We have a coffee invite with the neighbours and I am very nervous it is going to turn into a Leageue of gentlemen you be strangers event. Wish me luck.

[twinsetandpearls]

My family and I just do not fit in on our road, we are very obviously a northern working class family who are fish out of water. We live on a road of old, reserved very settled dorset types. THe house is rented and everyone knows that as it belonged to a lady who lived in the house from when it was built.

We live next door to the cultural movers and shakers of the town who often have garden parties or intellectual gatherings. DD often stands at the bottom of their garden when such things are happening and yells in her northern dulcet tones " Mum the neighbours are being posh again".

I did send around some baking when we moved in and we do get the odd smile or hello but nothing else. Dp who works from home, so is here all the time, says he feels quite uncomfortable on this road and wants to move.

Last week, cultural movers and shakers knock on the door and say do come around for coffee.

I am convinced that all our neighbours are going to be there and they are going to chant at us "You be strangers" while their eyes go red and start to spin."

What do you wear for such an event? Should I take anything. I actually don't think I can as nothing is open around here.

Aw, tsap, I don't live very far from you and have spent most of my life in Dorset. We aren't all completely small-minded parochial types, you know! Am glad your neighbours turned out to be friendly, but am intrigued by the "rules for the front gardens".
ps: my dh is from the other end of the country.

teapot dp has never played golf in his life, am not sure how he is going to get out of that one

Stayfrosty they did mean it in a nice way we are lucky to live here, it is beautiful and my school is wonderful and I have come from a town that is sinking and a school that is dying. I think it is great that people know they live somewhere that is beautiful and they are lucky, it just amazed me how many people said it.

I did tell one of my classes that I bred ferrets and whippets up north and they did not get the joke at all.

cupcakes we all have our own drives but if you have guests there are only certain spots you can drive. Rubbish goes out the night before rather than early in the morning so as not to disturb anybody. None of us have gates, they are frowned upon. WE all also back onto farm land and there are all sorts of rules about what you can do with the bit of garden that backs onto the farm. Times you can and can't walk on the farm, and you need to be an established resident to get permission. Because we have such beautiful views they are also funny about what you have in your back garden so you do not spoil the view.

Ripeberry that did not understand dp accent at all, it took them 3 times to get dp name.

Notbig I really don't mean to insult anyone, I have met some really lovely people here. I think living somewhere beautiful must beautify your personality, we are certainly more chilled.

Wow! Those are some 'rules'!

Where my in laws live, it is frowned upon to have guests park on the side of the road that is not 'yours' and you must not attempt to do a 3 point turn adjacent to a driveway and flash your headlights up the drive while doing so as the lights flashing in to some people houses upsets them! My in laws had a 26 foot boat on their drive (to the side of the house really iyswim) for a while, while they were selling it and residents complained because it looked 'messy'!