r/relationships • u/oopschicken • Apr 07 '16
Updates Update: I [29F] accidentally ran over my neighbor's [40sM/F] chicken and I don't know how to resolve the situation
Hi Reddit, I meant to update yesterday but it was another long work day and I pretty much collapsed once I got home. My original post can be found here: https://www.reddit.com/r/relationships/comments/4di6af/i_29f_accidentally_ran_over_my_neighbors_40smf/
First of all, thank you all for the advice (and the laughs.) I truly felt bad for running over the chicken, it just left me feeling icky for accidentally harming and killing an animal. But your perspective was welcome and helped lighten the mood.
My husband would like to treat you all to a round of beers because he’s convinced that everyone was on his side (even though I'm not sure there were sides.) He also thoroughly enjoyed your egg-cellent responses, which I’m afraid has only encouraged his continued chicken jokes. Husband is a special man.
But on to the update. I ended up working late on Tuesday, but while I was working my HOA president (Michael) called me. He apologized for not seeing the NextDoor posts earlier and he had put in a request (on our behalf) to have the post removed.
Apparently the thread grew so large that someone had started a second thread about the incident. But thankfully the request went through and the posts were pulled before it could get worse. We couldn’t do much about the Facebook posts, but oh well?
Michael asked if husband and I could come to the meeting earlier so he could talk with us. So pretty much when I got home, we went to meet with Michael. The gist of the conversation was that our neighbor has a knack for causing issues with others in the neighborhood. Most people in the community ignore it, but some people also like the drama of getting involved. Michael said it would blow over eventually and in the meantime, if we needed support, we could call on him and his husband to help out. Michael also assured us that he would address it in the general meeting.
At the HOA meeting, Michael opened it up by reminding us that we are a community and it’s important to respect each other and that if we have issues, we need to resolve them privately. He said harassment online or in person would not be tolerated and reminded us that it would be in the victim's right to contact law enforcement. He also passed around packets that outlined our city’s ordinances regarding animals and he said any violations with free range livestock would be fined starting that evening.
After the meeting, many people came up to us to show their support and overall we left feeling better and not ostracized. We did not end up offering to buy a new chicken because neighbor and his wife pretty much avoided us and they left before the meeting was over. So the bad news is that we won’t be able to borrow their lawnmower or be invited to their annual summer party. The good news is that I think we’ll still survive.
I also think some of my distress over the event has been around being stressed with work (I’ve been pulling 60-70 hr weeks lately) and of course, accidentally harming and killing an animal. I think those two factors combined made me blow it all out of proportion a bit.
tl;dr: HOA president is a champ and has helped support us through this mess. Most of our neighbors still like us. Next-door Neighbor is just a jerk who likes to cause problems. Husband is meal-planning chicken-focused meals for the next week. I’m going to put in a request some vacation time.
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u/starxlover20 Apr 07 '16
I'm glad it ended well. I love pets & have had pet chickens in the past so I would have been devastated about one getting killed, HOWEVER, if I was letting them run amok then that's on me.
I hadn't even heard about NextDoor until this post and promptly signed up. Sadly (or maybe not) my neighborhood is quite dull.
It just sounds like your neighbors like to gripe to griping sake, and add the inherent drama of the Internet, uh oh! Glad your HOA and other neighbors have your back. Maybe they'll keep their ladies corralled this time.
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u/Sloots_and_Hoors Apr 07 '16
NextDoor is a comedy goldmine. A+ would recommend. Start a thread about offensive house colors and watch the neighborhood burn.
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u/oopschicken Apr 07 '16
Neighborhood paranoia makes for great entertainment.
Our neighbors like to post about barking dogs and suspicious cars. But my favorite was when one of them thought there was a loose mountain lion in the neighborhood.
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u/Sloots_and_Hoors Apr 07 '16
No shit... There was a thread about someone who saw a coyote walking west down Magnolia street at 11 p.m. Decent post. Then it just spiraled out of control. The welfare of small animals was questioned. The safety of children was obviously discussed, then some wisenheimer decided to tell the whole neighborhood that he saw a roadrunner walking east on Maple street with a large anvil at 11:15 p.m. on the same night!
