ROBIN REPORT UPDATE:I wasn't able to keep up with twittering about Robin, because we kept running out of internet money. ANYHOW, the long and the short of it is, Robin succeeded in getting *US* to move out when our lease was not renewed...and I think that's BALDERDASH. During the week of our move, Robin menaced my 7 year-old daughter with a hammer...A HAMMER, FOLKS, is it normal for a 64 year old woman to brandish a hammer at a child? NO, IT'S NOT, AND YET THIS WOMAN IS PERMITTED TO GET AWAY WITH IT AGAIN AND AGAIN. BALDERDASH, I SAY!
Originally posted October 1, 2012
You may ask, “What is the ‘Robin Report?’” The question is not merely ‘what’ but rather, EVERY ‘w’ question, that is, ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘when’, ‘where’, ‘why’, and ‘how’.
Who: The twice-divorced, certifiable lunatic they call Robin Morrison Streseman Owens. Robin claims to be 62 years old (though appears several centuries older), and has been my upstairs neighbor for the past three years.
What: A cacophonous campaign of crazy, waged by Queen Cuckoo herself.
Where: Directly overhead in my apartment in the Audubon area.
When: Throughout the day, every day, since April Fools Day 2012.
Why: The war Robin continues to wage against our family is apparently her psychotic way of seeking some sort of revenge.
During year one, Robin and I smiled and said "hello" to each other in passing, but I didn't know her.
During year two, whilst gazing at an angel-shaped cloud in the sky, Robin tripped over a crack in the sidewalk and broke her right wrist. Having seen me with computer and camera in hand on more than one occasion, she thought to ask me to photograph the sidewalk crack. She was so incapacitated and old-looking, and I was moved by her piteous "I'm old and all alone; I don't have any friends and my family doesn't care" stories. We both claimed to be Christians...and the Christian in me told me to offer this little old lady my help; indeed, Robin would be a good deed for the day. So I offered, and she accepted, and we quickly became friends.
I did everything for Robin, including accompanying her to the hospital for her wrist surgery, opening cans of dog food, taking out her trash (even her adorable dog's "wee-wee pads"), helping her brush her hair (ewwww)...this, that and the other. When the digital went out on her television, I got her a different converter box; when her landline phone proved too heavy and unmanageable, I got her a lightweight cordless; when her vacuum cleaner went on the fritz, I gave her an extra of mine. We went grocery shopping together, and my kids helped bring her bags upstairs. We gave each other a smoke or a couple of Advil or a cup of sugar or a pep talk if we needed it, and on at least two occasions she just handed us $10 or $20, explaining that she wanted to bless us with it. I really grew to care for her, and thought that we were friends.
Then came a time when Robin's meds changed; her doctor took her off of some, and she took herself off of others, and her behavior began to change. Robin always had vivid dreams when she slept; then suddenly she seemed to stop sleeping altogether. In the middle of her insomniac nights, she removed all of the carpet from her apartment. She started coming down three, four, five times a day to bum a smoke, talking and laughing loudly, dressed eccentrically, her makeup looking like it was applied with a trowel by Mimi Bobeck. She claimed that the doctor told her she was dying...and that one night, as she contemplated making contact with her long-estranged Mormon family members in Arizona, the Holy Spirit grabbed her by the shoulders and slammed her into a wall. I grew concerned. Robin joined the “Biker Church” and took to dancing about whilst singing hymns and clapping hands. She took to calling me "Spidey". I grew annoyed.
I began to dread the knock at the door, and started to pretend I wasn't home...but sometimes she would catch me... She came down one afternoon to bum the day's third cigarette ("I'm going to quit smoking when my nicotine patches arrive) and started crowing about the big stack of beautiful dresses she'd just moments before given away to the Muslim woman who used to live next door. I was outraged. She knew I was looking for a job...and I would have paid Robin a fair price for the dresses; the scowling woman to whom she gave the dresses never wore any of them -- no, not even once -- but then again, who could tell, considering she was always covered from head to foot and no one could see the dresses anyway...
Angry and hurt, I shut it down...telling my family to say I was busy or whatever -- no more cigarettes for the crazy lady.
She knocked one Saturday morning, and I mouthed to my husband, “Tell her I’m not here.” He answered the door, and she told him, "I came across a spider sweater for Spydra...but I need the money I spent for it." Well, everyone who knows me knows that I collect spider and spiderweb whatnot...and my husband saw the sweater and knew right away that I'd like it. When he told me about it, I was tempted to shine it on and not speak with her about it (o cruel and crystal clear hindsight!)...but my husband told me, "Maybe this is her way of apologizing about the dresses." So when she called to me "Spidey! Oh Spidey," from her upstairs window, I went up; and when she showed me the sweater with its spiderweb design encrusted with semi-precious stones, I caught my breath.
God told me 'don't tell her you love it'. "I love it," I said admiringly. "How much was it?"
She answered "$38."
"Wow! $38!!!” I was shocked at the figure she quoted for a winter sweater in springtime…but we'd just gotten our tax refund, so I had the money. “It is very beautiful," I mused, "Where did you get it?"
"At a boutique in Manitou.," came her reply. That explained the price.
"Oh, did you go to Manitou today? It sure was lovely weather for it," I said, a bit absently, all spider goo-goo eyed.
Came her reply: "Oh, no -- I got the sweater for $38 at a boutique in Manitou five years ago; but I still like it, and I would still wear it if you didn't want it...and since you do want it, I need the money I spent for it."
I turned to her and blinked. "You mean you didn't just buy this sweater for me?"
