OMG

Thanks to forum members for the useful ideas.  I will take on board the various suggestions and decide what is best for us to do in the circumstances.  I will also now resign my membership of the forum for the following reason. It amazes me that there are so many people with so little to occupy themsleves that they have to sit at their computers and make totally inappropriate comments and decide I am snob etc.  You know nothing about me and you obviously do not have the problems we currently have.  Were you the school bullies or is it only behind the anonymity of your keyboard that you are so brave and have so much to say?  You can also apparently not contribute anything constructive.  I certainly did not "have a go" at "poor" woody - he felt obliged to make a fatuous comment or two. To quote my son - "Get a life!"  

Don't get me wrong - I love delta blues ( Mississippi John Hurt anyone?)  I would just like to listen to it in my own time.  And a badly played harmonica is an instrument of extreme torture I can assure you! They have now been gone for three days and I have been feeding their 5 cats by putting a container of biscuits on the drive yesterday and today.  Otherwise they would not have eaten since Thursday.  No signs of the dog so hopefully he has been farmed out somewhere.  New neighbours are in, and other than an apparent banshee of a woman, seem OK.  It will be interesting to see what happens when they reappear, sparks might fly! We are having the estate agents in on Monday for a valuation, together with a guy for a quote for a very high wall and even higher gates so we shall make a decision about which way to jump soon. OMG?  I like Oh My God, unfortunately the reason for the name is much more boring - it was a nickname as a child as I always wanted One More Go at the local swings.

That sounds like a good idea Dave.  His music of choice is delta blues, perhaps he would like some nice Iron Maiden? New neighbours moving in today (the originals have been away for two days so far, leaving their cats with nothing to eat.)  Should be interesting when they come back tomorrow night. Woody, presumably you are the forum wag?  Glad you have nice neighbours.  I don't. 

Thanks for your suggestions.  I'm hoping the new neighbours will be a little better and might tackle them themselves.  It will be hell on earth for them - far worse than for us.  In the meantime we are planning on selling up and going back to our house in the UK.  This is the final straw for us, dream move it has certainly not been! Woody 234 - is that post supposed to be humorous in some way?

We have recently been "blessed" with a very attractive social housing bungalow opposite our drive (probably over 100m from the house itself).  Since they have moved in these new neighbours have been hell on earth.  Unfortunately we are on the outskirts of the village and no one else is being "entertained" by them. The guy appears to work 3 days per week.  For the rest of the time he plays music or has the TV on as loud as he possibly can with all the doors and windows open.  Or plays the guitar himself (which he isn't very good at) - ditto the harmonica.  Requests for him to turn it down have been met with an increase in  the volume and a response which I'm not sure of in translation but can imagine the general meaning.  They have a beautiful back garden with glorious views but they sit on the front tarmac area and seem to spend their time screeching at each other and their small child.  It seems they cannot arrive at or leave the house without sustained blowing of the car horn. They have 5 cats who appear to be starving and spend most of their time trying to get in at our cat's food.  They have a dog which is permanently outside and is either mooching around the village or barking. I have found him in garden several times too.  He seems a nice enough dog but if I wanted one I would get one of my own. This is obviously going to be very difficult to sort out and I don't want it to be more confrontational than it has already become.  We are NOT being over-fussy but this was a very quiet hamlet until this bunch appeared and there is another house next door to theirs which is still unoccupied.  They will either be worse or driven as crazy as we are being at the moment.  Short of building a VERY high wall at the end of our garden and relocating the drive does anyone have any suggestions please?