Friends with benefits.
Hang on to your boaters you public school poofters, I have a confession to make. I once lived in a council house on a council estate! Yes, a council house. The estate nestled on the edge of a northern city and was infested with inbred Ryans and Shannons thieving, vandalising and shagging their way to a life on benefits and prison. I liked them, obviously, but it was still something of a culture shock for me and my family. We had enjoyed our life in the country before the bankruptcy. Faced with the choice of homelessness, a room in a bed and breakfast ‘hotel’ or a council house we opted for the latter.
We endured, sorry, enjoyed five very stimulating years on the estate before we were finally able to return to society. A period in which we had stolen cars dumped on our front lawn and torched, a Piebald gypsy stallion being released to gallop around our garden, our windows being egged at regular intervals and numerous shit parcels posted through our letter box. Not to mention the bullying of our kids and the three times we were burgled, all in all I think we integrated pretty well.
Much of this delightful behaviour was instigated by our immediate neighbour and his pack. Our houses were separated by a thirty foot long privet hedge. Grossly overgrown at twelve feet high it was the pride and joy of the head claimant but it looked a bloody mess. Shortly after moving in I bought a hedge trimmer and slowly but surely over the years I trimmed the hedge down to a less ridiculous height of about nine feet. To appease the beast next door and to avoid a deluge of shit parcels and false pizza deliveries, I always trimmed his side of the hedge too. Never a word of thanks though.
Don’t give up yet, I’m getting to the point. Thanks to Thatcher, after two years we were able to buy the house and then after a further three years we were able to put it on the market. I did the house up beautifully but the only sticking point to attracting a sale was the huge privet hedge. I hired a chain saw and hacked a further three feet off the top of the hedge. That was the plan anyway but Mr Meathead had other ideas. He went fucking spare when he saw what I was doing and made it clear that the saw would end up my arse if I continued. Not wanting to waste my hire fee, I continued to lower my half of the hedge anyway and leave his untouched. I made the best of a bad job and it can’t have looked too bad because we had a buyer the following week.
During the six weeks after agreeing the sale and my family actually moving out, my friend next door, still stinging after my assault on his beloved hedge, upped the ante in the anti-social behaviour stakes. He made our lives hell but I never responded in kind. I was more intelligent, civilised and mature and unbelievably happy to be moving out. We escaped with our lives and vowed never to return to that area again. I couldn't resist though and about a year later I returned very early one morning for one last look at the old place. The thirty foot long privet hedge was now a light brown tangle of dead sticks. Not a green leaf in sight. It appeared to be deceased, dead, a hedge no more. I smiled and remembered fondly how I had accidentally spilled twenty litres of copper sulphate solution around the roots of the hedge just before I left. The five litres of B &Q Rootkiller can’t have helped much either.
(mallyjoe, Thu 8 Jan 2015, 20:43, 18 replies)

Clearly, you had the last laugh.

( monster munch person, man, woman... camera... TV?, Thu 8 Jan 2015, 22:44, closed)

How do you trim a hedge only on on side?
Did it look like this?

| \
| .\
| . .\
| . . | mallyjoe's side
( ferret -> twitter.com/syfyautocorrect <-, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 1:08, closed)

I assumed it was like this...
__
| .|
| .|_
| . . |
| . . | mallyjoe's side
( Batter Pudding Hurler is a figment of your imagination, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:02, closed)

I'm very much enjoying these diagrams.

(eViLegion Chief Commissioner of the Scottish Lunacy Board, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:11, closed)

More like this one... well done!

(mallyjoe, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:14, closed)

That was intended for the Batter Pudding Hurler.

(mallyjoe, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:15, closed)

shortarse

____
|..|
|..|
|./
|/

( drimble he'd been white, he'd been black, Mon 19 Jan 2015, 23:33, closed)

You should have hidden a dead fish in the hedge,
it would have taken him months to work out where the smell was coming from.
(Plague Hedgehog 'posting crap', Fri 9 Jan 2015, 1:15, closed)

They would not have noticed the smell to be honest!

(mallyjoe, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:15, closed)

Did Mum do Dale Steaks for tea when you got home?

(Set your faces to Stunned Bigly, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 9:59, closed)

Sorry... don't get that one.

(mallyjoe, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:17, closed)

Road kill rodents

(the other guy not the one that gave you coochie warts, Sun 11 Jan 2015, 19:32, closed)

Please clarify.
Which of you was the nice neighbour and which was the mindless vandal?
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Fri 9 Jan 2015, 10:10, closed)

Ha ha , good one.

(mallyjoe, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 11:19, closed)

Every single sentence of this makes you sound like this guy:

( .Yeti. El amor en los tiempos del cólera, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 12:52, closed)

Who wouldn't want to be that guy though?
He's clearly have a marvellous time.
(eViLegion Chief Commissioner of the Scottish Lunacy Board, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 13:19, closed)

Oh, absolutely,
his conscience blissfully free from the burden of wondering what anyone else might think of him.
( .Yeti. El amor en los tiempos del cólera, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 13:21, closed)

Ghettoblaster's pic.
Worryingly accurate. The style of shoes, colour of socks, pale blue shirt and tie, the slim physique,the arrogance and good looks. Shit, how do you do it?
Don't be misled by 'our life in the country' though. It was just a rented cottage which came with the business I was running.
(mallyjoe, Fri 9 Jan 2015, 15:37, closed)