"No," said she, "but my car is on empty and I have to get to church."
I found myself suddenly fed up. "I'm sorry, but not today."
"Wait! At least make me an offer!" she said after me as I started back down the stairs.
"I'm sorry, Robin, I don't have any cash."
And that was that. Or so I thought. Because the next day, Sunday morning, that wrinkled-up old bat stood at the top of the stairs shouting and badmouthing me at 8:00 a.m. Embarrassed and furious, I confronted her and told her I was not about to be bullied into handing her $38; she continued her verbal assault on me, claiming to smell smells that were making her sick and threatening to call the police...threatening to call DHS (now, dem's fightin' words); but I told her, "Robin, I once called you friend, but I'll never call you friend again -- so do what you're going to do, bitch, I really don't care."
So she called the police; they came; we spoke; the police told us both to ignore and avoid each other.
And as far as I can figure, that's the "Why" -- because I wouldn't buy her mothballed spider sweater.
How: Robin never sleeps, and so has time to pester us in manifold crazy and creative ways.
• Robin adopted two of the yappiest ankle-biters to ever have walked the face of the earth; in short order, one of them impregnated her adorable purebred Maltese – the puppies are due sometime this month (awwww….) . Allow me to say this: I have been surrounded by terrible dog owners for the past six months; each one has impressed upon me how far superior cats are to dogs. No matter how an owner may coax or coddle a cat, it will never bark (hysterically, all-day-long, or otherwise); a cat will not leave gigantic turds all over everywhere; a cat will never attack someone else on command – else I’d have long ago adopted four attack cats, one for each of the dogs who live above me.
• Robin removed the carpet from her apartment, the effect being that we can hear every step she takes. I am guessing that she has marked the places on the floor where it creaks, because she will go straight there and rock back and forth for up to an hour at a time.
• Robin eavesdrops on us all day long; we can practically hear her breathing – and she us. Every sound is amplified and awful.
• Robin drops what sounds like a bowling ball on the floor and lets it roll about.
• Robin goes to the bathroom A LOT, and each time she does, she SLAMS the commode lid as hard as possible. • Robin also drops assorted things: from the sounds of things, she will drop tools onto the floor from a height, she also likes to drop assorted things in the tub, making an incredible racket.
• Robin taps repeatedly on the metal vents throughout the apartment.
• Robin does the Riverdance whenever we have company.
• Robin vacuums like a demon possessed, for a very long time, at any given hour…torturing us with the very vacuum cleaner I gave to her.
• In front of our children, Robin hissed at me that she’d recently found her rifle, and that I’d better hope she didn’t shoot me through the floor…and when we complained to the office AGAIN about her behavior, Robin walked past my door threatening to “kick my ass, bitch.”
• Robin walks about the apartment complex, yakking to each and every neighbor unlucky enough to be in her path…and if I happen to come outside, she quickly resorts to the simpleton’s Ol’ Faithful: “Stay away from that nigger, she’s bad news.” I learned this from a neighbor who just two weeks ago moved to the complex. Robin has gone so far as to claim I struck her in the back of the head with half of a watermelon (as niggers are often wont to do).
• Robin scowls and makes scary faces at my kids, having the nerve to complain about the noise THEY make!
• Robin plays her Christian music so loudly, the floors throb and bounce…and when the Holy Ghost fills her, she begins to shout YAY YAY YAY YAY!!! and her dogs go nuts – ya know, I didn’t ever know that dogs were capable of even making such sounds! By itself, the music is enough to give me a terrible headache; when combined with the incredible sounds her dogs make, it’s enough to make me…make me…well, make me start up a Robin Report.
Robin has two faces, and you never see them at the same time. She has many tenants at my apartment complex fooled into thinking I am some kind of menancing black bully, and that she a nice little fragile old lady, but we have taken pains to avoid her at all costs...and she is the farthest thing from nice, little, fragile and lady -- what she is she? EVIL INCARNATE, AND OLDER THAN TIME.
It’s very plain that Robin’s has too much time on her hands, and is seriously mentally ill; since I know she takes Seroquel, I’m gonna guess that schizophrenia is what’s the matter with her brain. I left a note for her doctor, but never expected to hear back from him due to patient confidentiality rules.
The police won’t even come out anymore, really; they all know she’s batty and claim that’s why they won’t issue her a citation; they already knows she batty, and won’t issue her a citation because she’d be acquitted – innocent by reason of permanent insanity; won’t issue a citation because they fear is would exacerbate matters; they won’t come unless she pays $400 for all of her false alarms.
No one seems willing or able to do anything about it, and it looks more and more like we are going to be moving again…SOON. The strain of living beneath her noisy non-stop nonsense has had such a terrible, depressing effect on me. Sometimes, I’ll get angry, and decide, “Well, I’ll be damned if I move anywhere on account of that silly bitch!” At other times, I become quiet and grow despondent, feeling hapless, helpless and hopeless.
No good deed goes unpunished, and I kick and hate myself for having missed her now-obvious insanity and for letting her into our world. Robin loves to gossip about and malign me, and will shout from the rooftops what a sinner I am; but she needs to stop fooling herself; pious, high and mighty though she may consider herself, Robin is a sick, twisted, evil troll of a woman, and all sinners can look forward to bumping shoulders with her in Hell.
Because a diary is considered evidence in a court of law, I’ve decided to run a Twitter-like tickertape devoted to Robin, a real-time report that I’ll update whenever she starts pulling her lunatic shit. There you have it. And here it is.
Thanks for letting me vent. Love ya.
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