Bang the Drum!

My husband is a drummer. He's been a drummer since around the age of 12. He's really quite good. He plays in a band that usually meets once a week to practice. For what, we're not sure, but they (God love em!) keep practicing. The band could not meet this weekend - conflicting schedules - and so my dh set up his drums in our shed.

The shed is enormous. He built it himself and it is purely male territory in there. He does not use the shed for musical purposes very often. In the last 3 months, he's used it twice (including yesterday). There are two rental home across the street from us. Their landlord was over there yesterday cleaning up after one of her tenants moved out on Friday. She walked over and approached Frank in the shed and proceeded to launch in to a lengthy rant about how inconsiderate he is and how loud he is and how he had better just knock it off! Now, I am not thrilled when he has these home jam-sessions, but after a little while, you get used to the noise. She claimed that her phone was ringing off the hook (I don't see how it could be when she wasn't at home and in all her rantings her cell phone didn't ring ONCE) with complaints from all of her tenants and neighbors.

Okay, I think we have long-ago established on this blog how I despise a liar. Now, we know most of her tenants in the two duplexes and most of them have come over to COMPLIMENT the man on his playing. Next up, if someone in the neighborhood is making a ruckus of some sort, do you take the time to look up some random landlord who does not live on site, or do you call the police? Um, I'll take option number two for $200, Alex! Then she threatened to call our landlord AND the police! So Frank said "Go ahead, my landlord live just up the block a bit, I'll get you his number!" She left in a huff.

So Frank comes in to let me know what is going on and I snapped. After those two rude ladies in the store two weeks ago, I have had it with being walked all over by other people's rudeness. Why is it okay to go up to someone and DEMAND your own way? What did I do? I called the cops myself! I spoke to a lovely man about what the rules are about playing the drums during the day in your own home (or shed) and he said that between 9 am and 9 pm you should be fine, but he'd have an officer call me back. The extremely helpful officer called me back within five minutes and I explained the whole scenario and when I told him all that had transpired and how Frank only plays once a month, his only comment was "Why only once a month?" He decided to come over and check out the noise level and then go over the town ordinances with us personally.

Now here's where it gets funny - we've met this officer before! We spent part of last Easter with him! He's a DRUMMER!! He asked Frank to play for him and if he hadn't gotten called away, he was going to take a turn on the drums!! In a perfect world, the woman would have still been across the street to witness it all and the proverbial middle finger would have gone up! Bottom line, there in no ordinance that states that you cannot play drums in your shed. From 9 am to 9 pm, you can play. It is no more obnoxious than a leaf blower, lawn mower, or motorcycle - all of which HER tenants use with annoying regularity and I have not complained about. YET.

Thirty minutes later, my landlord makes an appearance. Apparently this woman DID go and see him and almost demanded that we be removed from the neighborhood because we are so rude and inconsiderate. He laughed in her face. He lives four doors down from us (and across a road) and he could not hear a thing. So the woman proved herself to be a LIAR yet again. So let's recap, neighbors to our left, no problem with the drums. Neighbors to the right, LOVE the drums and enjoy hearing him play. There is nothing but a big field behind our house so no one behind us has a problem. Half of the neighbors across the street who live in the duplexes all the time, no problem with the drums. Crazy lady who was there for an hour who doesn't live there or even know us, big problem, and that problem is that she is a LIAR!

Next weekend we plan to invite the nice police officer back for a jam session while Nick mows the lawn, Michael uses the leaf blower and I find a really loud motorcycle to rev. Ah, good times.