just curious, do you hear wierd stuff at night? like a dropping marble maybe??
i always thought it was just my upstairs neighbour in my old apartment that allowed kids to play marbles at 3 in the morning but i just found out that a lot of people experience them too, so i thought to check if this is strictly local or not.
Everything seems to sound different at 3a.m. I’ve always lived in old houses so I’ve always attributed it to that. It really freaks my son out–he’s 11 with an overactive imagination. Every winter when we turn the heat on he’s seemed to have forgotten that the radiators make some funky noises and I get that knock on my bedroom door and the little, quavery voice saying, “mommy, I hear stuff.” It’s usually the heating system–well, that or the squirrels that have taken up residence in his bedroom ceiling. Gotta get the building manager to do something about that!
When I was a kid we (my sisters and I) used to always hear the same thing in our front bedroom. It was a small room so only one of us would be sleeping in there at a time. You would be laying there in bed, trying to fall asleep and all of the sudden you would hear this cacaphony of sound, mainly voices, all talking at once, laughing, yelling, it was horrible.
We each heard it at different times and when we got older and described it to each other, it was all the same. Very very wierd.
That is why I have to sleep with a fan on. It blocks out all outside noises. I don’t worry too much about break- ins or monsters, my dogs would get them before they got to me. Ahhh…peaceful sleep.
There is a weird sleep phenomenon, I know it has been discussed here before. Right before I fall into a deep sleep, sometimes I will hear something that sounds like breaking glass. It isn’t real, but it is rather freaky. I have actually gotten out of bed to see what the cats knocked over, and everything is in one piece, in it’s proper place. I can’t remember what this is called, but from previous threads here it seems quite common.
I used to hear the dropping-marbles sound in my dorm room at college. It sounded precisely like someone dropping a marble or a large ball-bearing from about a foot above the floor, and letting it bounce. TAK-TAK-tak-tak-tak-taktaktaktaktaaaaa. Over and over again, with long enough pauses between them that I could start drifting off to sleep before starting awake at the next one. I always blamed the jerks upstairs. I never confronted them about it, though, because I was a big wimp.
It’d be interesting to find out that this sound is actually caused by something else.
Now I blame all weird sounds on the cat.
Yep, I hear the ball/marble thing - but I just assume it’s my upstairs neighbor, since I hear it when I’m not in bed too. Funny thing is, our floors are masonry covered by carpet pad and carpet everywhere but the kitchen, and his kitchen is right over mine, so I don’t know how anything could make that much noise.
Generally, once I’m in bed any funny noises are the cats. And if they’re not, that’s who they get blamed on.
I know my cat is the cause of the nocturnal noises. He’s not called Leadfoot for nothing! This morning, for example, I was awakened by a thump. For a few seconds, I lay there trying to figure out what it was. Then I heard the distinctive sound of kitty kibble being crunched.
If the fog comes in on little cat feet, it must make a hellacious noise!! :eek:
Oh yeah, and at my house, the “marble” sound comes from the drain. I noticed that one morning when I ran water in the sink then turned it off. Not sure if it’s the PVC expanding or contracting because of the temperature of the the water running thru or something else.
Yes, the “marble” sound. I didn’t put two and two together until reading FCM’s post. I often hear that sound when I run hot water and it goes through the drainpipes - and I hear the same anytime my upstairs neighbor runs hot water or operates the dishwasher. I figured it was pipes.
But it DOES sound like a marble dropping!
The last odd middle-of-the-night sound actually was my cats. I kept hearing this thwap…thwap…thwap and couldn’t think what they could be getting into. I get up, and they’re pulling out a strip of wooden edging from the kitchen floor. They have since opened their own design consulting firm and will appear as guest designers on Trading Spaces.
I used to have a lot of hypnogogic hallucinations (or whatever they’re called) but most didn’t involve the marble sound. There were animal sounds and people screaming and in one case I thought a demon in the form of a rat had jumped into the bed with me. There was another time when I was awakened by the sound of a horrible explosion; I thought WWIII had started. However, no one else heard the noise.
Lately this hasn’t been much of a problem, but a couple weeks ago in the wee hours of dawn I did hear something that sounded like a beer can pyramid falling down. I did not have a beer can pyramid and an investigation the next morning revealed that nothing had fallen, so maybe that was just another hallucination.
When I was dating my now husband, I was sleeping over one night and heard what must have been the apocolypse for two poor animals. They seemed to be fighting each other but holy moly, what shrieks and animal sounds.
I lived most of my life in Florida. I’ve lived in DC for the last (almost) 10 years. I remember the first winter I lived in an apartment with old fashioned steam pipes. It woke me up every night for weeks going WHAM THUMP THUMP THUMP BANG BANG SCREEEEE. Like a shopping cart being pushed down cement steps. Then I began to associate loud nocturnal noises with sweet, sweet warmth. Then I found out about the miracle of bleeding the radiator. All this time I thought letting some steam off was just an expression!
Ok, my wife swears my brother & I are insane, but we have heard something scampering across the ceiling in the wee hours of the night. We live downstairs in a furnished, divided basement (have our own bedroom, bathroom, kitchen) and the ceiling is made up of those foam panels you see in middle school that you can throw pencils up into (only thinner/lighter) , and my brother and I have heard what sounds like a mouse scurry across in different directions… very eary. I am afraid to look up into the panels just because I foresee him attacking my face as soon as I look!
Also, about a week ago I heard our house mate (the people we live with) upstairs clopping around in her high-heels on wood floor getting ready for work — at 3:30 AM!!
We have one of those instant hot water taps. Only at the wee hours can one hear it heating up the water within its small tank. A hissing, gurgling sound.
During cold nights, sometimes I can hear the wood floor crack.
All the appliance motors.
Branches moved by the wind against the house.
Deer dashing across our roof from the walled hillside next to the house or the pesky racoons seeking windblown wild cherries in the late summer.
My old cat snore.
My 6 year old daughter talk in her sleep, sometimes she cries for 2 seconds.
I hear the sounds of a lulliby song and a running, gurgling stream at night…
I have music on for my daughter and a nature sounds radio/clock machine on for myself. Occasionally, I hear dogs barking but I cannot sleep without noise. I used to have this big floor fan that had a mild droning noise to it and it was very soothing! That shut out any other noise possible, it was GREAT! My ceiling fan sometimes makes a noise but it’s rare. Thank God for no strange, spooky noises!
I often hear weird noises not only at 3.00am but all through the night and day. My home is 104 years old with a history of deaths occurring in this house.
Quite often, both during the day (if I’m home alone and the house is quiet) but mostly the early hours of the morning, I hear our timber floor-boards creaking as they do when someone is walking through the house.
Quite often through the night, I think someone has gotten up to have a bathroom visit, but the footsteps never return to the bedroom!
Also, I quite often hear sounds through the night as though someone is throwing rocks on our metal roof. I go to investigate outside and there’s not a soul around… Bit spooky!
A few times my daughter has woken up screaming because she says someone was banging on her bedroom window. I heard it once and ran to look and there was absolutely no-one there!
OMG! I also hear that, and also from upstairs!
Anyone care to explain?
I always assumed that it’s a high-heeled mule slipper dropping (Because I hear it in the bedroom, right above my side of the bed, nowhere near utilities, and I assume that’s where the upstairs neighbors have their bedroom as well). But why multiple sounds? Like it bounces?
that’s exactly it! are we saying it’s not marbles? 
When my SO can’t sleep, he listens to the radio or an audio book through earbud headphones. When he’s listening to an audio book I can hear the motor of the tape player.
whirrrrrrrrrrrr…