http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6483533/Vermont-man-spends-4-000-5-meter-tall-hand-flip-town-officials.html
A Vermont man has taken the ultimate revenge on town officials by building a giant statue to give them the middle finger after they blocked his application to build a garage.
Ted Pelkey from Westford, had been locked in the battle over planning permission with the Westford Selectboard and Development Review Board for 10 years.
According to UniLad, Pelkey wanted to build the garage next to his own property as a headquarters for his truck repair and recycling businesses, which are currently based in Swanton.
When the town officials blocked the move, Pelkey spent $4,000 commissioning a giant hand to flip them off every single day.
The hand is made of a 700 pound block of pine, is nearly 5 meters - 16 ft. - tall, so it can be seen all across the town of around 2,000 people in Chittenden County. ...
It is even surrounded by floodlights to make it visible 24 hours a day, a constant reminder to the officials of their ill-fated decision.
But Pelkey wanted to make sure most of his neighbors did not take it personally, adding: "It was critical to me to make sure that my neighbors and the people who live in this town understood that I didn't put that up there for them."
"It is aimed directly at the people who sit in our town office. I'm not trying to cause hate and animosity to the people who live in that town, because there's very good people in that town. All the people are very good people."
It seems that the statue will stay up for the foreseeable future, as Pelkey said he was no plans to remove it.
"If you don't want to look at the [garage], look at this," he added.
The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted. ~ D.H. Lawrence
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