10th March 2008

Dear Neighbour (Ha! Did you see that, Neighbour? We spelled it the British way, because we're trying to unleash some subliminal companionship here! We're bonding! We're on the same page! Enjoy, because I will pluck my beaver clean with some rusty tweezers before I will ever pronounce it to-MAH-to!)*,

We send you this either because you live on our road or because you border our property from the Lane on our other side, the one where people drive too fast and we encourage you to madly chase after these drivers and shake your fist angrily, too, because I can't be the only crazy lady around here.

As most of you know, we welcomed twins the end of last year and to that end the need to extend our family home became rather pressing. You may have heard the babies, actually, as we had a very collicky beginning which we like to look back on as How the Fuck Did We Actually Survive That? Or, as experts call it, Effective Birth Control Reminders. We would very much like to thank you for your support of our extension plans and appreciate the fact that no one rasied objections to the council about our building works. This means that at Halloween I will not be forced to leave flaming love parcels of dog poop on your front doorstep. We can be friends. You complete me.

Our plans were approved and we have finally gotten off our lazy asses and hired a builder, who is known for being conscientious, clean, and sensitive to the needs of the owners and their neighbours (and if you believe that, then I have a blue dress from the Gap to show you, one I disgustingly decided not to wash after the action shot). Yes the builder is kind of a cowboy originally from East London - we even call him The Cowboy - and yes although he showed us some of his building works at his home (which we really liked and approved of) he also showed us his beautiful handmade gazebo with hot tub, plasma TV, and massive bar. This means that he gets paid a lot. This also means Helen needs to bleach her eyeballs at the thought of him in the hot tub.

As nearly every room in our house will be impacted, we will have a shipping container in our front garden which shall serve as storage for our belongings – we are very sorry for the unsightliness of it, and want to assure you that the shipping container is temporary! I'm sure you thought "Christ, there goes the neighbourhood" when you heard an American moved in two years ago. Now I bet you're worried that we're going to invite all of my podunk redneck American relations to move into a giant shipping container on our front garden. I think you only need to worry if you see us bring in a pickup on cement blocks and a whole bunch of broken plastic garden furniture. If you don't see those, then chances are Cletus and Marlene are not, indeed, moving in.

We want to sincerely apologise in advance for any noise or disruption (which we will try very hard to minimise) that this may potentially cause you. We will only be building during normal working hours and hopefully you wonÂ’t find any stress or strain to your home life on account of our building. We would like to build around the clock, but there is such a thing called "Overtime", and it would mean we'd have to choose our favorite child and let only them go on to secondary education, so we'll skip that part. We will try to be very diligent in respecting your space and in ensuring that the road is kept clear of too many vehicles so as not to block anyoneÂ’s access. We're even preparing to sacrifice our front garden to make it into a temporary parking lot for the builders. Now where did I leave that broken plastic garden furniture....?

Truthfully, we're just hoping to get out of this alive and with our sanity, if you get pissed off at seeing a builder urinating in the garden then please just bear in mind that we're likely not too happy about it either, ok? We're going to be doing our dishes in the bathroom and living in two rooms of a house with twins. We won't have a working kitchen. Half of our roof will be gone. Cut us some slack already. I may show up at your house in tears, trying to slice my wrists open with an unwrapped pack of Ramen noodles (hey-those little fuckers can be sharp before you add the boiling water). If that happens, just take the seasoning packet away from me and talk me off the ledge.

Building is to commence on 1 April, and the build is estimated to run for 12-16 weeks. If it actually finishes within that time we'll invite you to come over to ours for a 4th of July party. You know, the one where we eat and drink too much (even - gasp! - a bottle of wine in one sitting!) and then have fireworks to celebrate the day that Americans kicked the English out of their government. Huh...you know, thinking about it, it's kind of an inappropriate thing to celebrate over here really. If the build runs over then you'll know by the keening and wailing going on, as well as the cement mixer which will be dispensing anti-depressants in liquid form, as opposed to composites used to settle the foundationd. One foundation at a time, my dears. One foundation at a time.

