{"id":685,"date":"2010-07-21T02:01:55","date_gmt":"2010-07-21T00:01:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/?p=685"},"modified":"2015-04-28T00:34:16","modified_gmt":"2015-04-27T22:34:16","slug":"ah-the-sounds-of-summer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/ah-the-sounds-of-summer\/","title":{"rendered":"Ah, the sounds of summer!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The past week in the office has led me to one <span id=\"tooltip55207b485cffd\">conclusion<\/span>: there are better places to spend the summer than in a German industrial park. It&#8217;s nice to open the window to catch a <span id=\"tooltip55207b485d3e3\">breeze<\/span>, but it&#8217;s never long before you hear:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>hammers, <span id=\"tooltip55207b485d7cc\">saws<\/span> and other construction equipment<\/li>\n<li><span id=\"tooltip55207b485dbb3\">jackhammers<\/span><\/li>\n<li>trucks that <span id=\"tooltip55207b485df99\">run their engines<\/span> all day in order to mix asphalt or <span id=\"tooltip55207b485e382\">concrete<\/span><\/li>\n<li>trucks that shake and empty the <span id=\"tooltip55207b485e76b\">garbage bins<\/span><\/li>\n<li>trucks that shake and empty the recycling bins<\/li>\n<li>guys with electric <span id=\"tooltip55207b485eb53\">hedge clippers<\/span><\/li>\n<li>guys with electric <span id=\"tooltip55207b485ef3a\">leaf blowers<\/span> (<a title=\"20 Steps to World Peace (Mike Pilewski)\" href=\"\/blog\/20-steps-to-world-peace\" target=\"_blank\">as previously mentioned<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>guys driving <span id=\"tooltip55207b485f322\">street sweepers<\/span> (whether necessary or not)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>while you&#8217;re trying to work. The <span id=\"tooltip55207b485f70a\">delivery vehicles<\/span> that come by are almost <span id=\"tooltip55207b485faf2\">inaudible<\/span> in comparison.<\/p>\n<p><b>All of this noise<\/b> is made by men. Women apparently don&#8217;t get any <span id=\"tooltip55207b485feda\">kicks<\/span> from it.<\/p>\n<p>The funny thing is: in America, this kind of noise exists, too, but I&#8217;ve always <span id=\"tooltip55207b48602c2\">associated<\/span> it with progress, not with <span id=\"tooltip55207b48606a9\">frayed<\/span> nerves. That&#8217;s because no one has to listen to it all day.<\/p>\n<p><b>You see, we have a wonderful invention<\/b> called <span id=\"tooltip55207b4860a93\">air conditioning<\/span>. It not only cools the room you&#8217;re in; it also blocks noise from the outside. Even indoor sounds are <span id=\"tooltip55207b4860e7c\">muffled<\/span> by the pleasant <span id=\"tooltip55207b4861262\">white noise<\/span> it produces. After only a few minutes in an American office building, you are in a state of Zen. You hear phones ringing and people talking, but they all seem so distant.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve been thinking of patenting air conditioning in Germany, as I&#8217;m sure I could <span id=\"tooltip55207b486164d\">make a fortune<\/span> from it. It does use a lot of energy, and it heats up the planet as fast as it cools the room, but think of how it would <span id=\"tooltip55207b4861a32\">cool our tempers<\/span>!<\/p>\n<p><b>Summer offers many sounds.<\/b> The <span id=\"tooltip55207b4861e1b\">sonic<\/span> environment of downtown Pittsburgh includes:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b4862203\">hum<\/span> of all the air conditioners <span id=\"tooltip55207b48625ea\">embedded<\/span> in the windows of older office buildings<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b48629dd\">clank<\/span> of metal <span id=\"tooltip55207b4862db9\">gratings<\/span> in the street and sidewalk as you walk or drive over them<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b48631a1\">honk<\/span> of car horns when someone doesn&#8217;t notice <span id=\"tooltip55207b486358a\">the light has changed<\/span><\/li>\n<li>the &#8220;<span id=\"tooltip55207b48639ac\">smack<\/span>&#8221; of a <span id=\"tooltip55207b4863d59\">gargantuan<\/span> pizza as it lands on its serving tray<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b4864141\">roar<\/span> of a city bus as it starts up, leaving a cloud of hot smoke at waist level<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b486452a\">flutter<\/span> of a <span id=\"tooltip55207b4864912\">flock<\/span> of <span id=\"tooltip55207b4864cfa\">pigeons<\/span> as they descend on some <span id=\"tooltip55207b48650e1\">crumbs<\/span> that someone left behind<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b48654c9\">chords<\/span> of a <span id=\"tooltip55207b48658b3\">random<\/span> pop song for 15 seconds as some <span id=\"tooltip55207b4865c99\">show-off<\/span> in a <span id=\"tooltip55207b4866081\">convertible<\/span> pulls up to a traffic light<\/li>\n<li>the distant <span id=\"tooltip55207b4866470\">beeping<\/span> of a <span id=\"tooltip55207b4866852\">backhoe<\/span> in <span id=\"tooltip55207b4866c39\">reverse<\/span><\/li>\n<li>the &#8220;Ding!&#8221; of a heavy <span id=\"tooltip55207b4867021\">brass<\/span> <span id=\"tooltip55207b4867409\">elevator<\/span> as it reaches your <span id=\"tooltip55207b48677f2\">floor<\/span>, just before the doors roll open.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The <span id=\"tooltip55207b4867bd9\">suburbs<\/span> offer a different <span id=\"tooltip55207b4867fc8\">soundscape<\/span>. I think of:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>the echo of <span id=\"tooltip55207b48683aa\">elevator music<\/span> inside the <span id=\"tooltip55207b4868793\">vast<\/span> supermarkets<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b4868b79\">rattle<\/span> of <span id=\"tooltip55207b4868f61\">ice cubes<\/span> as they are shot out of the machine and into your cup<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b4869349\">hiss<\/span> of water coming out of a <span id=\"tooltip55207b4869732\">drinking fountain<\/span> when you push the button, then the sudden vibration as the motor kicks in to keep the rest of the water impossibly cold<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b4869b1a\">purr<\/span> of a <span id=\"tooltip55207b4869f02\">lawnmower<\/span> as some kid cuts the neighbors&#8217; grass<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b486a2e9\">zip<\/span> of the UPS truck as it <span id=\"tooltip55207b486a6d2\">swoops<\/span> down the street to make a speedy delivery<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b486aab9\">tweets<\/span> and <span id=\"tooltip55207b486ae9c\">caws<\/span> of visiting birds<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b486b284\">rustle<\/span> of <span id=\"tooltip55207b486b66c\">laundry<\/span> hung out to dry, or of sunflowers in the garden<\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b486ba54\">chirp<\/span> of cicadas and <span id=\"tooltip55207b486be3c\">crickets<\/span><\/li>\n<li>the <span id=\"tooltip55207b486c224\">murmur<\/span> of the neighbors&#8217; TV through an open window late at night.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I think I&#8217;ll <span id=\"tooltip55207b486c60d\">take<\/span> that over the jackhammers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The past week in the office has led me to one conclusion: there are better places to spend the summer than in a German industrial park. It&#8217;s nice to open the window to catch a breeze, but it&#8217;s never long before you hear: hammers, saws and other construction equipment jackhammers trucks that run their engines all day in order to <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/ah-the-sounds-of-summer\/\">&#8230; >><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[63,16,70,162,230,82],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=685"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1782,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685\/revisions\/1782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}