Naughty Neighbors 2010-02 -

Welcome to the suburban battleground of 2010. Forget terrorism and economic recovery. For millions of Americans, the real front line of daily stress is the six feet of grass separating their home from the next. And a new term has entered the lexicon to describe the culprits: the . The Sins Next Door What exactly makes a neighbor “naughty” in 2010? It’s a sliding scale of passive-aggressive terror.

In February 2010, we are tired, broke, and cooped up. The holidays are a distant, debt-ridden memory. Spring is a rumor. The line between “reasonable request” and “unhinged demand” blurs. That pile of snow you shoveled onto the edge of his driveway? You thought it was harmless. He thought it was war. Naughty Neighbors 2010-02

Take the case of Ronald and Patricia K. of suburban Cleveland (names changed for legal reasons). In January 2010, their neighbor’s tree dropped a limb on their garage. The neighbor refused to pay the insurance deductible. Ronald retaliated by trimming the offending branch at 6 a.m. with a chainsaw. The neighbor called the police for a noise violation. Ronald then installed a 6-foot privacy fence – painted high-visibility orange on the neighbor’s side. Welcome to the suburban battleground of 2010

As the groundhog prepares to make his annual prediction, perhaps the only forecast that matters is this: the naughty neighbor isn’t going anywhere. He’s out there now, revving his snowblower at 6:30 a.m. on a Saturday. The only question is – what are you going to do about it? And a new term has entered the lexicon

There’s – the family with four cars, a boat, and a recreational vehicle, all of which occupy the street in front of your house, leaving you to park three blocks away in February slush.

There’s – the guy in the split-level who believes his new 1,200-watt subwoofer is a public good. At 11 p.m. on a Tuesday, as you’re trying to wind down from a 10-hour shift, his living room becomes a nightclub. The drywall vibrates. Your toddler cries. He yells, “It’s not even 11:30 yet!”

Additionally, the rise of online forums (think early Reddit, neighborhood message boards on Craigslist, and angry comments on Patch.com) has given vent to a new kind of digital rage. Anonymous posts titled “Does anyone else hate the people at 1423 Maple?” are becoming a guilty pleasure. One user, “FedUpInFairfax,” writes: “She lets her cat poop in my flowerbed. I bought a motion-activated sprinkler. Am I the villain?” The consensus? No. She’s the naughty neighbor. The naughty neighbor phenomenon isn’t just about one-off annoyances. It’s a dynamic. It escalates.