Thing one is that my house is covered in a not-so-fine layer of dust. I knew this was going to happen with a remodel, but it’s kind of impressive. There is still a hole in the basement floor, but it’s all filled in with dirt again, covering up the plumbing that was laid in the trench. Mere, being the asshole that is a cat’s birthright, is using the loose dirt as a bathroom. SIGH. I cannot really do anything about it. I should have asked a friend I had over for dinner the other night how the house smelled. She’s the good kind of honest.
Thing two is that my neighbor is starting to give me the creeps a little bit. I went out to get the mail from our shared mailbox cluster and she came out behind me. I passed her on the way back and I was going to give her the cut but she deliberately stopped me.
“I’ve been wanting to talk to you.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Are you planning to cut your hedges back any more?”
“What? Probably? I don’t know.”
“Well, by my raised beds. There used to be hedges there, but now there’s not.” I’m starting to understand why the previous owner let everything completely overgrow on the shared property line. I kind of shrugged. “I just know that YOU like YOUR privacy, and I like MY privacy…”
This woman and her obsession with what I am doing in my yard, I tell you. No further cans are even remotely possible. It’s JANUARY. Who is out in their yard right now, steaming about this? My neighbor. I don’t even think about my yard unless I have to right now.
I walked away. I am not going to have any more conversations with her about my hedges. I wish people would just say, “I hate your stupid face and I am mad I have to see it over my fence.”
“She’s just a mad person who wants something to do and be mad about,” P. said, when I told him what happened.
“Don’t talk to me unless something is on fire,” I will say, the next time she stops. “And then you should probably call the fire department.” In the meantime I am making plans to have the south side of the house that faces her where she had the lilacs razed painted orange, with a mural of a middle finger. Actually, I am planning on painting a mural on the garage with the girls next summer. She’s going to hate that so much.
Too bad for her. You can do what you want.
As dorrie said, you can do whatever you want!
I straight up don’t talk to one set of neighbors anymore. And similarly, that neighbor, who moved in during the winter and is a tenant, kept trying to tell me my box elder was dead and that I should “do something” about it only to see it bloom and leaf in the spring like so many deciduous trees do.
Maybe next time you see her and she tries to talk plants, just scream out, “WHERE IS YOU HORTICULTURE DEGREEEEEEE?” and throw a clod of dirt at her and run away? I am obviously not a diplomat….
If the bonest friend to which you referred is me, your house smelled nice. No poops detected.
Oh, LOL. HONEST, not bonest. Although I am the bonest, too.
Those people who just want to be mad…
In Australia there’s a hedge whose common name is “Neighbour-be-gone” (it’s a fast grower).