As I sit here in my bedroom, in a house I pay a monthly mortgage for, I can hear, over the loud TV, dog barking.
I have a next-door neighbor, whom I love, who owns a German Shepard. This is a good dog, and barks only if another dog is within their property. The neighbors on my other side have two shiatsus, which bark like mad when they smell me in my back yard, but, lucky for me, they are inside dogs, and only come out to pee or poop.
The lady next to them owns a black cocker and a black lab. She lets them roam the street as they please, crapping in my yard and causing other dogs to bark. When locked up in the back yard, they too, bark like mad, at virtually everything.
But the line has been drawn recently.
The people who USED to live behind us have moved. In their place, a nice family of a man, a woman, and 2 girls has moved in. With them, come 2 dogs.
These dogs bark all the time.
At any, and everything. They hear a truck in the neighborhood, they bark, I go to my trash can, they bark, a dog in the neighborhood barks, they return with a bark. Their barking then causes other dogs to bark, in which case, the dogs behind me continue their barking.
I thought I left this crap when I moved out of an apartment complex, but I bought a pair of earplugs today. This is my house people. I should not have to buy earplugs to sleep peacefully. But last night, I assume someone in the neighborhood was moving, so a moving truck was coming in and out. This caused the dogs to bark. I was up till 11:30pm hearing the barking. I gave up trying to fall asleep and went into the living room to lie down and watch a Harry Potter movie. I fell asleep eventually and came to bed. I walk into my dark bedroom, stop, listen.. I hear barking, still. I glance at the clock... 12:30am.
I go into my bathroom and take a muscle relaxer. My muscles feel fine, but I don’t care, I will drug myself to sleep. I go back into the living room, flick around the TV for a while, then give up, and decide to go to bed and read until I fall asleep.
Sure enough, my wife tells me I fell asleep with a book in front of me with the lamp on; she turned it off at 4:30 this morning.
Friends... tell me, why do people own dogs and keep them outside?
Cattle, I understand, poultry and hogs, I understand. Goats, sure, keep them outside. But if you are going to buy your family a pet, and all you do is keep it in the back yard, you don’t have a pet, you have an animal that you keep locked up in the back yard... why? I can’t understand this???
Worse yet, if I had a dog and it barked past midnight, no one would say a word. Yet, if I go outside right now (9:30pm) and start saying the alphabet as loud as other dogs bark, I'd have the cops called on me.
SURELY the owners of these dogs hear them barking! SURELY it bothers them, or at least they consider that it MIGHT bother neighbors.
I am looking at my wife right now, she is sound asleep! Do I have supersonic hearing? Why do these dogs bother me so? Cats, suddenly, appear to be a wonderful animal to me!
So, by buying earplugs, have I caved in some way? Should a man be able to sleep peacefully in his own home without buying earplugs? I wore earplugs in the apartments we lived in, but I am in a HOME now!
What do I do? Introduce myself to the new neighbors and say "Hi, I am your neighbor behind you, your dog keeps me up past midnight every night, do something!"
FYI, I just muted my TV, the howling and barking was without pause and it sounds like I live in a zoo full of canine.
Is this against the law in anyway? Sound ordnance? I love(d) dogs, but now, when I lie in bed listening to them bark, I think of so many wonderful ways to do so many unwonderful things to the dogs....
What to do….
50 comments:
Jamison, I do feel your pain. My folks live way out in the country.
So this means that they have outside dogs..4 or 5 of them. The
only difference is that these dogs
aren't chained up. They are allowed to roam free...barking at whomever and whatever they please.
Now I love dogs as well..but I can't stand to hear them bark at nite...which they do every time I spend the nite at my folks house...
I'm not sure what to do about the neighborhood dogs though...but I do agree that you shouldn't need earplugs in your own home...
Read our neighborhood rules on animals... says you cant breed animals and the only animals you can have outside are dogs or cats. Then it says "Owning a pet which disturbs neighbors or the neighborhood in anyway is a violation blah blah blah..."
I may have a case!
I was going to suggest checking out the old neighborhood policy. File a complaint!
Call the police. That's a great way to make friends with neighbors.
Speaking of loud neighbors. One of mine has a tendency to play some video game (at least it sounds like a video game, I hope his musical tastes aren't so repetetive and derivitive) at late hours. I got up for the bathroom at about 3 am last night and he was still at it.
