" I am trying to convinced husband to get a solid structure gate at the end of the driveway, but he thinks that will spark more curiosity, not deter it. Any thoughts on that?" We have a farm property that was in a similar situation. Teenagers throwing parties and using it for a "romantic spot". Deer hunters just doing whatever they felt like even trying to put up permanent tree stands in the woods. People fishing out of the pond and weirdos coming out and parking behind the barn out of sight doing god knows what all day. We put carpet tack strips across the drive, huge piles of logs and sticks, etc. It still didn't stop them from driving back. We found out that to most people property rights mean very little. They will do whatever they want if there is not something to put an active stop to it. Our neighbor across the street used to catch them all the time and call us. Sometimes, these people would show up 5 minutes after we left! Who knows where they all came from. Anyway, we finally decided to put a homemade gate across the gravel drive. It was cheap to build and when painted didn't look too bad. Stopped the driving traffic 100%. They still tried to park in the neighboring lot and walk across for hunting, but another family built a house on the other side and he goes out to make a ruckus when he thinks hunters are trying to get out there so it's no use even trying to get a deer. If you can't be out there right away, I wouldn't hesitate to put up a gate. It will help a lot. Especially if it's right on the road where if they stop their car will be visible to everyone driving by.

i have a diabolical part time neighbor from hell. he hates my race???? i am very quiet and live alone, no stereo, meditate and do not bother anyone. neither do my two pets. he has tormented me for 3 years, abused me, harassed me, stalked me, bullied me. ways you would not believe someone could be so obsessed with your life and making you suffer. i now have the state attorney involved and aps will soon too for abusing a disabled person. however, i always leave a little recorder on when i go out. it is dated and timed. i then download all the recordings to my pc and keep them on a flash drive and also on an external hard drive. this way if he ever decides to be even more evil, i have proof. my dog and bird are quiet when i am out and when i am home as well. so you might look into a little recorder to start. i do have surveillance cameras now to hear and see him when he tried to vandalize or enter my property and to prove he is intentionally harassing me, which is a crime. sadly, the criminal is always protected and the victim always victimized by the law as well. the recorder i have is OLYMPUS, it only cost me $69. i is really good and very sensitive. it will work fine for you. the web cam is also good but you have to make sure you are not needing to keep internet connection or if you lose the connection while you are gone, you are not going to have a record of your time away. but the recorder never fails. i have rechargable batteries in it. good luck. i know neighbors like that need to not be.

I have to imagine that most people who go through open houses are not seriously looking for houses. When I was seriously looking, I made appointments for private showings for all the houses. I have a three bedroom house in a neighborhood I really like and am constantly struggling with the concept of moving up to a 4BR, building onto our current house or just making do with what we have. I would never engage the services of a realtor to tour neighborhood houses, since I haven't even put our house on the market, let alone sold it, but I periodically go through 4BR houses in the neighborhood that appear to meet our needs. I do it as much to keep tabs on what you can get for your dollar than anything else. Since we want to stay within a mile radius of my current home for school purposes, I truly am a nosy neighbor. None of the realtors mind when I come through as far as I can tell. I'm just honest with them; it seems not uncommon based on their reaction. Most of the time it's not even the listing agent at the open house, more of a junior associate, and they do try to sell themselves/their services once they realize they can't sell the house to me. That's OK by me, too.

I wouldn't worry about rose purgatory. After all, you're planting on YOUR side of the fence, lol. I say go for it. But if you haven't completely settled on Treasure Trove you might look at some I've grown. If you're thinking in terms of coverage and securing your perimeter against mean neighbors and/or zombies, there's nothing like the sempervirens ramblers. I've grown all these I mention below (except Awakening. It's new this year) in my zone 7a without any problem. The only time any of them had dieback was after the Arctic Express back in the 80's when we set the record of -24F. All of them are healthy for me. My favorite is Francois Jaranville, a beautiful warm pink/peach. Gardenia is a great warm white with hint of creamy yellow. It will bloom in some shade and gets HUGE. I'm talking 30+ feet. Of course there is my pink trio: Dr W. Van Fleet, New Dawn and Awakening (once-blooming dad, reblooming sport-daughter, and double reblooming grand-daughter, lol). There are many other sempervirens climbers to look at on HMF, some more rambunctious than others, and I assume you want a BIG rose. If you're concerned about hardiness, you might look at the setigera climbers. Some are house eaters as well, but in general are hardier than the sempervirens. Long John Silver (white) and Baltimore Belle (pink) are big, boisterous and bountiful. If you just want to block the view, you probably couldn't do better than good old climbing Mlle Cecile Brunner. If you can track it down, there's an elusive reblooming form somewhere out there. Mine has rebloomed a smattering in the past when I've done some judicious pruning right after the Spring flush, but it's getting much too big to bother with. If I were you, I'd contact Lynette, aka oldrosarian. There isn't much about climbing roses she doesn't know, and not many she hasn't grown! And her photos...oy vey!