're talking ass on the ground in the snow. I'm sure this contrast of temperatures is nice for the blood flow, but as a resident this guy or guys or whatever need name tags.

The crème de la crème though is the butt hole who lives right above me. I have never seen this dude, but I have to imagine that he is indeed fat. Probably the kind of jellyfish fat that will shudder on its own under the force of a strong breeze. He most certainly has thinning greasy hair and I can guarantee that his “around the house” outfit of a two sizes too short burgundy bathrobe and white motel slippers. As he strolls around the apartment I imagine that he ties the bathrobe but his gut is too rotund for the full coverage so he has about six inches of belly exposed down the center of his figure.

Now with that image in mind you might be wondering, "What are you talking about if you've never actually seen this guy? How do you even know of his existence?" Excellent question. It is not his appearance that bothers me but rather the noises he makes from above.

It is more infrequent now, but in the heat of the summer this guy would spend at least two hours each day just belting opera tunes. I mean, he really thinks he could be the next tenor. The best part is that he'll often accompany himself by playing a little piano. I don't know if he's just never learned to play or if his fingers are too fat to only push one key, but Pavarotti loves to play simple one handed piano tunes while he literally shouts out the lyrics to some of his favorite operas. I personally think he's a bit too liberal with his use of vibrato because almost every word sounds like he’s singing while falling down staires in a sleeping bag. This guy's talent from drawing out syllables would make a catholic priest sound like a fast talker. Sometimes it will take him more than a whole minute to belt out one sentence.

One time he invited some friends over and "performed" for them and I can only imagine that they were all sitting on his several items of mismatched furniture trying to point their eyes at anything but this guys exposed belly button just bursting from the crack in his robe. I imagine that he probably offered them some slices of white sandwich bread and perhaps some chocolate milk to accompany.

There are many more residents of the illustrious Marco Polo Apartments who freak me out but there simply isn't enough time. The only one I'll quickly mention is this dick who always seems to be in the elevator when I take it. I guess he maybe wants to be young again and he thinks that all guys my age talk like out of work porn directors. He'll say things like, "What the fuck man? How the fuck are ya? You see those fucking chicks outside? Shit man, those asses were ripe for the picking." To this I simply reply, "Maaa." I really don’t even know what to say. I like to think of myself as a pretty vulgar person, but when faced with an actual sleaze ball like this guy I rarely know how to retort to his explicit blabberings.

Now don't think I consider myself perfect. I'm sure people don't like the amount of parties and drinking that goes on in my place. I can guarantee that no one enjoys the volume at which I choose to watch my movies. And I'm fucking positive that everyone hates how I don't have a buzzer so my friends just scream at all the balconies until I come out and throw down my keys. But that's another story and this blog is about making fun of other people. Not me. You take care world.