Apartment Living (update)

Why do I feel that we are the only ones that are even remotely considerate when it comes to noise and apartment living?

I'm currently being graced with the repetitive bass line of the Hispanic music being distorted from the apartment below. With its accompanying accordion and timpani drums, it's hardly bearable. I mean, I can't hear myself think—let alone hear my own music. I'm sure the neighbors above us can hear it so clearly that they think we're the one's putting on the circus show.

I am SO tempted to sit the subwoofer directly on the hardwood floor and turn my bass up to high, but something tell me that would be less effective.

*UPDATE*
A few minutes after finishing this post, the music got even louder. It had begun making our floor vibrate, and the sound was emanating from one of the living room walls as if the entire wall was a speaker itself.

At that point I had had enough. Remembering the awkward situation** the first time I attempted to go down and ask them to turn their music down, I decided to instead knock on the floor in the hopes that perhaps our noisy neighbors would get the hint from my rudimentary Morse Code.

I knocked on the floor several times, but the music blared on. My knocking had no effect. I put on my sandals and made my way down the stairs to the floor below us only to realize that the closer I came to the offending apartment, the quieter the music became. I felt a little foolish as I turned around and headed up to the floor above us, muttering a bashful apology to myself for my falsely accused neighbors.

Once on the correct floor, the source from which the bane of my auditory system had been issuing was readily apparent. I knocked at the door several times, but the music was so loud, it wasn't until a break between songs that my knocks were finally able to bring someone to the door. After a brief conversation, I was able to walk back down the stairs to the apartment and enjoy the rest of my morning in relative silence.


**the first time: I was forced to have a conversation with the old woman downstairs through her apt door because she wouldn't open it for some random man she didn't know (i.e., me). We could barely hear each other through the door over the music and the fact that English wasn't her first language didn't help the situation.