Opening the floodgates

[miki]

These are things that really bother me but in the grand scheme of things they are not that important. But they still bother me. Feel free to add your own vents and get it off your chest before the weekend starts.

I live on a cul de sac adjacent to a condo development of many small apartment buildings. The front of my house used to face the wall of shrubs planted along the perimeter of the condo property. We had a nice screen so that it seemed like we had a nice, cozy street. HAD is the operative word. The condo folks razed the entire stand of trees and shrubs to the ground so now when I look out the front of my house, I see parking lot and apartment buildings. I feel like I live in the projects. (I know this is a big exaggeration, but this is my vent.)

On a related note, one of my neighbors has 2 boxer dogs that she likes to walk unleashed. They noticed that the wall of greenery is gone and ran wild running all over the parking lot, the street, my yard... Animal control has already been by to talk with the owner because someone, not me, complained. Even though I should have complained. There have been occasions in the past when the dogs were running loose and I have almost hit them with my car comming down the street. And they have charged at me and DD while we were out walking my dogs. The neighbor always says her dogs won't hurt my dogs or anybody. Try telling my dogs not to be protective and ready to fight when your dogs are going berserk on my driveway. And try telling my bawling child not to be afraid of 2 really big dogs barking their heads off. Anyhow, the other day when the mad-dogs were running loose as I went to our mailbox, I told the boyfriend of the owner they needed to be leashed. He promptly blew me off and I promptly called the animal cops on them. And I deposited the crap that their dog left on my lawn back onto their driveway.

DH just tells me that his parents are coming to spend the night on Saturday. It's no problem for them to come. They have a good time with DD and DD thinks they are fun. They are not actually coming to visit us. They are house hunting around here but it's kind of a long drive for FIL to do twice in a day. But give me a little notice because I need to do laundry to have clean towels for them, buy bedding for the new mattress we got, go grocery shopping for the stuff they eat.

I wish that moms of older toddlers would properly supervise their kids at Gymboree so that younger toddlers who are not as steady and still need some help to play don't get bowled over. Quit chatting with your friends and watch your kid!

Aaaahhh.

[babymama]

Neighbors can sometimes be the worst. Our across the street neighbor has 4 cars to one household and only 2 people drive in that house. Their garage is jam-packed w/ junk, so they can't actually park cars in the garage. He's been "selling" one car for years - it's a junkie old car. It sits in his driveway with a tiny little sign on it, that no one can read unless they walk up to the car - now is that any way to market a car for sale? He has a classic car that he works on ALL THE TIME and he parks his precious baby of a car (another hunk of junk) right at the end of our driveway. Because it's immediately behind us when we back up, we have a really tight turn to get out of our garage. I'm convinced that one day we'll hit his car bc he always places it just so close to our back-up zone. He covers these 4 cars with really ratty old car covers that he's mended about 100 times with patchwork tarp, vinyl, stray material, you name it. It's so ugly. All the other houses on our short street are fine, but his car collection really drags us all down. I know there are some that would say that I should move to a suburban planned community with strict HOA rules, but I love living in the central city and I wouldn't trade it for the world. This sort of unruly neighbor comes w/ the territory, but it's still annoying.

Lydia
Mama to Santiago, born 11/16/03

[steph2003]

Wen -
sorry to hear about all the craziness going on up by the lake :)

Hope you survive the ILs this weekend & can make it out for sushi next week!

[missym]

I'll add my car collection story...

Our next door neighbor has some obsession with Pacers. You know, ratty ugly 70's Pacers? He has 11 of them. As far as I know, none of them run. They're parked in his side yard, visible from the street. He did put up a privacy fence but has since gotten more of them so they've overflowed that space.

The best part - he moved to England and left them there! His son is living in the house while the father is overseas indefinitely.

Occasionally I get sick of looking at them and am tempted to call the cops to see if he's got them registered, but I never do.

Missy, mom to Gwen 03/03

[psophia17]

There's a playpen in the locker room at the gym, that all the mothers use (2-3 at a time) to keep their kids contained and off the wet floor after waterbabies...but the moron who hoses down the locker room floors likes to hose down the playpen, too! What a dummy! It doesn't happen often, but every time it does, it's a big pain in the behind. 14 mamas and 14 babies, there's just no way to manage it without having babies in wet clothes!

Another one - the nice friends and family who insist that it's much easier to pack up the baby, the baby's toys, diapers, food, etc., to mess with the baby's naptime schedule, and to drive an hour+ to get to somewhere that is not baby-friendly than it is for them to hop in their vehicles and drive out to visit us where all that stuff already is, and where the baby can nap while we visit...if that's how you are, I don't want to visit you!

And the FDA - I want to send my family some treats that are available here (near Vancouver, Canada) that aren't available there (in upstate NY) but the FDA has passed some stupid rule that you can't send pre-packaged food to the States unless you do a mile's worth of paperwork because it violates the Bioterrorism Act of 2002 to do so. It's a stinking box of cookies and I can't mail it to my Mom??? Are you kidding? The rules for shipping chocolate are even stricter - again, ARE YOU KIDDING???

