I have just spoken to the man from Environmental Health assigned to my case.

There were a couple of interesting points:

• Recordings, even made with their equipment, isn’t admissable as evidence.
• He, or another member of EH staff must witness the noise firsthand.
• They arrange the times to come and listen.
• Even if they were able to come out on demand, chances are they wouldn’t get here in time in this case.

They are unlikely to get any result quicker than the management company, so they will be closing the case (though it is easy to reopen it if need be).

I have also heard from neighbours across the road that at 0645 on Saturday morning she (and a friend) were witnessed returning to the house completely sloshed. The were struggling to open the door so much so that she had to take a pee at the side of her own house.

Today, Ms Neighbour-From-Hell’s window broke. Now I don’t know for sure that it was on purpose, but she’s done crazier things.
What I do know is that some glass fell onto the pavement below, and that more fell on at least 3 later occasions, and that at one point it was green and beer-bottle shaped.

I also now know that her tipple of choice is White Thunder Extra Strong Cider. Two empty 3-litre bottles now reside in my property after being thrown from her window. One of those even managed to get caught by my motion-detection camera!

Earlier this afternoon I was making my front door close a little more easily when my neighbour comes out and, surprisingly comes over to me.

More surprisingly, she friendlily asked if I was called ‘Stu’.
I’m not so I said so, and the conversation continued roughly thus:
“So what is your name?”
“I’m not sure I should tell you, we’re not really friends are we?”
“Oh, why not?”
“Because you play loud music at unsociable hours.”
“You didn’t ask my question.”
“What?”
“You didn’t answer me.”
“You didn’t ask a question.”
“I don’t play music.”
“Do you remember when you last played music?”
“Er.. (music starts from her house) now.”
“And when else did you play music? At night, when we’re trying to sleep – my girlfriend and I have both got jobs, …”
(Interrupting, getting up) “Oi…”

So the mention of jobs obviously upset her, but is that my problem?

As she was having difficulty participating in a simple conversation she wanders off, toddler in tow.

Later we discover that she has thrown eggs at our house. It’s sad that this is all she can think of, but it’s sad that she causes the anger in the first place.

Update
I spoke to some other neighbours and was told two things:

• She went into a shop run by one of the neighbours and declared herself to be “The Neighbour From Hell”.
• There was a nasty physical fight between a couple of guys who came from her house the other night.

Last Night:
Smashing glass, shouting, thumping and bumping.
The glass turns out to be part of an internal door which she ripped out and dragged outside last night.

13:15
My neighbour is currently throwing junk over the rear-yard wall.

The junk includes glass bottles, broken garden furniture, a broken TV stand, and bizarrely a raw sausage.

I’ve called the police (though not 999) and have been told that they’re sending someone out.
I believe in zero-tolerance, but am not convinced this isn’t going to backfire…

15:00
A couple of police-officers have just visited.
They asked what had happened and had a look at the pile of junk. They then tried next-door but she didn’t answer, so they came back here and reassured me that the matter won’t be dropped until they’ve talked to her. She can be done for littering if nothing else.

19:00
I have just received a call from the Police.
Basically I was told that, absurdly, this isn’t quite covered in Anti-Social law since it involves no public property!
They will however come out and speak to her this evening. Though I doubt she’ll answer…

Update (Later in the week)
They’ve now tried a couple of times, but she has never answered. Surely they should have some greater power.
Hopefully Environmental Health will be able to do more, once I’ve submitted the log of the noise.

We’ve been away for a week and come back to a raw egg through the postbox.
It’s hard to not assume it’s her-next-door’s doing.

Although she hasn’t actually made any noise either of the two nights we’ve had back here she has managed to irritate us enormously. Not the egg, that’s just pre-school and wasn’t even particularly good.
She spoke to one of our lodgers as she was coming in.
Apparently she said something along the lines of “Tell him to stop ringing the landlord and trying to get me evicted, it’s not going to work.”
Truth is, we only called the management company because she never responded to knocking on her wall or door neither at the time nor during the day. While we would now like her to leave, that wasn’t our aim when calling the management company, and it was their decision after hearing from various other neighbours too.
She also apparently apologised to my lodger about the paint splashes on the door, and that apology was (misguidedly) accepted.
What really pisses me off is that I have to behave decently, with manners and simple courtesy, while she gets to do whatever the hell she likes.

The management company has told me that they have to do everything by the book (fair enough), but that means that her eviction notice will not expire until the end of June(!) and that she can then be taken to court (meaning another wait for a court-date).

My neighbour has in the past couple of weeks been making a lot of noise at night.

This includes one night where the music started at midnight and went until 8 in the morning – precisely the hours me and the GF usually sleep.
Another night involved the bizarre a very loud use of a hammer at 0400, and my other next-door neighbour saw and heard her using an electric drill.
A more recent night saw her badly painting her front door at midnight. She also painted the frame around the door with the same gloss. And worse, she painted over on to our side and splattered our month-old front-door.

She is clearly alcoholic and possibly worse.
She has a toddler. Poor thing.

UPDATE (2006-04-12): I have now heard from the management that she has been served an eviction notice. Here’s hoping she buggers off soon…
UPDATE (2006-04-13): Last night a friend of hers replaced the front-door. No idea why. Involved a lot of banging. No idea why.