parking problems

[Ant]

Your neighbour's behaviour sounds totally outrageous and she ought to be thoroughly ashamed of herself.

Do come along on Friday, chuff. The more the merrier, and you could tell me at which end of Secret Street I need to leave the family rustbucket.

[chuff]

shall look out for your gigantic audi, leave space for my crappy silver odd car though.

Actually we did try to buy a house on one of the Alleyn roads before buying here but lost out, should have found some more money from somewhere at least then we might have had interesting neighbours.

I need exercise, have eaten a hefty amount of chocolate today due to feeling bullied by the locals.

[ratty]

Worth mentioning at this point, and maybe I am causing paranoia, but didn't that young pregnant lady in Clapahm get shot twice in the head by a neiaghbour over a parking dispute?

I'd get the first blow in and make it fatal if I were you. No point in taking risks!

[mockney piers]

Actually I was going to bring up this incident on a more serious note. If this is what things have come to in London, then perhaps you'd be better off inviting her to dinner and giving her a nice scotch rather than starting things of in a confrontational manner, tempting as that might be given her behaviour.

I hate to sound like one of the Waltons, but being nice to someone can be incredibly disarming. Mrs Mockney has started using this technique in business and it can really pull the rug from under the carpet of some people who think tantrums and confrontation are the only way to get what they want.

[chuff]

I have thought about that actually and do worry about possible repercussions. I am confident however that this particular neighbour is unlikely to shoot me but she does have teenagers around sometimes so they could potentially be trouble.

My own boys are far too small to pose any problems for them.

It's the end of the street with the lowest odd numbers, but not the first house as the old lady there is quite sweet....

[spymum]

Clever Ko, you are a master sleuth!

Chuff, your road is really pretty. Don't worry, I am sure that the grumpy neighbours will soon come round and start being friendly, silly old Victor Meldrews that they are!

Just smile, give them a cheery wave and park away to your hearts content.

spymum

(Blog: Posh Mum)

[chuff]

I honestly did try to be nice yesterday when the conversation started.

Originally as I got out of the car she came and asked me to move my car because she was expecting a delivery. I said 'yes of course, when is the delivery arriving?' 'all the time' was the reply! Ok I said, I am out again in 1 hour so will be moving then, please knock on my door if it arrives beforehand and I will move. I don't know where you live she said, just there (pointing) said I.

I don't have time for this says she, you are inconsiderate to people with babies and the old people.

Me - shocked - What? Excuse me but this is a public road etc etc. Her then telling me that the neighbours all agree that I should park somewhere else and leave the spaces free. finishing with me saying I don't like your attitude and don't understand your point, her, I don't have an attitude I am a peaceful person and I don't have time for you - goodbye.

it's all very strange, I really don't want to make enemies but I don't think these people are interested in being friendly with their neighbours only their own little circle.

We are thinking of selling up and moving back towards ED, Forest Hill etc.

[mockney piers]

Well you have my heartfelt symapthies chuff you really do. I do rant on here about the me me me culture, but this is just absolutely typical behaviour, 'my space', 'consider me', yet never do these people consider anyone else.

I may have to post a copy of the letter the residents committee jsut posted around our estate. Shocking self-absorbed nonsense!!

If they keep up an attitude and are impervious to your approaches then give them a copy of the highway code and ignore them sadly.

I really hope you don't have to move, that would be terrible, especially as it is a lovely part of ED, even if it does look like Letchworth ;)

[Polly D]

Chuff, this is horrid. Are you seriously saying that this person feels she can dictate who parks outside her house? No she can't. If you blocked her driveway then that's a different matter. Do not let her bully you into moving - expensive, stressful and ridiculous. As Ratty points out, these things can become more serious.

Not that I think she desverves it, butyou could buy some biscuits or chocs or something and pop round to talk about it with a nice cup of tea. If she still feels the same, learn to ignore her (it's the sort of thing that would reduce me to tears but it's not worth it).

PD

[chuff]

the moving thing isn't really due to the incident yesterday. We had been speaking about it because we need more space now and thought we might find something larger and cheaper so we have less of a mortgage back towards the roads that we know and love. This was just one of those little things that makes you think about it more seriously, especially if you can't ever see yourselves fitting in properly or more to the point your children finding friends in the area.

we are going to carry on parking where we can and have decided just to smile and shrug and say, yes parking is terrible around her isn't it and then walking off.

[Huguenot]

It must be quite an oft encountered problem - when people park outside my place (being next to the top end of LL they do all day every day), and I happen to encounter them in the act of parking as I emerge from my house, the embarassment, anxiety, combativeness on their behalf is almost palpable!

Me, I just give them a wink ;-) as I've never owned a car....

PS, I agree with Mockney; confrontation with neighbours is bad news - they can make life very difficult for you! It may be that she was expecting you to be a casual shopper rather than a neighbour, and was all tensed up for a proper row and got deflated and confused when she realised she didn't have a strnog position (hence the walk-off). She may even have thought you were lying? I'd grit my teeth and invite her over for dinner :-S

[capt_birdseye]

Huguenot Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

I'd grit my teeth and invite her over for dinner :-S

... and poison her, good thinking!

[chuff]

hmmm poisons, not to up on those. Might speak to mr chuffs father though who knows very much about these things...

and Huguenot yes I would agree that normally she might have mistaken me for a non-local but we see these people everyday and have done for the last six months. Our children are regularly popping out of the side gate on their bikes and trike to go up and down the road or to the park and not once has anyone spoken to us or even acknowledged us. Our oldest doesn't go to school around here as we aren't in a postion to pay for the independent schools in the area and the only other option in our catchment is a church school and we are not churchgoers so I wouldn't expect them to go there. Maybe that is our problem, we don't fit the typical brief for a family in this area.

I'm sure too that there was great speculation as to who was moving in to our house when we did as not many of them come up for sale very often. I have decided that we will have a very noisy bbq sometime soon and invite all of our less desirable friends to lower the tone.

She knew she just didn't want to have to engage in normal conversation with me.

[ClareC]

Excellent idea! A bring a car BBQ rather than bottle!

[Keef]

Maybe they saw THIS, took it seriously, and thought it was you ;-)

[chuff]

ha ha, they would know just by looking at our car and our unfashionable furniture etc moving in that DM wasn't me.

I am definitely not that classy. Also CL Gardens are most definitely out of our price range!

loads of people are parking here today, I can see them all from the side of my house and I have been happily dancing about every time someone parks in front of her house.

You would think I had better things to do really wouldn't you?