July 30, 2006

Neighbours who suck a$$

I live in a townhouse. I used to be flanked by neighbours who, to the right, screamed at each other and their kids, constantly; and to the left, had a revolving door/unofficial drop-in centre for teenaged boys who liked to drink and gamble online. Good times for all.

I found myself shaking my head in disbelief at my good luck earlier this spring when both units were vacated within a month of each other. I did so, of course, with the trepidation of not knowing who their successors may be.

On one side, I now have a lovely young couple with a small child, and a dog who, despite being the size of an elephant, has never had an offensive "deposit" left on the lawn for more than a moment before his owners scooped it up and disposed of it. This huge dog also never barks (whines occasionally, being a husky). Could not ask for more friendly and respectful neighbours.

On the other side, we have Hillbilly Heaven. The patriarch of HH is a quiet, middle aged gentleman. He isn't the problem.

His adult son and daughter-in-law, and their 3-year-old, are the problem. They keep their own unit and lawn, tidy and clean enough. Everything looks nice. It's their utter lack of respect for others that sends me to the moon.

Adult son has never worn clothing on his upper body. Like, ever. And lives in a red ball cap, camouflage shorts, and workboots. Daughter-in-law is quiet enough, but I'm guessing she's not overly bright. 3-year-old is disrespectful of others' things, particularly my garden tools which I place neatly on my front step for the next time I'm to use them; and my six-year-old's toys; he has also squirted me in the face with a water gun - twice - while his mother, 20 feet away, said nothing.

They have a friend who visits with two little white dogs; these dogs are prolific in bowel elimination, and it never gets picked up. Fab.

They have parties that last till after midnight. Said parties happen to take place outside our bedroom windows at the back of our house - pop quiz, does excessive alcohol consumption make a group of people (a) quieter or (b) louder? You only get one guess.

This morning the daugher-in-law was sitting on her front step with a friend who lives in another of the townhouse units here who coincidentally also has a 3-year-old, who loves to screech at the top of his lungs incessantly. His pronounciation is really poor, so I guess he makes up for it in volume. But I digress. They were sitting outside having their morning coffee and cigarettes, watching the two boys play. One of the little boys had to pee. Braniac from the other unit tells him to go pee on the tree. So he hangs it out in the middle of the lawn (nowhere near the tree - not that peeing on the tree would have been okay) and lets a stream go, while the two "adults" who were responsible for him laughed their a$$es off. He got some great arc, I'll give him that. Too bad that next time someone walks across that part of the front lawn, they'll be walking through another human being's body waste.

On a related note, I recently discovered the album "Specialist In All Styles" by Orchestra Baobab, a great Senagalese band. The album sounds (to my untrained ear) like Indian or Algerian singing style, with Mexican music. Talk about fusion jazz. :) My personal favourites on the album are Ndongoy Daara and El Son Te Llama.

I've chosen this morning to listen to it. And you know, you really can't get all the nuances of the music unless you've got it at a pretty good volume.

It's sooooo beautiful today. Think I'll go open all my windows.

No comments: