There is a reason most communities form a neighborhood watch. To watch the neighbors. You never really know a person, not deep down. What we are all capable of is still a mystery. So that's why it can be unnerving, at best, when saddled with a neighbor who you can't trust. We've all had that person next door, or one floor above or below who left us double checking the locks and resetting the alarm.
Redditor u/gigi_c16 wanted to hear about the people we've all lived around that left an unsettling feeling by asking... What was the weirdest or creepiest neighbor you had?Neighbors are supposed to deliver apple pies and check on one another in hours of need. On television the neighbor always has an abundance of sugar or butter or a comical snippet of advice. They aren't supposed to raucous degenerates and criminals straight out of a David Fincher serial killer film.
How Fatal
wo glenn close GIF
Giphy
When I was seven, our next door neighbor came pounding on our front door to scream at and threaten to kill my dad because our pet that we kept in our backyard was being too loud. The pet was a rabbit.
A rabbit.
The Drive thru
A high school kid who used to live next door to us was a drug dealer. Our house is on a corner, and he told buyers to park in front of our house on the side street so his dad couldn't see them. There was so much traffic, it was like a drive-through, and we live in a relatively quiet neighborhood.
Strange and creepy people would often walk into our back yard or driveway thinking that the kid lived at our house or trying to figure out a way to get over our fence into his yard. Very scary times.
The Last
Growing up there was a middle aged lady, lived across the road, with her young daughter.
Every day I'd see her walk down the road carrying two large laundry bags, and later she'd return with them. Did this almost everyday. I was curious how just the two of them needed to do so much laundry, so frequently.
Years later my mum told me the lady had been a refugee from nazi Germany. She was terrified she'd leave the house and the Nazis would raid it when she was out. So she carried all of her clothes with her. Always. Everywhere.
Hide the gas...
When we moved in, he came over to tell us the house had previously burned down twice (news to us). Got the feeling he wanted to sort of brag about how he saved people from the fires. Then a few years later after leaving our garage door open we found our stored grill with all the unlit burners on and a bit of burnt paper sitting underneath.
He's since disappeared (moved or dead, idk), but we lock up our propane now.
You have to wonder just how much of literature in film and television is based on actual people, including horror films. Constantly we are introduced to psycopaths who are characters that have been excavated from a writer's backstory. And it's often overlooked that the murdering sociopath, (star of the story) like the next group of people is a real person to someone.
I don't Talk
Bored Beauty GIF by Juno Calypso
Giphy
I lived in an apartment building and would hear weird scratching at my door like someone was trying to get in at night. Then someone knocking at my door. I answered that exactly 2 times because the dude terrified me.
He would show up wearing nothing but an open bathrobe and wanted to "just talk."
I actually called the cops the second time he knocked and gave them the whole story. A 20 yo girl living on her own and some middle aged man trying to get in to her apartment? Scary. The cops and landlady must have worked together to get that guy to back off cause after calling the cops he stopped coming by.
That Guy
When I was little our neighbor robbed my dad at gunpoint. He was caught and went to prison. When he got out and moved back to his house down the road. I was terrified. My dad tried to reassure me but I had nightmares until he moved on a couple of years later.
Exhibit A
Next door neighbor had a corvette and one night I awoke to flashing lights and a squad car on his lawn. I assumed someone had been caught stealing the car and went back to bed. Another neighbor asked me the next day if I knew what happened. I said I assumed someone was caught stealing the car and the other neighbor told me that the guy's girlfriend ended her life. The next day the couch was sitting on the lawn with a bloodstain on it and stayed there for a couple of days.
The neighbor moved out shortly after. Several years later the district attorney stopped by our house and asked us if we were friends with the neighbor which we said no as we only had just moved in. He said it definitely was not suicide.
Blinds Down
Me and my flat mates used to live in a tenement before we moved this year to a different area. Our flat was the one on the ground floor and the tenement had a small community garden that was right in front of our living room.
We couldn't eat lunch or even watch tv without seeing through the corner of our eyes one of our old neighbors watching us.
And they wouldn't even pretend they weren't watching, it was really creepy. At the end of our second week there we agreed we would always keep the blinds down.
We never lifted them till we left, hope the new tenants know how to deal with the old bats.
Behind the Fence
The neighbour that I never knew. For ages thought it was a witness protection house, or drug related, but have no idea to this day.
A family moved out of said house. Then, prior to next residents moving in, a heap of work was done on house. Most notably, the biggest fence I have ever seen was erected around the property. Not only that, the existing fences were extended in height, with the rear fence not only having an extension, but barbed wire added as well.
The cars and vans of multiple security firms were seen coming and going as work continued on the place. Still, it appeared to the rest of us that no one had "officially" moved in.
A guy sat in a car directly outside said house for over 6 hours by himself one day. A drone was seeing flying overhead around the same period.
