BPB, Revisited

I should have known it would happen. I've heard from several of you (by private message), asking about BPB. The most popular question, by far?

Was it awkward living next door to him after he exposed himself to you?

So I figure BPB warrants just a little more of our time. Plus, perhaps I haven't been totally fair to him. No - I've been perfectly fair to him. But I had my own moment of freakdom with him, and it's the right thing to be upfront about that.

Remember how I met him about 6 months before he asked me out? Remember how, whenever we ran into each other outside our doors, we made small talk? Well, I could not for the life of me remember his name. The day he asked me out, I drew a complete and total blank on his name. SIX MONTHS of talking to the guy, and when he requests a bit more of my time in a one-on-one situation, I let him down. I didn't remember his name.


Oh, I remembered his roommate's name well enough (let's call him "PornMaster" - more on that later). Somehow, that was an easy one. Despite the fact that I'd never talked to PornMaster, I knew his name - first and last. Yet, this guy who I'd been talking to at least twice a week for SIX MONTHS? Nope. Don't know his name. And, really, is it really okay to go on a date with someone whose name you don't know? That seems kind of lame. And it's especially lame when you've been told his name.

So I jumped into action. More accurately, I crept into action. I watched to see when his car was gone. I watched to see when the lights were out in their apartment. I waited for the mailman. And when I was certain no one could see me, I tiptoed over to their door, pulled out their mail, and looked at the addressees. On the first day, only PornMaster got any mail. Same thing on the second day. Third time's the charm, though, and the day before our date, I learned BPB's name. You can call me "Mail Stalker," if you want.

The thing you've been wondering about, though - what about that?

Well, no. It was not at all awkward to see him after. It could have been. It maybe should have been. But there was too much other drama happening in the BPB-PornMaster apartment for a little thing like that to get in the way. (I suspect this drama had been happening the whole time, but I'd remained oblivious to it until my interest was piqued by the "incident.")

Like the two different times the cops visited...

First, the men in blue came by to pay a friendly arresting visit to PornMaster. Turns out he'd been producing pornographic videos in their apartment, and something about that wasn't exactly on the up-and-up.

Then, they showed up in the middle of the night a few months later. BPB had called them to request that they escort a female visitor off the premises. I was thankful for that call, actually, as the woman had been pounding on their door (and my bedroom window, a few times), screaming at BPB about how he'd been cheating on her and she wasn't going to stand for that. She pounded and screamed, screamed and pounded. That woman was going nuts on him. But you know what's really funny about it? When he opened the door for the cops (it was him - I was watching through the bedroom window, so I know it was him), she looked at him and stopped screaming immediately. Turns out she'd been seeing someone else who told her his name was BPB and given him BPB/PornMaster's address. How funny is THAT? BPB actually stopped by my place the next day to apologize for the noise.

Anyway, the point is that there was drama enough going on after I saw all BPB had to offer that it just wasn't awkward. Plus, we just made an effort not to cross paths quite as often. Plus (and maybe this is the real reason), I moved shortly thereafter.