Nasty Neighbor!

June 5, 2008 | Filed in: Uncategorized

WARNING REALLY LONG RANT!!

We have lived in our house for about 4 1/2 years. We fell in love with the huge yard and the fact that a bike path and 13 acre park are in our back yard. The house itself is OK, actually more than OK, but all those quirky things that surprised us at the open house are the things that drive me crazy about this house now. But really we bought for the yard! We were familiar with the neighborhood as we were only moving about a mile or so north-west of our old house.

We moved from a smaller house and yard on a street with stay at home moms and kids running wild. We loved our neighborhood and our neighbors; block parties in the summer, Oktoberfest in the fall, a progressive holiday dinner in the winter. It is what this little pocket of a city we live in is all about. I assumed all of Clintonville was like this. Boy was I wrong!

Within the first week of moving, our single, lady neighbor was full of questions, and not the kind of get to know you questions you usually ask new neighbors. More along the lines of; what are you building? Will that dog kennel smell? Can you move that rabbit hutch that is on your side of the fence that I can’t even see but my only child, I mean dog can smell and it is making him upset? Can you not stack your wood so high, it scares my child, I mean dog. Later that week, my mom and her dog were visiting and Sammy the dog was chained up out front in our shady front yard when my nosey neighbor came over and yelled at my Mom for leaving the dog chained up outside all day. Hmm, did I mention my mom was just visiting. “What is her name?”, I asked my husband. Oh well I guess there’s plenty of time for that, we have only lived here a week.

Then we started getting these funny letters and valentines addressed to us from our dogs asking us to let them live in a world with out chains. There was no return address either. We received letters from the police department warning about our dogs excessive barking. Hmm, we do live on a park were strangers and strangers with dogs are often walking on the bike path behind our house. Luckily we never had to pay any fines. We had visits from the dog warden telling us of complaints they received about the way we keep our dogs. He checked out our kennel and our dogs and scratched his head at the complaint. We also have a gas house on our property that is a small single story building that is an invitation to any 10 year old boy to get on top of and throw walnuts off the roof at his little sister. That is until a cranky voice told him to get down. “Who told you to get down? “ “Our crabby neighbor. What’s her name anyway?” “I don’t know son. But we have only lived here a year.”

Later that summer my husband and kids started building a tree house in an area of property that we maintain but technically don’t own. They set the posts and put the platform up. The following summer they finished the tree house complete with a front porch to watch baseball games going on in the park as well as fireworks on the 4th of July. All who passed by were eager to share their childhood tree house stories and admired the craftsmanship and the time my husband and kids spent together working on it. We hung a rope and a hammock near by and it really started to feel like home. Until that week we received a letter from the park telling us to take the tree house down, a neighbor had complained. “Who?” I asked. They couldn’t tell me but it didn’t matter anyways since I don’t know that #$%&*! s name anyways. So down came the tree house. We salvaged all the pieces and covered it with a tarp for the winter. We talked about finding a new place to put it, closer to the house and two weeks ago the project began again.

Right in the side yard between our house and the crabby nameless neighbors house!

She was out of town most of that weekend so when she came home and found a large bucket truck idling in what she claims is her front yard and posts about 10 feet in the air looming over her fence-she freaked out!

Once again, She Who Shall Remain Nameless, barked requests and questions our way. And sure enough the code enforcement man was knocking on my door yesterday. He asked me some information and took a photo or two and got back to me later in the afternoon with the news that we are in compliance with all tree house building codes. Sorry, name that I can not bring myself to type, but this is the house that Joe built and we are thinkin’ of painting your side pink and running electricity to it so we can light it up and play music just at the legal level!

Really we have tried to be nice and neighborly. We know you are bitter and lonely. We are sorry your Vegas marriage only lasted 1 week. We tried to help when you were out in the yard, in the pitch black screaming because your only friend, I mean dog, killed the neighbors, sisters cat he was watching. We showed our concern for your dog when he was gored by a deer while running of leash in the park. Funny, isn’t there a leash law? We didn’t make you move your flower bed or garden wall that is on our surveyed property by a good 4 feet. But this is our neighborhood now. We will make this yard our own. Complete with vegetable gardens fruit bushes and trees in that sunny front part of our yard that you have been cutting for all these years yet we pay the taxes on. You will move that garden wall to make room for my expanded strawberry patch. We will put that treehouse up in our very wide side yard and my kids will laugh, scream in delight and run wild with their friends in this north west side of Clintonville.

