I need a perfect line to cut to the bone and deter them once and for all.
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Dear Hera
Every Sunday afternoon my neighbour and his friends and flatmates all gather to watch the rugby league. I’m not a sports fan, but I actually kind of love hearing the yells of excitement or screaming when there’s a close call. The problem begins as they sink their fourth beer. Rather than using the bathroom, they nip outside to the side of the house to piss on the fence. The fence adjoins my property and is facing the only door to our backyard. Every Sunday now, for several weeks, I exit that door to get my washing off the line or mess around in the garden and come face to face with some half-cut 30-year-old (or two) mid-stream. As our houses are quite close together, they’re standing only a meter or two away from me. I usually just say something like “Oh woah” and they act kind of embarrassed or mumble an apology. Last week one of them asked me if I liked what I saw. I was mad about it all week. What I need is the perfect line. Something withering but funny enough that they will go back and tell the group. Hopefully, then they’ll choose somewhere else to pee. Please Hera, can you help me?
Sincerely On the Fence
Dear On the Fence,
You know the old saying. The problem with neighbours is you have to live beside them.
It sucks that your peaceful Sunday gardening routine has inadvertently turned into a bathroom witness lineup. And that drunk strangers are asking you to rate their genitalia! I am sure they all have beautiful and magnificent penises, and it’s hard not to sit there all day with a pair of binoculars and stare in wonderment at the beauty and nobility which is man, saying “hoo boy” and “gosh darn it Phyllis, the hog’s got free in the back pasture again”. But there’s a time and a place.
It would be nice to think there was something so cutting you could say that it would make these guys change their behaviour and share their findings with the wider group. But the more withering your retort, the more likely it is they’ll keep it to themselves. It’s unlikely you’ll get the exact prompt again, but if you do, what do you say?
The boomer response would be to make some joke about whipping out a magnifying glass, but making fun of people’s genital size is stale and retro. A more interesting tactic would be to tell them you’re a qualified doctor, and that you don’t want to be rude or intrusive, but you think it’s important they go and get an emergency check up, because you worked in a sexual health clinic for years and think they need medical attention. The more sincere, the better. Making people seek unnecessary healthcare isn’t a crime, and the doctors might even discover some previously undiagnosed rash. I also like the whimsical and flirtatious charm of saying “wow it’s so big, how do you manage to fit that entire thing up your mother’s tight little ass?” but it might not improve the tenor of the situation.
To be honest, “whoa” is a pretty fair response. I don’t think you’re going to be able to Aaron Sorkin your way to victory.
So what can you do, besides putting up a golden frame and trying to pretend they’re a Renaissance painting, or setting up a paid live-streaming service for Dutch perverts?
You could always send over a crate of beer with a friendly note explaining the situation and asking your neighbours if they could ask their friends not to pee outside. There is, however, no guarantee they will care. As far as I can tell they’re not breaking any kind of law, and any Home-Alone electric fence-style retaliation is only going to get you on Neighbours at War. But it might be worth asking nicely!
It’s hard to know what else might work without being able to visualise your property, but depending on fence height and opacity, maybe you could buy some potted trees just outside your back door, to create some leafy insulation.
You say this appears to be happening when you’re not actually using the back garden, and happen to pop outside for a moment, which makes me wonder if giving your neighbours the feeling that you’re occupying the outside space might deter them. You could open the back door and play the national radio at top volume. They might be less inclined to drop their pants if the garden is full of the sound of someone reviewing the latest cricketing memoir. You could even go out early with a pair of particularly sharp gardening shears, and do some aggressive pruning.
If you’re not a National Radio listener, you could take a more hostile approach. I’m not sure what the worst soundtrack to pee through is, but here are some suggestions:
The sound of applause
The sound of crying
The Yellow River band
The national anthem
Winston Churchill’s collected speeches
You could also install sprinklers around your fence, but this is a pretty hostile tactic and only to be used when someone gets sexually inappropriate.
The end goal is to be able to enjoy your own garden in peace. So I would try asking politely first, music and foliage second, and brutal personal insults third.
Good luck!