noise

Everybody Needs Good Neighbours..

9 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

So we’re going from a house back to a “townhouse” when we move. We only have neighbours on one side. The rent on these townhouses is not cheap, they are considered executive so hopefully we will not end up with neighbours like..

Plympton, Adelaide – we were the middle townhouse in a block of 7. On one side we had an elderly lady who owned her townhouse, who was lovely and very quiet and cooked the most amazing smelling food but on the *other* side we had the teenagers just moving out of home for the first time. Loud music, parties every weekend, cars coming and going..

Seaton, Adelaide – we lived in a block of 20+ townhouses on a main road. The road was a terrible neighbour but we got used to it pretty quick. Again with the quiet people on one side, noisy on the other. The noisy were a group of young lads who used to sing along to their music and we got to enjoy it, NOT.

It was in Seaton that I woke up one morning to hear The Other Half on the telephone while Iron Maiden played so clearly and loudly I thought it was in *our* house. At 4:30am. I thought I must be dreaming because The Other Half had called the Police (not the band, the law enforcement types) on a neighbour for the first time ever waking up to that racket.

You know it is bad when The Other Half voluntarily calls the Police – he suffers from what we in the call centre industry named “call reluctance” – a complete inability to make a phone call. He will tolerate pretty much anything – and tell me to call if he can’t handle the noise.

Woodville, Adelaide – We lived in a villa which was attached to the villa next door. I remember Easter Weekend 2005. It was bizarre. Jesus Christ Superstar played at very high volume. I had to hide the Metallica so The Other Half would not scare the neighbours into moving out on the spot.

South Coast, NSW – I’ve spoken before about the noisy neighbours, the barking dog, the screaming kids across the road etc. However last night we had a new adventure. I woke up at 5am to the sound of the car across the road. When I looked outside suspicious goings on were.. well. going on. Cars were being reversed into the driveway. I swore I saw the man across the road carrying what looked to be an upside down tree. He was holding it by the trunk. I figured I might be hallucinating and went back to bed.

This morning, the neighbours across the road have double the amount of plants in their garden. Given all the driving that was going on, I can’t be sure they didn’t steal it from somewhere. Why else would anyone choose to plant things at 5am – in the RAIN? I am not joking!

I will admit, I had just finished an Agatha Christie novel before bed, the other thought was that they’d murdered someone and had to reverse their car in to load a body into the boot. Yes I agree, no more murder mysteries before bedtime. ;)

So today we went to take measurements and the electricity was on and I’m crazy about this place. We get the keys on the 3rd of September. We also measured the distance from the house to the beach – 1km. We’re the first people to live in it. Ever.

We took my Mother, who wasn’t too impressed with the idea of us moving until she saw the place, and now she’s on board. She keeps saying it is very far away – it is 19kms from where we are now. Pretty close by in Australian terms, and we did used to live 1600kms drive from her, and being down the street hasn’t inspired her to walk down here very much so I’m not sure what she’s on about. We’ll probably see more of them when we move! ;)

So for those of you new to the blog who don’t know, today marks the end of three months of searching for this place to move to in our dream location. Some previous posts with photos –

Beach Walk(s) With Photos
My Heart Is Broken – With Pics

This has been a Hump Day Hmmm post – the topic this week is being good neighbors in the world. Please join in, if you feel like you have something to say on this topic. ;)

move to the beach, noise, renting

Wanted : Peace And Quiet.

5 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

Julie Pippert asks today – So tell me, what’s your ‘more’ that you wish was ‘less?’ What do you need, what would take that 50lb weight off your chest and shoulders?

I’m here all day, every day, unless The Other Half has a day off. His day offs are never the same day, one week out of four he has Saturday and Sunday but the rest of the time it is Monday/Tuesday, Tuesday/Wednesday, Wednesday/Thursday and then sometimes he just has the one day. If you want to go anywhere around here, especially in school holidays, weekends are times of busy traffic, of crowds, of screaming kids. That’s not something we enjoy.

The Other Half had Saturday and Sunday off, and on Saturday we went shopping in a place which is more populated than where we live. It was scary for me. Too many people. Too much movement. People walking where they want and not paying attention to others around them – bumping, pushing, like dodgem cars. We got in and out of there as fast as we could.

Personally, and no offense to those with kids who work a normal 9-5 week and have weekends off, we prefer the weekdays as days off. When we first moved here, I was working every single Saturday and it suited me just fine. I put a proposal to my parents which would have seen us never having a weekend off. Sales are better on the weekends most of the time, so that is when you want to be in the store. It never happened.

