Trashy People

Just received this...

For our yard that looks like this...

Honestly! How can people live like this?!? Some people are just so trashy. 

(Can you hear the irritated sarcasm dripping from the words?)

It's a second notice, but the yard looked like this for the first notice I ignored.

It says we must reply within 10 days via certified letter, so I sent this snarky reply...

(Yes, I feel much better after writing it.)

Our patience is wearing thin with your unfounded harassing notices.

We’ve received NUMEROUS car citations. Only ONE of the vehicles was ours (NO IDEA who the other cars belong to) and it was the DAY AFTER WE MOVED IN! We hadn’t even gotten all of our boxes INTO the house and you were citing us for the truck we used to move our stuff with. Really?!?! New residents aren’t even allowed a week to move in before you sic the “inspectors” on them? Wow, amazing community ya’ll got here. Remind me to recommend this Gestapo to all of my friends and family. I didn’t even want to live in this neighborhood, but we’re cheap and low quality KB homes, with guest quarters to care for an aging parent and rooms for 5 kids, are sufficient for a cheap budget. Come on people we’re not living in high quality housing here, it’s KB junk and everyone knows it. This is a stepping stone neighborhood where people live until they can get into the neighborhoods they really want.

Now we’re being cited for our phantom weeds?!? The notice states the inspection was done on October 16. That happened to be an insanely busy week from hell for us. Your notice berating our “eye sore” of a yard was a lovely ending to it. Thank you so much for the attention.  You can imagine the warm fuzzy feeling I got when I opened my mail box to find the cursed yellow card sitting there to greet me. I grabbed it and skimmed over it’s “information” filled contents while I loaded all my kids into the car to leave. Desert Broom?? Oh crap! I’m deathly allergic to that devil weed. I loathe that horrible plant with every fiber of my being. I lose days at work every stinkin’ year due to being so sick from that nasty plant. That policy is the ONLY saving grace to this community’s stupid CC&Rs.  We spray weeds every Saturday so how this awful plant snuck through I had no idea. At the risk of being late for the appointment we were headed to I jumped out of the car for an inspection of our yard “to the left of the driveway”…and I found…N O T H I N G!!

(Picture of Yard)

So, I checked to the right of the driveway…NOTHING. There wasn’t a weed of any sort, at all, much less a Desert Broom. I figured it’d been such a busy week that we must have just overlooked something growing. Uhhhh, no, you guys are just seeing things. Due to the fact that I, along with all my kids, are so allergic to this plant we can identify it at all stages of growth. And get this; we always removed it immediately upon noticing it at our old house…wait for it… wait for it…without someone ordering us to do so. I know it’s a novel idea that the minions are capable of independent thought and action. With such a difficult concept for you to wrap your minds around, I’ll let you ruminate on it for a moment…

My husband and I are just naturally organized, clean kind of people; although, the 5 kids born in under 7 years make cleaning anything a challenge, we still do it. I’m not sure if this is just the standard “welcome to the neighborhood, now get in line” kind of harassment you bestow on all the newcomers or not, but it’s ridiculous. For heaven’s sake! Are you nothing but a bunch of robots? Did it never cross your mind to think, “Hmmm, that family moved in 1 day ago let’s give them a couple weeks and see what happens to that truck.” Or, “Oh, I notice a weed let’s give it till the next inspection and see if they are capable of self governing and get rid of the weeds on their own.”  *Or* I don’t know, maybe just maybe, in the true spirit of community why don’t you ask, “Hey, are you doing alright? Is there something so consuming going on in life that you’ve not been able to get to the weeds, bring in the garbage can, move the errant car, sweep the front walk, trim the bushes and trees, etc, etc, etc?” And here’s the best part…are you ready…this will blow your mind…ask them,  

“HOW. CAN. WE. HELP?” 

Now that’s an earth shattering concept right there.

We’d be deeply grateful if you’d calm down, take a breath, and behave like humans. If our yard ever truly becomes an eye sore I can assure you my anal retentive self will be acutely aware of it. The fact that the dead tree and scraggly ugly bush were removed within a week of moving in illustrates the fact that we, too, like “aesthetically pleasing” yards. If my yard isn’t “aesthetically pleasing” to you, it’s because life has hit a new low and we’re barely hanging on to body and soul…we’ve been there, it sucks. When our fourth baby was born with a 50/50 chance of survival and my husband was barely back into work and I was living at the NICU; we got a few weeds in our yard. Guess what? As soon as we were all back home alive we took care of them, again, without anyone telling us to. During that time a letter from someone like you guys would’ve sent us over the edge. Our baby had barely survived, my husband had barely gotten back to work, our world was turned upside-down, and I’ll be forever grateful there was NO HOA breathing down our necks about something so incredibly insignificant.

I’ve included a large picture showing the state of our yard the day of inspection and the day I received the notice. I would love it if you could circle the Desert Broom I’m supposed to remove and send it back to me…ON YOUR DIME NOT MINE.

Since only one of the errant cars was ours I’d like the $1.30 you wasted sending me a certified letter (which by the way stunk picking up with 5 kids in tow) removed from my account. Rude! Not cool charging me for other people parking in front of my house!

There IS a Desert Broom just outside my back fence in the desert owned by the HOA; I’d like YOU to remove it “no later than October 28, 2012 to protect the aesthetics of the community” desert area.

Instead of wasting so much money on postage hounding people about things they’ll probably take care of on their own anyway; may I suggest taking that money and purchasing some additional descent playground equipment. THAT would be a benefit to the community. Have you checked out the “playgrounds”? They are L A M E! If every minute of my residency here is going to be managed then I’d like the HOA to manage to give something back. All of the quality neighborhoods (think Dove Mountain and Tangerine Crossing, shoot even North Ranch) have good playgrounds. Their HOAs provide something for the residents and in turn the residents keep their yards looking nice.

Disgusted with having to live here,

P.S. We’re not quite as smart as the HOA president and board, but don’t think we don’t notice the red neck inflatable pool on the front porch AND PLASTIC CHAIRS. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander…dear leader, uh…el presidente, uh…great one, uh…whatever it is you crown yourself. I certainly hope you’re heading all the notices about those chairs. Or do you get to be an exception?