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Lately I’ve been driving around with the car stereo off, just in case the most recent starting problems I’ve had have something to do with the battery, and in case keeping the stereo off might help. I like the sound of music (or even talk, though not “talk radio”) because it muffles the sound of the engine, which I don’t like hearing, mostly because I don’t know what all the different sounds mean, and so I work them up in my mind into something ominous. So I play music instead.
It’s pretty much the same at home. My house doesn’t have an engine, but it does make noises, and I have the radio or TV on almost constantly anyway, so I rarely hear it. Today, though, I turned off the Texas Fred’s Zydeco Trailride show on XM12 Cross Country and sat down to read for a few minutes. I don’t often have the chance to do this, sit down and read, and I was really enjoying the silence, right up until I heard the ticking in the wall.
Or maybe it wasn’t a ticking as much as a clicking, or— Oh, I don’t know. The sound a rat makes when it’s eating through your pantry, maybe? Because that’s what I was thinking when I got out of the recliner to check. The sound of the chair handle lowering my feet to the ground would have scared the rat away, but the ticking or clicking kept going, so I opened the cupboard doors above the stove, which is where most of the action always seems to be set. That’s where the ants were the last time, anyway.
Nothing there, though, and my saltines seemed to be intact. A few feet to the left, though, and down on the counter, my coffee maker was ticking. And clicking. I don’t think it was about to explode, but it was late enough in the day to turn it off, so I did. I didn’t get much reading done, but I was supposed to be working anyway, so I just turned the radio back on and went back to it. |
