How to Deal with Bad Neighbors

Every apartment or residential neighborhood dweller has them. They come in all shapes, colors, and sizes. They are: The bad neighbors. Do they park in your designated spot? Do their friends park in your spots, forcing you to park in the streets? Does their rap music come blaring through the floor at 1 a.m. and then again at 8? The bad neighbor can come in all forms, and so can their habits. Perhaps they just have friends over every night, drunk and disorderly, and won’t shut up. Well, the bad neighbors can be defeated. Pranks may sound childish, but let’s face it. The bad neighbors call for all stops to be pulled out. However, I take no responsibility for you taking any action involving one or more of the following ideas, and I would not recommend them. They are fun, but I am not going to condone any illegal activities.

First is the classic “Call the Cops” routine. This one isn’t a prank, but it is highly effective. Call the cops, tell them your neighbors are breaking noise ordinances or even drinking underage. They’ll come and break it up, of course. Problem solved, but now they hate you. If you want to turn this into a prank, you’ll have to be willing to make some illegal moves, such as supplying false information. It’s not such a good idea, but a call about marijuana being hidden by neighbors, grown by neighbors, or sold by neighbors is great. I would not do this, however, as the cops will be involved and you may get in trouble.

Next, let’s give these neighbors the “Slow Leak” treatment. This is the number one prank against neighbors in your parking spots. Every time the neighbor parks there, take around 5 PSI out of their tires. To do this, just take off the valve cap and press down on the middle of the stem. Careful, this will be a little loud. It’s best to do at night and when they are partying. Next time they park there, take another 5 PSI out. Next time, take out another 5, and so on. When they notice the flatness, the neighbors will believe they have a slow leak and take the tire to a service shop, where naturally nothing will be wrong. Repeat as desired.

Another tire trick is the “Flat Tire” trick. A common way to do this is with a knife, but an idea cannot be worse. Then they will know exactly who did it and why. When the neighbors park in your spot, simply use the above trick, but deflate the tire all the way. Also, if you have a broken jack lying about the house, or one with no hydraulic fluid in it, it can be fun to give them when they ask for a jack. However, the slow release of air is long, slow, and loud. However, by unscrewing the valve cap and then using pliers to unscrew the actual valve stem, the air will escape very quickly. This can actually be repeated on all 4 tires, but then it gets fairly obvious as to what is going on.