Am in the camp of “lawn service companies use leaf blowers- it is what it is”. They don’t bother me, but they don’t go on all day when I am home. The constant dog barking is annoying. If someone is going to own a dog, don’t leave it outside all day and night. That’s cruel.
Neighborhoods here have restrictive covenants. The board members can be ridiculous. A friend was required to move the vegetables she planted in her front yard. Some returned annually anyway (I forget— maybe it was lettuce?) and she got in trouble again.
Here’s a side noise issue. We have to keep our cellphones on and nearby (and usually charging) when we sleep (on call, healthcare and IT fields). Some people seem to think its ok to text late at night or very early in the morning. Was included in a group text recently about an upcoming event, and they were texting about stuff (some unrelated to the event- just chatting!) until midnight. To me its like not calling after, say 10ish. Stop texting late. Some in the group politely asked but it persisted anyway. If we took ourselves out of the group text we’d miss updates about the event. You can’t win.
Then, we had a houseguest recently who thought it was perfectly fine to text at 5 am. His attitude was “if I am thinking about something and I am up, I should be able to send it. I shouldn’t have to wait and save it for later. You should have your phone off if you don’t want to be bothered”. Um NO. That’s rude and selfish. I get that sometimes people forget or don’t know if you are in a different time zone (have gotten those 6 am calls and texts when people don’t know we are across country) but to purposely, knowingly text at 5 am- RUDE!
@jym626, I turn the volume off on my cell phone at night. But my alarm and podcasts still work. I’m assuming phone calls would come through also. Just a thought.
I had to learn to turn off the volume at night after a few midnight texts from my daughter, which awakened me. Now all is good.
If your phone doesn’t already support different volume levels for phone calls and notifications, you can get an app that lets you do that. That way you can turn off text message notifications but still allow the phone to ring.
Some of these apps also let you control individual phone numbers, so if you are on call and the number will always be the same (or maybe a small group of them) you can set it up so that only that number rings, and everything else is silenced.
Generally, if there’s something you wish your phone could do that your phone doesn’t support, there’s an app for it.
I had to post because it’s pouring rain here, yet two guys with leaf blowers are out at the house across the street. They are blowing water. Or perhaps they are blowing bits of stuff into the water on the driveway, and then from there into the street gutters to be washed away. There is not a leaf in sight, and it’s very curious to watch these soaking wet guys blow water from here to there in the rain.
@FlyMeToTheMoon - I would think if I turned the sound off and I did get a call from the answering service I wouldn’t hear it - which defeats the purpose
I use the do Not Diaturb setting on my phone. It’s set to go into DND mode every night. You can set it to slow calls from a certain group of contacts. This is an iPhone 6.
Too funny, @3SailAway - I came on to post the same thing about my OCD neighbor - it is raining here too, and he is out right now with his blower. My H came down the stairs and said, “is that Crazy Neighbor out blowing the rain off his lawn??!” Yup. I think he is blowing the small (newly blossomed) leaves that came down in last night’s storm, plus rainwater. I guess the positive is that his yard does always look nice!