The funny thing is that at about 9 pm the other night I hung up a little painting on the wall. Had to hammer little nails to get it up, noting too loud and only a couple of taps. This guy starts banging on his wall back at me like I was disturbing his sleep.
I think its war.
be careful Brew...
Your best bet is to bite your bottom lip and go over there and tell them how mucgh it has been bothering you that you may have disturbed him one night when you were hanging up a picture.
heck, even offer some cookies Amy made to him as a peace offering.
you dont want to have a wall-banging war with nieghbors. At least after you do the peace offering, and he keeps YOU up with video games, you can just go over to his pad and ask him to turn it down a bit. Make up something like your wife works the late shift, i dunno.
In my old apartment, we had Auburn football fans above us. 2 Good-ole boys. They would invite good looking girls over often. Sometimes on Sunday morning, youd see 3 of them leaving the apartment (3 girls for 3 boys?).
Anyway, on football nights, these girls would come over with very heavy shoes, high heels maybe, and when Auburn would score a touch down, theyd do some sort of fast stompping that was so annoying.
I went up there, knocked on the door, and when the man came to the door I said "War Eagle!" And he was like "alight, this guy is on my side!" Then I said "Do you think perhaps yall could tone the stomping down just a bit? My wife worked all night last night and is trying to get some sleep." And they were like "Oh yeah, sure, sorry."
Never spoke another word to them. Sure, they did a few shorter stomps, but nothing too annoying. The most annoying was the guy next door to us, but they had a new born wo would cry in the middle of the night. This was solved with ear plugs, but even with the ear plugs I could still hear the father yell at the top of his lungs at 3 am "SHUT THE F*** UP!!!!" to the infant, then the wife would yell at him and back and forth and here we go.
I would prefer the upstairs neighbor entertainment me and Brew Sip had at Monticello... well, when they were arguing about the porn magazines she found.
There are some dogs in our neighborhood that bark incessantly, too. They live two houses down, but I think the owner brings them in at night.
I never have trouble sleeping because of them, anyway.
When we lived in Washington, GA we walked our dogs around our neighborhood often. When we did, they would relieve themselves as dogs do.
One day, Ace (our male dog) pooped in the yard across the street. it was right at the edge of the street and we thought nothing of it since nobody but us ever walked there anyway.
We continued our walk and on our way back home a police car pulled up. The officer politely requested that we go back to a house and scoop the poop out of the yard.
Even though he was polite, we were angry that the owners of that place didn't have the guts to come directly to us and ask us to not let our dogs poop on the very eedge of their yard.
I went to THEM and said I was sorry. They acted like they were scared of me. I told them I wouldn't let it happen again.
I guess my point is, be open and honest with your neighbors. I lost respect for those who were not up-front with me and gained their respect when I was honest with them. Just communicate and try to get along.
yeah, people say you can technically call the cops, but that is my last resort.
Ironically, since I posted this blog, the dogs havent been a bother...
Maybe my neighbors are reading this blog!
You never know...
Something Rachel and I use every night is a "white noise" machine. We keep our machine on the sound of ocean waves.
It lulls us to sleep and drownws out all of the outside noises (few though they be). Anyway, with a "white noise" machine and earplugs, I'll bet you have a really good night's sleep, dogs or no dogs.
Shoot the dogs.
Someday, once we move out of a townhouse, we’ll get a small dog for the family but not until then. I can’t stand the idea some people hold that having a dog allows them the right to let it shit and where ever it wants and to make as much noise as possible.
I’d go and talk to the folks with the annoying dogs before doing anything else, if they are jerks send them the bill for your ear plugs, after that write them a letter. If you’ve reached the end of your rope and they don’t care shoot it then call the cops and tell them you saw someone who was obviously sleep deprived at 3am march over and cap poochie. Leave out the description of the sleepless man you saw staring back at you in the mirror holding a gun.
I have a love hate relationship with four legged creatures. If you are in an area where you could need some security I can see having a big dog or even if you are using it to hunt or keep cattle or what ever. To me big dogs in developed areas are silly. I’d love to have a big dog but I live in a city and it would have very few places to run and play so I think it’s almost cruel to contain it in a house all day only to give it a small yard and a couple of 15 minute walks to do what ever in.
