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I'm only 26 but I think I've become a grumpy old man. Heres the thing...
I live with my girlfriend in a small terraced house that I rent off my friend who's gone travelling. On alternate weekends, my 6 year old daughter comes to stay. We live in an area very popular with students, so although we've only lived here a couple of years, we've seen a few neighbours come and go.
One set of neighbours moved in last september, and seem to enjoy the odd house party or two. This wasn't too much of a problem; they were quite frequent and loud, and went on until 3 or 4 in the morning, but were at a volume where if you were tired enough you could get to sleep within 20 minutes or so. It was even less of a problem as they never seemed to clash with my daughter staying over.
Anyways, the parties stopped for a month or so, and then on Saturday it became a whole new ballgame. I had put my daughter to bed, then around 9 o'clock one of the neighbours knocked on my door and said that they were going to have a party but they were going to try and keep the noise down. I said that would be much appreciated as my six year old daughter was asleep upstairs and left it as that. As the night went on the music got louder and louder. I'm pretty sure they must have had some form of PA in there as this was no where near home stereo volume. Also, we had a partygoers sitting on the wall in front of my house all night rapping along to either their car boombox, or some tune they had on their mobile phone. As it got louder and louder, and I could hear the TV less and less, I got more and more annoyed. I ended up doing something I thought I would never do. I called the council.
It turns out though, here in the UK, they can't actually do anything. They turned up in their car, parked quite far down the road, and phoned me from there...
Council: Hi it's the council, are you in the house with the lights on?
Me: Yup, that's me.
Council: We need to come into your house and take a reading, but their seems to be a few black lads sitting on your wall. Is it a Jamaican Party? Are they playing the bass beats?
Me: Yes they are playing the bass beats. I'm not that keen on you coming over though as there's a lot of people on there and it's might get nasty if they think I've complained.
Council: Yes. We wouldn't come across right now as we get attacked frequently, and even if we did get a reading, we can't knock on their door without police backup, and we'll never get the police out on a Saturday night as they're already too busy.
Me: Jeez...
Coucil: We could maybe do a walk-by thoough and get a reading, and send them a letter in the week though?
Me: Ok then
Convesation ends. Phone rings again...
Council: Hi it's me again.
Me: Hi
Council: I've just wound down the car window down and I could get a reading from here (they were about 150 meters away). We'll get a letter to them by wednesday and hopefully you should have a quieter weekend next weekend.
Me: OK, thanks, bye.
And that was that. My girlfriend and I managed to get to sleep around 3:30 when the party was finishing. My daughter woke up at approx 1:30, at which point I thought I was going to be sitting up with her all night, but it just turned out she had a tricky bit of snot wedged up her nose and she wanted me to dig it out for her. She didn't even notice the "bass beats" coming from next door. Straight back to sleep.
So was I a grumpy old man for phoning the council?, and, should I play Shitmat really loud from now until they move out?
Sorry about the big winge.
What's more, the music was crap
Jenny from the block.
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05/15/07
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ignatius
you sound perfectly reasonable to me. at some point you have to either move or complain. the "council" sounds odd to me. in the USA we just call the cops for everything.
i used to live in this crappy apt building and it was built around a swimming pool. so there was just concrete everywhere. it was cheap so there were young families there and in the summer they'd let there kids go apeshit in the pool. so all day everyday for a couple months it was kids screaming bloody murder. you couldn't tell if they were having the time of their lives or if someone just ripped their arms from their sockets. the place being built around the pool made for a stadium like effect and it just got really really loud sometimes. if i didn't feel like leaving, i'd close the windows and play records when i had enough. []pusher, snares, richard devine etc.. really loud. juvenile i know.. but it made me feel better.
05/15/07
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mlbot
hope the letter helps.
That sucks. I dont suppose you know their landlord's phone number?
05/15/07
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Roshi
I used to break out my copy of "The Greatest Jewish Melodies" and blast it when our neighbors would blast Korn through the paper thin wall. 
Somehow, it was satisfying.
05/15/07
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mlbot
I wouldnt get into a noise war. Or threaten them.
And if you dont feel safe going over there at night, try going over in the day and say "hey d00ds, you kept us up awful late, think you could close some windows and ask your friends not to sit on my wall next time?
05/15/07
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Psyingo
pull a TG and use ultra and infra sonic frequencies to mess with them. inaudible sonic warfare! thats how you play the game.do they have dogs? keeep them up all night with that shit.
05/15/07
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Roshi
Oh, I wasn't trying to condone my behavior, sorry, that was kind of thoughtless.
edited: May 15 2007
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ignatius
i burned out a tweeter trying to play ultra high frequencies at my neighbors once. it just sizzled and a little smoke came out the front of the tweeter.
that was at a different apt building. the neighbors were annoying as hell. they had one of those outdoor metal firepit things you get at homedepot and would do a fire once in a while. our apt was on the 2nd floor right next to their courtyard so the smoke from their damn logs would just blow right into our apt. it was pretty fucking infuriating. they were scumbags and i told as much and to this day i hope they all get lice.
i called the fire dept and told them the low down. they asked "are they burning trash?" i said no. "well then there's nothing we can do".
so, whenever you are asked by the fire dept if the smoke coming in your windows from your douchebag neighbors is because they are burning trash SAY YES!
05/15/07
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jdg
explain to me, as a yank, "council"
what are they?
05/15/07
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mlbot
is the Council like a Harry Potter thing? Will they turn your neighbors into badgers?
05/15/07
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jdg
badger badger badger badger
badger badger badger badger
badger badger badger badger
05/15/07
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bsr
the council is the local representation of government, workers that take care of administration, the local schools, roads, rubbish/recycling, housing, tenants etc all at the local level.
and they're fucking useless. i worked for one for four years.
the old workers have mostly had their jobs for 30+ years cos they were too lazy to get a job in the private sector where performance matters. in local government the trick is to spend your budgets otherwise you get a reduced budget next year - millions are wasted everywhere with stupid schemes that have no chance of working as it doesn't matter if they work effectivly, departments just need to ensure they use up all their budget.
i wouldn't have phoned the council, they're fucking lazy.
i hate to say this as i hate the police but i'd have called them, if the kids were being assholes the police love nothing better than shutting down student parties. you have a bunch of assholes keeping your daughter awake, introduce another set of assholes and they cancel each other out > blessed sleep.
05/15/07
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bsr
that was a sweeping generalisation btw - i'm sure there are plenty of shining lights working for local governmentbut en mass they're still a joke - especially considering a quarter of my wage gets stolen in taxes to pay for it each month. one big circular money pit.
05/15/07
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frnortnr
i once had flamenco dancers that lived downstairs from me. i found out they didn't like it when i blasted urmur bile tracks at them. we did get into a noise battle, i don't recommend them. i've called the cops on people before, and i've also had the cops called on my parties before. sometimes you don't realize you're being uneasonably loud (usually due to impaired judgement) so a you need a reminder.
05/15/07
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VC
I'm grumpy everytime someone else is making noise and not me, so yeah i would def call the cops. Ive had LOUD parties but never did the cops arrive and only few complaints have landed my way.
05/15/07
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minisystem
our neighbor yells at her dog for peeing on the floor almost everyday. other than that, quiet as a mouse.
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