Fireworks and dog poo - WWYD?

[Sewbean]

We had some fireworks in our garden last night. Saturday before Bonfire Night, 6.45pm, lasted not much more than 5 minutes, we told immediate neighbours and someone further along the road we know has dogs.

A woman I didn't recognise came to our door to complain. Said we were the most selfish people she had ever met and we would rot in hell for distressing her dog. Her exact words.

This morning we were all out of the house, car was away. Came home to find a dog poo in the middle of our front path, right in front of the doorstep.

Complaining woman must not have noticed the CCTV camera our neighbour recently installed which covers the joint part of our path nearest the pavement. Clearly shows her walking in the gate with a full dog poo bag and walking out and putting something small in the bin by the gate.

Now I get fireworks split opinion, but until they are illegal we are not doing anything wrong, we were not outrageous at all as these things go. I'm not going to apologise for our fireworks. But she's obviously been upset and I am assuming she feels better now she has evened the score so I want to just let it go. DH however is upset and wants to speak to her. We don't know which house she lives in but could find out easily enough I suppose.
I don't want a massive neighbourhood dispute over something that took us 30 seconds to clear up (luckily it was solid).

WWYD? Ignore or 'have a chat' and drag it on?

I vote ignore, DH unfortunately votes the opposite.

I get you've decided not to do anything. At the very least she needs to be aware you have her in CCTV.

@Lulualla you did say 'from', not 'about'.

OP, I think you're right to ignore. However, I would make sure I kept a copy of the CCTV.

@Lulualla
ODFOD.
I read your post. I'm not lacking in comprehension skills

@Sewbean
Sorry for the derail,
I probably wouldn't go after her, it could backfire. Maybe just keep hold of the cctv and see if this escalates.
I'm a dog owner and mine are fine with loud noises, fireworks and jets flying overhead. All depends on how you as the owner respond, just ignore works for me. No petting, no fussing, no saying oh it's fine. It'll be ok. Dog doesn't understand.
It's still shitty behaviour on her part.

Report her

What’s the difference in the anti social stakes,bang bang bang of fucking fireworks or dog shit.

@Lulualla your post said she would spin stories "from" a man approaching etc not "about" a man approaching etc. From changes the meaning of your sentence completely. It means the event (him approaching) has occurred and she is making up more stories about an actual event.

Yes I'm a GN.

I agree with you that just leaving it is best. She sounds slightly deranged, has said her piece, got her "revenge" and will now hopefully leave you alone.

I have one cat who isn't bothered by fireworks, the other doesn't like them. She just has to put up with it though, it doesn't last forever.

I'd post it on a neighbourhood group asking who she is as you have something of hers you'd like to return.
It's only fair that you know where she lives, as she knows where you live to the extent of feeling comfortable enough to enter your property and leave shit on it, the dirty, dirty sod.
Just asking for the info is enough to shame her so I'd leave it after that.

@Wheat2Harvest my golden retriever used to not bat an eyelid if she heard gunfire when we were on countryside walks... But every November she became such a quivering wreck with fireworks she needed sedation on a couple of occasions. She was absolutely terrified of them. Whilst possibly not too percepable to human ears there is a big difference between fireworks and gunfire in terms of bass, volume and also frequency (ie loads of fireworks going off at once when in reality you don't get that with gunfire).

I don't know why op bothered posting on here asking for advice if she's not going to do anything anyway. Just let bullies and criminals get away with their appalling and illegal behaviour!

I hate fireworks but I would definitely report this.

If the OP is up for it, start with a letter requesting payment for the cost of cleaning the mess (£25 sounds more than reasonable).

If it's paid, alls well. If not, letter before action, and a Money Claim Online for the amount, noting the existence of the video.

Still no money ? Proceed to court and lay the evidence out. Courts decide on balance of probabilities so as long as the video is clear enough to support that level of proof, job done.

I don't know why op bothered posting on here asking for advice if she's not going to do anything anyway
Maybe because everything on here should be taken with a pinch of salt, as more and more posters are thriving on the drama of a posters life and post very inflammatory and over the top responses to whip up a frenzy to feed into the drama.

OP knows if she were to “shame” the woman on social media it could cause a further issue (remember this woman has already gone to spear shit on her property, she’s obviously not a rational or sane person ) and poowoman knows where OP lives so could quite easily launch another attack. OP doesn’t know where woman lives, although says she could find out but why waste energy on doing that? When all it realistically would do is start a tit for tat battle between the two of them. Poowoman is not bullying the OP ffs, yes she did a shitty thing (no pun intended) but it was an off the cuff reaction from being upset and distressed for her animal. Bullying is (usually) repeated and with an imbalance of power, this is just tit for tat revenge.

OP you sound very rational and level headed, and I agree that the best thing to do is just inhale and let it go. I think there would be a lot less aggro in the world if people just learned to step away from a situation like this and get on with things.

I wouldn't take it further and I'm not very confrontation shy at all! She was obviously upset for her dog and made a shitty (lol) decision. It's cleaned up, it's fine. I would however track her down just so that I would then know where to knock and inform for the next time I planned to have fireworks. If she's a cow about it after actually being informed then I would be more tempted to escalate the situation.

I’m with Sagradafamiliar on this - I love the idea of posting to a neighbourhood forum & saying you have ‘something you need to return’

(Though no, I wouldn’t confront either. Not sure it would end well?)

I don't know why op bothered posting on here asking for advice if she's not going to do anything anyway

Because I wanted to know what other people would do.

Because I wanted to talk about it without talking to real life people who might know her. What if she turned out to be someone's auntie?

Having read what everyone has said I still feel the right thing is to not take it any further. I don't know how she would react if I shamed her publicly, not well I imagine. I don't need that stress.

I would leave it OP as she sounds unhinged.

I must say though, that while I absolutely disagree with her actions, I think a lot of people massively underestimate the impact fireworks have on animals (and some groups of people)

It isn't unusual for dogs to die of heart attacks from firework fright, like the 16 week puppy mentioned upthread, some of them are so terrified they lay down shaking and panting too terrified to even stand up.

While her actions are unhinged and revolting I think you should try and see it from her side and have a little sympathy for the neighbour whose much loved dogs have obviously been suffering immenseky from something that to be honest, was utterly, utterly unnecessary.

I think you should try and see it from her side and have a little sympathy for the neighbour whose much loved dogs have obviously been suffering immenseky from something that to be honest, was utterly, utterly unnecessary

Lots of nice things in life are unnecessary.

But I am considering it from her side and that's partly why I'm not doing anything more.

I haven't seen her since and there have been no further deposits thank goodness.

Fireworks? Selfish pricks simple no need for them - shouldn’t be sold to the public