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Irritating neighbours

Sporadic Sparkly

Do you have neighbours who annoy the heck out of you?

Back in the summer, I received an unexpected visit from my council housing officer and one of her colleagues. The reason being that a complaint had been made to the council about the state of my garden. Furthermore, the complainant had also contacted the MP for my area, which had resulted in the MP putting pressure on the council to get their tenant (me) to sort out their neglected and overgrown eyesore of a garden.

My son had been with me when this visit took place. Although the housing officer could not tell us who the complainant was, my son and I were both 99.9% sure that the complainant was a particular neighbour of ours who has a reputation for being a bit of a bully.

Fortunately for me, my local council know that I can struggle physically. It was made clear that if I was perfectly able-bodied, the pressure being applied by the MP would have resulted in the council pursuing the legal route and taking me to court. That said, if I was perfectly able-bodied, it's unlikely that I would have allowed my garden to end up becoming an eyesore.

It wasn't the complaint as such that irked me, but the fact that the complainant had not considered the option of sharing their concerns about my garden with me first. I'm not an unreasonable person, or at least I don't think I am. 

I have what I consider to be a good rapport with the rest of my neighbours, but it seems like this one particular neighbour seems to take great delight in trying to antagonise and intimidate anyone and everyone to get what he wants. As my son said, if the state of my garden was causing the neighbour distress, there was nothing stopping them from going down the neighbourly route and offering to help me get it sorted.

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  • I’ve got nosy neighbours who are curtain twitchers and seem to know how many times a day I leave the house, what I had for breakfast and my blood type. They often group up with each other for a good chinwag and stand on the pavement like they own the public path, I’m surprised they haven’t dissected it up yet and claimed ownership of it. Perhaps it’s my lack of care for mundane issues like overgrown gardens but some people simply have nothing else going on in their lives so like to stir up trouble for others. And as you stated at the end of your post there they could just have a friendly non confrontational chat with you about the garden without involving local authorities which is going to be seen as a step too far. 

  • in reply to Autismman
    Autismman said:
    I’ve got nosy neighbours who are curtain twitchers

    I have to confess that some of my neighbours possibly consider me to be a nosy curtain twitcher. If I happen to be near my windows and something catches my attention, I find it impossible not to look. I'm a curious person and looking out of windows and watching the world go by is something I have done since early childhood.

    If I see my neighbours chatting to each other outside, I consider it lovely that they are being neighbourly and talking to each other, even though some of their conversations might seem uninteresting to me. With the exception of the one neighbour, they are a pretty decent bunch.

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  • in reply to Autismman
    Autismman said:
    I’ve got nosy neighbours who are curtain twitchers

    I have to confess that some of my neighbours possibly consider me to be a nosy curtain twitcher. If I happen to be near my windows and something catches my attention, I find it impossible not to look. I'm a curious person and looking out of windows and watching the world go by is something I have done since early childhood.

    If I see my neighbours chatting to each other outside, I consider it lovely that they are being neighbourly and talking to each other, even though some of their conversations might seem uninteresting to me. With the exception of the one neighbour, they are a pretty decent bunch.

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