Being here alone much of the time would not be an issue at all if there was peace and quiet. I’ve mentioned before here on the blog that recently this has become a very noisy neighbourhood but the last week was the worst yet. There was not one day where the dog didn’t bark for at least 4 hours of it. As I sit here right now, that droning engine noise can just be heard over my music (coldplay) but I can also feel it through my feet – it is vibrating the very foundations of this house and consequently, going right into my soul. The dog was barking right outside my window about 10 minutes ago, prompting me to skype Sephy with the following –

Snoskred says: cam do ,e a l;ittle favour?
Sephy says: find you some new fingers? ;)
Sephy says: what’s up?
Snoskred says: find out if theres anything i can do about a barking dog
Snoskred says: it wont shut up!@
Snoskred says: and its right outside my window now

Yes, as you can see, when I’m annoyed, disturbed, not at peace, my typing goes out the window.

When the droning engine noise stops, it will be time for kids to get home from school and the people across the road will be outside playing rugby. When you kick a rugby ball, it makes a heck of a racket. It’s enough to make you shudder. Yet that’s not all. They will be shouting, screaming, yelling at each other.

This constant noise is difficult for me to tolerate. By Fridays I am ready to SNAP. Saturdays and Sundays may be a little quieter but there’s still the dog, there’s still the people across the road. My noise thermometer has gone down slightly over the weekend but each week it climbs higher and higher. How much more can I take? I honestly don’t know.

I need to move. I want out of this noisy place. I want to go to the place I believe will be more peaceful. There are 17 properties available where I want to move to right now. 5 of those are townhouses and very close to each other. Having lived in townhouses before and knowing how noisy they can be if neighbours are inconsiderate, I’m holding out for something better. I can see this new lifestyle inside my head, beach walks, a summer of bbq’s, of The Other Half coming home and we go out to walk for an hour.

The real estate agents down there are fairly useless. I’ve left them info about what we want, and have not heard from any of them, once. It baffles me! If a tenant came in and gave notice that they’re moving out, and you had tenants who wanted exactly what they were moving out from, wouldn’t you say – this might be the easiest solution, let me call these people and ask them to come and see it. Then I don’t have to list it, I don’t have to deal with trying to find people to live there. But no. Properties have been listed that we would have considered, and they have not called.

What would break me completely would be to get there and find out it’s just as noisy as this place is. But I need to get there in order to find out. That’s what I need. A new home.

beach1_600x400

move to the beach, noise

Aussies TAKE NOTE..

Leave a comment Posted on by Snoskred

Tomorrow evening, a new show is launching on the ABC. It’s called The Sideshow, and it stars Paul Mcdermott. It will be funny. :) And Paul will be nice to look at, as always. And he’ll probably sing, which is also very pleasing to the ear.

And then about an hour later, the last of the West Wing is on.

I’m really tired at the moment. These school holidays have been two weeks from hell, in fact so bad I’m seriously talking with the other half about moving because I can’t take much more. So I think I’ll get an early night and maybe tomorrow if we get up really early even though it’s the weekend we can go snorkelling without 50 zillion kids screaming. I truly need some peace and quiet.

noise

Only one thing spoiled it.

Leave a comment Posted on by Snoskred

My wonderful lunch today, which is pictured in the below post. Yes, those noisy kids from across the road. *sigh*

Actually my day started off not brilliantly to begin with. At just after 9am (I went to bed after 3am) the lawnmower man started up his lawnmower right outside my window. I thought right, there’s no point trying to go back to sleep here, so I got up and stumbled out to the computer, where I found unpleasantness I don’t even want to speak about. Someone showing their ass, yet again. And to be honest, they don’t have that great an ass. I mean, I wouldn’t mind if it looked like a male model or something. And the lawnmower man wasn’t the cute buff one but the older string beany type one, so there wasn’t an ass around to make up for the terrible ass I had to look at.

So then I stumble back to bed, wanting to get some more sleep, but none arrived. And the alarm my other half set without telling me went off, so I figured I might as well get up.

Then, as I am sitting here, I can hear those noisy kids. They’re outside running around screaming and shouting. Sure, it’s great exercise, but there is a *park* not very far away and I’d prefer they take it there where it’s not in my face. Then I sit down with my excellent lunch to watch episode one of season 3 of the west wing, and it’s noticeable, I can hear it above the noise of the surround sound system. I turn the volume up. I can still hear it.

