This is probably in the wrong place, but I don’t want to put it in the Pit because all I’ll get is “you chyld hater you” responses. OK…
For the third straight weekend, the people across the street have rented one of those bouncy things, set it up in their driveway and allowed their kids and others from where-ever to play in it essentially all weekend. There are breaks when I assume they are eating, otherwise they are out in the thing. For a fairly significant amount of that time, they are literally screaming. Not yelling, shouting, laughing - screaming. High, shrill sounds, from several throats. Since we live in a southern California tract home, the bounce house is approximately 100 feet from out front door. These same neighbors also have shrieking pool parties most every weekend during the summer.
How is this even legal, not to mention neighborly? We are not allowed to park our travel trailer on the curb in front of our house for longer than 24 hours, and it is illegal for our dogs to park after a certain time of day and/or for a certain amount of time, but it’s OK for this noise to go on until midnight or so? I can hear it from the back of my house, with the TV going - when it’s time for me to go to bed, I guess I’ll have to see if I can find any earplugs.
So, finally the question Am I really expected to put up with this, even tho no one seems to be willing to put up with any noise my chosen dependents make? That seems to be the consensus in the Pit - that if I don’t like noise that sounds like a five year old girl is being drawn and quartered across the street, I should just move. (As if inconsiderate parents don’t live everywhere) Really? Is this what we have come to?
If you have a question of what is legal in your municipality you should contact the police via the non-emergency phone number. No one here is going to be able to tell you about noise ordinances in your town. Every town is different.
No, not the legality of it - I’m sure it is technically illegal under noise laws. What I am really wondering is why is it so accepted that children must be so incredibly noisy?
As I said, when I complain about it in the Pit, I get jumped on as if I am suggesting that children sit around with their hands folded and mouths shut at all times. Yet these same folks will complain about any other non-child related noise, such as if our next door neighbors have a small party in their garage and play their music until 10 - 11 pm on a weekend night, or if there are dogs barking. If it were just these jerks across the street I’d write it off as “jerks across the street”, but it seems to be accepted that kids can make as much noise as they want and the rest of us are just supposed to suck it up.
On preview, as Maggie the Ocelot says - “its just one of the noises children make”. The message being I’m supposed to just put up with it because the parents don’t want to/can’t get the to have fun without shattering glass. Really? Is that the attitude now?
That’s got to be annoying. I’ve always liked the convenience of leaving my car in the driveway and being able to have my dog park it in the garage for me.
Have you considered …
[ul]
[li]Reading up on local noise ordinances?[/li][li]Considered videotaping the events as evidence?[/li][li]Decided to keep a detailed, log of events?[/li][li]Called the police on the non-emergency number to speak with the community liaison?[/li][/ul]
Essentially, the police aren’t going to do anything. There is a retired guy down the street who complains a lot to the police and I’ve heard second hand that they refuse to come out when he calls about the screaming, tho they have about the parties, once about a motorhome and once about our dogs.
OTOH, complaining here seems to have worked as the noise has stopped. Or they are having a late dinner…
I deal with this regularly, except I live in an apartment, so the kids screaming at the top of their lungs are right outside my living room. The first time it happened after we moved in, I reflexively said “shut the fuck up!” out loud, and apparently louder than I thought, because I saw the mom look up my way sharply. Oops! I didn’t mean to say it, I felt bad, kind of. The next time, I complained to the management, who spoke to the offenders. Now, I just put my camera on movie mode and go out there and film them. Except they never do it while I’m out there. :smack: I really don’t get it either, how this is acceptable just because kids do it, as if there aren’t any rules or standards of behavior. It’s crazy to me. I have the urge to call 911 and say that I hear someone screaming at the top of their lungs as if they’re being murdered, because really, I do! If you come with a solution to this, OP, let me know!
Actually, they haven’t complained and we’ve only had the one complaint from the retired guy down the block. But, really, I no desire to be friends with people who let their kids run amok like that.
Ya know, I’ve been really tempted to call 911 during one of the pool parties, because it does sound like someone is being killed and since the pool is in the backyard, I can’t actually see whether or not someone is being endangered… But, I really don’t want to do that to our police.
I really don’t get why this level of noise is OK just because it’s kids. Everything else is complained about by someone, and it stops, but the kids? It just seems to get worse - well, it has since it’s moved from the back yard to the front.
It is acceptable to parents who think their children and precious little snowflakes who can do no wrong.
My kids didn’t act like that. They would get their happy butts hauled back in the house for that sort of behavior, and they knew it. It’s rude and thoughtless to allow that in a residential neighborhood. Not everyone thinks noisy little hellions are adorable.
Of course, I’m one of those neighbors who would call the police every single time and complain until it got through to the neighbors that they’re noisy gatherings were not acceptable behavior.
Do you live next door to me? No, our neighbors don’t have a dog…they have three children I very seldom hear. Even when they are out playing in the backyard pool.
Across the street I have the same situation you do - the bounce castle is set up, the adults go inside and are not seen again. I actually ran outside once because I was sure a child had been hurt - that glass shattering shriek scared the hell out of me.
Fortunately, the air conditioner in the cat suite blocks most of the noise when I’m in my office. I was allowed to run around and play as a kid, but if I made a noise that brought an adult running out of the house in panic there had better be a reason to panic - or at least some blood. Just screaming for the sake of screaming? Oh hell no.
Wait, the kids are screaming in the bouncy house until midnight? The “decibel level” noise ordinances, if they exist, are probably impossible to prosecute. But the ones restricted the time of loud noise are more likely to get cops involved. Cops routinely break up loud parties late at night, at least in the cities I’ve lived in. Plus there may be safety concerns about kids bouncing around at midnight – is the bouncy house lit up? I second the recommendation to call the cops, especially the next time they’re screaming at midnight.
I wonder if I’m guilty of this. When I’m out with my three-year-old, he will often shriek with delight at something or practice his T-rex roar in the middle of a store. I myself am not bothered by it; I guess it is one of those things you filter out as a parent. As long as it is happy noise, instead of pain or trouble noise, it isn’t noise, that is how the parent brain filter works. Such shrieking is like a little green OK light on a terminal: “kid’s still alive, kid is still in place, kid is having fun. No action necessary”.
So I do always ask him tot tone it down, but not in my I-mean-business-voice.
Have you strolled over to their house and politely asked the parents to keep the noise down, particularly past a certain time at night? If so, what was their reaction?
This. I remember once as a teenager my folks had just bought a new house. My step-dad’s family came by to help fix up the garage. It was probably 8 o’clock at night, and there were power tools being used. If some old bastard had come by to ask them to keep it down, they’d have stopped. Instead, some old bastard called the cops, who had to take their time to ask them to keep it down.
Although there are assholes in the world, the vast majority of people in the world are really quite reasonable. Don’t be a pussy unless you’re agoraphobic. Go talk to them.
I live in a nice quiet suburban neighborhood and have only two neighbors I wish Human Combustion on. Motorcycle Guy on one side, who endlessly revs his bike and rides it up and down and up and down and up and down the street, gunning it as loud as he possibly can. Someday I am going to take a slingshot . . .
And on the other side, more pertinent to this thread, is a family with three preteen girls, all set on perma-shriek.
In both cases, there is realistically not a damn thing I can do, so I either drown them out with a white-noise machine or loud music, and I brood angrily and take another year off my life.
Am I really expected to put up with this, even tho no one seems to be willing to put up with any noise my chosen dependents make? That seems to be the consensus in the Pit - that if I don’t like noise that sounds like a five year old girl is being drawn and quartered across the street, I should just move. (As if inconsiderate parents don’t live everywhere) Really? Is this what we have come to?