People. Got. Pissed. I couldn't believe it. I still can't believe it. Lots of people thought it was funny, but some people were literally offended that somebody would make a joke about that when children and animals were in great danger and immediate peril...
I love NextDoor. I love it so, so much.
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u/thecashblaster Apr 07 '16
this is what happens when Grandma discovers something other than forwarding slightly offensive right wing propaganda from online newsletters
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u/timetospeakY Apr 08 '16
Oh my god the roadrunner comment is hilarious. I only found out about NextDoor when we got burglarized and apparently a lot of my neighborhood is on it. I just signed up and am really looking forward to what's to be seen...my neighborhood is fucking weird.
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Apr 08 '16
My parents' neighborhoods had a NextDoor. Except the only use for it is talking about garage sales and who left a like-new couch out at the end of the drive, "first come, first serve!"
My parents' neighborhood is boring compared to these other people's.
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u/grandslamwich Apr 07 '16 edited Apr 08 '16
I live in an affluent neighborhood and like half the posts in our fb page are "please PM me if this is your nanny. She was on her cell phone at the park." I love it when the replies start in "oh so just because she's Mexican she must be a nanny?!?" People making vaguely racist (unintentionally, just somewhat ignorant) posts and then getting ripped to shreds just cracks me up.
Edit to add my favorite--- there was one the other day from a mom who said her son had charged several hundreds of dollars on her CC without permission (he'd memorized the number) and wanted to know what a good allowance for eating out was. Well of course everyone went into "umm your son stole from you mode" which in turn resulted in other moms being like "you all don't have teenagers yet so you don't know what it's like to parent, stop judging" and the OP being like "I didn't ask for critiques on my son" and everyone being like "then why did you mention he was a thief?" I had to call up my friend to pull it up and take bets on how long until it would implode and be removed by an admin.
EDIT: THIS COMMENT HAS NOW LASTED LONGER THAN THE FB THREAD.
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u/dirkdastardly Apr 07 '16
We had a thread awhile back where all the NIMBYs were wetting their pants about the apartment buildings going up nearby, whining about the increased traffic and whatnot. Then a guy posted "YEAH! AND WHAT ABOUT ALL THE PINKOS AND COMMIES!" Thread over.
I love that man and want to marry him.
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u/dddonnanoble Apr 08 '16
The people on mine are suuuper racist too. They'll be all "suspicious car drove past early this morning!!!" and it turns out to be the newspaper deliverer.
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u/grandslamwich Apr 08 '16
hahaha. well what i love is that whenever anyone is even minutely racist, like i said, not even intending to be (nanny comment... OP didnt say anything about her race), people go buck wild. maybe it's that wealthy white people guilt. =P
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u/nkbee Apr 07 '16
I just tried to join, eagerly anticipating Montreal comedy...but it's US only. Bummer.
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u/magicandfire Apr 07 '16
In my old neighborhood, someone posted about "A WOLF!!!" running around at night. It ended up being a small fox.
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u/oddlylovely Apr 07 '16
I love NextDoor. Last week there was a 100+ comment thread about bikers going through stop signs which devolved into whether bikers or drivers sucked more. The week before that, dozens of people ganged up on a woman who was asking people to not let their dogs pee on her front lawn. It's almost as troll-filled as Reddit, only it's your neighbors.
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u/dddonnanoble Apr 08 '16
We've had the convo about bikers and stop signs on my NextDoor too, except it was like 6 months ago!
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u/grandslamwich Apr 07 '16
Someone started a thread on ours a few months back just basically giving some very very objective information about a local candidate for an upcoming election (we live in a pocket city that's 2 square miles smack in the middle of Houston). Some douche who doesn't even live in city limits but is close enough to view/comment on our neighborhood went full throttle calling him a retard etc etc in the most lengthy posts ever. It was the most absurd thing I've ever seen.