*sigh* what is the world coming to?

-Petra

DS - Nathan, 12/29/03

[tarahsolazy]

I'm sorry Wen, I also hate it when people have uncontrolled off-leash dogs, which they claim "won't hurt anyone" I had a very timid dog who was easily freaked out, and it was Heck sometimes. I hope they get ticketed big time!

My current fave:

Why do I have DS all day, when DH is also home? I have work I need to do, grant writing, etc, but he NEVER offers to take DS for a while. As boyfriend doesn't nap consistently, there's no time to do it. I'm going to have to institute a schedule, for heaven's sake, so he knows what hours he is responsible for DS. This is the guy who was (and still is), a SAHD for 6 months.

Oh yeah, and he threw out the new mortgage bill, because it looked like trash to him! He does this with bills intermittently, and it drives me nuts. He doesn't want to do the money stuff, which is fine, but PLEASE, read the crap before just throwing it all away!

Thanks for starting the thread Wen, I feel much better now!

[lisams]

"I wish that moms of older toddlers would properly supervise their kids at Gymboree so that younger toddlers who are not as steady and still need some help to play don't get bowled over. Quit chatting with your friends and watch your kid!"

I hear ya on this one! Just recently I noticed that DD was a little more sophisticated on her feet and I worried about her harming another child accidently (she likes to run, jump, etc) so I bumped her up to the next class (explorers). There are some parents that just don't pay attention in this class, and it drives me crazy!! Since we're on the topic, it drives me crazy when parents bring their sick child to Gymboree with yellow gunk sliming down into their mouth and they're coughing all over. Do they think the other parents won't notice it? It's just gross.

Lisa

[crl]

Thanks for the invitation!

Do the construction people across the street HAVE to cut through brick during ds's nap time? Okay, so they have no idea and couldn't schedule around everyone's nap time anyway, but twice now it has been quiet when I left the house with him in the stroller and they have been cutting away when we come back with him asleep. Argh.

What's with older kids (3 to 7 years) at the playground that follow ds (16 months) around? He keeps walking away from you--that means he doesn't want you following him around and getting in his face. Does this happen to other toddlers? (I usually say he doesn't want you touching him because he doesn't know you--they still follow him around though.)

[zen_bliss]

pacers??? this just cracked me up so much i forgot about any minor irritations i could add. that is straight out of a movie. you've got to take some photos and share them. maybe he'll come back and get into yugos and gremlins to round out the ugly squat car family.

[ellies mom]

Ok, my daughter is going to have a bit of a potty mouth because of this one (well, maybe two). I hate it when you need to change lanes and the person next to you is driving just behind you at the speed where you can't get in front of them, and to get in back of them you have to practically stop. So there they are just oblivious to your signal, just right there in the way.

Ok, and my other not-important-in-ten-minutes-but-driving-me-nuts-now thing is when you are trying to turn and you're waiting for traffic, and there is always one car that is going a bit too fast to pull out in front of but slow enough to bother me. I really think they slow down once they get to that "can't pull in front of" point. I mean I'd have pulled out in front of them if they had been going that slow earlier.

[kijip]

I am sick of running into people that I know, but that I do not particularly like (and it is mutual- they don't like me) who insist on acting like my best friend for 5 minutes at the grocers, bank, shop, park or cafe and then act like I am holding them up by saying something like "SORRY we have to go!". Look lady, I have not been talking to you, I barely said hello to you and I am THRILLED that you are leaving. Don't act like I am slowing you down. Your big fat bragging/gossiping/busybody mouth is slowing you down....

Also if I hear one more long winded armchair political analysis from some person who does not bother to vote except in national years and who can't list the friggin canidates for any local races I am going to scream. I am sorry, you don't count if you just woke up to come up with a brilliant, inane remark you are copying from Fox or NPR and you will promptly go back to not paying attention till July 2008. I don't care what you have to say. Tell someone else, not me. Note- this does not include people who can't pay attention due to babies or health. Just those who care about the election for all of 7 seconds.

[smkinc]

>I am sick of running into people that I know, but that I do not particularly like (and it is mutual- they don't like me)

I hate this too. The way I handle it is to actually chit-chat for a minute and then say 'Well I should let you get going'--I know it doesn't really make a difference, but it always works. I feel like I'm in control of the situation and have yet to have someone say 'oh no, I have all the time in the world to talk to you'

Mary

[nov02mom]

I really hate construction workers right this minute! I am sure there are some who don't feel the need to start pounding on nails the second it is light outside. I am sure that some don't have to play their music so loudly I cannot hear myself think inside my own house. And I am sure that some of them GO HOME when it gets dark!!!!!!!

Can you tell there are houses going up very close to me???
Kristen