Neighbours - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly Part 3

I lived in London twice. The first time was just after university. I moved because I had got a job in London. 1987. Twenty years ago. I had to share a flat with another bloke who had joined the Company on the same day as me, Simon. Simon was a drinker. He was a drinker who thought he was bright and was owed a living on a plate. He was not as bright as he thought he was. He was a drinker, a diabetic and a crack addict. I forget the number of times that I had to revive him with a sugar cube or an emergency Mars Bar. We lived in St. John’s Wood in an ex-council flat above Barclays Bank. Most of the other flats on our floor were still council flats. The tenants were quite elderly and doddery. Many were house bound. We rarely crossed paths. The only time that I would see the old girl across the corridor would be on Sunday mornings. She would struggle across the landing using her zimmer frame to knock on my door. To inform me that my flat mate had passed out on the landing or at the top of the stairs. It was quite a regular weekend occurrence. What must she have thought of us? How embarrassing.

I was glad to leave the flat in St John’s Wood. And Simon. He left the Company. By mutual consent. Something to do with expense claims I think. Or it could have been his regular afternoon naps in the toilets. He was an odd one. He ripped off a bunch of colleagues by organising a fictitious trip to Moscow. He was a raving lefty. And, I once had to bail him out of jail after he had been caught stealing books from Waterstones. We didn’t keep in touch. I suspect he will have drunk himself to death by now, or have been killed by some victim of a scam, or, a millionaire.

My experience with Simon made me adamant that I would never share a place again. Except with C and Maslow of course.

On my second spell second spell in the Smoke, I lived in Kilburn. Little Ireland. Well, not so little in fact. Kilburn has the largest Irish community in the world outside of Dublin. It was the safest place to be during the IRA bombing campaign of the late 80s. The only time I remember Kilburn being effected by a bomb scare was on St. Patrick’s Day evening. I suspect it was a hoax aimed at disrupting all of the Paddy’s Day celebrations.

I lived in a one bedroom flat on he first floor of a two-storey house conversion, opposite a launderette where the local hoodies would hang out and which once figured in a Crimewatch reconstruction following a murder. Nice.

I only met the girl who lived below me maybe twice to talk to. The first time was on the night I moved in. Not being a southerner I “knocked on” to introduce myself. She was very welcoming, invited me in, and offered me a glass of wine. An hour later we were exchanging spare keys, in case of emergency.


The second time I saw her was a bit more embarrassing. C and I were in the shower. This was not long after we had got together. Apparently, C and I were oblivious to the fact that the spray from the shower was hitting the tiled wall at the side of the bath, running down a hitherto unnoticed crack, and exiting through the light in the kitchen of the downstairs apartment. My neighbour had been knocking, apparently, but we hadn’t heard her. She had let herself in and was coming up our stairs as I was walking out of the bathroom. How embarrassing. We didn't keep in touch after I moved.

Neighbours - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly Part 2

There have been good neighbours along the way too. When I lived as a bachelor in a small, brand-new estate called Galley Common, near Nuneaton, I had lots of nice neighbours. Wikipedia claims that Nuneaton is most famous for its association with the gender-challenged author George Elliot, but I think it should be more infamous for its town planning. They built the ring road in the middle of the town! Both Mary Whitehouse (the TV moral campaigner) and Larry Grayson (the camp host of the Generation Game) lived in Nuneaton. Now that would have made for an interesting dinner party. Galley Common doesn’t even rate an entry.

Nevertheless, bachelorhood in Galley Common, in the late 80s, was a good time for me. I was the only single male on the estate. I worked from home a lot. I was often asked to fix a punctured tyre, to rewire a plug, change a light bulb, by the many housewives that were stranded there during the day.

I lived in a very small, badly built semi-detached starter home. The walls were paper thin. Thank goodness I had a great neighbour at that time, Ruth. She would sneeze, I would say “bless you” and she would reply “thank you”. We could hear each other switch lights on and off. We could hear the toilet flushing. We were both very glad to be next to good neighbours.

Everyone else on the estate seemed to be called Sue. Sue 1 lived opposite. She was ten years older than me, very good looking and bi-sexual. My dad used to love it if she was cleaning her car on her drive when he was visiting. She wore very short shorts and a very cropped top. She made Paris Hilton look prudish. She would fling open her bedroom curtains every morning, completely naked. The net curtains that my mom had installed as a moving in gift were very useful.

Sue 1 and I had a brief fling one Christmas. I changed a punctured tire for her and she reciprocated with lasagne and a Saturday night. We both had been recently dumped and found the festive season less than festive on our own. So, we wallowed in our depression together.

Sue1 almost fulfilled a teenage fantasy. By which I mean a common fantasy of all teenage boys. A threesome. Me, Sue1 and her girlfriend. I turned them down. Sue1’s girlfriend was not a looker. She was not attractive. She did nothing for me. I thought that it would be impolite to bring two paper bags with me, so I declined the offer. Just my luck.

Sue2 lived next door. Sue2 was 7 years older than me. Sue2 was a babe. She was tall, pretty, with long dark hair, short skirts, long legs and stockings. Sue2 was living with a typical Midland Man: bald, shorter than her, white socks. A Neanderthal who believed that women should be ladies, housewives, and “on call” and men should be whatever they wanted to be.

Midland Man worked away during the week, in Oxford. On one occasion Sue2 went to surprise him for his birthday. She surprised him alright. He hadn’t been expecting her. She also surprised the “other woman” he was with. It would seem that Midland Man was having his cake and eating it.

