Strangers in the night

A fairly accurate representation
of my evening

I had a bit of a Bridget Jones moment last night.  You know the drill (or maybe you don't): a bottle of red wine, apartment karaoke, Party of One.  Thank heavens for solid brick walls in this building.  Ugh.

When I peeled off the Emirates eye mask this morning, I cast bleary eyes around the apartment.  I surveyed the carnage of unwashed dishes and take-out containers lining the very limited shelf space in my tiny kitchen.  I chugged a Diet Coke from the fridge, grateful to the universe that my drunken self hadn't realised it was there last night.

And then I got down to the very serious business of finding someone to bring me breakfast.  Because in New York, someone is always out there - any time of the day or night - just waiting to deliver food to your door.  Within 30 minutes, the uniformed representative of the diner down the street showed up at my door, bearing bacon.  Wonderful man.

Apartment living is really strange, you know.  I'm confident that my neighbours heard me warbling on and off last night, just as I'm sure they hear me every morning on my way to work - locking my front door and stomping down the stairs.  And I hear them too.  I can tell you that my next door neighbour and his girlfriend test drove his new bed about a month ago, and the upstairs neighbour has a dog that sniffs and snorts at my door every morning and night on his way outside.  The guy across the hall is in a band, and he has a little yappy dog that doesn't know when to go to sleep.  The guys who live in the granny flat out the back decorated the dumpsters with fairy lights and it looks incredible.

But do I actually know any of these people?  Nope.  I couldn't even tell you who lives where or what any of them look like.  We all hear each other's lives, but we do our best to stay out of them.  Our apartments are our sanctuaries and keeping to yourself seems to be the name of the game.  Besides, I'm not sure I could look my neighbours in the eye if one of them asked about my resounding Whitney Houston solo (unless he was complimenting me, obviously).  And really, given how my head felt before the bacon took effect this morning, I was definitely smart to remain under house arrest, safe in my anonymity.