Property Slug?

We have been in this house for more then fourteen years and in all that time we have had the same set of neighbors to the North and to the South. We have been blessed in that they are great neighbors. Lou to the North is a bit gruff, he owns a bar and who knows what else. He lives by himself in this huge house, he has powerboats, muscle cars and a “land yacht” he takes out even national holiday in the Summer. Lou for the most part is a mystery. He speaks of a career he had with GM and he owns only GM products except this last year when a new Audi appeared in his drive way. I asked him how he like his Audi and his reply was

“I hate it. I am going to get rid of it. It doesn't have any power. Besides I am a GM man. I don't know what I was thinking.” This was enough and I knew the conversation. But Lou is approachable enough but I rarely approach. Lou keeps to himself, keeps his yard up and leaves me alone. Perhaps that is enough.

The other` night I was speaking to my other neighbor to the South The H's are great people. I have written about them before in this blog. The H's are older then Me or Dianne and are very approachable. They help us when we need it, give us all kinds of advice and, act like neighbors. The other night I was talk with Al and he was looking behind me and indicated that Lou was in my yard doing something behind by va. I blew it off thinking Lou had just lost a tennis ball or something. But Lou was still there when I was finished visiting with the H's and I knew I was going to have to engage in conversation with him like it or not. And there Lou was big as Dallas; squatting down on his haunches, down by my van digging at something in the fence which separates our property. I has not noticed when I wheeled up but Lou's Rainbirds (Lou always nothing but the best) were on laying down a perfect carpet of water on his perfect grass. Lou was focused on a sprinkler which had somehow gotten tangled in the fence and was not working properly. In a few moment Lou had the sprinkler untangled and working like a champ jetting a huge arch of water perfectly over a section of Lou grass.

The fence which separates our property is of rickety wood. Some of the slats are gone but for the most part the gray sun bleached pieces are standing their guard to make sure my concrete does not invade his perfect grass. A couple of times over the years I have noticed a slat had fallen from the fence and I have righted the wood and pounded the piece back into place. I have thought of replacing the fence more then once but I figured the fence was Lou's and he would replace the barrier when he thought he needed.

We did engage in conversation and during that conversation Lou indicate he was thinking of replacing the wood gates to his back yard with a chain link gate. The gate which is currently there is wood looking very much like the wood on the fence between us. Then Lou suggested maybe I should think going with chain link when I replaced the fence between us!. MY FENCE!!? I must have had a puzzled look on my face when he added that “ Yeah, it would not take much chain link to do this space. I just nodded like i knew what he was talking about. Some how the conversation turned to property lines and this led to us examining the property slug. Lou then proceeded to show the slug Sure enough right there in the side walk just other side of the fence was a small piece of mettled which looked like the head. The property slug! The official measuring device which set my propery from his and sure there was another on my South side separating my area from Al's.

And the fence was ALL on my side of the slug. Looks like I have some decisions to make.