The Fence Farce Continues

I first mentioned “the fence farce” in a post in May of 2011, but a refresher may be in order. In the spring of 2010, the landlord who owns the house behind us said he was putting up a fence “next week” and wondered if I wanted his friend to help me clear out the overgrown hedge we had back there. His friend gave me a cheap price that I couldn’t turn down and he cleared out most of the hedge, which extended the entire length of our back yard and was probably about 6 feet deep. I spent a greater part of that year digging up roots, like honeysuckle, wisteria, ivy, etc, until it no longer came back. Needless to say, the fence did not go up “next week.” Nor did it go up the next year. It was May of 2012 before we started to see any sign of a fence going up. It was an ugly, white vinyl fence and they did a really shoddy job of putting it in, but hey, at least it kept me from having to look at the tons of cars he had in his driveway that he’s always working on and gave us a bit more privacy. I was ready to rejoice – Hallelujah a fence!...however...he never finished it. They got about 3/4 of it done when they ran into a stump and couldn’t get one of the fence posts in. And there is stalled...and is still stalled. Hence, we still have a LOVELY view of his broken down boat on the right side of the back yard.

Unfinished section of the neighbor’s fence.

I had a fence farce scare the other day. When I came home from work on Friday, Brian said, “You’re not going to be happy. Take a long out back.” This is what I saw:

A gap in the neighbor’s fence.

Imagine my horror as I saw a missing panel from the fence that I have been waiting four years for. While I was working in the kitchen garden on Saturday, the neighbor said that his father-in-law was helping him reinstall the fence properly, so that it was more straight and looked better. However, he made no indication of any plans to finish it. He said there is still the stump issue and they also ran out of the metal brackets that hold the fencing to the posts and those are $7.95 a piece. Sigh...always an obstacle. Will that bloody fence ever be finished?! If or when it does get finished, you better believe I will be celebrating. It might be the one and only time you see a picture of me on this blog. It will be a picture of me drinking a big bottle of champagne while hugging that (expletive) fence.