I've become ''that'' neighbour

We have two sets of neighbours. The ones to the west/north west and the ones to the east/north east.

Our western neighbours are great. We have the nice Newfie guy next door (the one with lung cancer). We have the resident neighbourhood lookout (he's the one who knows everyone in the neighbourhood and all of their business - but not in an irritating way) He's the one who's wife is also battling cancer. We also have the couple who are around our age - the wife is finely leathered from sun exposure and the husband seems nice enough but has only ever said two or three words to me. But they never seem to get annoyed by the kids balls and Frisbees repeatedly ending up in their veggie garden. All in all, they are all great neighbours. They are nice to us, we are nice to them, they are all on the Christmas card list.

The neighbours to the east, however, are a whole different story. Now granted, there is a tree line that separates our yards and we are elevated above them slightly so the opportunities for 'chit chat' over the fence is not there, though the playroom window overlooks one neighbours yard perfectly and the front yard sides the other neighbours yard perfectly.
So, there are two neighbours in particular on this side. Mr. Green Lawn, so named because he has a yard that is immaculate (seriously, we're talking Hank Hill obsessed with keeping his yard green - there is not a weed to be found on this mans lawn. It's really a thing of beauty) The thing that rubs me is that he's got this gorgeous back/side yard and no one EVER uses it. EVER. It's fenced off. There are no lawn chairs. There are no umbrellas, nothing...just a green square. Anyhow, in our 8 years here they've never once said hi to us. Okay, not the friendly sort.

Then there is "playroom neighbours" so named because we can see their yard from our playroom. Sean has talked with the old woman (the grandma I think) who used to live there and the husband walks their dog past our house everyday and even once snowblowed our sidewalk and the lower part of our driveway (despite the fact that we don't actually live on the same street)
But the wife has never said hello. She also bitched out the cable guy this past summer when he had to put a ladder in her yard to re run our cable line.
So again, not overly friendly folks but we've never had a problem with them.

Until last night.

Last night at about 9 pm we suddenly hear music blasting - so loud it could have been coming from inside our own house. We quickly discovered that playroom neighbours kids (older teens/young adults) were having a party. This family has many parties, and they do tend to be loud but it's their voices that are usually loud and that doesn't bother me. Have fun! But, this was different. This music was ridiculously loud.

I was getting madder and madder and I finally said to Sean, you can go over or I can go over but either way they are being asked to turn the music down a bit.

So we both went.

Now let's establish that Sean does not like confrontation whereas I love a good brawl, especially when I'm on the 'just' end.

So Sean knocked on the door while I waited in the driveway. A girl got out of the car and said "I guess you want them to turn it down?" I said, "Yep, my son's bedroom window is right there and I can hear it as clear as day in his room"

So she went into the yard and we followed. When we got to the side of the house the door opened and the mom was there. Sean asked her to turn the music down to which she gave him a 'look' and said "Well, not too much. They are allowed to play it loud until 10 pm"

Here's where I lost it.

So the exchange goes something like this.

Me: "We didn't ask to turn it off, we asked to turn it down. I can hear every single word of that music like it's in my house. My son's bedroom window is right there. He's two years old. He's trying to sleep."

Her: "Okay but we have until 10 o'clock."

Me: "I don't really give a shit! It's too loud, it doesn't need to be so loud that I can hear it in my house like that. My son is in his room screaming hysterically because it's so loud he can't sleep" (okay, so this was a lie, he was sound asleep but she doesn't need to know that)

Her: "We'll turn it down a little but not all the way because we have until 10 o'clock"

Me: (now I'm really pissed and yelling) I didn't ask for it to be turned off - but turn it down. You have until 10:00? Fine. I'll bring my son over here and he can scream in your house for the next hour! How would that be? That's what I'll do, I'll got get him right now and he can scream in your kitchen until 10:00. Turn it down!!! Be considerate of other people, you're not the only people in the world!!!"

And then we left.

They did turn the music down. Thank goodness because I know calling the cops would be futile, they have better things to do.

They did however, exact their revenge. At about 11 pm we heard two loud thumps at the side of the house. We looked out but with it being dark we didn't see much.