Then I venture to the front door to notice that they have actually moved over to MY lawn to play on. Hello? Do I live here? Then they start to play cricket on my driveway. I try the Metallica trick. *IT DOES NOT WORK*. I think because their parents were not at home to drag them to their bibles. AND WHAT KIND OF PARENTS ARE LEAVING KIDS OF THIS AGE AT HOME ALONE? We’re talking all under the age of 7. Cricket balls are bouncing off fences randomly making a hell of a racket. I need peace!

Not only that, these kids clearly not having any intelligence, they decide to play cricket *across* the road. AND NO PARENT TO STOP THEM!

So I’m in a pretty bad mood today, despite my wonderful lunch. They went on all afternoon. Please, end the school holidays early. I can’t take anymore!

So someone tell me, what am I supposed to do about this?

1. Confront the across the road neighbours about their noisy kids. Hmm, not likely to end well.
2. Call the police each time they are being noisy. Hmm, waste of police resources.
3. Start looking for somewhere else to live, somewhere peaceful, quiet, out in the country.
4. Put a note in their letterbox asking them to please have more consideration for the people who live nearby and not allow their children to run amok like wild animals, and also point out they may get run over if they are not more careful of that road. Suggest they use the park, a safe place to play, instead.
Any other options?

Annoyed Snoskred, noise

I need a nap..

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Grr kids across the road woke me up this morning, shouting, yelling and screaming while waiting for the school bus. I’d had maybe 5 hours sleep. I wasn’t going to get up but then I did, and now it’s almost 5pm and I have chores to do but am having trouble staying awake. I certainly am not up to writing anything intelligent, so check back tomorrow for more Internet Safety. Maybe I will have a nap, but the trouble is once I go to sleep there’s no waking me up until I’m done sleeping. Maybe I can get those kids to start shouting and screaming a couple of hours from now, which would wake me up. Maybe.

Annoyed Snoskred, noise

Metallica is scary..

2 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

So, Saturday the people across the road and their kids spent two hours out on their front lawn playing sport of some kind, and along with it went two solid hours of constant yelling, screaming, shouting, crying, and various other annoying noises. I’m not joking when I say solid, they did not shut up once, and it was so loud I think the kids must have hurt their throats.

Apparently not, because on Sunday they were back for two hours more. And I was actually trying to sleep at the time, because I’d woken up with a headache from hell and spent the rest of the day trying to get rid of it by sleeping it off.

You can bet two hours of them yelling and screaming did not go down well with me. They’re lucky I didn’t go out there in my sleeping attire and do some yelling and screaming of my own.

Monday, the school bus got home, and within one minute the kids started yelling and screaming. Within ten minutes the whole family plus some extra random kids from around the neighborhood were out there. I still had a dull version of the headache from the day before, and tried to drown them out with a movie. One hour and forty minutes later, I snapped.

I stormed into the kitchen and grabbed the Metallica DVD that we have. I took it into the big lounge with the big stereo system (that I never turn up over 25) and loaded it in there. Enter Sandman. I turned the volume up to 10 and went into the kitchen to get some headache tablets.

When I got back just three minutes later, the subwoofer had danced across the floor all by itself, there’s some vicious drumming in that song, and when I looked out the window, there was nobody to be seen. Probably they all ran inside to read their bibles and hide from the satanic music. I think all the other neighbors were actually thrilled and possibly inspired as to how to get rid of them next time.

Later that evening we were summoned to my parents house, probably 800-1000 metres away. I told my Mum what I’d done, and she said “That was you?” damn, it must have been loud. ;)

And today, thankfully, no screaming people. If they come back, it’ll be Metallica in 10 minutes next time. It’s just so inconsiderate to make so much annoying noise. I rarely make any noise here, the stereo is always at a reasonable level and I go outside to make sure it isn’t too loud that it would annoy anyone.

They only got 5 minutes of how much noise I’m happy to produce on a regular basis if they want to keep it up. Plus if they really upset me, my parents have the subwoofer of champions just down the street which I could borrow. ;)

I really love Metallica, by the way, everything up to St Anger, and I think many of their songs are true classics. It’s even better when you watch the film clips. But the choices are not limited to that. I think a bit of Marilyn Manson might really freak them out. It makes one wonder, what music would I need to play in order to inspire them to move out completely?

Angry Snoskred, move to the beach, music, noise