For the second day in a row this morning one of the builders was needlessly blocking the driveway with his ute. It’s one of those bright red ones that is way too new and shiny for a builder’s ute, and I bet he never drives it onto proper building sites where there might be mud and other such things.
The driveway in this place is a wide one. Convention is that people park on the side next to the fence, leaving the side next to the building free for people to drive along to and from the car ports at the back. It’s not rocket science, right? So when I saw this ute parked on the wrong side again, I got rather flustered. None of the builders were visible, so I beeped the horn a couple of times.
Some seconds passed and I was getting impatient. I beeped again, longer this time. I stopped the engine and got out of the car, looking around. The owner of the ute appeared. "Maybe you could park it on the other side next time" I remarked. "I’ll park it there any time I like", he replied.
What?! WHAT?!!!? He kept walking down to move it, and I shouted after him "Hey I’m still paying rent here you know. You guys shouldn’t even be here for another two weeks!" It’s true – the notice to vacate specified a deadline of 26th July. Now, I don’t mind that renovations have started earlier on the other flats, and fair enough that occasionally they’ll be unloading a truck or something in the driveway. But this arsehole sure as hell has no right to deliberately block the remaining residents’ cars.
So when I got to work I rang up the agent to hassle them again. Sympathetic noises were certainly forthcoming, but whether they can or will do anything about it is another matter. Grumble.
Still, it leaves me wondering if they’re trying in their way to apply pressure for people to leave early.
I had a word to a very helpful bloke at Consumer Affairs (okay, so he’s a friend of mine, but I’ve always found them to be very helpful) who has suggested various avenues of action should this happen again. We shall see…
