If you woke during the night when at home what noises might you hear?

My dog snoring.

My furnace kicking in finally.

At this time of year, hot water circulating through the radiators. Distant sound of traffic on the expressway ¼ mile away. There’s a clicking sound I haven’t figured out, like the building settling, but it seems too frequent for that.

Snoring dog, nearby freeway noise (more like a river at night, it has a white noise feel to it) wind and rain depending on weather.

Freight trains. The railroad tracks are two blocks away. We run a fan at night to try to block out the noise. It doesn’t always work.

Besides noises that come from the house fridge turning on, or furnace , just jake brakes coming from the highway about a half a click away.

How are we defining “night”?

The occasional car driving by, birds chirping, the refrigerator, NAS HDDs spinning up, someone else using the toilet and hearing the waste water fall down the pipes.

Trains and my cat scratching at
the door to get in our room.

Loud trucks going up the interstate (which is about ½ mile away) – if the wind is right.

Hoots of an owl

(closer to dawn) – the damned rooster that lives next door

(in case of emergency) – fire truck or ambulance from the fire station about ¾ mile away

water sloshing in my waterbed as I turn over,

The heater shutting off and on.
The ice cube maker refilling.
Maybe turkeys walking by.
If it’s 7am, the open door ding on my neighbors car.
Where I live has no street sounds or city noises.

@Jeruba “Night” is the hours of darkness, when you might normally expect to be asleep.

I hear a very occasional car go by, or the sound of a taxi door slamming followed by voices and laughter. Sometimes I hear the crying of the two year old next door but again that is rare. Last night I heard a couple arguing but when I looked out the window there was nothing to be seen but stars twinkling above the rooftops. I sleep with the window open and the sounds don’t usually bother me.

traffic. The streersweeper swings up and down Mission st every morning 5 AM. The garbage truck on Tuesday. None of it wakes either of us.

My dog, the “60s revolution” channel playing music quietly. Wind blowing outside. Creaking windows from the cold.

I live in a pretty quiet neighborhood, but every now and then, my neighbor across the street can be heard arguing with God knows who on his cell phone, in front of his garage anywhere from midnight to 3:00 am. This is about a once or twice a month occurence.

Also, if the (double paned) window is open, you can almost always hear birds tweeting, sometimes loudly. Thank goodness the crows don’t start in until just as the sun is rising.

We live on a hill, and there are other hills surrounding our neighborhood. The train is a good 2 miles away, to the North, but you can always hear it clacking or whistling in the wee hours, but it always sounds like it’s coming from the South. It’s a very pleasant, soothing sound.

Lately coyotes. Not a good sound, as several of our neighbors have lost their pets to coyotes.

Every once in awhile, some ding bat wiil come screeching down the street, I’m guessing they are drunk, around 2 to 4 am. I don’t think they are neighbors, because they don’t stop. We live almost at the end of our street where there is a cul de sac, and then another block that intersects. I get the feeling that these idiots are drunks that somehow managed to get lost, and ended up in our neighborhood. Sometimes I get up to look and I’ve never recognized a car, and they never stop, they just speed through, squeeling their tires, and often with loud music blaring out of their open windows. This happens about once or twice every few months.

We are in a residential neighborhood, not anywhere near any bars or nightclubs. There is a main thouroughfare about 6 blocks away. I figure the drunks are on that road, get lost, and end up barreling through our neighborhood. It’s very hilly, winding, and confusing, even for people who are not drunk.

@flutherother, it’s pretty dark here by 6 p.m. right now. I don’t go to bed then, and I don’t get up at dawn. So I guess my answer to your question wouldn’t be relevant.

My husband defines “night” as “when he’s asleep,” none of which takes place during the hours of darkness. That accounts for a lot of the noises I hear when I wake up and it is dark.

Emergency vehicles and motorcycles reaving.

Sadie, the world’s cutest dog, snoring softly. That’s what she does when she’s sleeping deeply, and it’s SO sweet.

Owls, sometimes.

A mountain lion attacking and eating the little dog who comes around at night and shits in my yard.

My neighbors arguing, with his girlfriend threatening to leave him for the 20th time

I live in a apartment building. They guy that lives right above me got a guitar for Christmas last year.

I keep really odd hours. I often go to bed at 4PM and wake up at midnight to start work. If I am awake I probably have headphones going so I can’t hear his three chord chicken rock.

When I sleep I sleep hard.

But I took up some beer when this fist started and we worked out a solution. If I bang on the ceiling he stops for 30 minutes. I will generally be asleep by then and then I don’t care. I can sleep through anything.

Other than that things are pretty quite around here.

If the weather has been bad for a long time recently, and we’ve had a lot of rain, then I’ll hear the sump pump – when it cuts out and stops suddenly. In winter I can hear the snow plows run past the house. Sometimes – on the most extreme days – I can hear the wind outside, or driving heavy rain (or sleet) against the windows.

Since I live near a main road I will sometimes hear fire engines or ambulances (once in a while cops) running up or down the road with sirens on.

In the summer, with the windows open, I can hear the early-morning train about a mile away as it crosses roads and sounds its horn.

Our pool filter is set to come on every night, we live one block from a fire station, someone on my block rides a motorcycle every night around 2am, several appliances hum most of the night, various people turn over in their sleep and we keep our bedroom doors open, the charging station for our electric car makes loud clump noise every time it switches on or off throughout the night, And Hubs work computer calls him whenever anyone tries to make an unauthorised transaction. (It’s usually a night audtor who forgot the password for the day)

Oh yeah, I forgot the firetrucks. I live a block away too. Sometimes they get called out three times in one night. Sometimes I can go a week without hearing them at night.
It usually gets busier in December.

The house staff plotting bloody murder the likes of which you see in an Agatha Christie film

The freeway, mostly. I live fairly close to the freeway—it’s the only way I can afford to live here. But I’ve come to appreciate the freeway sound as white noise and it often has the effect of lulling me to sleep.

The bedroom has very annoying “cracking“sounds. The wall will crack, which makes me think of sinkholes and , whats even louder, the ceiling fan will have a loud, metallic sounding ring, one time, that usually happens just after I’ve fallen asleep. Lastly, rain blowing on the vinyl window trim we had put around the windows because the wood was rotting slightly. It produces a clickity clack sound.