Sue2 cried on my shoulder. To cheer her up I took her to Alton Towers for the day. You get very close on those theme rides! When we returned home we had one too many drinks together and one thing led to another…….Ruth must have had her fingers in her ears that night.

That weekend I heard an almighty commotion coming from next door. Where Sue2 lived with Midland Man. From my bathroom window I could see into their kitchen. The door was open. The kitchen was a mess. Things had been thrown around. Then I heard a scream and saw Sue2 running outside, her dress torn, crying. Midland Man came running after her, clutching a carving knife.

I assumed that Midland Man had discovered our roller coaster ride and was none-to-happy. What was sauce for the goose certainly didn’t seem to be sauce for the gander. I rushed outside and put myself between him and Sue2. Between Sue2 and the carving knife. I don't like knives. It was a huge relief when he immediately said: “Dave, get out of the way. This has nothing to do with you!” Phew. He was a bully and as with most bullies he was also a coward. When I told him I was going nowhere and that he would have to come through me to get at Sue2, he backed down, handed me the blade, and collapsed in a heap of self-pity. Phew.

I don’t think that Sue2 and Midland Man stayed together very long. Unfortunately, after the incident with the knife, Sue2 developed a bit of an infatuation with me that wasn’t reciprocated. On one occasion she came round with her bags packed and I had to persuade her that this was not what I was looking for. Fortunately, this was just as I was relocating to London with work. Sorry Sue2. You were gorgeous though, and, you deserved better.


I was just glad to escape Nuneaton in one piece. Metaphorically and otherwise.

My Neighbours - The Good, the Bad and the Ugly Part 1

I have been blessed with good neighbours. I have been damned with awful neighbours. I crave for a detached house. Isolation. Neighbourless is a state that would suit me down to the ground. I am paranoid about neighbourly noise. Actually there is nothing neighbourly about noise from your neighbours. It is intrusive, wearing, impolite. It eats into your soul. It gets into your head, and it stays there. It grinds you down and it drives you out. It eats away at you until you can hear yourself scream the silent scream.

This is all the fault of Val. C and I lived next to Val for six years in our first home as a married couple. It was a beautiful Victorian cottage in Bolliwood (Alderley Edge) in Cheshire. Unfortunately, it was a semi-detached cottage, just one room wide. And, Val lived on the other side of the shared wall. Val, her TV and her stereo.....

Don’t get me wrong, the years were not all bad. Indeed, the first five and a half years out of the six were wonderful. After we had moved on, Val “knocked on” as they do in the North. When our paths crossed she always raised her hand in hello and we exchanged a word or two. Indeed, I remember the first time that we went away on holiday we left Val with a set of keys. In case of emergency. It was such a nice surprise when we discovered, upon our return, that Val had stocked the fridge with milk, bread and bacon and egg as a welcome home gift. We reciprocated, of course, when Val made one of her many trips back to the motherland. Val was Irish.

On my last night in the house I could have killed her. She was deliberately provoking us. She held a party despite the fact that it was a Thursday night. A work night to all intents and purposes. But, she knew we were leaving. So, she had all her Irish drinking partners around until 3 am. The shared wall shook to the tune of many an Irish jig or sad rock ballad. If I had gone round to complain I would have killed her. Actually, C refused to let me go. She was more concerned that this was a deliberate provocation and that if I had gone around there would have been many a Guinness and Jameson fuelled navvy more than ready to kill me.

For most of these six years Val lived alone. Occasionally she would obtain a boy friend. Val was in her fifties. Most of her boyfriends were in their twenties or thirties. Toy boys. Val was no looker. Perhaps she had money. These toy boys came and went. But, the toy boy that went five and half years into our residence next door to Val must have been significant. Val was inconsolable. Val resorted to self-pity, alcohol and Shirley Bassey. Shirley Bassey ballads would reverberate through the walls. Cover versions. Val once spent a whole weekend playing Shirley’s version of Foreigner’s “I want to know what love is” at full volume, back to back, in a constant repetitive loop. I did complain about 3am in the morning. Monday morning. I had to get up for work at 6am. She answered the door in an apologetic drunken haze. She did turn the music down. For maybe 20 minutes. After which Shirley belted it out at full volume until the alarm went off and opened the door to sanctuary.

Also during this last six months, Val discovered the pleasure of Line Dancing. She also discovered the joys of practise. Home practise. Can you imagine listening to Cotton Eye Joe being played at full volume on a constant loop! It was almost a relief when practise was over and Shirley Bassey would kick in. Or, bloody Simply Red. God I had that man. Ginga!

For those of you who have read my earlier post “There’s a Bomb”, you will understand that I have long suspected that Val was trained in terrorist techniques. To be sure, the CIA would have been proud of her excellent use of noise pollution. General Noreaga would not have survived 24 hours next to Val.

I became paranoid about noise. I became convinced that we were somehow provoking Val into retaliating. I would only allow C three bars on the TV volume control. More often the not we spent the last six months in this house watching the same programmes on TV as Val next door, with our volume down, listening to her TV. When C was out I would listen to the football on the radio in the bathroom or in the kitchen so as not to provoke a retaliation. Mostly I would go out for a walk or a drive. I was making myself ill.

When selling, we would schedule viewings when we knew that Val was most likely to be out. We got very excited when someone put an offer in for the house who was hoping to set up a recording studio in the attic. Revenge would be mine. Unfortunately he pulled out. Shame.


Val, wherever you are now I hope you rot in a Neighbour From Hell existence of your own making. My own personal Hell would be a small cottage, a shared wall, Shirley and a Ginga singing a duet of Cotton Eye Joe. Thanks Val and good riddance.