I know this reveals a horrific lack of keeping-up-ness, but is Grace out of the hospital?

I'm so not a bath person. I get bored, too.

Happy birthday, k-bug!

Shir, really? into a neighbor's place? No way, no how - 1) illegal, yes? 2) I'd fear violence.

Yes. I don't know about 1), but as for 2) - easy. Forget everything you feel at the moment, put a true-to-God-I'm-a-people-lover-smile on your face, and act the up "umm, I'm so sorry to interrupt, really, but I knocked and no one answered, but I was just about going to bed - do you mind turn down the volume in about, umm, 30 minutes?".

Unless getting a party invitation, they'll usually turn it down within 5 seconds with an apology.

oh Shir, in some of the places I've called in complaints, not only would I possibly have been threatened physically, I most certainly would have been assaulted verbally. In NM, after asking for turn downs twice at 3-4am parties, the neighbors started loudly discussing how much they must be bothering us before jacking up the volume. They got evicted a month later for violation of lease agreement which stated no loud noise after 11pm. In NY, the place I would call the cops on was home to at least 2 thuggy 20-something men and no way in hell was I going to confront that.

And I thought Israelis are hostile to each other. If I'd live in a places like you just described, I don't know how I'll feel safe. I can't even imagine that.

As an example: my sis is now home for the weekend (yay!), while piles of laundry. The machine broke for some reason in the morning, and my parents, living in the middle of the desert, have nothing they can do about it until Sunday, when it'll be too late for my sister. So we asked our neighbors for help, they agreed to do this within a second, without blinking or thinking twice and with an honest smile. My mom baked them a cake.

That reminds me of my freshman year of college, where people in the room next to mine would party late at night when I had 8:00 calculus the next morning. When I'd ask them to be quiet, they'd crank the music and bounce a golf ball off the wall in order to intentionally keep me awake.

I've not always known my neighbors by face or name in the places I've lived, but the apartments have been safe. Where I live now, I know all my neighbors.

Tommy, my roommate and I dealt with the late night/early morning partiers (they worked shifts that brought them home at 2 or 3am) by turning our stereo speaker to the wall/ceiling we shared with them and turning our music on very loud when we left for work at 8am. Goodtimes.

My uncle, a jr high teacher and then principal had a policy when he went on school trips - any kid that woke him up or kept him up would get rousted from bed at 5 or 6am as he was headed down for either exercise or breakfast.

You mess up my rest, I'll mess up yours.

My parents often have students living next door (often grad students, but still), and one time they had a late party that kept my parents up on a Saturday night. Since my father was a Christian minister, and worked Sunday morning, he just went over on his way out at like 7 the next morning and rang the doorbell until someone answered it. He very pleasantly explained the situation, and they kept it down from then on.

You know Spring is around the cornwer in NY when... [link]

You mess up my rest, I'll mess up yours.

Heh. I sorta' did stuff like that - our dorm had a single phone for the whole wing - On my way to my 8:00 I'd just call that phone and set down the receiver, letting it ring and ring....