I had a bad day yesterday. All kinds of bad. Be forewarned, there is foul language in this post and it’s long. But kinda funny.
It started out with a knock on my bedroom door when I thought I was home by myself. It scared the holy living crap out of me which isn’t a fun way to wake up. Turns out it was the oldest child. She had spent the night next door and let herself in our house thru the garage which is what I told her to do so it wasn’t her fault. She came in to ask if it was alright if she went to Jacksonville with her friend. I told her it was and went back to bed.
Then, I’m hearing voices and I’m like, “What the heck?” So I get up to see what’s going on and it’s my daughter and the girls from next door and they’re cleaning up dog puke. Since my daughter voluntarily cleaned up the dog puke herself I figured it was one small spot and told them to hurry up and go back next door.
THEN, the youngest knocks on my bedroom door with her friend that she had spent the night with. Oh. Did I mention that there was no school here on Friday? I was totally looking forward to sleeping in on Friday which didn’t happen at all. So, at this point, I have five girls in my house and I’m losing my patience. I told the oldest and her two friends to go back next door and the youngest to go play then I tried going back to bed again. I realized my mistake right away when I’m hearing complete silence. The youngest took my direction to mean to go outside and play which I didn’t want her doing alone and when I was in bed. So I get up to tell her to come back inside and this is when I finally vive up on sleeping in. Oh well.
I walk into the living room to a vomit smell and puke stains EVERY freaking where. What I thought was one spot was at least ten different spots, one of which I suspect was diarrhea because of the nightmarish odor it had to it. I could do nothing but stare in horror at my carpet which I had just had cleaned a month or two ago. I have totally lost my mind at this point. I opened the front door, told the youngest to get inside and all the rest of the neighborhood to get off my porch (including my oldest) and the youngest had her own meltdown on the street which got her sent to her room. So now I have a pissed off oldest daughter, a bawling youngest daughter, two sick dogs, puke everywhere, and I am still in my pajamas. But I’m not crying. Yet.
I grabbed my steam cleaner out of the garage, mixed up some cleaning solution, and went to work on the carpets. Some of it came out but from where the oldest had tried to clean it, not very much of it was coming out at all. This is when I start crying. I went through two tanks of cleaning solution before I gave up. I called our carpet cleaners to see if they made emergency house calls to find out that they don’t and they can’t fit me in until TUESDAY. Meanwhile, I have stains setting in and the puke/diarrhea smell is horrible. I’m crying over the phone too which is humiliating but at this point, I can’t seem to stop myself.
I resigned myself to waiting until Tuesday, Febreezed the hell out of my house, and went to hide in my bedroom and cry for a few hours. I was truly sad and pathetic. Oh. And the oldest didn’t go to Jacksonville with the neighbors because they took two hours to get ready to go and I guess they started bickering with each other. She came home and she and her sister were very quiet while they watched me warily for the rest of the afternoon.
After I had had my self-pity fest, I came out of my room around 2’ish for lunch and the kids decided to get out while the gettin’ was good and went outside to play. My day is finally looking up, right?
The oldest comes in the house about 20 minutes later to tell me that a baby squirrel was being extremely friendly and was letting her and her friend pet it on our front porch. Wow, right? I told her to be careful because they can bite and went about my business. The Mister had come home from work somewhere in the middle of the day so we were upstairs when the oldest comes in crying and saying that the neighbors had yelled at her again. These are the neighbors that live behind us, not the ones with the kids she plays with. Now for a little back story.
These neighbors live on the cul-de-sac behind ours and their yard is directly behind ours. We’ve never talked to these people and they are the only people my dogs have EVER barked at. And I mean out of all the three different neighborhoods they’ve lived in, they’ve never barked at people. Other dogs, yes. People, no. But they bark like mad every time these people go in their backyard even if my dogs are inside. Also, last year on Halloween, they yelled at my kids and a few others to “get the eff out of their yard” when they were running around the neighborhood for trick or treat. I let that go and just told the kids to stay away from them. Then, I started noticing that someone or several someones in that house stand in their back door and stare into my house. I know. Sounds paranoid, but it’s all the time and once I caught them looking into my kitchen with binoculars. By now, I’m pretty weirded out by these people but I have solar screens on my windows so its pretty hard for them to see much and I started keeping my blinds on the backside of my house shut. They’ve also periodically yelled at my kids (and other’s kids) to stay out of their yard over the past year. What the dispute is, is that we have space between our respective fences and the neighborhood kids like to play back there in the ditch. Not the cleanest but I didn’t figure they were hurting anything. That’s where my daughter was when they yelled at her yesterday. There’s a tree back there with tons of acorns and she was watching two baby squirrels eat when they came out and yelled at her to get the eff off their fence and out of their yard.
