Bob and Vera,

We wrote a letter to your mortgage lender offering our apologies but apparently that’s not a good way to communicate to your next-door neighbor…maybe they never forwarded you the email.

While it seems very odd that Bob would be working at 10pm on a Friday night and Vera would be waking up for work at 6am on a Saturday, we’re sorry for the obvious inconvenience socializing on a weekend night would cause for those extremely unusual work schedules…perhaps if we had talked in person, we would have known to assume you’d be working at such hours.

While we provided over $60 of candy to neighborhood kids the following evening, not a single parent mentioned anything about a sleepless night caused by our party.  The “dangerous” vibe we must’ve given only twelve hours earlier had apparently dissipated enough to give candy to your children… but not to talk to “grown-ups”.

It’s a shame we still haven’t met any of our neighbors.  Boy, having a party for the street would’ve been a great opportunity to do so.  Instead, I understand not inviting us and just bad-mouthing us about a single festive event over two months ago on a holiday, weekend night as a better way to settle grievances.  Bringing up non-sequiturs like how someone BEFORE we even lived in the neighborhood once got drunk and threw up in your flowerbed as a corollary to our party probably gives people the right idea about us.

In addition, Vera tying in a break-in that happened a week before our party to us surely gives neighbors a good impression of us.  Regardless of the fact that that same thief was caught by us stealing from OUR house definitely means it was because of us.  Two things stand out regarding this idea that we make the neighborhood unsafe.  First, the week we moved in a neighbor approached us to ask if their grandparents could park in our garage because they thought a full car would be unsafe on the streets.  We agreed (look, talking to us, we’re nice people!).  Obviously, the problem existed before we got here.  Oh, they wanted to park in our garage because their garage was broken in May.  It is still broken in December.  Vera’s real neighbor has an abandoned, half-finished house.  That probably doesn’t have anything to do with giving the neighborhood a dilapidated feel that empowers thieves to break in to houses.  Who is not looking after the condition of their house if not those two neighbors?

Finally, we are, respectively, a diplomat (surprise), a doctor, and a seminarian.  Who exactly do you want to live in our house?  If you wanted to meet us, you would have.  You don’t.  You don’t treat us like real people, preferring to write letters to Chicago than walk twenty feet and knock.  Why should we want to meet you?  The first thing you do that upsets us (say working with a buzzsaw at 7.45am), maybe we should call the mayor’s hotline or write another email to your mortgage lender.  And continue to do so for two months without ever mentioning a SINGLE THING TO YOU DIRECTLY.  Thanks for teaching me a lesson in being passive-aggressive.

Sincerely,

a pissed off neighbor you don’t deem worthy enough to talk to.

Bob,

I appreciate your apprising me of the information you learned.  The holloween party is the first I’ve heard of any disturbance.  As you know, I typically have rented to families or couples, w/the exception of the past 2 years.  Although I elected to do it, it was not my first choice for similar reasons you outlined below.  Nevertheless, I believe in general the 3 young men living there are responsible people whom you would enjoy knowing –perhaps not as well as you did Karl S. and his family, but quite pleasant nonetheless.

I have spoken with and emailed my tenants regarding the neighbors concerns.  I also encouraged them to smooth things over with Vera.  They do lead busy lives and have full schedules so I don’t know how convenient it is for them to catch others at home.

I understand that a person wouldn’t want to go over in the middle of the night to request that the music be lowered, but calling the police and not following-up afterwards explaining why,etc. doesn’t establish a positive dynamic either. I do not think it’s especially neighborly, responsible or fair to complain to each other without talking to the individuals responsible for the disturbance.

If I had a party that went late and disturbed others, I would expect that someone would share that information with me.

I would encourage you, Vera, and any other neighbors, etc. to knock on the door or leave a note indicating you would like to meet/befriend them.

I will also convey the information I learned to them so they are aware that several people were disturbed by the event.

Many thanks,

Kate

Dear Ms. Gottfried,

Your tenants did not seem respectful to me on the night before Halloween and I am afraid I won’t leave my house and my child behind to wrestle with someone I do not know after midnight. I think you clearly do not understand the situation.

Also, I was not referring to leaves. I am referring to old newspapers piling up in the driveway and on the sidewalk as well as phonebooks and trash. They leave a rather unkempt impression.

What I did miss was any assurances that such disturbances won’t happen again.

Rather disappointed,
Vera Erdmann-Keefer

Ms. Erdman-Keefer:

Thank you for your belated note about your concerns. My tenants have always been very respectful. I know that they did have a weekend halloween party.

My only suggestion is that you might have asked them directly to lower the music that Saturday night, rather than calling the police immediately, because they are respectful,(two professionals [and a religion student]) and I am confident that they would have lowered their music just as quickly if you, rather than the police, had contacted them.

I am sorry to hear about the rash of burglaries in the neighborhood.  Actually, my tenants stopped someone from stealing one of their bikes out of the garage and have made it a point to ensure that their possessions and the house are locked, but I appreciate your concern and wanting to make sure that they are aware.

Regarding the leaves, etc., I have a service that I use to supplement the responsibility of the tenants. As you can see from my note below, I inquired about the owner’s schedule b/c I wanted it taken care of in October, but I was not queued up until the second week in November.  I recently received the bill, so I know [and my tenant verified] that the work was done on Nov. 16th and will be done again in

I hope you have good Holidays,

Sincerely,

Kate Gottfried

Dear Ms. Gottfried [Landlord],

I am writing, belatedly, to inform you of two incidents. I had to call the police, via the mayor’s hotline on the night of Friday/Saturday Oct. 31 at 12:30 a.m. Your tenants had the most roaring Halloween party going. I had trouble falling asleep around 10 p.m. because of the loud music and rowdy behavior of guests coming and leaving and leaving and coming. I was kicked out of bed and sleep a few hours later by what appeared to be a discotheque unfolding in my bedroom. The lyrics were so clear I could sing along.

The mayor’s hotline was very supportive and helpful. The respondent suggest that I could certainly demand that the music be turned down and connected me to a police dispatcher. At some point after that the music was turned off. I managed to fall asleep again around 2:30 a.m. I have a child to take care of; my day usually starts around 6 a.m. Halloween or not. I suggest that your tenants keep their parties to themselves, the decibels down and the hours reasonable so that the other inhabitants of the block, who have owned their houses for years and bought them with the intention of raising a family there, can have a life, too. Again, I go to bed at 10 p.m. in order to keep my work schedule, every day.

The second incident I wanted to relate was that my house got burglarized on the night of Sunday Oct. 25 and among other things, my computer was stolen. The shipment of the replacement was delayed; otherwise you would have heard from me sooner.

As with all neighbors I could reach, I wanted to caution that your tenants should be careful, keep their doors and windows locked and be alert to prevent opportunities for theft. There were several burglaries in the neighborhood and the police is investigating. Again, they were very helpful with an uniformed officer, two detectives and a forensics experts looking into the case.

In addition, I personally think that it would be helpful if your tenants picked up trash, newspapers, etc. to make your property look cared for. I have been doing that for years for them. Again, I thought Chesapeake St. was a neighborhood where I could raise a kid. Other neighbors certainly thought the same and are very helpful and caring.

Thank you very much for your attention to these matters.
Yours sincerely, in the hope of more peaceful holidays ahead

Many of you had the opportunity to attend our lovely halloween party.  I am sure you remember the party was fun but certainly, by no means, “over the top”.  I am also sure you remember that around  midnight or so we got the fog machine going and naturally the dance party began.  I am also sure that you remember the police coming to the house to ask us to turn down the music (though we did it before they even  got out of the car).  And since you remember all of that, I am sure you remember that we did in fact turn down the music to appease whomever called the police on us.

So what is all of this about?

Well, about a month ago I received a phone call from my landlord (a full month after the party) telling me she had received an email concerning the party.  To my surprise my landlord stood the defense of myself and my roommates, insisting that if we throw a party again to invite her.  And then, after all seemed to be well, and two months after the party, my landlord received yet another email from a different neighbor had emailed her with the same complaint. Thus what is to follows is a series of disturbing emails between my neighbors and my landlord.  The emails contain subtle hints that we are the cause of stealing, lowering the house value on the street, and dangerous.  These absurd claims all come from the neighbors imaginations, as none of them have ever confronted us about the party, except through emails to our landlord who lives in Chicago.

So as not to give away anything, here is an outline of the blog posts that are to come and the correct order to read them.

Outline:

A Party of Epic Proportion: Introduction

A Party of Epic Proportion: Part 1a

A Party of Epic Proportion: Part 1b

A Party of Epic Proportion: Part 1c

A Party of Epic Proportion: Part 2a

A Party of Epic Proportion: Part 2b

A Party of Epic Proportion: Roommate Response (A MUST READ!!!)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/16/education/16college.html?_r=1&hpw

Two things that upset me.

1).  Less than half of the people in the United States that attend college graduate.  Of course their are numerous reasons for this, but one of them is cost.  The cost of a college education has consistently gone up for the past three decades.  President  Obama’s response to this rise in cost is trying to make education cheaper by allowing those who have served in the armed services or helped in non-profit organizations to recieve a tax credit for college.  Brilliant.  Obama recognizes that education is enormously important and his policy reflects that  by providing education incentives (along with community service); conversely, Mayor Ravenstahl wants to deter (albeit in a subtle way) students from pursuing an education.

2.)  The most insteresting and frustrating part of the article is the chief of the firefighter’s union response to the situation:  “Without the tax, the fate of those pensions could be in trouble,” he said. “We are not asking young people to carry more than their due. We’re just asking them to pay for what they use.”

First of all, college students work and pay taxes like everyone else in the city.  Thus, the money is there.  Second, yes Joe King, you are asking college students to pay more than “their due”.  Imagine, Joe King, if all of the colleges decided to move town because of this ridiculous idea.  What would that do to the city’s taxes!  College students provide an enormous amount of money annually to the cities budget through income tax, property tax, and perhaps most importantly sales tax (i.e. BARS, and restaurants).

Being in graduate school in Washington DC has caused me to accumulate an enormous amount of debt.  If DC decided to tax my tuition that would mean I would be forced to rack up more debt.  Thus, the government is asking the students of Pittsburg to go into debt on behalf of the pensions, that the students, in all honesty, had absolutely nothing to do with.

The problem here is rather simple.  The recession has caused a drastic decrease in taxes and therefore the government is trying to raise taxes on students (who already don’t have money) to help close the budget gaps.  However, the real problem is the government being fiscally irresponsible!  The students are doing their share, the Government on the other hand is not…

Click here for article

http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/02/italian-police-crash-lamborghini-patrol-car/

And we think we have spending problem in the US?