Early this morning, I noticed a new harbinger of impending doom in the driveway of one of my neighbours on the cul-de-sac in the form of a rather large stack of packages full of shingles indicating they’d been gotten at by one of the roofing scammers that regularly cruise through the neighbourhood.
This invariably means that I can expect to have them on my doorstep at some point disturbing the peace of this home quite unnecessarily and uninvited.
Normally we get a couple of days before they start harassing us but I honestly wasn’t prepared to see a person wearing what I can only describe as just barely above homeless panhandler chic with his phone glued to his ear in that universal sign of I’m totally Gen Z wandering across my driveway toward the porch literally as I’m driving up to park in my garage.
Oh, joy.
I debated parking at the top of the cul-de-sac to see what he was on about but all he did was put something under the doormat and didn’t bother ringing the doorbell.
OK…not sure I’ve ever seen that move before because normally they’re banging on the door and/or doorbell like the experimental monkeys hooked on crack hitting the whammy bar to, well…get another whammy of whatever drugs are being tested upon them.
The driveway was empty at the time as Nicholas was off to his mate’s place for, well whatever young twenty-somethings are of a mind to get up to in terms of gaming and/or wobbly juice…so I can see how he might presume no one is about. And until I got to the top of the cul-de-sac, that was a fairly accurate assumption but surprising that he’d ignore the possibility there might be a vehicle in the garage and someone in the house to harass and flog whatever they’re trying to sell.
So I stop just before the driveway to avoid running him over, he makes eye contact and waves as he keeps talking to whoever is on the phone apparently trying to keep him amused in what is truly the most awful job short of being elected to Congress that I can imagine.
My original thought was that I can work with this provided he doesn’t follow it up with “hey” which I truly loathe with every fibre of my being especially coming from total strangers of his generation who have raised disrespecting their elders to a high art.
He gets some points for at least never uttering that despised word.
That’s when I asked him in what I thought was a polite yet firm tone to “please go back to the porch and pick up what you left there and then leave”.
I don’t think that this should be too difficult for even this person to understand what is expected, when it needs to happen, and what they need to do afterward.
In hindsight, I probably should have added “without another word escaping your mouth” but I was hoping he’d realise just how lucky he’s getting with a free pass from the approbation he truly deserves and leave it at that.
What I wasn’t expecting was this guy to adopt a facial expression that was a dead-ringer for Tucker Carlson when he confronted with actual provable fact and his brain was hitting several CPU wait-state cycles to where you’re wondering if his head is about to explode!
What was less surprising was that he decided to go on the attack accusing me of being disrespectful to him.
Are you flippin’ kidding me?
Being firm and to the point as to what I need him to do to collect the litter he left on *MY* property (not his that he is certainly not welcome nor was at all invited!) is *NOT* disrespectful.
Frankly, he’s darned lucky he didn’t get a first-hand exhibition of the difference between me trying to be nice and giving him something truly disrespectful with both barrels right then and there.
But then he doubles down by telling me that the cops won’t arrest him but that I’m welcome to call them.
In fairness, he’s partially correct in that the rozzers likely won’t bang him off to chokey (or even respond to the call for service) merely because he walked onto the property to solicit and the courts have consistently ruled that a homeowner’s right to peace and quiet on their own property and in their own home is subservient to the First Amendment prohibition against government regulating speech, even if that speech is unwelcome to the occupants of the home who actually should have a right to be left in peace.
I can only hope that whichever judges thought subordinating the rights of homeowners to live in peace to total strangers to come harass them have a steady stream of door-to-door solicitors banging on *THEIR* doorbell and annoying *THEM*.
By this point, I’d told him at least three times to do the same thing in a firm monotone…pick up his litter and leave and he’s still trying to give me crap about being rude.
Let’s see…you’re on my property without an appointment or leave to remain, you were never invited, and now you’re arguing with the person who actually does hold the title and pay the mortgage.
This guy really can’t be that bloody thick, eh?
I realise that more than a few of Gen Z seem to have a real problem with the concept of respecting their elders but you’d think that someone whose livelihood depends on getting people who’d never seen them before in their life to contract to thousands of dollars of work on their doorstep right at that moment would at least understand the concept of “just shut your mouth, clean up after yourself and go find someone who actually cares about what you have to say”!
But what I found really surprising was his dangerous lack of awareness and understanding that technically after the first warning, he’s committed the offence of second degree trespass, a Class 3 misdemeanour with a maximum penalty of 20 days in jail and a $200 fine.
§ 14‑159.13. Second degree trespass.
(a) Offense. – A person commits the offense of second degree trespass if, without
authorization, the person enters or remains on any of the following:
(1) On premises of another after the person has been notified not to enter or remain
there by the owner, by a person in charge of the premises, by a lawful occupant,
or by another authorized person.
(2) On premises that are posted, in a manner reasonably likely to come to the
attention of intruders, with notice not to enter the premises.
(3) On the curtilage of a dwelling of another between the hours of midnight and
6:00 A.M.
(b) Penalties. – A violation of subdivision (a)(1) or (a)(2) of this section is a Class 3
misdemeanor. A violation of subdivision (a)(3) of this section is a Class 2 misdemeanor. (1987, c.
700, s. 1; 1993, c. 539, s. 102; 1994, Ex. Sess., c. 24, s. 14(c); 2023‑85, s. 1.)
He’s probably right that the police would hardly consider it a priority (though I seriously thought about asking the RPD officer that lives on the other side of the house about to get the new roof if he might make it a priority to show this Gen Z wonder that he’s treading in dangerous waters!) and I really doubt that the judges in Wake County would throw the book at him.
I’d still imagine that having charges laid for second-degree trespass and going through the booking process and then the legal headaches would still be an inconvenience he’d rather avoid.
But that shouldn’t be required if these solicitors would just take the hint and leave people alone who want to be left alone and actually start the interaction by showing some measure of respect first before automatically demanding it of someone who really is under no obligation to show any hospitality to a total stranger on their own land.
He eventually did as he was asked to do and collected his business card he’d put under the doormat but couldn’t resist making noises that sounded like a dog whining which not only was rude and disrespectful (exactly what I’d been accused of by this hypocrite!) but it actually made me regret having him take away the card.
I’m sure whoever he was talking to must have loved those noises because his phone never left his ear in the entire interaction.
If history is anything to go by, I can expect another set of these imbeciles from this same company to show they’re just as incapable of taking the hint and maybe I’ll review-bomb them online after all. 🙂
Or at the very least, perhaps the owner of the company might want to know that his employee seems perfectly fine with employing a sales technique guaranteed to turn off pretty much anyone subjected to it and maybe accountability will come this guy’s way (or maybe not given the generally low quality in terms of ethics and respects of those who darken my doorstep with their unwelcome presence).