The noise abatement meeting

or Give me strength

In which Terry recalls a meeting that was taken over by someone seemingly obsessed with… cockerels!

Greetings! This is part of an article I published a couple of years ago when I had only two subscribers. I’ve doubled that number since! Anyway, here it is. Read it and weep.

Photo by Jairo Alzate on Unsplash

Our local Neighbourhood Watch person organised a meeting to discuss noise. The meeting was addressed by a police officer and a lady from the Noise Abatement section of the Council.

The Noise Abatement lady outlined when the Noise Abatement unit operated, where the police came in, and what to do if, say, a neighbour consistently played music loudly in the middle of the night. Then it was time for questions.

Attendee: Someone’s got a cockerel in my road, and it wakes me up every blasted morning at five o-clock.

Noise Abatement Lady: I’m afraid we don’t deal with cockerels. You would have to call the Nuisance Wildlife Department.

Attendee: Every morning. Five o-clock.

NAL: Yes, but if you just call the Nuisance Wildlife team they should be able to help you.

Attendee: It’s a cockerel. It starts up every morning at five o-clock.

NAL: Well the Noise Abatement Team only deals with noise made by human beings. You would need to call the Nuisance Wildlife Department.

Attendee: It wakes me up every morning at five o-clock.

Me: May I ask a question please?

NAL: Yes.

Me: Would I be correct in assuming that if the noise comes from a person we should call your team, but if the noise comes from a cockerel we should call the Nuisance Wildlife people?

The police officer was desperately trying not to laugh. The NAL managed to splutter out “That’s right.” The cockerel-obsessed attendee spent the next ten minutes glaring at me.

But at least we got off the subject of cockerels.