This morning however, we saw three or four pears along the side of the house (they have a pear tree in their yard)

Mr. Green Lawn's yard is also littered with pears and crushed beer cans. That will go over well, I'm sure.

So yep, I've become that neighbour. The one who bitches when the music is too loud. I guess I really am getting old.

(though I'll admit, I was wishing I had a noise canon like the ones the cops use for riots....that would have been some fun at 6 this morning!)

These are crazy economic times.

When I get my first paycheck on September 24th it will have been over 3.5 months since my last real paycheck. I closed my daycare (unofficially) on June 25th so my last fees collected were two weeks before that.

We've managed. It's been tight and thank God for Visa - we've been able to supplement when we've been short.

It's been worth it though - robbing Peter to pay Paul because it gave me the summer with the kids (even if they did ignore me) and it gave me the summer with myself...time to become amply bored with being a SAHM. I couldn't do it, not just for economic reasons, but just out of sheer boredom. I was never a SAHM really because I still worked at home (for the purposes of this post I mean with an income providing job because I know just as well as all of you that SAHM's work their asses off - they just don't get any money for their efforts) So kudos to you mom's who stay at home with your kids. No amount of Mommy and Me classes or playgroups would be enough to stop me from tearing my hair out.

I'm going somewhere with this.

I'm cheap. Yep, I said it. I'm not going to nice it up with pc words like frugal, conservative, economically careful....I'm a scrooge. But only on certain things. For instance groceries...if I can get generic I will. But I won't sacrifice some things, like say, pasta. I can't generic whole wheat spaghetti so I only buy the brand name. I won't do white pasta. Yuck. Pop is another thing. It's diet Coke or nothing.

When it comes to clothes, well, the only reason I bought new clothes for me was because I was going back to work and had to look the part (and damn - I looked fabulous this week!) For the kids though, I'm cheap.

I'm coming out with it. Get ready. I buy second hand. You wanna know why? Last year Mary successfully put holes into the knees of all but 3 pairs of pants. And the reason those 3 survived was because they were jeans - Mary doesn't wear jeans so they sat in her drawer untouched. She also stains every shirt she wears within minutes of having it on. This is why we buy 'busy' patterned clothes for her. It's not just about the 'very Mary' look, it's about being able to wear it despite the chocolate and Sharpie smudges because you can't see them - they blend in with the pattern.

Emily grew 3.5 inches this past year. I'm not kidding. It's on the kitchen door jam cookie jar ladder (confused? I'll tell ya later) So needless to say, her clothes don't fit her long. She does however have a fabulous friend who is one size bigger than she is who hands down a lot of beautiful clothes to her. The problem is, the changing bodies - this girl is tall and very thin whereas Emily is pretty average sized all the way around. So for her, it just makes sense to buy stuff second hand. Add on to this her growing 'need' for brand name stuff.
We've talked about this before. I'm not opposed to her wearing a Bench jacket but I refuse to spend $100 on one so if she wants one she better be buying herself.

And Connor - well, he's a boy. We needed a whole new wardrobe for him - we don't have any hand me downs (actually not true - Emily's friend above has a younger brother (Mary's age) and we have most of his size 5 and 6 wardrobe. I look forward to not having to buy Connor clothes for probably a good solid two years.

Today I took the kids to Value Village. It's a local charity second hand store. It's where we send all of our outgrown clothes (Ironically most of them came from there in the first place) I can outfit my kids in really nice clothes; Gap, Children's Place, Carters at a fraction of the true cost simple because they are gently used. (though a lot of the stuff is NWT)

A new on opened last week so we popped up there and Emily found her dream come true. She snagged herself a lululemon hoodie for only $25. It looks like it came right off the rack at the store. She came tearing through the place eyes wild, face red, jumping up and down "Look what I found, look what I found!" Under other circumstance I would have balked at paying $25 for anything second hand but let's face it - we're talking about a $100 hoodie.

So, I managed to get Connor a whole seasons worth of pants, some jammies, a hoodie, Emily's hoodie and a pair of jeans, some pants for Mary, some toys for my class and a toy for Mary and all for under $100. Can't beat that.

And it's a damn good thing too because you see, the girls have only been in school for a week and already I've written $93 worth of checks to the school.

These really are crazy economic times.