Heaps of mail would build up in their mailbox.
Occasionally the supposed 'residents' would be seen dropping-in, as if only temporarily.
Then one day, a removalist truck appeared there. We thought they were finally moving in officially (after 2 years) - but items were coming out.
When you thrown in the fact it is a government-owned house, things get a little stranger.
Face Smile GIF
They kept a dog chained up outside 100% of the time in the back yard. they would come by once every couple days to work and feed the dog, but that's it. another neighbor wanted to give the dog some blankets on a particularly cold night and hopped the fence. they had eyes on the house and two cars came screaming into the driveway minutes later. no violence or anything, she just put the blankets in the doghouse and gave them a little piece of her mind. the whole situation was pretty lame/sketchy/sad.
ZOMBIES
Not mine, but my aunt's neighbour scares me a lot, she told my aunt that she used to do heavy drugs but her boyfriend (now husband) saved her and she's been clean for like, 10 years or so. The scary part comes with the Covid. When the pandemic started she told my aunt that Covid is the signal of the end of times, and Covid infected people were sinners who will become zombies.
She says she's not letting the zombies eat her children, so she practices how to cut heads everyday with a sword she keeps on her room, because she "could never use a fire gun to hurt someone, even if it's a zombie". That lady is probably caring addiction side effects, but still, she's freaking terrifying.
Don't Listen
Channel 9 Reaction GIF by Married At First Sight Australia
Giphy
Dude came over and knocked on our door one night (saw on the camera).
My husband went over the next day and he said he was having sex with his girlfriend hella loud in the middle of the night and could hear it and didn't think it was okay for the kids to hear. Had no idea what he was talking about. Then he claimed I drove to work with her in my car and she was laughing at him. Still, no idea what he was talking about. Then he got mad we had cameras at our house with bright a** spot lights. He eventually got picked up by the cops for a parole violation. We moved shortly after that.
Crisis
Not me but someone else's. I used to volunteer with a Crisis Helpline and this young guy called in and told me he was watching his female neighbour through her window, and she had no idea. He called back a few times and the police tried to locate him. Very creepy to hear him describe her just living her life - zero idea that someone was watching her.
Get Off my Fence...
My current neighbor. He used to lean on our fence to watch me and my dog play in the yard, and he was the only neighbor my dog absolutely hated (RIP Achilles). Lately, I guess he has fallen on to hard times and has asked my mom and our other neighbors to borrow our cars since he doesn't have one (we later found out it was repo'd). His power has been shut off to his house and he's been sneaking into our's and the neighbor's barns to sleep in and charge his phone. My mom would have offered to have him stay in ours (since it's heated and it's been below freezing) if the police were not constantly staking out at his house and asking all the neighbors if we've seen him.
Apparently they have been trying to catch him since we moved here (4 years now). We have no clue why and we're not the the type to judge someone based on their hard times but he's also tried shoving his way into our house several times and my moms not comfortable with him trespassing since it's just the two of us that live there and we're not sure what the police want with him.
The Christmas Card Guy
Our first house, couple next to us was maybe 10 years older - wife was as a sweetheart, husband was rarely seen. She would go for walks with my wife, always check on us and would stand outside at bus stop with other parents watching kids go and come back from school even though her kids were gone or past that age. I always felt kids were a little bit safer outside because I just knew she was likely watching too.
Husband on other hand worked bizarre hours, she said he was a CPA and had demanding clients but he would come home at like 1 am and turn around and leave at like 5 am, and occasionally wouldn't see him for a few days but she confirmed all his clients were local. They had one kid at home, high school age and he was pleasant enough for a teenager and I never got weird vibes but they had two daughters who rarely came home. She said the daughters couldn't wait to be on their own.
One night my wife and her sat on back porch for a few hours and she gave a creepy insight into his bedroom preferences to my wife, apparently he liked her to lie perfectly still and he would just stare for a legit two hours... she would just lie there and wait for it to be over - .he either had second family or was a serial killer. We still exchange Christmas cards and Facebook pleasantries with her 15 years later. My wife will grab lunch with her once a year or so too - such a sweetheart trappped with a psychopath.
Stakeout
My current neighbor actually, he's an older gentleman, let's call him p, that lives with his wife. Hell randomly call over and ask about lights coming from down behind the shed I have at my house. Doesn't sound bad or weird until you know that his house is probably a good 1500 feet from there with quite a bit of dense woods in between. Only way he could see that would be if he's using binoculars.
I've been over to his house and he does keep binoculars on the table next to his recliner. He also has "staked" out our other neighbor who well call J, by parking across from their house and spying on them for hours. J has called the cops on p for sitting in his truck with binoculars looking into their house. P has also drunkenly come up to J's house and tried to fight. There's a ton of weird stuff he's done but if I typed it here it'd be a book.
