Neighbor Profiling

Is there a Home Owners Association Screening Program?

You know, like before we let someone move in the hood, can we screen them?  Check out their background.  See how they dress, what kind of car they drive and how many pets they house? 

It would have been greatly appreciated if that were the case last summer when the sweet neighbors on the left (if you're in my house and looking out the front door) of us moved out.  They were an elderly gentleman and his wife who really minded their business and kept things looking fabulous in their yard as well as mine.  It was not uncommon for me to come home from work in the afternoon to find my next door neighbor in my back yard picking green plums for his wife who was craving them because she had an iron deficiency.  Occasionally, he would leave us some tomatoes in a brown paper sack.  We traded our fruit.  It was nice.  Some weekends my husband would go outside to cut the grass and it would be literally HOURS before I heard the lawn mower actually start.  The neighbor was bending his ear.  A LOT.  As the years went by the neighbors on the left were getting older and less capable of keeping such a big house that was for just the two of them.  Times started to get difficult financially and they moved into a small apartment just a few miles down the road.  We were sad to see them go, but completely understood.  Their health was deteriorating and it had become difficult to keep up with the yard and cleaning the house at their age.

I really miss them. 

I miss them because what moved into the house on our left, (if you're looking out my front door) is the complete *opposite* of what used to be there. 

One sunny afternoon my husband and I were in our backyard playing catch with the boys.  I know it sounds like such parody but it's really true this time and I'm not trying to paint a beautiful picture.  Because really, this gets ugly.  There was some commotion on the other side of the fence and I'm a nosy person so I stepped up on a bench and noticed that we had some new neighbors moving in.  Yay!  My husband steps up on the bench with me and introduces himself to the....young old aging lady who is trying to keep her two black labs in the backyard.  I notice she's wearing a spaghetti strap Harley Davidson tank and some jeans that look as though she had to jump from the roof right into them.  And, no bra.  Oh, this is not going well for me.  After our introduction she says:

This sure is a quiet neighborhood, y'all don't mind a party every now and again that can get kind of loud do you?  This here neighborhood doesn't know what they're in for because we like to get LOUD.

I lowered myself off of the bench and went directly into the house.  My husband kind of giggled and said it was nice to meet her and told her to have a good day.

It really hasn't been the same since the day the rednecks new neighbors moved in.  For one, they have 3 dogs and 4 cats INSIDE the house.  That's not the real issue.  There are also two very large Black Labs outside that bark. Loud.  Non-Stop.  All day.  All night.  They bark because they are tied to the column on the back porch with a small leash no longer than 2 feet long.  Their food and water bowls are 2 and a 1/2 feet from them, so they bark.  The dogs are tied to the column because the fence is broken.  Their fence is broken because the dogs tried to escape the back yard and the literally tore it down. There is a trailer propped up where the gate used to be to try and keep the dogs inside the yard.  Ya, that doesn't work.  The dogs sometimes come over to my house and rest their ferocious bodies on my front porch and wait for me to get home so they can terrorize me.

As of today there is only one dog in the back yard.  I swear on my great grandmothers grave that I do not know what happened to the other one. 

The police have been called to our neighbors house (on the left) a total of 67 times. 

I have not called the police 67 times.  Forty seven maybe.  But, not 67.

The neighbor directly behind my fence as well as the neighbor to the left of the rednecks all-night party people called me on three way calling before to complain about the dog barking. 

I've even called a towing company to come tow their 5 cars they used to park all along the street and in front of my house.  There's a law in the city that I live in, which says they can't park on the street. 

They don't park on the street anymore.  THEY PARK IN THEIR YARD!!!!!!!!

During the month of November I didn't have to call the police at all.  Not even one time.  There were no cars parked in the yard.  There were no towers of beer cans being knocked over by tennis balls that were purposely thrown at the beer can tower in an attempt to see just how many of those beer cans could be knocked over.  My children didn't come wake me in the night to tell me they couldn't sleep because the neighbors were keeping them awake with their loud music and foul mouths.  It was pure bliss.  I even thought there were new neighbors because for the first time EVER, the yard was mowed and shrubs were trimmed.  There were no cars parked on the front lawn. 

Last night, over the sound of mine and my husbands sound machines AND my wonderful breathing apparatus I heard the faint sound of a dog barking.  That familiar sound grated on my nerves horribly and I thought I was having a nightmare.  I got out of bed and went to the backyard.  Sure enough Black Lab is back and barking. 

Hubby called the Law.  My blood was boiling.  I was so confused and curious.  Was the last month or two just a figment of my imagination?  Had I just slept through the barking?  We stood on the front porch for what seemed like 30 minutes waiting for an officer to show up.  (Oh yeah, it was thirty minutes - stupid cops!).  When the officer arrived, he knocked several times the next door neighbors door.  There was no answer but there was one car in the driveway.  The officer confirmed that he indeed heard the dog barking and then came over to our house to talk to us. 

GUESS WHAT Y'ALL??  Our *stupid* neighbors have been in jail for the last 30 days because they refuse to pay a fine they received from the City of ****ood for being a nuisance and disturbing the peace!  How lame is that?  They would rather be in jail than pay a fine???  Now, that officer maybe wasn't supposed to tell us that so y'all don't tell anyone OK?  Especially don't put it on the Internet because you know how that shit gets around!

Don't you agree that we should have some kind of HOA Screening Program?  It would have been nice to know that the woman who wanted to buy the house next door didn't have a job and was living off of insurance money from her dead husband and that her grown children of 19, 22 and 26 are also living at home along with their boyfriends/girlfriends and they don't have jobs either, other than the occasional night of bar tending for a friend of a friend of a friend! 

P.S. I found out that they have a scanner so they know that the cops are coming before they actually get there, that's why they don't answer the door for the officers. Meh!