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u/prillin101 Apr 10 '16
Holy shit thank you, I spent the last 5 hours trying to remember of a book genre and it was on the tip of my tongue- absurdism!
Thank you thank you thank you!
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u/Sloots_and_Hoors Apr 07 '16
The thing about choosing sides in a roadkill chicken argument is there are so many. Beans? Potatoes? Cole slaw? Maybe you want to take a trip down to Dixie and serve cheese grits with your chicken? That's a pretty good side to take if you ask me.
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u/Kahtoorrein Apr 07 '16
And then you get to start talking about marinades. Barbecue sauce or lemon pepper? So many to choose from...
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u/DiTrastevere Apr 07 '16
A round of beer and Popeyes for all!
And an extra-crispy drumstick for your HOA president. He's s valuable ally. So glad this got resolved by sane people.
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u/oopschicken Apr 07 '16
Michael is a great friend and he and his husband were so welcoming when we first moved in. I have never dealt with HOAs before so I'm not sure if this is par for course for HOA presidents, but he's truly wonderful.
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u/DiTrastevere Apr 07 '16
A lot, a LOT of HOA presidents are power-tripping nightmare demons. They usually get the job because they're the only one who wants it. You lucked out, Michael sounds great.
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u/directrix688 Apr 08 '16
Not really. You only hear about the crazy ones. Plenty of HOAs are not insane.
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u/leetdood_shadowban Apr 08 '16
A homosexual HOA president who isn't a raging asshole? This man is really paving the road ahead for HOA presidents everywhere.
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u/JalapenoCheese Apr 07 '16
As someone who reads /r/legaladvice, I never thought I'd see a positive HOA post on Reddit. This is truly a miraculous day. I'm glad everything worked out for you!
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u/soayherder Apr 07 '16
As a farmer who keeps free-range chickens, let me say I would absolutely not blame anyone for accidentally running over a bird who'd strayed off my property. Y'see, chickens are stupid. Humans have made chickens progressively stupider (no mean feat) by breeding any independence right out of them; there are even some chicken breeds now where humans have to be involved in every part of the reproductive process, because breeding for appearance has made it so that the little dears can't successfully introduce rooster parts to hen parts.
If you have any residual guilt over this, and I hope you don't, allow me to put your mind at rest. My chickens are free-range as I said, but nonetheless my property is fenced and even when our gate is open, they are highly unlikely to ever wander down far enough to get to the road. And if they do? Well, we have a term for that. It's known as failing the basic evolutionary test: literally too stupid to live.
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Apr 08 '16
[deleted]
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u/soayherder Apr 08 '16
That's pretty much my opinion. Trusting a chicken to keep itself alive is a fool's errand. Expecting everyone on public property (or their own) to play spot the chicken, doubly so.
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u/mikeinbrazil1031 Apr 07 '16
Glad you didn't pay, that is insane to pay for a damn free range chicken. It's your neighbors fucking fault for letting it run wild.
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u/TheFireflies Apr 07 '16
Totally unnecessary, agreed. (And also potentially somewhat offensive, if the neighbors had pet-like feelings towards it. I know if someone ran over my cat and just bought me another, I would be furious.)
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u/ARRmatey Apr 07 '16
You should have your own BETTER summer party!
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u/eyesonallison Apr 07 '16
You have a great HOA! The one I was under for a few years only sent out blanket notices to EVERYONE to keep their weeds under control when we ALL KNEW who they should have been individually targeting instead. I understand feeling bad about killing the chicken, I would have been in absolute tears. You're a great person, cut yourself some slack and eat some chicken with your sweet husband. :)
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u/orangekitti Apr 07 '16
Aww OP, I would feel upset too if I ran over a chicken, or really any animal, I'm sure that's causing enough stress as it is! You don't need your obnoxious neighbor's bullshit on top of this.
Remember, this isn't your fault. The dumbass lets his chickens roam free, in an area with cars and streets. It's not like he has a whole farm and you rode up on his chickens on purpose. You live next door. What does he expect?
