Nappies and Neighbours.

I live in a quiet part of London, on a road of semi detached houses. On one side is a great neighbour - almost as close a family. On the other side is a not too bad neighbour - we have no issues with them, but not really close either. They're kind of neutral. All three families in these houses are of the same ethnic background.

What happened? Nappies happened.

One morning early in the new year, i saw a dirty nappy on our back lawn. Eh? How did it get there? We assumed an animal had dragged it there. Not sure why it would do that. I got rid of it, but had my suspicions. Since it wasn't a brand we used, i knew it wasn't from my house.

A few days later, another one. This time, i noticed they had an odd way of extracting rubbish from the house - instead of collecting in a small bin inside the house and then taking it out to the wheelie bin, they were leaning out of the upper storey window, and dropping it straight to the ground to be dealt with later. Hmmm, was this the source of the flying nappy?

I threw that one back over the wall, to their garden. (The neutral family i mentioned earlier)

A few weeks later, again on the front lawn. Another nappy. This time, i had to put a stop to it. My dad was in hospital, my baby daughter was keeping us awake at all hours. There's enough going on without dealing with other people's nappy litterbug habits. I walked over and dropped this one on the porch, with a note: "i have enough nappies, fresh and soiled, of my own thanks".

Ten minutes later one of their family comes back and vaguely says something about maybe it got over the wall by accident. (You'd have to have a really bad aim when you're throwing crap out of your window and it keeps ending up next door, quite a good distance too, like 4 metres).

Well that put a stop to it for a while. Except a few more months later on, and another one. I made sure it landed on the bonnet of their car when i returned it via airmail. My mum raised it with their mum, who said she had already jolly well shouted at all those with nappy wearing kids, and warned them to stop it, embarrassing as it is. They claimed this one must be from random strangers throwing litter in from the street (really? It hadn't been a problem in 20 years ago far. My street is very quiet, and rarely used as a through route). And animals? Animals open food bags. They can smell the nappy and would leave it alone. Why would they want to drag nappies around the garden?

Anyway, they've totally stopped now. Even the open-window-garbage-disposal system. We're still cordial, and we even return their kids garden toys that stray over the fence. I'm glad i didn't end up having to report them, as I'd been ready to do if i see another damned nappy on my lawn.