So, how bad did I mess up?

We finally built a fence. We've been wanting to do it since we moved here a little over a year ago. We ran out of money doing this little repair and that little replace when we first moved in and we've been regretting that ever since. However, having a land-shark that goes by the misnomer "beagle" served as an impetus to get that thing put up. So, "What's the problem?" you ask. Follow along.

This rather dated aerial shot (Google maps rock, but Live.com's maps have a very cool bird's eye view tool) is my house. As you can see, fence to the left of me, fence to the right, but none for me. Worked to my advantage though, I only had to have the fence built into their fences.


This crude outline shows how I contemplated building the fence and how my wife wanted it to be built (starting to sense the problem here?). But apparently, I did not pick up on the fact that this is the absolutely correct way to have the fence built.


So, this is how I decided to have the fence built. Apparently against all common sense.


This is how the fence looks. See, I like the way it marries up with the neighbor's fence.


This right here is the problem. According to J-mom, I just made our backyard smaller. I don't know why this didn't occur to me when I was laying out the fence with the builder, but it didn't.


This is what it looks like from the inside (yeah, yeah, it's a mess, shut up).


So my question, er, questions ... How bad did I screw up? Is this really that off-of-the-wall a way to do this? Seemed intuitive to me.

J-mom is having a hard time figuring out how to get over this. She's gotten over being angry, but it still bothers her. Any advice on how "to accept the things you cannot change?"

I will say this, regardless of innie or outie L-shape, putting the dog out whenever and not having to put it on a chain is such a very cool thing.