Sipper you’re a rare bird. If someone yells at you for letting you dog crap in their yard you’d apologize profusely and clean it up. Others would yell back with a few indiscriminate descriptors and leave it there. You did the right thing on both fronts: cleaning and confronting.
If you want a lap dog and it goes out two times a day on a leash and then runs back in cowering against the big wide world who cares? But then again what use is a small dog aside from bickering who’s walking it next.
If you live around an expanse of land where the dog is not going to do any harm to anyone then you’re dealing with a different set of rules. They should still be pinned to some extent.
Once you have a dog that creates a noisy ruckus then you’re imposing your creature on other people and I think that’s rude. The dog doesn’t know any better so I can only hold the owner responsible. Just like if you own a Pitbull, Chow or anything else and it has the ability to get loose and harm someone then the owner should have made sure it would never get loose, charge the owner, put the dog down as punishment for both. To the point keep the dog quite as a courtesy to those who are now having to deal with the animal who may not want to.
I really love our dogs.
I've told y'all about them many times. They're beautiful greyhounds. They don't bark. They're sweet and gentle. Great dogs all around.
But, they poop, pee, and barf inside. We keep them shut in a room with hardwood floors for easy clean-up. They only poop, pee, etc. when they're sick and can't help it. But, we don't risk it and let them roam free to poop on the only carpt in the whole ouse (which is what they do).
Anyway, people get pets, then wonder why they got them all the time. I'm glad we have our dogs. I look forward to walking them every day. They are sweet and loving and Luke LOVES them.
Anyway, I think it's selfish and dumb to get a dog just to leave it outside to annoy other people. Those folks need a good talking-to.
Im with you Mullins... I grew up with a dog at all times with me, my fave of which was a choc lab, Josie lived to be 16. She dies when I was 22 which means she was with me for over half my life...
Now, thinking about it, I cant imagine why people have a dog at all unless they own a storage facility and want dobermans to gaurd it.
FYI< I emailed our homeowners accosiation, they simply told me to give them the address of the home with the loud dogs and they would send them a warning letter... guess that $320 a year is good for something... But I told her havent heard much from the dogs since (which is true) and if they become a problem, ill let them know.
Dude, you pay $320 a year to your neighborhood association?!?!?!
Is it a mandatory part of living there or something? Holy Cow!
Ours is only $20 a year and we live in the historic district. Something's not right here.
yes, if you dont pay a homeowner association fee, they can put a lean on your home.
it is for the upkeep of the grounds, maintenece on the tennis courts and club house, and I assume decorations for the years holidays.
However, it is a nonprofit org and is comprised of neighborhood volunteers, so I assume all the money gets spent. It is $81 every 3 months.
Good grief!
I've never heard of such a thing. We got an Old Cloverdale Association thing when we moved in. We read it over and it said it was $20 a year and you had to submit any changes to your house to an architectural review board, but they had nothing about liens and such.
That sounds like highway robbery to me, but OC doesn't have tennis courts and grounds to keep, except for the parks. But, the city keeps those anyway. I had no idea they charged that much to live in a neighborhood...croike!
It may have something to do with security too, they may hire out off duty cops to hang out becuase I see them every now and then. In the almost 4 years that I have lived there, the only reported crime I have seen, heard of, or been told about was someone getting some tools stolen from his driveway, by, presumably, the people who were doing work on their house... and that was across the street from us.
Many neighborhoods are higher, and many are lower. It depends on many factors, alot having to do with how old/new the neighborhood is, whats comes with living in the neighborhood, etc. Understand, neither the city, county, or state do anything involving out neighborhood, except deliver the mail and fix the road. Even the streetlights are dealt with by the homeowners association.
WOW!
Yeah, I know the OCA has two rent-a-cops on the payroll 24/7. I don't know how they afford it all, but they patrol past my house all the time, too.
I really don't understand how they afford it because membership is totally optional. No liens, no hassle, no nothing. You either do it or you don't.
I understand now why EM has the rates they do now, though. Actually, I'm surprised now that they don't charge more!
Jamison who cleans the crop crap off the tennis courts?
all this talk has actually got me thinking...
