The frat house across the street....

Ok, in my swank neighborhood there is one house that has continually been a problem. It is the house across the street from me. Originally it was built by Donny Osmond, and according to my neighbors during the time he lived in the house he was a wonderful neighbor. He sold the house to a playboy/party type, who built a hideous addition on to the house and was famous for holding all sorts of parties. The neighbors were very happy when he was run out of town.

The third owner of the house was an incredible family, however due to church callings and assignments that took them out of the country, they probably spent more time NOT living in the house than actually living in the house. They occupied the house at the time I bought my house. A short time later they put the house on the market because he got a new church calling that required him to be out of the country for five yeas. The house sat vacant for a few years until it sold. The fourth owner of the house was a very young couple, which I really liked, but they were involved in what I like to characterize as a "get rich quick" real estate scheme that eventually collapsed, and they lost the house to foreclosure.

The fifth owner of the house, who is the current owner, is an individual who likes to purchase foreclosed properties, hold on to them until the market bounces back and then sell the property. He has had the house for about a year and a half, and the house has been vacant. Recently his grandson who just returned from a mission and is attending college moved into the house with two of his college buddies.

Now to fully understand the impact of this I have to tell you a little about the house....now earlier I mentioned the hideous remodel/addition that the second owner did to the house, well he remodeled it into a party house, and despite the efforts of subsequent owners, short of demolishing the house, it really has bad flow, that is if you want to live the family lifestyle. If you want to live the party lifestyle, well then this is your house.

The house is rather large, 13,000 square feet to be exact. It has both an outdoor and indoor pool. HUGE media room, dance floor and quiet frankly probably one of the best views of Utah county you can find. One side of the house is floor to ceiling windows. (I hear rumors that the utilities on the house run close to $1,500 per month, which quite frankly knowing the lay out of the house and the amount of single pane glass windows, I believe it.)

So you can imagine my pure delight at discovering my new neighbors are college age kids.....this house is a magnet for parties.....and what do college age kids like to do....party.

Now I am not against a good party, heavens knows in my college days I had quite a good time. My objection is to parties in MY neighborhood, because quite frankly if I wanted to live in a party environment I would have purchased a house south of BYU campus, not up on the hill in my tree lined family street.

Ok, now you have the background, how about the rest of the story???....

On Friday night Rick came to my house to spend some weekend time with the kids. After we got Katie and Mark to bed, I took Lauren out for a late night girls movie, and he went to bed. We returned from our movie around midnight. As I was approaching my driveway I noticed that there was a gold colored car parked in my driveway behind Rick's truck. I did not recognize this car as belonging to anyone I knew, and Rick had not said anything to me about any of his friends coming over to my house. After going inside my house and determining that Rick was indeed asleep, and I did not have any unexpected visitors, I assumed the car belonged to the house across the street, which by the way at this point in time was in full PARTY mode. After all it was the first weekend of the new semester, so no nasty tests or assignments to bog down party fun.

I promptly called the police department and informed them of the car that did not belong in my driveway and requested that they take action to remove said car. I was politely told by the dispatcher that since the car was parked on private property the police could not do anything but I could have the car towed. Great. Did I really want to deal with a tow company at midnight? Not really.

On to plan B. With Lauren watching out my mud room window I marched myself across the street to locate the owner of said car and share with the owner a piece of my mind about parking in someone else's driveway, BEHIND their vehicle! I was greeted at the door by a sign telling me that indeed this was the house where the party was being held. (Like that wasn't obvious by the number of cars...) The sign also said that due to the large pile of up of snow on the street, parking was limited and it was suggested that guests park at the church parking lot at the bottom of the hill and either walk up or caravan. An instruction that was clearly lost on the owner of said vehicle. The sign said there was no need to knock, I was welcome to come on in. So I took that as my cue to crash the party. And crash I did.

