My Next Door Neighbor Stuck a Nasty Letter in My Kitchen Door

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

66. It sucks to have nasty neighbors.

I live between a nice older woman and a nasty couple. The nice one always waves and says hi (from a distance these days) and has done things like help me get my car un-stuck from a ridge in the alley created by a snowplow. The nasty neighbors have been jerks for years (they are Karen and Brad, for sure), but the worst thing they did was use Round-Up to poison a swath of my garden all along the property line because they don't like my landscaping (no grass, all native plants). When I complained through a lawyer (they refused to talk to me about it), they claimed as an excuse that the property line wasn't really where it's always been acknowledged it to be, marked by their landscaping as well as mine, by a low fence belonging to them, and by a survey marker that's probably been there for 100 years or so. I've lived here for 30 years, they've lived in their house for 12 or so, but they never contested the property line before. Their lawyer wanted me to get a survey; I said hell no. That lawyer must have given up because that was the end of it and nobody poisoned my garden this year. "Brad" has been relatively nice lately and I haven't seen "Karen," who is the worse of the two, at all. I don't know where they are politically. It's easy to assume they're Trumpers, but I've run into some Democrats who were assholes, so you never know.

I can't imagine siccing city inspectors on a neighbor for anything less than a gross eyesore or a health hazard
(and you really should be able to identify poison ivy before you claim somebody's growing it), but inspectors have their purpose, and if your neighbor was ordered to get her lawn mowed I guess that's a good thing. It usually has to be pretty bad before the city will issue an abatement order. It was obnoxious of her to accuse you of it, and apparently she assumes you'll keep plowing her side of the driveway. But sometimes it's a good idea to love your enemy because it will drive them crazy.