They picked a gosh freaking bad day to send my kid home crying over freaking acorns I’m telling you. The Mister and I decided that enough was enough and went out to see what the heck was going on. I’ll admit, I was spoiling for a fight. I’d had a bad day and I was sick of these people yelling at my kids and making such a case over a freaking ditch for pete’s sake. So, the Mister starts out real nice and asks them what’s going on. They said something about how they were tired of our kids playing on their fence. I asked them what was the harm? They said that I wouldn’t like it if they were on my fence. First off all, I probably wouldn’t even notice as it’s a 5 ft tall privacy fence and secondly, as long as they weren’t peeking over it into my house, defacing it, or digging it up, why should I care? This went on for a bit with the woman talking in this reasonable, “we’re nice people and you’re horrible neighbors” kind of voice and I am really starting to lose my cool. I mean really. The Mister is still talking to them in a reasonable sort of manner and my voice is slowing rising with each thing that I say. I don’t even remember what was said at this point. All I remember is her holier than thou voice and that she kept talking over me and interrupting me. I finally lose it and say something about how they are being unreasonable and that I can’t talk to people like them and to stop looking in my effing house. She’s all, “Excuse me?” And I’m like, “You heard me (I’m yelling pretty loud. She heard me and the people in the surrounding houses with their doors shut probably heard me too). Stop looking in my effing house! You people are the worst neighbors ever and you’re complete assholes! You’re asshole neighbors!!” I’m totally screaming at this point and I’m not sure if that’s exactly what I said but I know I used the “f” word at least once and assholes twice. Then I slammed into my house and went across the street to the neighbor whose son plays with my kids behind our house to tell her to tell him that they can’t play back there anymore because I can’t take the fact that these people are assholes and just looking for a reason to start crap with me. I told her what happened and she was pretty unhappy too because they have yelled and cursed at her kids too. She said we should go the HOA president and let them know what was going on but I don’t see how that would help anything and declined. She also told me how they shine laser lights into her windows at night. So, it’s not just us that have been having problems with these weirdoes.
Pictures from two different angles. Click on them to make them bigger.
I completely admit that I could have handled the situation better and that if I hadn’t been wading through dog puke all morning, I would have had a cooler head. But this has been building up for a year now. If they have a problem with my kids, they should come to me, not scream at them and cuss at them until they come home crying. Yesterday wasn’t the first time they had come home crying because of them. Not even the first time this week. Earlier this week, they had been playing with one of those rubber balls, you know the size of basketball but they’re lighter and colorful? Well, the wind took it and blew it into the neighbor’s yard. Not the peeping toms but the house next door to them. This house belongs to an old bat that hates kids I guess. It was my daughter’s ball and she refused to give it back. How mature is that? She also took my strainer that the kids were playing with in the backyard too. The point of that? I don’t know. She was in her backyard putting in her two cents during the confrontation too. I’m sorry. But if you live in a neighborhood with kids, you have to put up with them. They annoy me too on occasion but I certainly don’t cuss at them and steal their toys. This is a young neighborhood where young couples would buy their first house kinda thing. Not a retirement neighborhood. Get a freaking grip.
The peepers also told the Mister (this was after I had left the scene) that instead of worrying about what they are doing that we should be paying more attention to the oldest sneaking out of her bedroom window. Now, I’m not naive enough to think my kids are never going to sneak out at night. I was about this age when I snuck out for the first time. However, I didn’t have to go through two screens to do it. It would be impossible for her to put on the solar screen from inside the house and our doors cause the alarm system to beep every time they’re opened. I’d hear it. And since we always get up before she does, I would have noticed her running out to the backyard to put the screen back on. Sure, she could sneak out but I don’t see how she’d do it unnoticed. At least out of her window anyway. She’d have better luck disarming the alarm system and walking out the front door.
I hate them and hope they rot in hell. Yes. That’s evil but it’s how I feel and I’m not sorry for it. The next time they yell at my kids, I don’t care if they’re throwing rocks through their windows, it’s ON! She probably has 30 pounds on me but I have righteous anger on my side. Their son, who is maybe 18 or 19 invited the Mister over for a fight yesterday too, lmao. Stupid kid.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was my day. Drama filled and puke filled. I’ve always said that neighbors suck. I’ve kept myself to myself for a year now and look what happens. I put up wiht a lot from those people, the peeping and the verbal abuse of my kids and didn’t say anything for the sake of peace and look where it got me. Maybe I need to move to Montana where you can buy lots of land and live in the middle of nowhere by yourself.
