neighbours

Neighbours are funny things, aren’t they? I’m not really used to having neighbours that you do more than nod hello to as you pass on the street – I haven’t really been “buddies” with neighbours since I was a child. In fact, the last neighbours I had were an old pair of alcoholics, who must have single-handedly kept the local liquor store in business. They liked to have nasty arguments at the top of their lungs, smoked like chimneys (which doesn’t seem to have weakened their lungs any, given the volumes they could achieve) and regularly set off the smoke alarms with their cooking.

So you can see how I’d find it a little odd getting used to neighbours who not only seem quite normal, but who are actually friendly. To give you an idea, they brought us a cake when we moved in. Seriously! A very yummy strawberry cheesecake, in fact. And knocked on the door last night to invite us over for a quiet beer.

They seem like a lovely couple, though – about our age with a young baby. And, funnily enough, it turns out we know some of the same people – never mind 6 degrees of separation, New Zealand is more like two or three.

So there you go – a new experience for pj-now-in-the-suburbs: friendly neighbours.