The sounds of Summer!

These are all Boys Toys, Phoenix. According to twenty-first century Caveman philosophy, if something is worth doing then it's worth being Bluddy Noisy about it!

This is the suburban gardening equivalent of Formula 1 Grand Prix stuff - guys roar up and down the lawn on sit-on mowers, wield strimmers and electric hedge trimmers like Excalibur and blast the driveway with the power washer as if they were using a flame-thrower.

The sounds of summer are Godawful mostly at the weekend - it's as if these guys cannot sit still if they've got access to a shed full of noisy gadgets. D'you reckon it might be some sort of addiction, a bit like computer gaming?

I'd like to try (and get away with) hacking through their testosterone levels with a strimmer......

Humptydumty
Know what you mean. New neighbours moved in a few doors away last summer and decided to mow the lawn at 6am on a Sunday morning it didn't go down well I thought the neighbours including the ones over the back were going to linch him!! ? He didn't repeat that mistake again.

I grew up in Germany, no washing on the line on Sunday, no annoying noise.

I echo all that has been said here but my worst pet hate is Barbecues and the smoke that gets on my chest and has me almost in tears, also those little garden fire things that are lit and give off smoke and fumes. Last bank holiday weekend neighbours lit one when it was so hot late afternoon, we honestly though there had been a fire when smoke billowed into our garden, when it had calmed down they sat round it most of the evening, it was so hot but we had to close our windows put all the fans on, so much for enjoying an exceptional warm Spring evening.

I sympathise totally. On Friday afternoon I was lying on sunbed toasting away nicely with my Kindle & a cool drink when my next door neighbour's gardener turned up with his unbelievably noisy petrol strimmer & proceeded to cut the hedge between us & then went on to use it on their bushes & even the flaming lawn! 2 1/2 hours later I got peace &quiet again.
I accept noise at weekends as everyone at work has to get things done then but I do hate it during the week.
The gardener is very annoying at best of times as he will try & engage me in conversation if I am out there THROUGH THE HEDGE. I totally ignore him & have asked them to tell him to leave me alone but he is very odd. I see no reason why I should make conversation with a total stranger when I am relaxing in my own space.
DH has rigged up a screen now between our patio & theirs so he cannot see through the hedge anymore.
I would be livid if my gardener behaved like that & upset my neighbours (but then mine is a lovely girl!)
It is quiet out there now so I should get a peaceful afternoon today.

Weekends are the only time I and DH get to do anything in the garden as we work Monday-Friday. We have no choice but to cut the lawn on a Saturday or Sunday. No strimmer or other power tools mind you.

My neighbours all live in "paved paradises" with not an inch of soil or green in view.

I agree, it's awful when the peace is disturbed by mowers, strimmer etc. But we do it ourselves so we cant really complain. As we are retired now, i do find that we can usually get peace and quiet during the week when most people are working. I am sitting, as I type, listening to nothing but Bird song. It's lovely.

As we are retired we endeavour to do any noisy gardening or DIY tasks on weekdays when many neighbours will be at work, and never too early or late in the day.

But my pet hate noise-wise are motor bikes. The road outside our house is a main thoroughfare across the island, though not particularly noisy even at 'busy' times. But at weekends and when there are motorcycle events taking place the noise is horrendous. The bikers ride slowly through the village (low speed limit) but just before they get to our house they know they are approaching miles & miles of open coast road and they open the throttle making the most awful din!! Have even seen some of them doing wheelies past the house. It frightens our youngest grandchild and terrifies our dog. Thank goodness it is mostly confined to the summer months.

My neighbour to the left has a motorbike so I know what you mean happysexagenarian. He doesn't just get on it and ride off either , oh no, he has to rev and rev and bl**dy well rev before he sets off.

Well this summer our Asian neighbour's sons seem to have gone away- so no hours of bouncing on giant trampoline with gangs of their friends all f-ing and blinding for all their worth! (And the build-up of fury when your polite requests over fence that they stop are met with sullen silence- and five minutes later they're at it again as if you hadnt spoken. Hope they don't come home till winter...

Is the fact that they are Asian significant?

starbox I can sympathise with that problem. When we lived in London our neighbour's children (3 doors away) shouted at the tops of their voices to their friends (2 streets away!) from 7am asking them to come round to play! Then we had to suffer their foul language, and that of their parents, for the rest of the day, all through the long summer holidays. Any request to lower the volume was met with further abuse or we were called snobs.

I love the summer with all the birds darting about enjoying the day.

I can, however, live without the complete prat to my right, and his gfriend who decided to have a ‘domestic’ at 1/4 to one on Saturday morning- with all doors and windows open - using some utterly vile language. I called the police as I actually feared for her safety.

And naturally, on Sunday the newly loved up couple were billing and cooing louder than the resident wood pidgeon.

