Aaahhhggg Make it Stop!!!

The noise, that is. I've expounded at length before regarding Japan's addiction to obscene noise, and the uncanny ability of the Japanese to not be driven totally insane by it. Generally speaking I've probably become pretty tolerant of the noise, but I still have my days. Today was one of them.

When I have a morning class, I usually get into work around 7:30, about an hour before classes actually start. It's early, but I like to get in and have time to eat some breakfast, check the news online, listen to the first half inning of the Red Sox game, and get myself organized and in the frame of mind necessary to instill knowledge on the youth. It's a peaceful time of day on campus, usually, with not too many people around, morning sun, birds singing, all that sort of thing.

Well, for the last week or so the maintenance crew has been going to town getting the school grounds all springified; pruning, mowing, painting, grinding the hell out of stuff, and of course, blowing leaves. All in all, minus the painters, who are very quiet, the rest of the crew is LOUD. The campus has been reverberating with noise which echoes off of buildings and even up into my penthouse classroom on the 10th floor of the library. There is no escape.

Now, I appreciate the work going on. The place looks great, and the guys work hard. Before progressing into the cushy world of academia, I spent the majority of my summers on Cape Cod toiling in the sun, mowing lawns, planting trees, replanting trees when the customer changed their mind on a whim, spreading mulch, trimming, cutting things down, etc. So I can empathize with the fact that these guys probably take a bit of perverse pleasure in making the lives of us scholars a bit difficult when they get the chance.

And so it was at about the time I rolled into my office early this morning, fired up the computer, cracked my yogurt and began to sort out the day, that this guy fired up his blower, right outside my window. I tempered my anger, mostly because I wasn't fully awake yet. It was OK though, soon I was off to class on the other side of campus, far far away from the wicked drone of the two stroke engine.



And then I came back from class a few hours later. It was lunch time, and I'd been hard at work for a while. It was time for me to enjoy my lunch and catch up on reports from the morning's Red Sox game (another win, oh yeah). But low and behold, look who was still blowing his little ass off. He'd made it all the way across the parking lot since the morning, so there wasn't quite the immediacy to the noise, but it was still loud. I complained to my coworker in the office next to me. 'I didn't even notice,' he replied. And he's not even Japanese.

Eventually the groundsman finished up, and I put it all behind me. I left work and walked home. Right as I got to my apartment, someone dropped the neighbors kids off from school. The kids are loud, of course, and you can't really fault kids for being loud. I suppose you could but that make you mean or something, but it wasn't the kids exactly that bugged me. It was their frigging golden retriever that flips it's lid anytime anyone or anything comes within 100 yards of their house. Considering we live on a well travelled road, the dog is often flipping it's lid, to my chagrin. So naturally the dog starts barking manically, which is really one of the things that drives me most crazy in the world (incessantly barking dogs, that is). And of course once the dog is wound up, he's extra sensitive to everything, so now if anyone comes within 200 yards of the house he loses it.

Everywhere I live, I can't seem to escape spasmatic dogs. At my previous apartment there were 3 or 4 in the immediate vicinity. When one would start barking, the other clowns would chime in until there was a chorus of distinct yet equally annoying dog barks driving me curl into the fetal position and writhe on the floor. Now we've got the golden across the street to contend with. The next place I live, I'm doing a thorough dog search beforehand.

OK, I feel better now.