There Aught To Be A Law—Part III

(Channeling my inner Sam Kinnison)


We live in a nice old brick condo complex here on our little island—built back in the mid 1970’s. Big rooms, pocket doors, lots of glass, and we only have 48 units on about 5 acres of land. There is actually more green space than there is area covered with the buildings, parking lots, the swimming pool area, and covered parking spaces. The average age of our neighbors is 104. (OK, maybe it’s actually about 75.) Did I mention that it is VERY quite out here?

Like all Condo developments, we have our own version of “The Condo Nazi’s.” You know --the Condo Board and a few other “activist” owners who have nothing else to do other than spend their time reading and quoting the Condo Association’s Covenants to unsuspecting tenants and new owners. They are ever vigilant, their brows deeply furrowed from worrying about the aesthetic degradations caused by a few beach towels carelessly hung to dry on your balcony railing or what appliances and other personal items they can see sitting on your screened sun porch.

I am generally respectful of these concerns because the Covenants have been in place here from the beginning. When you buy or lease in a given development you are legally required to accept the rules because they come with the property. From personal experience I can tell you that it’s a good idea to understand the rules before you sign on the dotted line and move in if you don’t want nasty notes taped to your door once a week.

I don’t, however, agree with municipal governments and homeowner’s associations substantially changing the rules imposed on residents on an arbitrary basis, after the fact.

For example, the busybodies out in the suburbs of Memphis, Tennessee have enough time to start worrying about when and for how long residents should be allowed to leave their garage doors open.

“GERMANTOWN, Tenn. (AP) - Some residents of this upscale Memphis suburb say ordinances have gone to far. The final straw may have been rules proposed about when garage doors can be opened.

Among other directives, the city codes would tell homeowners to open their garage doors only when entering or exiting or for "short periods of time" for cleaning and maintenance.”

(Pause…sigh…taking a deep breath)

In the words of the comedian Sam Kinnison…”OHH OHHH AAAAAHHHHHHHHH…THEY WANT ME TO DO WHAT?”

Can you believe this crap? OK, I have a few questions and comments…

Are they willing to pay me for the cost of my garage door?

If I come home late from work and need to open my garage door, do I have to have a police escort?

Will the city inspectors come out once a year and inspect the contents of my garage to make sure that I am not storing anything offensive like empty beer cans, old copies of Playboy Magazine, or ashtrays full of cigarette butts?

What are they going to do if I tell them to “bite me”? Fine me?

This is an insane abuse of government power. If they insisted on enforcing this ordinance, I would either take my garage door completely out of my house, else paint a cartoon caricature showing the responsible city officials in compromising poses, naked, on my garage door and illuminate the scene with floodlights every night of the week until they rescinded the law.

It’s not enough that the government morons have brought us Global Warming, the UN, holes in the Ozone Layer, and “the nuclear option,” now we have a “garage door crisis” in Memphis.

Can we all just GET A GRIP?


And by the way, back in the 1980’s my favorite Sam Kinnison quote was one he stated while talking about a central Africa crop failure due to drought…

“Yes, we have deserts here in the United States…

We just don’t TRY TO LIVE AND FARM IN THEM…”