Crawl Spaces
I self-renovated my side of an old, cheap, and very scary duplex in college before moving in. It was one house that had been split into two and the other side was still painted completely black inside when this group of guys moved in. So many things happened when they lived there but two stand out 20+ years later:
- My electric bill suddenly quadrupled. Turns out they had figured out how to power their side by plugging into mine through the shared attic.
- Soon after they moved, I noticed a small hole in the ceiling above my bed. Turns out they had one in my shower too. fromtheperiphery
Vacate the Premises
Lived in a small community with about 10 houses where we mostly knew one another. Someone new moved in next door (not a family, mostly male) and we didn't think much of it as they seemed nice enough and didn't cause any trouble. So my grandma was going on a vacation and told the guy next door, 'I'm going to be away for a month, just keep an eye on my family (we were mostly girls at home as my grandpa was out working most of the time), he was nice and he said sure'.
So months pass by and suddenly one morning the house was vacated in the middle of the night. A few days later we read in the paper that that guy was actually arrested by the police cause he was big time gangster and he has been on the 'wanted' list for quite a while 😬😬.
The Highlights
This is gonna get buried but lived in the hood in a small town and here's some gems:
Shooting across the street where someone's dog was killed
Drug house next door that got raided at least 5-6 times while I lived there
Upstairs neighbor who dealt weed (not a big deal) but threatened to kill us if we ever told anyone
Neighbors after he moved out was a super physically abusive dude and his gf. Had to call cops constantly because we could hear her screaming bloody murder. When they moved out there was holes in every wall, knife holes (like someone threw knives at the wall) and a big blood stain in the back bedroom.
Thats just the highlights! Glad I moved out of the hood.
Bonfire
Season 2 Clique GIF by BBC
Giphy
I had a set of neighbours that, to this day, take the biscuit for scummy, terrible neighbours.
They would blast music and shout well past acceptable times. I'm talking 4 in the morning and I can hear their kids and themselves argue.
They would light a Bonfire in their tiny cement yard any time I put washing on my line. Any time.
The Bonfire would be fed with clothes that still had tags on. Including security tags.
One lovely summer morning I opened my back door to a sanitary pad on my doorstep. A used, duct taped sanitary pad in the very center of my doorstep.
We moved not long after they moved in. Our landlord had the gall to ask us why. Lol.
Well, I don't know about y'all but... I'll be checking every door and window tonight. And I think I'm going to start googling names and maybe do some light surveillance of everyone on this block. Not that I've been accosted by anyone but some behaviors have left a question mark or two. We can't be too careful.
Want to "know" more? Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again. Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
Curious to hear about some of the more creepy indiscretions people get away with, Redditor Flytechofficial asked:
"What is perfectly legal, but creepy as hell?"
These things that happen in public restrooms can be considered criminal.
Respecting Splash Zones
"Using the urinal next to me when there were plenty of other choices."
Nightmare For The Pee-Shy
"hanging out in a public bathroom timing how long people pee."
Bad Timing
"I swear to God. I did a lot of work in hospitals for a while, big f'king hospitals with tons of bathrooms all over the place. For some God damned reason, regardless of what time or bathroom I selected to take a sh*t in not 30 seconds after I sat down a janitor would knock on the door to clean the bathroom. It's not as if it was one janitor, just some random janitor would inevitably need to clean whatever bathroom I was in as soon as I got comfy. It's like I was being stalked by the janitors."
"So now I'm trying to take a sh*t knowing full well there's somebody out there actively timing how long it takes."
Looky-Loo
"I was drunk in a casino and went to use the washroom. The floors in there were a polished marble or something. Sitting on the toilet, pants down, my stall neighbour made eye contact with me on the reflective floor tile."
The following examples involving minors have no legal repercussions.
Outside Watchers
"Technically, you can stand on the sidewalk and stare into someone's house through a window. It's not illegal as long as you stay off of their property, but it's really freaking creepy."
Keeping Tabs On Someone's Age
"A national newspaper having a countdown for when a child actress becomes 'legal' for sex."
"Answers to questions that will surely come. ....Yes. The Sun (UK). Emma Watson."
– pdirth
The Young Subjects
"When I was a child, we had a creepy horrible neighbor that would harass my family constantly. One of the things he did was stand at the corner of his yard and videotape me playing in a pool with my friends (we were around 8). My parents called the police but were told that it's legal if he's on his property."
These perfectly harmless examples can give you goosebumps.
Macabre
"Hanging your doll collection from the trees in your yard using string made from human hair."
People's Taste
"I believe the act of cannibalism itself is legal so long as you didn't murder anyone to do it. If your homie gives you his arm to gnaw on, it's fair game."
I recently treated myself by going to a movie theater after what seemed like a long hiatus for much of the year.
Streaming blockbuster movies from home, while convenient, has never made as much of an impact when compared to the moviegoing experience.
