Diurse Alarums

It was the most perfect Spring day last week and I’d even managed to get off work relatively early to enjoy the sunshine. I had a vague notion of sitting in the back garden with cats for company and the trills of the resident blackbird washing away a day’s worth of work bullshit.

Stepping off the bus, I walked ten yards into the housing estate to hear a wailing:

“Oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no…”

Even the fucking burglar alarms are afraid in this estate.

I think it’s either loneliness from being left companionless all day, or else the designers of the damned things are subliminally building into them their own paranoia about people rifling through their CD collections.

What kind of burglar alarm goes “Oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no” for fuck’s sake?

I heard it again today, when home on the mythical flexi-day (ironically, introduced to give the worker a rest from working; instead I mow grass and stick tiles onto walls for hours and hours) and I stepped outside the back door for a moment to fetch something. I can image one of those Disney-animated teapots shrieking in terror, its four-fingered hands held over its mouth in horror: “Oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no-oh-no!”

The wind was gusting, so the alarm obviously thought there was a break-in. The trouble is that the person who owns the alarm suffers from a number of deficits in relation to their trusty alarm system. 1. The alarm goes off with a gust of wind. 2. It would be a laughable alarm if it wasn’t for… 3. It doesn’t switch off until the owner comes home from work at whatever time in the evening.

We’ve had troubles with our own alarm system recently, but at worst the outdoor siren switches off after a relatively short period, leaving the indoor siren giving it socks. We also went to the trouble of having the alarms people come out and fix the problems as soon as could be managed. But this resident either hasn’t figured out why his neighbours aren’t talking to him, or (like me), finds nothing unusual in the fact the neighbours don’t talk to him.

Do you phone the Gardai whenever you hear a burglar alarm? Me neither.

If he got a recording of a blackbird and played this through the alarm box I could listen to it all day without complaint. I’d even enjoy the confusion of the local bird trying to find his new enemy.

If the wind comes around much this Summer, it’s going to be a long one.