'AITA for mowing my lawn in the early morning to get back at my neighbors?'

"AITA for mowing my lawn in the early morning to get back at my neighbors?"

Alright, I work late nights and sleep in every morning. My neighbors right next door have three little kids who scream and play and bang and ahhhhh! in the backyard at 7 in the morning every single day. I mean talking yelling, running, loud toys, pounding, whatever they can do to make noise.

I know. Kids are kids. But every morning? Weekends too? No. Just...no. I nicely mentioned it to my neighbor a few weeks ago. She laughed and said, “Oh, they’re early risers! You’ll get used to it.” No apology, no effort to quiet them down. So the other day, I set my alarm for 6am and mowed my lawn. Right up against their yard.

Then I used my leaf blower, for added punch. Neighbor comes outside in her jammies all pissed off. “Why are you being so inconsiderate?” She says. I smile and say, “Oh, I’m an early riser! You’ll get used to it.”

Now she and some other neighbors are saying I should have just “dealt with it like an adult. But I feel like I just gave them a taste of their own medicine. Those kids need to be considerate too. AITA?

Here's what people had to say to OP:

kush_babe wrote:

I love this kind of petty with parents and kids like this.

InvestigatorJaded261 wrote:

The pettiness aside, do you have any other neighbors? Because if you do, this was YTA moment, no question.

TA122278 wrote:

I aspire to this level of pettiness. I have neighbors like this but it’s not just early mornings. It’s ALL the time. They have a couple little kids and a dog. They leave the dog outside barking constantly for HOURS. The kids are so loud and obnoxious that my own kids complain. I’m glad I don’t have babies trying to nap anymore bc these people are SO loud.

And like I said, I have kids so I get that kids are loud. But when my kids were little and outside a lot I actually supervised them and told them that laughing and playing are fine, screaming for no reason is not.

We have neighbors. My neighbors however, dgaf how loud they are. I swear they just toss the kids and dog outside so it’s not as loud in their house. People suck. OP is NTA.

pupperoni42 wrote:

YTA only because that affected all the other neighbors as well. But if it was a one time thing and it actually works and changes her behavior, then it was worth it for the sake of those same neighbors. Next time, mow at 9pm when her kids are sleeping but most adults are still awake. Maybe the exhausted kids will sleep later the next morning.

SpecialShake6702 OP:

None of them complained about the noise, for what that's worth. They just complained about me not “being an adult”. They’re not situated where the noise would bother them as much.

Vivid-Kitchen1917 wrote:

What are the actual quiet hours in your municipality? Mine are 11pm-6am. You can do whatever loud ist you want to do that isn't going to involve blasting caps as far as I'm concerned outside those hours.

I get up between 330 and 4 every day, so I try to be quiet or at least mindful of how loud I'm being, but 6AM if I need to be in the driveway with my tablesaw or air compressor running, sorry, 11pm-6am was what the people you voted in decided on, and I'm just not having a conversation past that.

1045pm you are blaring music at your house part, that's unfortunate for me, but as long as it's off in 15 minutes we're not going to have a problem.

williwife wrote:

I know I'm old, but we were never allowed to go outside to play, or make personal phone calls before 9AM. We hated it, but we're told that if someone has a day off they should at least be allowed to sleep until 9. I stand by that decades later. This should be a law. We have enough other petty laws. What's one more? Lol.

bigschnekin wrote:

Where I am 7 am is the time you're allowed to start making noise, eg construction, mow lawns etc. I have a noisy obnoxious asshole neighbour who only ever has his kids once a fortnight but 7am they're bouncing the basketball in the driveway and yelling.

I could live with that but he makes more noise on his own, at 4.30am the other day he was standing outside having a very loud phone call until I told him to shut the fuck up and he went inside.

The problem I have is, the lawnmower annoys other people than just your targeted neighbour. Sure the kids probably annoy them too but now you're the one pissing people off and it's even earlier. I can hear a lawnmower a good 4-5 houses away especially on a quiet morning. Now your other neighbours get to put up with you two having a noise war.

independentanxiety70 responded:

This is where I land too. Nothing before 7. Those kids will grow out of it, become addicted to screens soon enough. OP indicates mentioning the noise to the neighbor but was an actual complaint or request made?

I will say I can probably be heard shoving snow/scraping my 175’ of city sidewalk with my hand plow at 6am after an overnight snow. I justify it as making sure the sidewalk is clear before the heavy foot traffic to the schools a few blocks away and commuters walking to the train station one block away. Not running a snow blower though.