Please, if you have any concerns or comments, feel free to drop in for a chat, because nothing pleases Helen more than drop-in guests. She loves that as much as she loves hand herpes, Robert Urich, and bananas. All rolled up together. You could call as well, only Helen also hates talking on the phone. You might be getting a sense of anti-socialism here, but we assure you - go ahead and email. That'll be ok. We have a delete key.

Warm Regards,
Angus and Helen

*Yes we really did write each of our neighbors. No, this was not the letter we wrote them. My mouth/brain connection may often be on the fritz, but usually when there's a spell-checker involved I get by ok.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 09:57 AM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 1079 words, total size 6 kb.

1 Good luck! Hope all goes to plan....we have just submitted our plans to the Council for planning permission...all a bit nerve racking waiting to see if anyone has any objections! Hope it isn't too bad...just think how great it will be in the end. Keep smiling.

Posted by: Suzie at March 18, 2008 10:28 AM (weSjv)

2 Good luck...I hope they get done quickly.Just keep thinking of the end results.I know easier said than done lol.

Posted by: Erica at March 18, 2008 11:21 AM (AZFra)

3 Good luck! And just what do you have against Robert Urich? Let the man rest in peace already.

Posted by: paula at March 18, 2008 12:13 PM (jh9Oj)

4 Best of luck! I hope everything goes smoothly and painlessly. I also hope you take lots of before and after photos - I love those

Posted by: geeky at March 18, 2008 12:48 PM (ziVl9)

5 Paula - Robert Urich creeps me out. He's always creeped me out. He was the reigning master of Primetime Miniseries, and I used to dread seeing him. I hope he rests in peace and all, but seriously - he still creeps me out.

Posted by: Helen at March 18, 2008 12:52 PM (Kcxwm)

6 Wow - starting on your birthday, huh? Did you do that on purpose? You'll survive it though - it has to be easier than a colicky baby! I agree that tons of pictures will be in order since the changes will be so massive. As if you'll have nothing else to do besides play construction paparazzi. Heh.

Posted by: Lisa at March 18, 2008 01:00 PM (EcHBm)

7 Good idea with the letter. Being the crass Americans that we are, we just plop the huge skip in the front yard and start the hammering and pounding at an ungodly hour. Really we're just paying back our neighbors for the same treatment we received before. It's catchy too, every week there's another house with another skip in front of it. Good luck with the build, Flanders. I hope it's as painless as it can be.

Posted by: Michele at March 18, 2008 04:08 PM (h1vml)

8 Geez, Happy Birthday to you, huh? Oh well. G;ad it's up and going. Somehow I suspected you go with the Cowboy :-)

Posted by: caltechgirl at March 18, 2008 05:50 PM (IfXtw)

9 The day our neighbor moved in, he immediately started knocking down walls in his new house. He's been slowly (i emphasize slowly) working on rebuilding ever since, which doesn't bother us much, as he's doing all the work himself. The only thing that REALLY bothers me is some sort of saw or sander he was using this past weekend that sound EXACTLY like a dentist's drill. Not a good sound. I think I'm going to have 9 bottles of wine this weekend in your doc's honor. Also? I've done a straw poll, and NO ONE agrees that there is 9 servings in a bottle of wine. Unless it's a REALLY BIG BOTTLE. You know, the kind you get from Wild Vines.

Posted by: Tracy at March 18, 2008 07:02 PM (zv3bS)

10 Any post that has "pluck my beaver clean with some rusty tweezers" in the first paragraph will have my immediate and undivided attention. Not for perverted reasons (though I have sometimes been rightly accused of such), but for the "oh boy, Helen's in a mood and this one's going to be good" reason. I wasn't disappointed. Hope the home destruction goes well and you two don't end up living a remake of "The Money Pit" as Tom Hanks and Shelley Long. The thought of Angus hee-hawing like a donkey when the tub falls through the floor would be a bit much for me to bear. In the meantime, enjoy those nine glasses of wine.

Posted by: diamond dave at March 18, 2008 08:57 PM (Vqhyo)

11 You better hope the Gypsy's don't get wind of the fun in your yard....Crist, that would really be a party! PARTY @ Helen's place!

Posted by: Heidi at March 18, 2008 11:34 PM (I1a0d)

12 12-16 weeks, eh? That actually sounds about right, even accounting for delays.

Posted by: ~Easy at March 19, 2008 03:49 PM (XD24A)

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