"How are you?" " Yes isn't it lovely again" "Yes I must water my tomato plants later - your courgettes look lovely." "See you later, going to read my book/play with baby/listen to my podcast now" Big smile. Sorted.
It’s not them it’s you. Very easy to say, “gotta go see you soon!”
Comments like these are pretty naïve.
Some people are just extremely rude and intrusive, and lack basic social skills. This describes the OP's neighbours, not the OP. There are plenty of people who force themselves onto anyone who wanders by and just gabble on and on and on at them.
At least two of the neighbour stories on this thread have moved from "lack of social skills" and into outright stalking.
People who gabble at you will not listen to a polite "have to go now."
I was waiting for a bus recently and some elderly man started monologuing at me, so I nodded and smiled politely, and when my bus came I politely said "bye now, have a good day", and he actually put his hand on my arm and started babbling twice as fast, very clearly with no intention of letting me exit the conversation, when I literally had one foot physically inside the bus! What did he expect, that I'd miss my bus because his small talk was so scintillating? Obviously I shook him off and stepped on.
I have a couple of neighbours who are retired, they are sweet and I do happily chat to them frequently, but there's a generational divide where they seem to think that mobile phones are bad things only used by naughty children. Several times I've been typing urgent work emails on my phone and they've approached me with the mentality "durr, silly little Jemima playing on her phone again, we've got to teach her to stop spending so much time playing on her phone and actually learn how to speak to people face to face haha!" I mean they've literally come up to me while I'm working and said "stop playing on your phone!!" Drives me mad.
I've taught myself to have good boundaries, but one of my best friends is somewhat famous and he often gets fans who grab his arm and physically drag him, or flat out refuse to let him go when he's explicitly said "I have to go very urgently right now" like four times. He can't just force his way through them and walk away for fear they'll go to the press. That's how rude and entitled some people are. Obviously that's different from the OP's situation but if someone is standing there gabbling on and on at her and she just walks away while they're in mid-flow, it could easily lead to gossip painting her as rude, which could be uncomfortable or worse.
And what do you do if you want to lie in a chair reading a book, and someone stands right up against the fence calling your name over and over, even after you've politely waved and said "good morning just have to read this book for work, chat later"?
Some people just refuse to be told.