See, the homeowners group used to be run by the company that builds most of the houses in my neighborhood, so making a profit made sense, but the home owners took it over, now "we" own it, so no profit needed...
But the rates didnt go down when "we" took it over... i may have to join the pow wow at the next meeting. It is pretty high, but since i am only sent a bill every 3 months, it isnt something I get fired up about all the time, just 4 days a year. Plus we budget for it... but still, my friend Dave M lives in a MUCH nicer neighborhood, where the average home price is $400,000 (albeit, a smaller neighborhood) and he pays like $82 a year...
Ill blog it if I go to one of these neighborhood meetings... ill embelish all I can.
whats crop crap?
Ive actually never seen anyone "maintain" the tennis court.
Loads of people use them, in fact my wife and I do. In fact, people who dont live there use them. But I mean, other than landscaping, how much do you need to do to a tennis court?
You're being "fleeced" dude.
I don't know what "crop crap" is, either.
I think I'd be asking some questions, too. $320 a year is a bit much in my opinion.
I can see them spending $30,000 a year on lawn maintence easy... there are lots of "common areas" that need to be mowed and such... but still, there are over 400 houses here: $320 x 400 = $128,000
And the volunteer fire department gets none of those funds... Nore does the clubhouse so I have just learned (club house is funded by the charge you have to pay to use it)
I SMELL SCANDAL!
My parents told me to get a little white noise maker too. When the noise is bothersome we usually just turn on the fan. I think any type of waterfall would make me wet myself.
"Crop Crap" well it must be some kind of excrement. Assumably by a bird since I don't know what other type of animal would be in a tennis court. Crows seem the most likely stemming from the spelling, but how many crows like sports?
I want an expose on this homeowners association scandal. I expect resignations.
as the understood-head of the blog, I accept this reporting mission.
Developing... (as my hero Matt Drudge says)
So which one are you...Woodward or Bernstien?
Man, I hope you blow the lid off your neighborhood association. Sounds like a huge rip-off to me.
Sip said:
"I understand now why EM has the rates they do now, though. Actually, I'm surprised now that they don't charge more! "
then said:
"Man, I hope you blow the lid off your neighborhood association. Sounds like a huge rip-off to me."
You'd be a wonderful politician... I'd vote for you!
FYI Sip, I'm planning on blogging our fishing trip as soon as I bring those pics to work, where I have photoshop. I dont have it at home.
Awesome! I do love fish. Fish smell bad! Flip-flop...
Well, all I meant was that it seemed like there was more work what with replacing all the lights, doing decorations, keeping grounds, etc.
Then, when you came out with the $128,000 figure, I was shocked! I didn't realize how many folks would be paying in all that money! So, I reversed my position. I'm a Braly pundit now.
speaking of fish, this fish has no smell at all, it is that fresh!
Food tip of the day; if fish smells like fish, it isnt fresh fish. Well, the OUTSIDE of a fish can stink, but the filets should not. This bass literally had no smell when I handled it to bake it.
That's one of the reasons I like bass so much. It isn't extremely fishy. It's also very tender and juicy.
I'd eat some bass over catfish any day.
oh, did my wife remember to bring you some of it?
YES! I saw her in the break room a couple of hours ago and she said she brought it in.
Thank you, sir!
DANG! That chowder was GOOD!
I am glad!
Alright, Braly. In the spring, you're mine, buddy. We're going to my folks' place and doing a serious fishing/camping weekend!
What say you?
I wish all you guys could come! Maybe Chuck could come, too?
you dont have to ask me to go fishing. As soon as the warm weather comes back, I'll be going once a week at the very least.
And if I get a real motor on that boat of ours, I'll be on the Tallapoosa river if you need me.
Dude! It would be awesome to hook up a little Evinrude or something to that little boat!
Of course, I'd still like to at least go in together on the troller and battery.
We'll see what we can do about some springtime fishing, my friend!
my father in law gave Lariss and I some money as a xmas gift before he left. He said "Buy a trolling motor with some of that"... I guess he got tired of rowing.
So, Ill get the motor and you can buy the battery when I get the trolling motor!
why arent we emailing this? you are right, blogging is easier than emailing...
LOL! That sounds good, man!
Troll it baby!
Can anyone join this dance ladies or are you two together?