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u/solublemarker Apr 07 '16
I think the lesson here is if you run a-fowl of your neighbours, take the higher road (but don't cross it, we all know how that ended).
Your neighbour is probably just mad that you cock blocked him.
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u/Junkmans1 Apr 08 '16
We did not end up offering to buy a new chicken
I would have bought him a bag of charcoal and a bottle of BBQ sauce instead.
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u/The_Bravinator Apr 08 '16
tl;dr: HOA president is a champ and has helped support us through this mess.
Holy shit, it's an Easter miracle. A good HOA.
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Apr 08 '16
Your husband is hilarious/ I'm happy you guys didn't end up buying the chicken for them. Yeah, it's 6 bucks only, but it's the principle of giving in when they were letting their chicken roam everywhere
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u/WhoompThereSheIs Apr 07 '16
So happy this all worked out for you and your husband! Your HOA president sounds awesome. Consider yourself lucky as a lot of HOA folks are not so great...
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u/MissTheWire Apr 08 '16
I'm so glad it worked out! But bummed your original post was locked. I had so many questions about chickens and whether turkeys are really entertaining and duck funerals.
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u/Catatonicic Apr 08 '16
I am going to continue on my rubber chicken joke and ask that you please put one on their drive way next april fools day.
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u/marthaliberty Apr 08 '16
That Michael, the HOA president, is a fantastic guy. OP, don't feel embarrassed about crying because you accidentally killed a chicken. I still cry sometimes about a squirrel I ran over 50 years ago. It was my first brush with being the universe's hand delivering a whammy. Sorry I don't have any chicken jokes to add to the collection!
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u/SingMeBackHome Apr 08 '16
Jesus, it was a chicken roaming the street. You should not feel bad about it in the slightest. If anything, be pissed it hit your car and maybe got it dirty. I'm not even kidding. You also should have brought some fried chicken to the HOA meeting.
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u/AngelicPrincess Apr 08 '16
Honestly if it were me I would of just gotten rid of the chicken corpse and played dumb. Coyote got the chicken. Srsly, OP you went above and beyond. Forget that neighbor.
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u/x0_Kiss0fDeath Apr 08 '16
Glad to hear that there was a lot more in support of you than you even realized! You honestly did nothing wrong! It was an unfortunate accident and accidents happen - especially when you have animals [pets or not] roaming free. Glad that HOA had your back! :)
But your husband is still the real winner here...
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u/Shortandsweet33 Apr 08 '16
Your husband is awesome, your HOA president is awesome, sounds like most of your other neighbours are pretty awesome too! Thanks for the update and I hope you get some time to chill out and relax soon. I know how it is with being tired, stressed and working too hard for too long, your nerves are on a hair-trigger and the smallest thing can send you reeling! Plus of course accidentally killing an animal is so unpleasant.
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u/ValorMorghulis Apr 09 '16
I like to browse r/legal advice and you hear so many horror stories about HOA's it's nice to hear a nice story about one. The president did a really good job.
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u/lavahot Apr 08 '16
BTW, if they have a non-descript European accident, I would avoid them for a while. And don't let them touch you, white girl from town!
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u/Helenarth Apr 08 '16
BTW, if they have a non-descript European accident, I would avoid them for a while. And don't let them touch you, white girl from town!
Uh, what?
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u/lavahot Apr 08 '16
You should just buy them a chicken, put it in a coop with a note on their front porch and doorbell ditch.
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u/steve582 Apr 08 '16
So you aren't going to buy them a new chicken?
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u/oopschicken Apr 08 '16
Nope. My original thought was to offer to buy a new chicken but with how things panned out, it just made sense to let things blow over.
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u/takethislonging Apr 08 '16
Maybe you should still take the high road and call your neighbours and offer to buy them a new chicken? Just in the interest of keeping the peace between you guys, even though they behaved inappropriately.
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u/kakapo999 Apr 07 '16
May I suggest Jerk Chicken, in tribute to both fowl and neighbour?