How a Texas Family Served Up Chicken-Flavored Justice to Their Slumlord
There’s a special place in storytelling heaven for tales of petty revenge—especially when the villain is a slumlord and the Texas summer heat is the unsuspecting accomplice. Imagine this: You’re a parent with two young kids, enduring roaches, mold, and malfunctioning AC in a run-down apartment. At last, your lease is almost up. You move most of your belongings, but you still have five days left to clean up and get the last odds and ends. When you return, you discover your landlord has yanked out your appliances, trashed hundreds of dollars' worth of food, and left it all baking in the sun. What do you do?
If you’re u/Imaginary_Drawing351, you get creative. And a little bit chicken.
Roaches, Ruined Meat, and Righteous Rage
Let’s rewind: As recounted in the viral Reddit post “Slum Lord Payback,” this Texas family endured five-alarm-level apartment hell—flooding, mold, bugs that could probably pay rent themselves, and an AC system that was mostly decorative. The finish line was in sight: just five days left on their lease.
But the real slap in the face came when the leasing office, in a move that would make even the Grinch blush, prematurely removed every appliance and dumped their freezer’s contents—meats, groceries, all of it—into trash bags. Then, as if to add insult to injury, they left those bags outside on the porch, where the Texas sun did its worst.
Furious, OP (the original poster) stormed to the leasing office. The response? A half-hearted apology and a full-throated refusal to compensate for the ruined food, even though the lease wasn’t up. As u/BooBoo_Cat exclaimed, “What terrible landlords. You still have several days on the lease. They stole your food!” No truer words have been typed.
The Poultry Payback Scheme
So, what’s a wronged tenant to do? Enter the era-old tradition of petty vengeance. OP and her boyfriend decided if their landlord wanted to play dirty, they could return the favor—chicken style. They took what was left of the ruined meat and stashed it in all the apartment’s darkest nooks and crannies: inside vents, behind toilet tanks, spots that would make even seasoned cleaners shudder.
It was, as u/geronite99 put it, “chef’s kiss” revenge. And in the sweltering Texas heat, with no AC to circulate even a whiff of relief, the apartment transformed into a meaty mausoleum. When OP returned a week later, the front door was thrown wide open—an act of desperation rather than hospitality. The smell, paired with a biblical swarm of flies, made even approaching the door an ordeal.
u/chalavet summed it up perfectly: “Poetic justice served Texas-style. I bet that landlord still smells phantom chicken every summer lol.”
The Art and Lore of Stinky Revenge
Reddit’s r/PettyRevenge community knows a thing or two about creative justice, and the comments section quickly turned into a masterclass in olfactory warfare. The infamous “shrimp in the shower curtain rod” revenge, as mentioned by u/CoderJoe1, is apparently legendary—so much so that stories about it have traveled from body shops to Reddit threads for decades. OP, however, clarified that “we didn’t have shrimp. We were too poor at that time 😂.”
That didn’t stop others from sharing their (sometimes fishier) strategies. u/BanditKitten suggested, “Mayo on a white wall is a classic in this case!” while u/Mission_Progress_674 recommended sardines, pilchards, and anchovies for optimal stink and “to attract cats from miles around.” If you’re looking for full-on pest chaos, u/Organic-Low-2992 offered this gem: “Take off an outlet cover in the kitchen and pour 5 pounds of sugar into the wall... They will never get rid of the roaches.”
But perhaps the most visceral validation came from commenters who’d survived their own spoiled meat horrors. u/nutmegger23 recounted a seafood fridge fiasco that left their house uninhabitable for days, while u/Life-Significance-33 described a post-vacation deep freezer disaster so foul, his wife let him smoke his pipe indoors just to mask the stench. Solidarity in stinks, friends.
When Petty Is Justified—and Effective
Was it legal? Maybe not. Was it justified? The consensus is a resounding yes. As u/Taelven pointed out, the landlord’s actions—removing appliances, destroying property, and entering without notice—were not just unethical but possibly illegal. “You’re exactly right, this is basically burglary. ‘Oops’ isn’t a valid excuse,” agreed u/Just_Aioli_1233.
And the ultimate result? OP never got her deposit back or any compensation for the food, but it’s a safe bet that the landlord’s next tenant didn’t move in anytime soon. Sometimes, karma doesn’t knock—it just seeps out of your air vent.
Conclusion: Have You Ever Served Up Justice—Texas Style?
Petty revenge may not save your security deposit, but it sure does make for a legendary story. If you’ve ever fantasized about getting even with a shady landlord, take a page from this Texas tale. The next time you see a slumlord sweating through an open apartment door, just remember: sometimes justice smells like chicken.
Have your own revenge story (petty or otherwise)? Drop it in the comments—let’s keep the tales (and maybe the air freshener) coming!
Original Reddit Post: Slum Lord Payback