DjMagra’s stuff ‘n’ stuff

One of the nice things about living in the countryside is peace and quite. One of the not so nice things about living in the city, especially somewhere as big and brash as London is the assault on your senses, especially your ears. Every day I try to brave it for a little while, treating the noises of every day life as part of the overall London experience, and every day I quite rapidly jump back into the sanctuary of my noise-cancelling headphones and my iPod.

But, you’d expect that once you head to bed, and close up the sound-proof windows in your nice apartment, that you could get some sleep. I’ve been to places where you can hear everything your neighbours are up to (Kassie can tell you all about that too!), or where you have rowdy neighbours who insist on making as much noise as they possibly can. But, that’s not something you expect living where I do.

So, imagine the shock to the system I had at 5am this morning when deep in my sleep I could hear the incessent whine of a fire alarm. It took me quite a while to realise what it was, but, as soon as I woke up enough to realise, my heart started pounding, and all I could think about was whether I could smell smoke. It wasn’t my fire alarm (which we’ve managed to set off more than once - who puts smoke / fire alarms right over a cooker anyways!!) so I dragged myself out of bed and fumbled around for a bit, trying to decide what to do.

Eventually, there was no sound of anyone else moving, and I was unable to get through to the concierge in my apartment, so, I took it upon myself to get out and see what was going on. The apartment down the hallway was where the noise was coming from, again, I couldn’t smell smoke, and the door was cold, so, I hoped that all would be ok and headed down to the concierge to let them know and investigate.

Turns out, the problem was a faulty smoke alarm, and that the apartment was unoccupied, but, OMG, that just never happens out the country. I don’t miss home because I’m loving living here too much, but, if there’s one thing that I do miss, it’s the ability to get some peace and quiet sometimes!