Bango

My daughter has something in common with a large number of children with special needs: she doesn’t like loud noises. Certain big bangs, crashes or wallops can upset her, although she’s not affected quite as badly as the autistic lad in her class who wears ear defenders and as a consequence looks like a miniature DJ who’s lost his decks.  

She updated me with the latest chart, today. Here they are, in reverse order, pop pickers.

5) Fire bells

“You don’t need to worry about fire bells, really, sweetheart, because they only have a drill every so often, and they only last for a minute or two,” I said to her last year. The day before her school had a fire. The day before the bell went off for about half an hour. The day before the fire bell was topped by the ear-splitting squeal of fire engine sirens, just to add another level of wrongness to the How Wrong Was Mum scale.

4) Loud people, particularly [name redacted] and [name redacted] in her class

A bit specific, this one.

3) Daddy, drilling

My husband does not do much DIY. I do not encourage him to do more. When he does, the rest of us go out.

2) Pop concerts/music

My girl is very concerned about music being too loud. Her parents’ choice of music more so than her own, but even her beloved One Direction tunes are never turned up to 11, which is something to be grateful for, I suppose. A few years ago, she went to ‘The Big Gig’, a show organised by the Guides at Wembley Arena, and still talks about how it was too loud. Pixie Lott was on the bill, so I would have to agree.

1) Rheumatic drills

When she told me this I wondered, for a fleeting moment, where on earth she’d seen a Sergeant Major doing that marching Sound Off song with a bunch of arthritic pensioners, and how noisy would that be anyway? Then I realised she meant pneumatic drills, which is fair enough.

You may have noticed fireworks aren’t on the list. After a brief spell in the charts a few years back, they have consistently failed to feature in the affronted eardrum countdown. She’s decided she likes them. "They're a different kind of loud, Mum. Thunder's all right, too."

So tonight, we’ve been to a display (with a set of ear defenders stuffed in my bag, just in case of a sudden change of mind, but which weren't needed). We’re off to a friend’s firework party on Saturday, too.  And we’ll have a bangin’ time, because they're the right sort of decibels, apparently.

Song is Billy & The King Bees - Bango

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Blast

My mother-in-law likes a bit of classical music. Quite what she thought when her son grew long hair and got into Mötorhead, I'm not sure.

It was her birthday, and we'd bought her a DVD of a performance of Verdi's Requiem. We put it on, deciding to give our new surround-sound speakers a bit of a blast. The volume was turned up to 'rattle the windows' level, and the sounds of the double choir and orchestra swelled around the room. It sounded immense.

The door was flung open. My daughter marched in.

"Grandma! Have you any idea how loud that music is? Turn that down!"

And with that, my teenager left the room, tutting loudly and shaking her head at the irresponsible thoughtlessness of an 82-year-old woman.

Video is Verdi - Dies Irae (from Requiem)

Digger

We’ve got the builders in.

The undisputed highlight of the first week’s work was me giving the plumber an eyeful when he walked in on me as I stepped out of the shower. I told the builders I wouldn’t be embarrassed by them telling the story later in the pub as long as they tweaked the facts to make me a foot taller and three stone lighter. I’m waiting to see how my daughter regales her teachers with this story, as sometimes these tales change in the telling. It’ll probably end up with them thinking I’m a naturist. Or having an affair with the plumber. Or both.

My girl has coped well with the disruption, despite her initial worries about how noisy the builders were going to be. From an early age, she’s hated loud noises around the home. Luckily Mr Drakeygirl does very little D.I.Y. (Or as I like to refer to it: ‘Swearing With Tools’).

So my daughter had a panicky few moments when the mini-digger arrived on Friday morning. We’d told her it would be breaking up the concrete floor of our demolished conservatory, and she was getting a little frantic that the mayhem would begin before she went to school.

“It’s going to be really loud, isn’t it? I don’t want them to start until I’ve gone. It’s going to be too loud! I don’t like it, Mum!”

I pointed out that as the digger was in the road at the front of our house, and our car was parked in its path, there was no way any concrete smashing was going to occur until we’d gone. But it wasn’t until we were turning out of our close that she was willing to believe her ears weren’t going to be assaulted.

We’ll see how she copes over the next six weeks or so.

I have no particular worries about my little boy being disturbed by the sound of heavy machinery. He’s learning the lingo as he watches the builders in action, misses off the beginning of some of his words in his customary manner. I’m convinced he does this deliberately because there’s only a limited amount of daylight hours, and it’s the only way he can fit in everything he wants to say.

“Where’s our 'servatory gone? Oh yeah, it’s in the 'kip. This 'ouse is going to be the coolest 'ouse in the world. Can I 'rive the digger?”

I’m not sure which made me smile the most. Watching him sitting in the cab of the excavator, making engine noises, or learning from my husband that the digger’s pointy hammer end attachment is called a pecker.

Video is Mark Lanegan - The Gravedigger's Song