It was supposed to be “Dog Crap” with some serious misdirected fingers. Jamison you guys are getting the shaft. Unless they are providing you with fiber optic lines, actual security and a slew of other service then someone somewhere is making some cash.
You do need to address it at least to get a monthly breakdown of what the services actually are and who is supplying those services with contact information. If the HOA can’t give you that then you’ve got a complaint.
I will keep you guys abreast (giggle) of the fight for my right to party.
Step one was to creat a gmail account to email the housing authority (Since they know my main account already, I email them alot).
From this account, I will request the financial statement to see how the fees are broken down.
From there, I could be putting my life at stake, this could go deeper than any of us know. There is a grass landing strip at the top of the neighborhood, across the street from the largest house there, gated of course. I suspect foul-play/drug money.
If you dont hear from me 4 days in a row, contac the authorities.
Funny thing... ive always had a fun day dream about the 6 of us guys dressing in all black and at night, we sneak onto this mans property with night vision and binoculars (Brew works the binocs the best) to find out what he is up to, maybe even hook into his phone lines (I have access to the equiptment to do this)
By the time March swings around we’ll need to have had developed our tactical team.
Sipper seems like the natural for intel since it was his former gig. Jamison: wire taps, Brew: recon, I’ll document the interrogation and break in, Stubbs can interrogate the slimy bastard and Chuck since he may be who knows where can be our Bosley. Montgomery’s very own pseudo A-Team.
I’ll start practicing my flight simulator incase we need to fly out for an escape. Otherwise Sipper can also be our driver since he’s got the minivan.
I can see us now pouring out of the toyota sienna, then, when we get in, the automatic door slowly closing.
How will Stubbs interogate? Have faux anal sex with him?
>why arent we emailing this?
Because it is so utterly fascinating to the rest of us.
Um, I'm wearing pajamas.
Brew in PJs....sexy!
Alright, we'll use Chuck's infiltration plan for this operation. We'll call it "Operation Infinite Booty".
Step 1 is to act sick, I mean REALLY sick.
Step 2, we all sneak around to the back door of the house and enter through the second-story window.
Step 3, we eat their food and have them take our temperatures with an anal thermometer (this is where Stubbs comes in).
Step 4 is the exit plan...We all exit through the rear with Mullins and Jamison providing cover. Brew's our lookout. I think Chuck should be our sniper. With this cadre of ops, we can't miss!
Brews job will to stake out the guy who we’ll now have to “$”. Brew will ensure us when he’s at home and when he seems to have settled in for the day. Jamison will have established a communication link with the guy so upon entry we’ll be able to patch into his computer for future monitoring, he’ll also copy his current hard drive onto a portable device. Sipper will have created a way to have all other household members be out of the house for the assault allowing us to deal with the perp alone. Later Sipper and Jamison will decipher the retrieved digital intel and redistribute stolen funds. Prior to Operation Infinite Booty I’ll tandem with Brew making sure the perimeter is secure with cameras and motion sensors. Upon entry we’ll subdue “$” and unleash the mind numbing antics and faux anal raping of C.A. Stubbs. After 15 minutes of “$” receiving a barrage of cheesy jokes and exaggerated dry humped we’ll have a confession documented and be able to retract the team as though nothing has happened. Stubbs will also be responsible for leaving “$” some ointment to sooth chaffing.
If Chuck is in around we’ll let him at least tie the guy up I’m sure he’s had some experience wink wink...
Maybe we could steal "$" plane and take off to Hawaii after the heist!
Actually, I think I'd rather do the Bahamas or The Keys...
ironically, ive never seen a plane land or take off... must be done in the middle of the night
I do have to tell you a couple of years ago there was a local sheriff who was co owner of a small grass landing strip which housed a few planes and even had a small refueling station. It seems that one day the locals wondered out loud why the only traffic it got was about every three weeks apart and always between 1 and 3am. Soon enough the sheriff was trying to explain why the only people who had been using the thing were busted with some 50 lbs of blow.
If we do have to hope a plane lets make sure it’s not loaded with cocaine first.
Maybe it'll be loaded with Cuban cigars! We could smoke all the way to Jamaica, mon.
What luck! We really needed someone who could provide this part of the plan, Brew!
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