The Truth be Told Part III- A L O N G one

This is the blog you have all been waiting for.

The neighbors.

I have lived in this city for about 25 years, and mostly in the house I live in now.  I have lived a block away from crack houses, across the street from funeral homes, near busy intersections, and most of the time have had good relationships with my neighbors. 

When I bought this house with No. 2 in 1991, it was in a lovely upscale neighborhood with 1920's houses on it.  Nice neighbors, well kept houses.  On our street live judges, lawyers, retirees, school administrators, the old D.A.  You get the drift.

But there was one problem with the house next to me, that I found out after I moved in.  The owner chose not to follow the city leash and pick up law and he let his dog out off leash and the dog promptly came over and used our yard as his bathroom.  Seems the person who lived here before us did not care.The lawn was half dead, and I had two pre-pubescent children.  They were constantly stepping in dog crap.

One day while I was sick, they threw the dog crap into the neighbors yard and it landed on their car.  I got a phone call from the screaming owner threatening me that if I ever did that again there would be trouble. I informed him that just because he was a lawyer he did not scare me and that HE, not I, was the one breaking the law, and I hung up.

Dog was put on a chain from that point forth, and eventually we said hi, bye, beautiful day, how do you do,  as normal neighbors are apt to do.

Flash forward 18 years. That neighbor rents his house out to a single woman with four teenagers and a huge black lab.  I knew I was in trouble when she first met me and said "I like to play my music really loud, I hope that is OK with you, if not, let me know."

The lab was left out loose all the time, and would bark 20' from my house for hours on end.  His huge poops littered my yard.  Her kids fought, screamed, threw their boyfriends things out the windows.  Tires screeched, people cursed, and the house next door turned into trash city.

I tried talking to the ex-neighbor landlord, but to no avail. He even went as far as telling his tenants that he also had problems with me and the dog. (WTF? I was NOT the one breaking the law, and I told her this!) He basic line to me was "do what you have to do".  In other words as long as I get my money,  I really don't care what is going on there.

One day where there was a particularly messy domestic dispute right outside from where I was sitting, I went upstairs, got down my boom box, put in the Ride of the Valkyries by Wagner, and blasted the CD for 1/2 hour.  Perfect music for domestic violence I think, no?  They got the message.  It was quiet for the rest of the afternoon.

I tried talking to them, calling them, offering to help them clean the end of their driveway in snowstorms, but nothing worked.  Finally I started calling the dog warden, who in this city, seems to be pretty ineffective.

Finally my neighbor and I took photos, and submitted four complaints against them, and they have to go to court.  As a result, other small petty things have ensued in revenge I suppose for my standing up for myself.

They have taken to putting their trash  on our property during trash days, with their three or four huge cans full of pizza boxes and dirty diapers from the baby of one of the teens (I say if you can't take care of your dog, how you gonna raise your kids?) and it totally blocks my sidewalk, which I do shovel, unlike theirs.  Then they leave them there for 24-36 hours until one of the kids, usually the boy, or the mother, decides to bring them in.

Last week, when I got home, I put their cans smack in the middle of their driveway.  They were empty, but I figured it sent a message, esp when they came home and could not get into their driveway, and the kid had to get out of the car and put them away so big mama could pull in, and I think she still managed to hit one of them because I heard a thunk.

I called the sanitation dept, but this week, if they do it again, I am going to drag the full cans back into the middle of their driveway, only up a bit. Oh well if the garbage men don't want to walk that far. And, if it happens again, I will drag their cans back to the side of their house and the garbage won't get picked up at all.

Then there is a snow issue.  We shovel/snowblow our driveway and long sidewalk, always making sure that we don't blow it anywhere it would inconvenience a driver or neighbor. THEY shovel their driveway and then throw the snow from it into our shoveled sidewalk!!!!!!!!  So, now we are at war.  The next time that happens, bad back or no bad back, the snow will be removed back into their driveway, and I have a snowblower, and they don't.

To some of you this might sound petty and mean.  But I am at a point in my life where I have no patience for people without brains or who think they are entitled to live a lifestyle that hurts others.
I pay a good chunk of my hard earned money to my mortgage and taxes, and will not let the quality of my life be effected by people such as these.

Photo is of one of the piles of poop I cleaned up and left in their driveway where their car pulls in. It sat for days before someone cleaned it up. Subsequential poop was flung over onto their property, and whereever it lands, it lands.  Do you think that they would get the message? Nope.  And it seems like until they move I am going to have to assert myself but calling the city and taking my own steps.

The house is for sale. I hope the landlord and the realtor check on it often as the sign keeps either falling down or being taken down. 

Patti O War.