"I Only Left it Two Minutes..."

A couple of days ago, my neighbour startled me by fiercely and angrily knocking the front door.  Reacting like a 73 year old woman, I exclaimed, "Oh!" and nearly dropped the mug I was drying.

Affronted by the aggressive knocking I resolved to answer it, but to take my time over it.  There was really no need to be knocking the door like that.  I placed the mug very carefully on the mug tree.  I had a biscuit.  Then I thought, "What if somebody has been run over?"  At that time I didn't know it was my neighbour knocking, it could have been an emergency.  So I picked up the pace, regretting that I would answer the door - potentially to a distraught child who'd just seen their granny go under the wheels of a Megane - with a mouthful of biscuit.

It was my next-door-but-one neighbour wanting to know if I had a visitor.  Thinking this an odd question to get so worked up about, I swallowed my biscuit and told him that I did not.

It turns out the reason he was asking was because somebody had just parked their car on my next door neighbour's drive, meaning she was having to sit in her car on double yellows at the end of her driveway.  We quickly ascertained that none of us knew whose car it was.

After about 20 minutes a woman came running up to the driveway saying that she'd only left it 2 minutes and was sorry.  Except we knew she hadn't left it 2 minutes.  The next-door-but-one neighbour, who - let me tell you - can seriously knock a door, was pretty confrontational.  This then sent the woman on the defensive.

"I only left it 2 minutes!" in a sort of, "Jesus, why are you getting so worked up about it?" tone of voice.

The thing I wondered was, how was she going to tell that story to other people later on?  "So I parked on this woman's drive, when I got back they were all waiting outside and they were so rude!"

"Hang on, you parked on somebody's drive?"

"Yes.  It was bang out of order the way they spoke to me."

"Somebody's private driveway in front of their house?"

"That's right.  Completely out of proportion their reaction, don't you think?"

"I honestly don't think we should be friends any more.  This, combined with when you shat on my lunch the other day, has given me a clear picture of what sort of person you are."