Our Saturday was blessedly quiet, but our Sunday was also graced with our neighbours to the left emptying their shed with much banging, clanging and rending of timbers - who then polluted the afternoon air with a stinky barbecue which heavily featured fish!

The detritus is still there (shed and barbecue), right next the the fence. An eyesore and nose-sore.

I will wait until Thursday when both sides have a day off, and begin my day nice and early by mowing the lawn.

A petty revenge - but pay-back no less

Agree about the barbecue smells. They seem to waft across from all direction on hot afternoons and evenings obliging us to close windows and doors. Another annoyance is next door’s grandchildren playing football in the the garden with constant loud bangs against our fence. I did suggest they use the length rather than the width of the garden but the neighbour said “what, and have a broken window?” I try not to get annoyed about what are probably minor irritations in the grand scheme of things, and just take steps to remove myself from the annoyance. There are lots of peaceful moments too and I try to enjoy them when I can.

Ah yes - the music-lovers Our road is usually fairly quiet and peaceful, with not too much noise -- until summer comes, and a couple of neighbours decide to delight us all, one by having BBQs in the back garden (complete with pounding music relayed through speakers) and one by occasionally inviting his friends round for karaoke - in his front garden (he's explained that it's bigger than his back garden...!)
Fair enough, neither goes on too late - usually between 11pm and midnight - but it does mean having all doors and windows shut to deaden the sound (& allow us to watch TV and hear what's being said) and it definitely precludes sitting in the garden with a nice glass of something chilled...
If we know it's going to happen, we usually go out for the evening - but in both cases it's often decided on the spur of the moment. Both families are lovely, and good neighbours, but those 6 or so weekends a year seem endless... Hey ho - it's called living in a community I suppose

I don't mind the noise children make, even the endless thwack of one of those tennis ball on a string things. I don't object to lawnmowers and strimmers because almost everyone has some grass to be cut and, once the job's done, the noise stops. What I object to is a radio in the garden all day long. Half the time, my neighbours aren't even outside! Listen indoors, switch off or use headphones! I fantasize about taking a potshot at the radio with a catapult. If I could choose to have a superpower it would be noise blocking ability...

It’s your own fault Craftycat for lying outdoors in your bikini and looking so attractive! The man is only human after all.

Hi . This all rings true with me . Don't mind mowing and power tools as these finish shortly and quite early . My neighbours have bought a hot tub . Their mate come round .On goes the barbeque until almost midnight . They stay outside . Children are reasonably quiet but the male member / my neighbour is crazily loud . Do I confront /Why should it be me ? or post them a no thank you note.

Phoenix you are forgetting the sound of digital keys opening and closing cars carrying on the soft summer breeze. I am sure they could turn them down but they want us to hear them.

I’m in lovely Wales on the Cambrian coast, sat on a bench this afternoon looking over Harlech Beach, with Snowdon as a backdrop. Not a strimmer, mower, bbc, or vehicle to disturb this tranquil moment. Just silence. It truly does restore the soul.

I used to have older neighbours who liked to get roaring drunk on a Saturday at home, have loud country music blaring out from hi fi speakers placed outside their back door. Some weeks they would fall out and the air was blue, they also threw each other’s possessions like missiles out into their back garden. At that point I would close my back door and windows.
One year he waved his pellet gun at her during a fight, she came around to me, I was happy to shelter her as the police marched him off in handcuffs to cool off.
I could see quite clearly what he shouted in the direction of my house as he was marched off.

I definitely think some jobs should be avoided at certain times. I’m not grumpy but sometimes I just need peace and quiet in the garden - there aren’t that many opportunities.
I was away at the weekend and nearby caravan allowed their little dachshund to yap incessantly. My tough Stafford’s never made a sound. I’m afraid I did and told the damn dog to shut up. It was moved inside.
We all need peace in our increasingly noisy world.

I don't like the smell and smoke of burning burgers.

We have lots of birds about singing their hearts out. They can be very loud but the blackbirds in particular are lovely. They sit on top of TV aerials and proclaim their territory.

We have a building site next door at the moment, and the sounds we hear are the thump, thump, thump of the pile driver. They've been at it for 5 weeks now, but I understand that they've got to stop before exams start at the grammar school.
Still at least they've moved to the other end of the site now.
When they were pile driving 10ft from our retaining wall , I was in terror of seeing our shed tumbling down the side.

I used to live in a quiet seaside town and we'd sometimes hear a lawnmower next door, I don't recall any strimmers. There was barely the hum of traffic, just lovely birdsong.
Back in a large town I often hear car/burglar alarms and sirens with the occasional youngster on a 'souped-up' motor scooter making a racket. It makes me feel a bit wistful.

The first swifts were screaming over the house today. I stopped the lawn mower to listen to them