A couple of weeks ago I was awakened by a lot of barking. This is unusual as Ernie usually only gives a woof or two at a drunk stumbling up or down the stairs. When the barking wasn’t stopping I got up to hear the door knob jiggling. I put on my best scary voice and yelled “Who’s out there?”… a meek little voice answered “Mary”.

I looked out the peephole to see a really drunk girl with her head on the door trying to shove in a key. “You’ve got the wrong apartment” I say. “No I don’t” answers Drunk Mary. I tried again to persuade her that she had the wrong apartment. She wandered downstairs but I didn’t hear the front door open and close.

About 20 minutes later Drunk Mary was back… we repeated the same scenario. This happened 2 or 3 more times with about a half an hour or so in between failed attempts. As one can imagine, each time Drunk Mary came back, I was less and less “pleasant” about dissuading her from her stubborn and misguided attempts to get into my apartment.

The next time our hapless intruder came back I asked The Lady to handle it. As it turns out, The Lady is the Drunk Whisperer! She calmly and assertively said “Hi, please go away” and just like that Drunk Mary was on her way. It was just like watching the unruly dog suddenly walk nicely on the leash.