My washing line annoying neighbour

[Afrodizzyak]

We have a new neighbour who has complained to me about my laundry hanging on the line ruining her view. It's just run of the mill laundry, no crutchless knickers or bondage gear, so not offensive. At first I ignored her, but she later told me she had photographed it and would complain to council.
I'm not the only neighbour she has complained to, another about his whistling, which is piercing her ears, having sensitive hearing and she asked another neighbour to keep his windows and doors closed whilst cooking as it made her nauseous.
It's not just humans she intolerant of, if a bird is singing, she will start growling to scare it away.
Before she moved here, we all just dodged along fine.
Is there any law against hanging washing? I'm not tumble drying our family's wash when not necessary.

Doesn’t everyone have a clothes prop then or am I showing my age here? Anyway OP, your neighbour would absolutely despise me….. I have TWO washing lines!!! 😱

An update, as was chatting to my lovely whistling neighbour and his wife on my way home today. He told me he was looking for a Roger Whittaker (famous whistler) cd on eBay.

I had that when i lived at my mums - woman hated everything life had to offer. When i was a kid it was my teepee out of bean poles and sheets that she claimed looked like gyspies had moved in, then it was our cats meowing (wasnt even our cat) our garden plants being seen from the fence - she would get a ladder out and hack them to death as far as she could reach, our natural pond full of life and plants she referred to as a stagnant bog... the fence fell down in a storm and for 20 years she left it open to our garden complaining about seeing our garden, the terrible view (huge gorgeous garden she was lucky to view) and then the laundry looking like a washer woman's house.... by then i was a teen and fed up with her waking us up at 5am every morning since the 80s complaining so loudly about everything she woke the neighbourhood so hung out all my Rocky horror costumes out on the line and took a seat to watch the fall out. Never seen a fence go up so fast in all my life!! But the kicker - it's one of those fences with cut outs so she can still view our garden and pond that she hates so much.

Some people are just fruit loops - yours, like mine, clearly hates the entire world and loves nothing more than to make everyone else as miserable as her. Just ignore her. She can complain to the council but unlike parts of Germany - there are no rules on when or where you can hang out your. I can promise you if she emails the council - they will put that up on their wall of 'crazy sh$t' because we all know they have one!!

Do as i did - hang out tshirts with suggestive slogans or bondage gear or something messed up like huge granny kickers and cut the crotches out or adult sized nappies - if she's going to complain about everything you do - at least get some fun out of it! Oh and get a cd of bird song you can play in the garden.

Next time she complains just say - Don't worry I'll take it down - as soon as it's dry!

Thanks for all your posts everyone, I'm reassured I'm not the only one.

Haha ignore her. She doesn't own the air above your garden. It's in your garden, and it's normal to dry washing outside. Just make sure you constantly have washing out to really piss her off

I hope I’m wrong but I have a feeling it won’t only be the washing she is complaining about. If she has only just moved in what will happen if when your kids or other people kids start playing outside. She’ll be complaining about the “noise” they make as well. Hope it doesn’t escalate. We had a neighbour who couldn’t stand bird shrieking or shitting used to shoot them with an air rifle!

@Emberino ·

I hope I’m wrong but I have a feeling it won’t only be the washing she is complaining about. If she has only just moved in what will happen if when your kids or other people kids start playing outside. She’ll be complaining about the “noise” they make as well. Hope it doesn’t escalate. We had a neighbour who couldn’t stand bird shrieking or shitting used to shoot them with an air rifle!

Wow. Hope you reported them to the RSPCA/RSPB, although it does depend on the type of bird.

We had a neighbour that used an air rifle to shoot/kill magpies and squirrels. And FIL did same with pigeons and squirrels. Both had medium sized suburban gardens and weren't protecting chickens or anything like that. Both had a veg patch which is, I think, what FIL was worried about. It annoyed me because the neighbours may disagree but are affected. It's a few years later but we still don't see squirrels or magpies here.

FIL once rang a fox wildlife charity to find out how he could legally kill foxes and they said, err we are all about protecting them not destroying them! PIL had a den and we could watch fox puppies playing from the back bedroom. It was lovely to see.

My neighbor leaves their washing out for weeks 😂

There could be a covenant about not hanging washing out…probably not in the ops area but it’s not unknown.
I once lived in a house on a river, near a Marina, we couldn’t hang washing out or even put a clothes airer outside, we got warnings, strongly worded ones too. We put a wall mounted four arm rotary drier inside the garage and left the garage doors open. Someone from a boat passing by complained he could see our washing inside the garage, I’d left the back door open as well as the garage door to let the air blow through.

I'm actually feeling sorry for the neighbour. Imagine being so highly strung that normal aspects of life like washing or whistling drive you so mad you complain to people. She mustn't be very happy.

I mean, don't get me wrong, I'd completely ignore her moaning and tell her I felt harassed which, unlike hanging washing out, actually is something you can report... But I'd do it in a sympathetic way, while wondering what would make her happy? A detached house? Then she'd likely be annoyed by the postie or whatever.

She needs a chillpill - wonder if anyone's suggested a chat with the doctor about how she can't cope with everyday life? Not saying you have to do it, OP, but I can see an anonymous letter with a cat with a speech bubble...?

I would be so temped to vist the odd charity shop and fill the line up with pants of many sizes and colours. Or for the cornatnaton red white and blue.

I know people don't like zombie threads being resurrected, but rereading the OPs posts,, I'd love her to come back with an update, and a Big List of Batshit Neighbour's Grievances.

You could put up a screen of light reed matting along the fence or grow tall trees to block all of her view or engage the local graffiti artist to draw a bright mural, tall and wide of foxes or rocket ships or large digital emojis.

She is very unreasonable.

Keep drying your washing the solar and wind outdoors method.

Sad we can’t all live in peace. I’d keep line drying my clothes outdoors.

She unfortunately has problems but it’s important this doesn’t impact on your lifestyle. It’s cheaper and not harming the environment.

She obviously has issues, let her moan to the council, I’m sure it’ll be their top priority 😂

I have one of these , she complained far too often to the local police about a neighbours relative parking outside his house! Eventually the police have spoken to her about her behaviour. She was like this apparently at her last address… all quiet now.

I wonder if the police/council have a 'spurious complaints' department complete with a photo wall of bothersome repeat offenders

Mad as box of frogs... no one will take her complaints seriously. Ignore her.

She sounds like a serial complainer and control freak. Telling people not to whistle or open their windows or put washing out? I think you all need to get together and complain about her harassment because that's what she is doing. Harassing people and trying to curtail anything normal that she doesn't like.

Daffodilsandtuplips Why did you decide to revive a year-old zombie?

There was a washing line thread a couple of days ago. I imagine this one came up in the list of suggested similar threads.
As to why people don't check the dates or activity of the thread... beats me.

What baffles me is all the subsequent posters chipping in with their 2 cents worth, usually after someone has pointed out THIS IS A ZOMBIE THREAD. It's a single click to read all the OP's updates.

I really do wish the OP would come back on this one though! unless the neighbour got her way and annoyed everyone around her to the point of moving out, leaving an unoccupied street. Or, less dramatically, the neighbour moved to an uninhabited island that even birds wouldn't crap on. Peace at last for her. Although I think people like that enjoy having people to complain to & about.

I have done this. Just not checked date, posted and then seen date and think "b**cks!". I try to remember to look now but sure I will probably do it again!