[sunshinegirl]

Hi all,

I am friends with my upstairs neighbor. Our personalities are VERY different, though I like her and we hang out occasionally.

Two areas of concern/friction that I could use some advice on:

(1) We share a long narrow driveway, and so have to stack cars. This is normally not an issue, because I sold my car a year ago so she's had the driveway to herself since last March. But I am using my dad's new car (a huge Suburban) for the next month and therefore we are back to sharing the driveway. In the past, we both kept spare keys inside the back door and would move each others' vehicles if we were blocked in and the other person wasn't around. But this is my dad's brand new, huge vehicle, and she is a terrible driver. She is spacey behind the wheel and has had 3 accidents in the last year. So I don't want to put a spare key out, because I don't want her behind the wheel of my dad's car. EVER. It's a tight driveway with a metal fence on either side and I can just see her scraping the hell out of his car. So what do I tell her? "No way, I'm not putting a key out. I don't want you touching his car." ???

(2) This one crops up every now and then: she is very outgoing and has a "the more the merrier" philosophy of socializing. So if I invite her to something, she will invite along a few of her own friends. (e.g. I decide I want to have a Fri night BBQ, and somehow it becomes a joint BBQ where she invites 6 of her own friends.) The latest thing is that my high school friend is in town and tonight I'm organizing a small dinner party thing so she can meet my boyfriend and a few of my friends. I invite my housemate; she emails me back to say "great! I'll be at this other thing til 9pm tonight but maybe I can meet up with you guys later? Oh, and a few people I'll be with might want to come too." GRRR!! I don't want HER friends at my thing, but am I just being a control freak?

Thanks for any advice!