Neighbors

I’m totally ticked with my neighbors! We used to live in lovely isolation, until the farmer who sold us our land decamped with his family to Idaho. He sold the rest of his land to a developer and now we have six houses along our western lot line. Unfortunately, neighbor number three has nothing to do all day but look out their window at the very old willow that is falling apart bit by bit on OUR land.


This neighbor called the Property Standards department of our city to complain that they had to pick up some branches from our willow from their lawn. Unfortunately, all this was supposedly done, and disposed of, prior to the call to the inspector. Now, this tree is more than 60 feet from their lot line. Since the tree is east of them, and the winds are westerly, I find it really difficult to believe that anything of substance could have landed on their land. What absolutely burns me is that they called the city without bothering to speak with us first!
I haven’t been to that part of the lawn for easily nine months. It’s not where we have a line of sight from the house. And, I’d be the first to admit that this tree is an eyesore. Large branches have been breaking off and falling for several years. But, the point is, they are heavy and they fall straight down. I seriously doubt they could possibly touch the neighbor’s yard.
The upshot of all this is that I’ve had discussions with the Inspector about whether the entire tree will have to be taken down, or only the portion that is dead. We had a contractor visit this morning at 6:30 (he’s in cahoots with that darned bird, I think), and he gave me his proposal to remove the brush, trim the tree to the live limbs, rake the area and cut up and leave the wood. If I hire him, it will set us back $575.00! And this is all to satisfy a neighbor’s whim.
I’m planning to look for the ugliest fencing I can find, and install a fence between us….just across the lot line between us and house number three, because once that area is cleaned up, I don’t plan to let them share the view.

6 thoughts on “Neighbors

  1. lol perhaps it was the contractor who deposited that bird early in the morning hours. Now as for the nosey neighbor what a bitch! It would be wonderfull if that bird or lets say a rooster, somehow made it into her backyard *evil grin*

  2. Here is what I propose…..buy the prettiest fence you can find to look out on your side of the lawn and then on their outlook have some graphiti *however you spell it* exspiring artist come and paint the uglest mural on their side of the fence for them to look at *big big smile* and then invest in a roster LMAO

  3. Sounds like a plan, Jamie! I see that you and Lois collaborated on the rooster. The woman who used to live on that land had a wonderful collection of chickens, and the roosters crowed at all hours. I suspect this neighbor would complain about them.
    I’m going to check into fence regulations! *G*

  4. Rock on, girl! Just make sure YOUR side of the fence is the pretty one, and hire some starving artists to do a ghetto mural on the other side, maybe some nice windchimes made from abandoned hubcaps! After all, it’s not in YOUR line of view, yet it expresses your variety of taste in artforms, so what can they possibly do? Plant a willow tree?

  5. I know what it is like to live pretty much in isolation and then suddenly have neighbors. Fortunately, we live in a wooded area (called New Hampshire) where it is the norm to have standing dead and 1/2 dead trees mixed in with the live – so no one can complain.
    They couldn’t complain anyway because there are only strictures agains junk yards (the unofficial type) – that is the nice thing about living in a town that is zones “Rural”!

  6. Keep your tree. Screw ’em!
    Have the papers dropped on your lawn near to their home and let DH pick it up in the mornings in his boxers! That should give them suppem to quarrel about! (If he is anything like the type of guy I am….couldn’t give a damn!) 🙂

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