There’s nowt so strange as folks

Let me set the scene for you…

You’re a parent of a pre-teen and you have dogs. Two big dogs. You’re looking for somewhere to live and you come across a charming property in the centre of town. One major drawback is that it has no garden, indeed no outdoor space at all. Fortunately your landlord is a major landowner in the town and there’s an overflow carpark behind one of the other residences they own just down the road, and permission to use it comes with your tenancy. This other residence also has a garden. Can you see where this is going…?

You send your pre-teen and any accompanying friend to romp around the garden after school. You also bring your dogs there, allowing them to run on the lawn off their leads, and to do that thing which dogs do when offered time and an expanse of grass. You do – to be fair – collect any deposits in your little pooh bag.

Except…

1. You, your pre-teen and your dogs do not live there.
2. You’ve not asked anyone for permission to use this piece of private property.
3. The tenants at that property are no longer permitted to keep pets themselves, for the specific reason of maintaining the unsullied nature of the communal grounds.

Is there a way of describing this person as anything other than a cheeky fucker? I’ll wait….

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Stirring no further than that self-same garden, we come now to the person Himself has dubbed “the mad woman” (he has a penchant for giving our neighbours nicknames, but is usually a lot more creative). This lady has already attempted to persuade me we should provide her with ground floor access to water (she lives on the first floor) so she can wash her car and her garden furniture – a service apparently provided by the other ground floor neighbour, who’s now moved. I’ve ignored this, successfully I thought, until…

On Saturday morning, when the sound of scrabbling was heard outside our patio doors, Himself whispered to me, “I think it’s the mad woman, don’t open the curtains!” But to no avail, for there followed a sharp rap on the patio doors. I open up, only to find she’s placed her garden table right by our patio doors, while saying “I’ve moved it here as you might as well use it too, because I rarely do”. Except that when you do use it, you’ll be sitting eyeball-to-eyeball with us – erm riiiiight.

Reader, I maintained my cool, thanked her… and then lied through my foul teeth. That lie meant we had to immediately go shopping for garden furniture! We now have a truly lovely garden bench, and I’ve agreed to a rather fine table, but have drawn the line at the firepit and the big BBQ. Garden furniture was on our list, but was not a priority – but we’re enjoying the Vitamin D infusion 🙂

Seriously though, isn’t wanting to position yourself within two feet of your neighbour’s living room somewhat odd? I mean, obviously I’m lovely 😂 but Himself usually intimidates people 😉 Years ago a friend called me a nutter magnet, clearly I’ve not lost it…

Anyone else a nutter magnet, or am I just lucky? How would you suggest we might deal with these two rather determined ladies?

© Debs Carey, 2025