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I just stopped by to check out what you had done for the Unplug your kids Project and saw this instead.
I am so sorry you are having to deal with this kind of neighbor.
I love your attitude about it though. By the sound of it, it sounds as though she certainly needs a taste of her own medicine.
Good luck and stay well.

You go girl!

You know, she could have had such a lovely time with y’all as neighbors. She could have had shared produce and invitations to awesome BBQs and gifts of art projects and someone to be a FRIEND but she blew it. Her loss. But it sucks that her negativity has to worm its way over to your happy yard. And when you paint that side pink? Make it fluorescent pink. Better yet, wall it with mirrors so it’ll glint and gleam and drive her crazy while also sending all that bad energy right back at her.

dang. you go, girl!

Ha! I was going to say what Laura said. Seriously, life is far too short for that crap. You tell her!

you go girl! can’t wait to see the finished treehouse photos.

Maybe, somehow, a thaw will come yet. We can hope, right? Your treehouse sounds like something childhood dreams are made of. (Really love, and often copy, your art projects, by the way.) –Nancy in NC

HA! I was gonna ask if it was against code to paint “F@*K YOU!” on her side of the tree house, but I like Dawn’s idea better.

I think Dawn said it best. She really lost out on a wonderful neighborly relationship. I’ve been there. The family that lived next door to us drove me up a wall. Their eldest son actually re-roofed and dry walled a shed in the back yard where he would live in the summer and sell pot out of. That is, when he wasn’t flicking cigarret butts into my yard. One day the whole family dissappeared. A family contractor showed up, fixed the place and sold it to a lovely couple. May this happen to you. (the last part, not the first obviously)

(to the tune of Ride of the Valkyries) ” Passive Aggressive, Passive Aggressive, Passive AGGRE-sive, passiveaggressive” This calling the city thing without talking to you first seems the most irritating to me. I would probably have to take myself over there and share the code inspectors findings with her, mentioning that I thought I’d cut out the middle man and try to establish some direct communication between us. But then, I’m always itchin for a fight.

TANYA—She loves to go behind our backs and when Joe has confronted her she denies things. The itchin’ for a fight part-well me not so much. I may be tough on paper but in real life I am spineless! Except for the one time Jake and Molly were little and out of control at the grocery and some old lady sneared and made some stupid comment and I so inappropriately said “Fu$^ You!” to her. I was having a really bad day and that was years ago!

It sounds like you’re the nasty neighbor. Don’t you think that if you had spent some time getting to know her (and at least knowing her name) that maybe she wouldn’t be so grumpy towards you? Take some time to get to know her… Bring her some sweets, talk to her, visit her weekly - I’m sure she’ll change her attitude towards you. It will make both of your lives easier.

Gosh Kristen, why didn’t you think of that? Now you can finally live happily ever after, guaranteed.

I had a similar problem, be sure to use that property that is actually yours, put up a fence, trees, whatever you need to do and tell her she may not take care of it. Our neighbors had attempted to claim the land since they took care of it for so many years, before we moved there. Good Luck! I feel for you!

will you post pics of the step by step process of the tree house? i would love to see! we don’t have a tree to put a tree house in…ours are not the kind that a house would fit in…but maybe there’s something i could use in your project! i love to take projects and tweak for my uses and this is something i’ve wanted to have for my kiddos.

[...] The neighbors behind us are trying to sell their house. They’ve already moved but we got to talk to them today. They are awfully nice neighbors so I’m a little nervous about someone else showing up there. On the other hand, I know how badly they want to sell it so I’m rooting for a buyer even though an empty house is less worrisome to me than potentially awful neighbors. [...]

Oh SARAGRACE we aren’t in Kansas anymore. You must of missed the part where I said I was the one that moved into her neighborhood-she should have brought me cookies! And you must have missed the part where we helped with the dead cat and her gored dog. She isn’t elderly either. She is my age so I won’t be visiting!
But NANCY, I do hope for a thaw- that would be the best case, but it will have to come from her side.

TINA-I will gladly post tree house updates!! My husband will feel like a star! I have some book suggestions I can post too!

Oh oh oh! Book suggestions on the tree house please. My husband and our otherside neighbor are scheming to build the kids a “tree” house over the fence.

Gee…I’ve been missing all this fun (I moved and we have been painting, cleaning and stripping wall paper…I HATE wall paper!!!). I’m w/ Carol…don’t let her use any part of your property if only for future legal reasons. Good luck!

That dude in the middle of the last pic is HOTT!

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