Published on 12, July, 2020
I've realised that people prefer it if I start with pleasantries, not just going straight to the point of what I want to say.
e.g. just now I went to get my recycling bin after it had been emptied. At least I thought it was my bin. I saw my neighbour getting into his car so I called 'is this my bin?' He looked blankly at me and said, 'hello, how are you? Haven't seen you for a while.' I was confused, I needed to know if that bin was mine or his. He was confused because he hadn't seen me for a while and wanted to say hello, not talk about bins.
Then it dawned on me, ta dahhhhhhhhhh! I should have said 'hello how are you?' Before launching into the questions about the bin.
I like to get straight to the point, never mind chit chat. Most humans prefer the chit chat first.
I hope this has been helpful
As an aside, why not just paint your house number on your bin?
Then there'll be no confusion, and you won't have to speak to your neighbour
It is on there but he was standing in the way getting into his car, so I couldn't really push past him to look at the other side. I had to actually talk. Anyway, he's nice, he helped me when someone crashed their car into my fence.
I have stickers. My neighbours are great though. They don't demand interaction.