I walked in and in the living room individuals seated looked my way to see who had arrived. It was mostly girls in the living room, and quite frankly I was looking for the party's male host. I went to the basement, because from the noise I could tell that is where the real party was happening. As I made my way to the bottom of the stairs, it was clear to the party guest that I did not belong at the party, because I was not age appropriate for this crowd. At the bottom of the stairs I announced that I was looking for the owner of the gold Honda accord parked in my driveway. Individuals started to stare at each other, with puzzled looks on their faces. Finally some young twit of a college age girl spoke up that it was her car. I informed her she parked it in MY DRIVEWAY, blocking a vehicle. Her response, a pathetic sorry, and that she would move the car. I followed her and her twit friend (you know they ALWAYS come in pairs) upstairs indicating that it was really immature to park in another person's driveway, and questioned them about their age. As they put their shoes on, I walked out of the house, slamming the door, leaving no doubt that I was upset with their choice of vehicle parking.

Upon return to my house I went into the mud room to check on Lauren and report that the car was going to be moved. Then I decided I was still upset, and that this twit of a girl and her friend needed a lesson on parking they would not soon forget. I went out on my back door stoop and as they were approaching the car, I asked in my best and most stern mom/lawyer voice "What in your right mind where you thinking when you parked her?" They both responded the same pathetic sorry. I repeated the question several times, with the same response, leading me to believe they were even more stupid than I had originally thought. (The problem with their "sorry," it is was not a sincere sorry, it was a "geezzz what is the big deal?" If I though they truly understood the magnitude of their actions, I probably would have ceased with my verbal tirade)

After not getting any response to my well thought out question, I did what any good lawyer would do and changed the question to "Why would you even think it is appropriate to park in someone else's driveway, BEHIND their vehicle?" Again, I got a pathetic "sorry." So I asked the question AGAIN. Finally I was told that it was late and they didn't think I would be going anywhere. Also where else were they to park, there was snow in the street. (Reading between the lines, "We wore our best shoes, and clearly we could not park far away and walk, our shoes are not designed to walk on snow and ice, our feet might hurt, we could slip on the ice, and then we wouldn't look HOT for the party, and the boys we wanted to impress.")

My response was it's really rude to park in someone else's driveway, and block their vehicle. Then they told me I was being rude. BIG MISTAKE. Clearly they did not understand what I do for a living......I hadn't even gotten to rude yet, I was still in mom yelling mode.... I replied "I am NOT being rude. Rude is being so self centered as to think you are entitled to park where ever it is convenient for YOU, without regard to someone else's property. Quite frankly I could have had your vehicle towed, and the you would be paying $300 to get your vehicle out of hawk, as opposed to me telling you your behavior is unacceptable. You should be glad all you have to do is listen to me rather than leave the party and wonder what happened to your car. I did you a favor sweetie, be grateful." With that I turned and walked inside, clearly these twits were not going to get it.

Once inside I found Lauren laughing hysterically. She said "mom, you really know how to argue." I said, "yes and this is why daddy has refused for years to watch me in court, lawyer Tiffany scares him."

I spent the better part of the next day planning my next course of action against my frat boy neighbors, knowing full well that as the weather warmed up and water went in the pool, I had not seen the last of the parties across the street.

Around 6:00 p.m. on Saturday night there was a knock at my door. I opened up my door to discover two of the frat boys on my door step. They introducedthemselves, and offered a very sincere apology for the action of their party guests. They told me that they had instructed the guests to park at the bottom of the hill due to the limited parking in our neighborhood. I acknowledged that I had seen that on their sign. They said they were really sorry about her choice of parking, and agreed it was no appropriate. I believed them. They really were sorry, and honestly were concerned that I was upset, and did not want to have hard feelings. We exchanged a few pleasantries about each other and they gave me a piece of paper with their names and telephone numbers and told me if I ever had a problem, an issue or needed anything to call them. I accepted their apology and told them I appreciated them taking the time to come over and it really went a long way in repairing the damage from the night before.

On a final note, right after my tirade against the twit girl, and her twit friend, the party closed down. I guess a raving mad neighbor yelling at your party guests, puts a damper on the party mood. Kind of like getting busted by the cops.....