The Most Unsettling Thing You've Ever Seen at a Restaurant

In the past, Pissing Contest has covered the grossest things you’ve seen at work, on public transportation, on an airplane, and at a hospital—your disgusting medical stories. These happen to be my favorite genre, so imagine my surprise when I realized we’ve bypassed the most obvious: food establishments. This week, I want to hear all about the unsettling, revolting, nauseating things you’ve seen at a place to eat. Maybe you worked there and caught a co-worker working barefoot and licking donuts? Maybe you were dining at an upscale establishment and saw a celeb doing something heinous? Maybe you were the 9perpetrator? Drop those stories in the comments below.

And now, it’s time to check out last week’s winners. These are your best stories about the worst neighbors.

ProudHamerican, you win:

We lived in the country. Our neighbor shot our pet rooster with a bow and arrow. In the winter. There was blood, an arrow, and feathers left in the ditch where he was shot, but no bird. I have always wondered if they ate our rooster. RIP, buddy, we miss you.

bourbonmillerj, that is psychotic:

At my old house in downtown denver, on one side I bordered a public park that was the location of several murders, we even had a couple guns thrown in our yard, one of which our daughter (age 1) found. But that’s not my worst neighbor story. My worst neighbor was the guy who lived on the other side of us. He ignored us and we ignored him for 2 years. After that, I received an IM at work one day from him asking me to please dress more professionally when taking out the trash. Turns out my next door neighbor was also an executive at my company and made it known to my boss that he was offended by my bathrobe.

dunnaeknow, I hate this!:

I own an untouched rural parcel of land and my neighbor clear cut my old growth trees from the bottom 1/3 of it. Once this quarantine is over, I get to head to the Ozarks and start fighting a man in court about tree stumps and the value of old growth.

(spoiler: if/when I can prove it, he has to pay me 3x the retail value of the trees or he gets hit with a felony. I really wish he had just left it alone.)

mtlchicago, this is stressing me out. Fuck Joe?:

I moved into my third floor apartment in August- before I moved in (with two other female roommates), I was warned by the previous tenants that the downstairs neighbor was a bit abrasive and highly sensitive to noise. The day I moved in, I heard banging on my apartment door and opened it to meet him. My downstairs neighbor, let’s call him Joe, introduced himself and told me that he hoped that myself and my roommates would walk much more quietly than the previous tenants. He told me that one of the previous tenants especially was a “heel walker” and how annoying that was to him. We said goodbye and I wished him well. For the past eight to nine months, I have received a constant barrage of texts from him about how loudly we walk in our apartment- the three of us living here are very quiet, tidy roommates who have never had a party or other large gathering and who never blast music. Joe, on the other hand, blasts music without fail almost every morning around 10 AM, his apartment constantly reeks of weed, and one time recently I heard shouting coming from his balcony- he was standing on it screaming (for close to 10 minutes) at a woman who had been walking through the alley behind our house.

Recently, the messages from Joe have gotten worse. He used to bang on our door when we were walking too loudly- at times, even doing so wearing only his underwear (which seems quite inappropriate given that he is a ~30 year old man and we are all ~21 year old young women, but I digress. Also, we reached out to the previous tenants and they also had experiences with him yelling at them in his underwear). Given the current situation with covid19, he has instead taken to messaging me whenever he feels that we are walking too loudly, even if there is no one moving in the apartment whatsoever (also, need I mention, we are rent-paying tenants who are allowed to walk in our own apartment!) A few key phrases from various text messages include the following: “Yo guys honestly whats the deal?” “Idk honestly i don’t think you guys realize how much the noise travels…like when you walk around at night pretend you’re sneaking into your parents house at night and you don’t want to wake them. Its so loud. Next time I’m just going to bang on the ceiling ok”, “walk slightly more delicately in the evening and at night. Like little mice”, “it’s really shameful”, and most recently, “You know this is ridiculous…its so simple for you…tell your roommates or friends or whatnot to walk softly at night”.

Now, in my own opinion, we’re not doing anything wrong- he also has texted our landlord that he thinks we are walking loudly on purpose and to spite him, although the three of us tiptoe around in the evenings to avoid having him message us. It’s gotten to the point where I often feel quite anxious in the evenings because I’m worried about receiving a message from him. Also, to note, I’ve done by best to respond extremely politely to all of his messages (i.e., thank him for bringing it to my attention, wish him well, just be super friendly and polite in general).

Finally, yesterday the third tenant in our building (an older woman) had to come to our apartment for access to the roof, in order to send a photo to a plumber. On her way out, she told us that Joe has told her how disrespectful we are, and lectured me on being considerate and kind, given that we walk so loudly above Joe. I responded very nicely and calmly to her, but at this point it seems a bit ridiculous. We are doing nothing wrong or illegal by walking in our own apartment, and now are being lectured by both parties. I’m open to any advice or thoughts on how to handle this? I’ve been super anxious about running into Joe in the hallway, as he’s super aggressive and clearly does not care for us, although we are doing NOTHING wrong by simply walking in our own home.