These 17 year cicada noises are driving me nuts! Maybe I have senitive ears. I am trying to soundproof my home as best I can and here are a few steps I have taken. I am open to more options:
1) I keep all the windows shut obviosly and run the AC.
2) I noticed much of the noise was coming from my fireplace since I have a gas log and the damper had to be clipped open (via building code). So I stufed the chimney with a chimney balloon and that all but stopped it. My glass doors did not fdo the trick on keeping the noise out and I even had a few of the little creepers come down the chimney before I put the chimney balloon plug in.
3) I draw the curtains. Maybe this is psycological but it seems to help a little
4) The little creepers were in my basement window wells as well so i got covers for those.
5) I have been wearing my Bose headphones around with the noise cancelling turned on but no music playing but they are uncomfortable after about 6 hours.
I got just the stuff. I am out of stock right now, but I have a new shipment coming in about 6 months, it is warranted for 15 years. Just send money. :-)
Well, unless you're willing to live your life in a concrete box, perhaps it's time to learn to tune things out. You may also want to have your hearing checked. It's possible that you're experiencing tinnitus.
Not sure what 17 year cicada is but I think it's catipillars? Noise is one of my pet peeves so you have a sypathetic 'ear' with me (pun intended)..
As people age it's not unusual for them to get more sensitve to alot of things (light, heat, cold, bitchy wives etc.).. I find that not only closing the windows against a particular sound but using the locks to snug them helps immenslty.
I've seen the video on tv of the catipillars munching away in the nearby fields of people's homes and I can see how this can easily become unnerving. I'm sensitive to all the things I listed above and then some. But I find being sensitive also has it's good points.
A beautiful landscape (woman, sunset, smell, taste) for example is much more appreciated now. So enjoy the good along with the bad.. Charles
Try white noise or pink noise. The AC might approximate that, but you can do better. You can look up "white noise" on Wikipedia and get a link to a 10-second sample, or Google. Same for pink noise.
Use audio editing software to turn it into something longer, say 20 minutes of white noise. Burn that onto an audio CD, and play it on your stereo or get a boom box so you can take it room to room. Set it to repeat the track.
I found a white noise sample that also had the drone of a fan in it, which I found better for masking some noises. I don't recall where I found it, though. I've seen another that had the sound of raindrops mixed in.
If you have any music production software, you can try mixing in other things. I played around in Garageband on my Mac adding in some percussion or rhythm tracks to the white noise, but ultimately decided that I liked simple white noise the best.
If you come up with several you like, just burn them all as separate tracks on your CD, and then you can pick whichever is best for a given situation.
Anyway, you've got the right idea here--make some other noise so you don't hear the offending noise. But there may be a simpler solution than white noise.
Have you simply tried playing loud music? Pick something that doesn't have any quiet parts. This might seem counterintuitive...making loud noise because you are bothered by noise, but the difference is this is noise you've picked. I find that it is somehow much more tolerable that way. I can take pretty much any CD I own, and crank it up, and have no trouble sleeping through it, or programming, or reading. But music coming from outside, even if I can barely here it, will be very annoying.
That was the main thing that got me to finally move out of my apartment and get a house--I could hear enough music from downstairs to annoy me, but could not turn mine up enough to cover it, because then I'd be bothering the upstairs and sideways neighbors. Now I have no neighbors close enough to hear normally, and if one of them were to manage to make enough noise for me to hear, I could turn my TV or stereo up enough to easily cover it, with no fear of bothering anyone.
Interesting Tim... I've found if it's a noise I can 'control' (such as when you said you can play your own music loud and fall asleep to it) I have no problem with it.. And this is true with alot of things.
I have my own business and I'll run across (on occasion) the same kinds of frustrating clients I used to get when working for others... It doesn't bother me nearly as much because I know I can always cut them loose.
Re: sound proof1) I keep all the windows shut obviosly and run the AC. Try white noise or pink noise. The AC might approximate that, but you can do better. You can look up "white noise" on Wikipedia and get a link to a 10-second sample, or Google. Same for pink noise. Use audio editing software to turn it into something longer, say 20 minutes of white noise. Burn that onto an audio CD, and play it on your stereo or get a boom box so you can take it room to room. Set it to repeat the track. I found a white noise sample that also had the drone of a fan in it, which I found better for masking some noises. I don't recall where I found it, though. I've seen another that had the sound of raindrops mixed in. If you have any music production software, you can try mixing in other things. I played around in Garageband on my Mac adding in some percussion or rhythm tracks to the white noise, but ultimately decided that I liked simple white noise the best. If you come up with several you like, just burn them all as separate tracks on your CD, and then you can pick whichever is best for a given situation. Anyway, you've got the right idea here--make some other noise so you don't hear the offending noise. But there may be a simpler solution than white noise. Have you simply tried playing loud music? Pick something that doesn't have any quiet parts. This might seem counterintuitive...making loud noise because you are bothered by noise, but the difference is this is noise you've picked. I find that it is somehow much more tolerable that way. I can take pretty much any CD I own, and crank it up, and have no trouble sleeping through it, or programming, or reading. But music coming from outside, even if I can barely here it, will be very annoying. That was the main thing that got me to finally move out of my apartment and get a house--I could hear enough music from downstairs to annoy me, but could not turn mine up enough to cover it, because then I'd be bothering the upstairs and sideways neighbors. Now I have no neighbors close enough to hear normally, and if one of them were to manage to make enough noise for me to hear, I could turn my TV or stereo up enough to easily cover it, with no fear of bothering anyone.
I can see one wanting to (maybe) experience them, actually they are quite gross.... But to have to live next to it even overnight is disgusting. Thank God it's only every 17 years..
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