Heh. Same here.
The sound of a zippo lighter opening or closing. Nothing else in the world makes that sound.
Yup. I can also identify by sound some Volvos, old Jaguars, MGs, slant six chrysler products.
I can often diagnose by sound several engine problems (busted timing belt, missfire, blown motor etc)
I can tell which rifle(s) are being fired by their sound. To me, an 5.56mm round sounds like a “pip pip pip”, while a 7.62mm cartrige sounds more like a “bop bop bop”.
Tripler
I can also tell you what time of the day it is, by the sound of airplanes coming in and out. . .
Ah, yes - I remember it well! Although, I think the hork hork (peristalsis-like heaving) sound comes first - and I got so good at it that I could often reach the cat in time to move it to the linoleum floor instead of carpet.
There’s a small circular racetrack across town in a city park. A few times every summer, serious model racecar makers come from all over the country to run their wire-tethered, handbuilt cars. You can hear the cars all over town, yow-yow-yow-yow-yow. They sound like nothing else.
I’ve always heard our cats upchucking as “Gluck! Gluck! Gluck!”
There’s a song by Ministry called Breathe. It starts with with a sampled noise, repeated three or four times. Kind of a vague sound, but each cycle ends with a car horn honking twice.
So I’m watching the film Cry Freedom, and there’s a long shot of a city. Typical city sounds rise up … and then there’s a car horn, honking twice. That’s it! Knew it immediately. The sampled noise.
Old-fashioned dot matrix printer. That screamin’ whine is as distinctive as it gets!
The sound of a half-dollar as it jingles with other change.
The old Apple ImageWriter printer had a distinctive noise as it started up, and could be identified from another room over.
The sound of an old Macintosh floppy drive.
They used to (and probably still on occasion) use that sound for all sorts of “computer noises” in movies and TV shows. Mostly I remember it being used as the sound a laser printer makes. :rolleyes:
Oooh, oooh, good one! Same with the clink of Canadian coins, btw…
The difference in the noise made by a single vs a double-decker London bus.
The route I walk home from work is used by both, one on each of two routes - the double-deckers turn left, toward home, and the single-deckers right not-toward home. I have learned whether it is worth running for the bus stop without wasting time looking over my shoulder to tell which it is.
Grim
Train conductors’ ticket punches. Soon as I hear that ttpch ttpch out of the corner of my ear, I know it’s “tickets please” time.
My refrigerator cycling on and off.
I’ve noticed that all the “regulars” at my subway station in the morning can tell the difference between the local and express trains by sound, so that if you enter the station on the top level and hear a train approaching, you can see all the visitors run, only to be disappointed when they realize it is an express train, while the locals continue to saunter at their own pace. Despite the name, the express trains often move through the station just as slowly (or even stop completely, but the doors don’t open) as the local, so I don’t think it’s strictly a difference in the speed that I am hearing.
The sound a mid-to-late-1960’s MoPar (Chrysler/Plymouth/Dodge) starter makes. Instead of r-r-r-r-r, they go something like “chow-chow-chow-chow.”
SR-71 Blackbird engines.
C-5 Galaxy engines.
Exhaust burble of an original 1965 or 1966 Mustang GT.
Hey, they let us downstairs if we want to go. I’ve never seen a head, but a Mason jar full of grass and toes was sent to our floor by mistake once…
If I hear someone scratching, I can usually tell what body part they’re scratching, especially if they’re scratching their ass. Asses have resonance.
A sound I’ve only heard four times, but the last three there was no doubt. It is the sound an agitated rattlesnake makes as it sees you lift your foot in preparation to step on it.
Actually, It’s not so much the sound I recognize as the squeezing sensation at the base of my spine that is a reflex reaction to the sound waves, occuring just milliseconds before said sound waves impact my eardrums.
Me too, but it doesn’t have to be an early year model Mopar. Even new models have a distinctive sound to me.
The sound of a well-struck soccer ball.