But after my recent trip to our local AMC, I'm beginning to think watching entertainment from the comfort of my quiet home is a much better option.
I forgot that a good majority of audience members are disrespectful and pretty much ignore all the rules—including no texting or talking during the movie.
The normal volume conversations and the number of lit screens from people's smartphone's in my peripheral vision throughout the movie were huge distractions.
Maybe as I'm getting older, my patience has worn thin, or I happened to have a particularly unpleasant experience. But seriously, how can anyone enjoy going to the movies when people are constantly updating their status inside a darkened auditorium?
It should illegal. Rant over.
I feel like if there is nothing after life, it just invalidates life. But maybe I'm just dramatic. I hope there is peace. Thoughts?
black and white two funerals GIFTogether...
"When we die, the whole world as seen by us, dies together with us."
"Yes it does. As does the entire universe. Only when we are alive can we experience the passage of time. The instant we die the entire universe will experience heat death and cease to be. It my take a million eons but since we can no longer experience time it will be relatively instantaneous."
- OkEbb749
Thanks Alan
"It's one of the great wonders of life: What will it be like to go to sleep and never wake up? And if you think long enough about that, something will happen to you. You will find out, among other things, that it will pose the next question to you: What was it like to wake up after never having gone to sleep? That was when you were born. You see, you can't have an experience of nothing. Nature abhors a vacuum. ~Alan Watts"
So Romantic...
"When I was much younger, I had a dream where I died. Not a typical dream, not a romanticized dream. It was a dream where I was an archer in a medieval battle. About 5 minutes into the battle, chaos was all around me, and I watched an opposing archer aim and loose an arrow straight into my left eye."
"I remember the sensation of impact, ringing in my ears, and falling to the ground. I remember the warmth of the blood on my face. The feeling of life leaving my body, and the sense of worry evaporating into warmth and peace as the world left behind me."
"I remember waking up shortly after thinking that the feeling and reality of that experience was so vivid and so detailed that it must have been an experience from a previous incarnation hundreds of years ago. From that moment on, I've never feared the actual process of death. I feel like I've experienced it many times before."
Erase
Computer Reaction GIFGiphy"I think one of your best friends delete's your browsing history."
"Take the hard drive out of my computer at home… Put it in the bath… And make sure it's completely wiped. -Tensai Slime"
If you love me... rule number one... HIDE THE EVIDENCE!!! Let that be heard far and wide. And dreams, always so intertwined aren't they?
Before & After
Happy Baby GIFGiphy"Exactly the same as before you were born."
- whumoon
"I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it. -Mark Twain"
Moving On...
"We clean the bed and assign it to another patient."
"The REAL reason why nurses are so dark. 90 year old man in hospice got hit by a car on his way to get fitted for his funeral tuxedo, and didn't have a DNR. Kept him alive for four hours, and now it's time to document everything that was done to save his life because there will inevitably be a lawsuit from a family member who has had four years to say goodbye but somehow didn't get to."
Again...
"Play again?
Yes
[No]
I don't know what they mean or how to utilize them. I'm a Buddhist (but a gamer first and foremost) so it's cool you guys made those connections This totally makes up for r/movies continuously banning me."
Oblivion...
"I've answered this one before but here it is again. Either two things happen after you die: you either go somewhere or it's oblivion. If it is oblivion, then we're just going back to the same place before we were born and there's nothing wrong with that. We were there for billions or trillions of years, possibly infinity."
"You lose that concept of time since your brain doesn't work anymore so you don't even know it's over. It's not nothing because nothing would be something and that means that you are aware, which you can not be if you're dead. If we do go somewhere, then that's something no one understands because no one has ever come back to tell us."
"Those stories of people coming back after they "died" and "saw stuff" weren't really dead. Their hearts stopped but their brains were still working. If the Universe continues to recycle itself infinitely, then there's a chance we will be reborn or continuously reborn but have no memory of our previous selves."
- jamoh20
On Holiday
"When I was a kid I drowned while on holiday with my family, a giant fat man jumped in the pool on top of me and no one noticed till I was on the bottom of the pool. I remember the feeling of my lungs being on fire, then shivering then as everything was going dark a strange sense of peace and I was ok with it, No panic or terror then it went black."
"I was resuscitated at the side of the pool a few minutes later. I remember nothing from the black to being "alive" again. I was around 7 when it happened and since then I've been strangely at peace with the fact that one day I will die and slip into the dark void of nothingness. Hope that helps."
Popcorn?
500 days of summer cinema GIFGiphy"You wake up in a chair in a cinema and learn that the other are past lives of you and you're about to watch your next life very soon on the big screen."
The truth is none of us know the truth. We live everyday with the afterlife being a gamble. And that seems like it's going to have to be enough.
Want to "know" more? Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again. Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.