I received another letter recently regarding neighbourly conflict related to a new play house.

14 years ago, my husband and I purchased a home in a rural setting on a 3 acre property. The reason that we chose it was because it had a secluded, sanctuary of a back yard, complete with high shrubs, gardens and most importantly a 6 foot privacy fence which separated us from neighbors on both sides. Generally speaking you cannot see either of their properties (except for the roof lines from some parts of the yard).

We both work in service type professions and have to deal with many people their needs & complaints all week long. At the end of a hectic week we want nothing more than to get away from it all and relax in our yard (in solitude) working on our many flower gardens or just relaxing in a hammock and catching up on a good the weeks news.

Our neighbor to the left owns a 2 acre property. They have a little girl who loves to come over and look at our flowers. The occasional visit and subsequent tour is fine and she leaves with a handful of flowers to take home. Recently they decided to erect a play structure for her. Rather than placing it somewhere in their yard near their house or towards the middle - guess what they decided? Since she loves our gardens so much, they erected the 8 foot structure directly next to the property line to give her a perfect view over the fence and bushes. Now all weekend long she perches up there gawking at us and pestering us with questions and comments.

Nothing like encouraging the invasion of peoples' privacy as a life lesson.

This sounds unfortunate. Up until the play structure was built it seemed there was no conflict at all with your neighbours. This isn't exactly a unique problem either. There have been a couple big stories recently about neighbour conflict that revolved around a play structure. In 2008 a story out of British Colombia regarding a pirate ship themed tree house made international headlines.

A quick google news search finds plenty of other examples:

Treehouse dispute in Park City, Utah

Front yard treehouse dispute from Dallas, Texas

I think you will probably be able to take some consolation in the fact that most kids grow out of the treehouse phase pretty quick (even faster these days thanks to 21st century entertainment like the Wii), so hopefully this particular little girl doesn't have any younger siblings. In a few years she will be reading Teen Vogue and arguing with her parents about how much makeup is appropriate for someone in Jr. High.

- Editor

Rose writes:

I have been living my apartment for 3 years and I have had the same idiot living next to me the whole entire time. Unfortunately I live in NYC and this not a great time to move as I don't have enough money saved up to buy a condo.

This fool has no understanding that people do work for a living because of course he does not. My management company (Community Access) takes in homeless, many with mental disorders and drug addicts into all of their buildings; basically all of these types because they want to collect sure fire government checks. I have sent multiple letters to the management and all possible governing bodies in NYC and cannot get relief. The management will not move him to another apartment in another building. They actually suggested I be the one to move. I am the one who works and does not make any noise!!! I have tried to have a mediation but he refused to participate. At this point I am fed up and began posting my annoyance on twitter and any other site that may prevent me from going upside this idiots head.

Just needed to blow off steam. Thank you for reading.

WORLDS LONGEST BLT

So I stumbled across this story about some folks in St. Louie who were attempting to break the World Record for the largest BLT sandwich. Truth be told I was drawn to the story because of the mention of 500lbs of beautiful tasty bacon that was needed to make the sandwich.

Then I saw a picture, and I call "Shenannigans". It isn't one piece of bread, just a bunch of separate pieces of bread laying next to each other. If you look closely you can even see that each piece was prepared on its own cutting board. Look, the fact of the matter is that ANYBODY can make "The Worlds Longest Sandwich" via this method. The only thing holding you back is $$$.

To truly be a "World Record" it should be something that is actually difficult. Like being able to cook a bun that is 179 feet long. THAT is an achievement. Guiness should rethink their rules for this sort of thing, or at least change the title to "longest chain of BLT sandwiches stacked end to end".

STOLEN CAR FOUND

A stolen car that belongs to an 82 year old German woman was found in a neighbours garage roughly 2 years after it was first reported missing. However this isn't a story about everyone being suprised that the neighbour was a thief. Turns out the car was parked it in the wrong garage.

Closer to home the CIA has smashed a terrorist group that had spent 3 years travelling the Middle East, buying guns, and hatching an elaborate plan involving kidnapping and murder to further a global jihad. Arrested were Aa'idah Mohammed Salem, Nesrin Waleed, and... oh wait, sorry... arrested was American-born Daniel Boyd, a drywall contractor from North Carolina. His neighbours were very suprised, and claim he was "the nicest terrorist they ever met".