Wednesday, October 27, 2010

So, why move in there then?

There are some people out there who will move into a new home say next to an airport and decide that as it's noisy, the airport should shut down rather than move themselves. There's a similar problem in the village of Mayfield, East Sussex, where a couple who moved in 2 years ago are now complaining about the church clock bells ringing through the night, the bells of which have been ringing since 1887 and Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee.

Mail.
A row has erupted over a church clock which chimes every 15 minutes - after a couple used an iPhone app to discover it was disturbing their sleep.
Lucie Kinnell and partner Terry Godden used the Sleepcycle application which monitors their movements during the night.
The programme showed they were just falling into a deep slumber as the chimes went off.
The couple are spearheading a campaign in the sleepy village of Mayfield, East Sussex to get the 1,050-year-old St Dunstan's Church to switch the bongs off overnight.
Lucie and Terry have lived opposite the church in the leafy village for two years.
Church-goer Lucie, 24, who went to Sunday School at St Dunstan's, said today: 'I've written to the the vicar, father Nigel Prior, to tell him that the chimes are seriously affecting our sleep patterns.
'It's not just a simple bing bong every 15 minutes. When it hits midnight it does the whole bing-bong cycle and then bongs 12 times in a row and then repeats the bing-bong cycle.
It's driving us both mad. I found out what other villagers thought and a lot of them agree that it should be put on timer between 11pm and 6am.
'What is the point of it making a lot of noise at 2am?'
But instead of the vicar writing back, Miss Kinnell received a letter from the Parochial Church Council dismissing her request.
 "When I were a lad", I lived in Gateshead, right next to a railway marshalling yard, there were loud steam trains and diesels running about all the time at all hours. You got used to the noise, the only time we noticed it really was during a railway strike, when it wasn't there.
Now I'm all for getting a decent nights sleep, which means that were I to move somewhere I'd make damned sure that noise levels were acceptable at all hours of the day. For God's sake the woman went to the Sunday school there, didn't she know? The bells have been ringing for 123 years, they've lived there 2 years, if there were any justice in the UK they'd be told where to get off.

I'll not take bets on the bells going off at night sooner rather than later.

sadly there's no app for justice.

6 annotations:

Chuckles said...

If I understand this correctly, their sleep is not actually being disturbed, they are incensed because an Iphone app says that their sleep is being disturbed?
Bizarre.
Perhaps we could suggest a strategically placed rubber plant to optimise the feng shui and offset the stressed out phone app?

John M said...

there's no app for being a knobhead as well... or maybe there is. What a pair of utter plonkers. They'll be complaining the village has ostracised them next

Anonymous said...

LOL QM... when you were telling us about your childhood there, I saw you in my mind's eye in a pair of shorts and a woollie jersey, coming up the hill in black and white, with a Hovis clutched in your grubby hand... and now I can't get the Second Movement of Dvorak's New World Symphony out of my head.

Oh well...

They're completely bonkers and someone should tell them to p*** off!


I'll have their house if they don't want it.

John M Ward said...

Funny you should mention moving next to an airport at then complaining about it and trying to have it closed...

There is a certain address in City Way, close to Rochester Airport, where exactly this scenario has played out. I was taken to task on their doorstep for having campaigned to keep it open (as thousands of local people wanted and petitioned for), and they wrote a letter to the local newspaper on the same lines as well.

There are times I am pleased not to be involved with door-knocking any longer...

English Pensioner said...

This is of course typical, and comes in the same category as people who move to the country and then complain about the cock crowing or the smell of organic fertiliser.
I'm a bellringer, and remember visiting a country church not so long ago where they were building some houses immediately opposite. There was a large sign outside the church stating that the bells were rung twice on Sundays and for weddings and funerals, that the ringers practised for two hours each Thursday, and that peals (taking approx 3 hours) were generally rung about once a month and on special occasions. Prospective buyers couldn't say they hadn't been warned!

Anonymous said...

In similar news elsewhere - black people who move to a European country and then proceed to complain about racism under every rock and stone.

Dont like it, go home.