h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I've gotten to the point where I can sleep through the bus that rumbles by every 10 minutes, at least that's a start...

I find I can sleep through most things. But i can't get to sleep with any sort of noise going on. Lorries going past, dawn chorus, music, whatever. Once asleep, fine. Which is really annoying as when I do have problems sleeping it is usually about 4am 5am that I start dropping off, only to be kept awake by some d*mn bird twittering its heart out.

Must get that shotgun license

Oh, with you there completely!

I used to live next to a laundrette when I was a kid.. The spin dryers made our whole house shake. One night, there was a minor earthquake. The bext day, everyone was walking around ashen-faced. We never noticed!

Mind you...I also slept through an INLA shootout 50 yards down the road....

A couple months ago I walked across the street to a convenience store to get an ice cream before going to bed at 3 AM. It was part of a gas/petrol station, and I was walking by the pumps, this cab driver starts laying on his horn because he can't get to a pump, because of the way another driver is parked. He could have driven around a little further to get there, but instead he starts just really pumping his horn.

So I asked him was he aware it was 3 AM, and people were trying to sleep. He told me to "get lost". So I asked him if he would like it if I followed him home, and layed on my car horn when he was trying to sleep. Then he really got mad.

I hear people doing that kind of crap all the time at 3 AM, and I never get to say anything to them, so this was a golden opportunity I wasn't going to pass up.

Good thing you weren't in LA, Dealer. You probably would have been shot.

No, really.

We have a whole lot of crows in the neighborhood (comes from having trash dumpsters that no one remembers to close) and they are the loudest damned birds at dawn. They're awful. I'm seriously considering getting a pellet gun and taking a few of them out.

But the worst has to be the very small Asian import cars with their very large, very loud, very bass heavy stereos pumping out atrociously bad music. I hate that.

That was dam funny, Ictoan.

Noggin suggests that firing off your shotgun at 4am5am might fix the bird problem but create a different sort of noise issue for your neighbours.


az

And now for something completely different:


"The lost boys, thrown out of US sect so that older men can marry more wives"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1505997,00.html

"Up to 1,000 teenage boys have been separated from their parents and thrown out of their communities by a polygamous sect to make more young women available for older men, Utah officials claim.
Many of these "Lost Boys", some as young as 13, have simply been dumped on the side of the road in Arizona and Utah, by the leaders of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS), and told they will never see their families again or go to heaven."


While the whole article is disturbing I find this particularly shocking. That although this sect is breaking the law they are not prosecuted simply *because* they are a religious group???

"Polygamy is illegal in the US, but the authorities have been wary of confronting the FLDS for fear of provoking a siege or inviting political attacks for religious persecution."


az

That is sad.

I suppose the families could be on a child neglect charge for that, but it sounds as if the youngsters are better off out of it anyway.

If the mothers actually *want* to abandon their children, and aren't merely being coerced into acting as if they did, the lost boys are probably better off out of the whole scene, as long as they can be identified and properly cared for.
I'm not sure that a Waco solution would be a bad thing, as long as children and those adults capable of being reeducated didn't end up as victims.

As far as the committed adults are concerned, a mass suicide would seem to be rather a cleansing of the gene-pool (or meme-pool?). If they actually started with the leaders *first*, and any people dumb enough to follow them *afterwards*, I'd be happy to chip in towards the cost of the Kool-Aid.

If they are correct in being the chosen ones, they'll end up in Heaven, if not, they're deluded abusers removed from society. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.

I'd read a relly interesting book about the FLDS recently, called "Under the Banner of Heaven". It shows a lot about how much power the Mormon church has in the US, because of its status as a religious group.

The way the laws here are written, it's very difficult to prosecute parents for abusing or neglecting their children if it's part of their religious beliefs. The children can be place din care of the State, but seldom are the parents or religious leaders proscecuted.

Truth be told, 13-year old and older boys are drawing near the age, if not already there, where being separated from their parents might not be all that traumatic for them. Particularly if they realize that they're being kicked out because their parents care more about religion than their familes. I know parents of other faiths who've thrown their children out for religious reasons- particularly for "converting" to another religion.

WHat disgusted me about the Mormons when I read that book, and followed it up with others, was that girls as young as 12, sometimes younger, are being married off into polygamous marriages with much older men. Sometimes, daughters are married to their own fathers. Statutory rape, incestuous relationships, and that kind of inbreeding, are going to bring about some really screwed up families, women, and children. And while it's illegal, the government can't, or won't, put a stop to it. Because it's done in the name of "god". That's just sick.

Over a hundred posts of backlog, so I'll just pick a few cherries to respond to.

Mother of God - not really a reply to your posting, but sparked by it. As you say, if resources and material goods were redistributed, they would be distributed right back PDQ. Some people will always do well. Consider Tallyrand, who was a minister of state for Napoleon *and* for the Bourbons, which you would have thought impossible if he hadn't actually done it - rather like the Shah's Head of Finance becoming Foreign Minister under the Ayotollahs.

Malabarista - teaching beggers to juggle, what a fantastically creative thing to do. Again it is treating people as people, which is probably the best thing of all.

Blatherskite's charity beginning at home - I will go out of my way to give practical help when I know it makes a difference, such as driving an ill friend to an airport for her much-needed break. I am considerably less supportive when the friendship is a one-way street (I give, they expect me to give), or when the help doesn't make a blind bit of difference.

Malabarista again - the beggars outside German stations are scary, and no, I wouldn't give to any of them. Hamburg was the only place I saw used needles on the street, and I saw one guy jacking up in the station on the best shopping street in town. This, immediately after living in Glasgow which was a model of probity in comparison.

Various - only one person commented on the 'water torture' principal as it applies in commercial districts. The people who run shops cannot get away, any more than you can get away from buskers if you live in the place. In fact, commercial areas are fuller than residential ones during the day, not emptier. When I ran a shop in the Lanes in Brighton we had one busker who only ever sang the chorus of Postman Pat and the only two verses he actually knew of 'where do you go to my lovely'. Nighmare.

Various - washing machines - some blocks (with concrete floors rather than wooden ones) are more soundproofed than others, and vibration travels far further through some plumbing systems than others. I never put mine on after 9.00pm, because vibrations after 10.00pm don't seem acceptable to me.

All - don't you use earplugs? If I need to sleep during the day or am in a particularly noisy location at night I'll use earplugs and bind a scarf over my eyes. Take some responsibility for your own comfort dudes! I mean... It isn't rocket science.

And yes, some people are more sensitive to noise than others. I heard of one musician who simply couldn't stand Muzac because she couldn't NOT listen to it, and I heard last week about someone who didn't have the ability to blockout traffic noise, rather in the way people with autism cannot block out writing and have to read every single poster and notice in a public place. Read "The Dog in the Night" for more about how that feels from the inside. I have a particular sensitivity to traffic noise in rural areas - I can hear a main road three miles away when other people quite clearly can not.

Ben

<<>>

helping people out as in old people or the ill differs from freeding junkies there habbit which in there case is brought on by there selves .

I just want to point out, that although there are some scary fundamentalist sects of Mormons, those aren't all mormons. The last several posts have blurred the line between the FLDS and the LDS, and that is a big mistake.

B,
"All - don't you use earplugs? "

Just one ickle, teensy weensy question. If I wear earplugs to sleep at night, how am I supposed to hear my alarm clock in the morning?

Ah, good point Ictoan - I am very protective of my sleep - hence earplugs and blindfolds when necessary, but I have developed the habit of waking up at my usual time without an alarm clock.

I actually find that alarm-clocks put me to sleep in the same way and for the same reason that bells made Pavlov's dogs salivate.

Ben

I'm sure I mentioned in my posting that the info I had read was regarding the FLDS. I have a couple of friends who are LDS, and they have very little in common with the FLDS activities I've been reading about during the past several months.

I certainly didn't mean to lump them all together, and apologize if I didn't differentiate clearly enough in my posting.

I've never been able to wear ear-plugs. Each time I've tried all I can hear is the amplified sound of my heartbeat, breathing and even the blood coursing through my veins.

Give me 3am garbage trucks anytime.

az

I know what you mean, Az. I find some kinds of earplugs have that effect moreso than others though.

Ben

I can't wear ear plugs, either. Sometimes it'd be nice if I could, then I could drown out my partner's and the cat's snoring!