Portland, Oregon

Portland, Oregon

Monday, June 6, 2016

A Quiet House

I'm a native Texan, lived there 62 years of my life and hated every minute of every summer. That's a lot of hating. In 2004 I retired and we moved to Oregon. Living in the Pacific Northwest is paradise to me. Our vet once told me when God retires it will be to Oregon.

Summers are wonderful here compared to Texas summers. We're in the middle of a 3 or 4 day heat wave with temps in the 90s, to near 100. Those don't happen all that often but certainly send me scurrying for a cool place to hide.

Tomorrow will again be a warm day but then the next 10 days will be in the 60s and 70s. Oh how I love this place.

I hate hot summers!!
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We probably have the quietest house around and I like it that way.

Many years ago we reached a compromise (we do a lot of that), Bob wears ear phones to listen to TV. I've never watched TV because I'm always reading books and find it very distracting if I'm in a room where a TV is on and I particularly don't like loud TVs.

We bought Bob a nice set of wireless head phones and we've both been very happy with the arrangement.  It's been long enough that he's had two or three sets but he always goes back to the original ones. I guess they just feel better.

In the last year or so I've begun listening to audio books and I use ear buds. We can occupy the same room because he wears headphones and I wear ear buds. Total silence in the room.

We would have very different tastes in TV shows anyway. Bob is also a flipper. I think men are genetically disposed to channel surfing.

Bob's twin brother used to have their TV at ear drum bursting level. His wife complained bitterly but she never did anything to make the problem more tolerable. I finally decided she probably liked her situation or she would have done something to correct it. I'm not one to suffer such things in silence.

Who controls the TV in your house? Do you agree of the shows you watch?

19 comments:

  1. This so reminds me of my parents..and my mother did finally buy a speaker to set right beside my dad's chair so that he can hear. I don't like it though- it is really still loud! My husband has lost his high tone hearing..from working at the mill, and he turns the tv up loud. I escape to my computer room, Don't know an answer to the problem. And yes- I think men are pre-programmed to channel surf. :)

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    1. My husband's entire working career was either planes or trains, both very loud. There is definitely something to the tone level. Bob can hear tones I have difficulty hearing but can't here me when I'm speaking to him. Hmm wonder if that's on purpose.

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  2. My husband and I had the same issues with the TV as you do and we solved it the same way---ear phones for him. Only I was mostly in the other room on the computer while he was in the living room. In the kitchen we watched mostly the news and with the TV in the bedroom I controlled the channels because he was usually asleep the minute his head hit the pillow.

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    1. It really works quite well. I have the attention span of a flea in a hot skillet and simply cannot stand a lot of noise going on around me or I get totally distracted from what I'm doing.

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  3. Summer's in Maine are pleasant, too, once they finally arrive. Ken cranks up the t.v.volume 3-4 levels beyond where I like it. He denies having hearing problems. He says it's the LOCATION of his recliner in the living room that causes the t.v.'s volume to be a problem for him...

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    1. I'd love to visit Maine in the summer. I'm sure their summers are lovely. Men are strange. Ken thinks the sound problem is the location of his recliner and Bob thinks his problem with the coffeemaker is the clock.

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  4. I think most men have selective hearing, just like children. Maybe women do too, I am just not aware of it. Ha Ha.

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    1. I'm very familiar with selective hearing. However, I find my two children are very hard for me to hear. Seems like I'm constantly asking them to repeat.

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  5. My husband and I are fairly compatible when it comes to TV viewing. We both like British dramas and mysteries that are shown on public TV (such as Downton Abbey and Agatha Christie mysteries). We share the remote equally but do somehow manage to irritate each other in the way we browse the TV listings. He flips through the listings too quickly and I actually get irritable and say, :Give that thing to me!" then I go through the listings at my own pace. Silly but true.

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    1. It's amazing how irritating the small things in life can be.

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  6. My husband controls the TV. The remote stays by his chair. I usually don't like what he likes. If he gets on the computer in the bedroom and I am in the living room, I will get the remote and look for something good to watch. He immediately changes the channel though when he comes back in the living room. This is why I sew at night in the little sewing room with my own TV. Mostly, I listen to the music channel while sewing. Men!

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    1. Would be interesting to know how many men in America that watch TV choose what the household watches. They just seem to assume it's their right and never occurs to them other people watching might like to watch something else.

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  7. I have lived in Texas all my life and will be here until the day I die! However, summer is my LEAST favorite season and I always DREAD it!! So far it's not been bad but we are only in the first full week of June! By August we are held hostage inside our own home! If I were wealthy, I would leave right after the 4th of July and return on September first! Not that it is any cooler by then but at least we have hope and September 1st is like a holiday to me! It is my MOST favorite day of the entire year - Christmas, birthdays or ANY other holiday included!! It marks the beginning of THREE seasons of tolerable weather!! I don't think I could live in snow country but the Pacific Northwest??? Ideal!!!!

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    1. You've just expressed my feelings. Texas has beautiful winters. More snow birds should come to Texas for the winter. The state is so large it has everything imaginable to see and do. I even think it has several dialects of English. I sound like Governor Ann Richards, certainly not like Lady Bird Johnson. I've never been down in the Big Bend area and don't have much appreciation for that topography. East Texas is very different. I actually kind of like West Texas, etc. I just can't stand those hot summers and unfortunately they go on forever. I've seen Texas have 100 degree days six months out of the year, not every day but some days. I'm totally gone by the end of summer in Texas. I planned an event in Texas in 2009 and I informed the folks if they scheduled it in summer I would not attend.

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  8. We do usually watch TV together. there are a few programs that I like that he doesn't care for so he will go upstairs and work or surf on the desk top computer.
    The TV volume issue was solved by my getting hearing aids, and for shows that are hard to understand we use closed caption. Oh, and I usually handle the remote.

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    1. Closed captions, a very good idea. They would probably drive Bob nuts but I would certainly like them. Haven't heard a report on the hearing aids in a while. Hope all is still going well. How are they in a crowd like at the Sounders games?

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  9. My TV and CD player are probably too loud for normal people but since I'm alone most of the time, it's ok. I also have earphones and earbuds I can use if there is a need - like when the Grand Girls are napping. It makes like so much easier to be prepared.

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  10. My husband had serious hearing loss and so had closed captioning on and he did use the wireless earphones. We watched the antiques road show together and an occasional movie. Otherwise our tastes were very different and we bought two TVs. He joked that he set the V chip to block HGTV on his set. There are so many times when I miss his company, but watching TV is not one of them.

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  11. I've worked with lots of individuals with hearing loss. Typically the sounds that are lost are high frequency voiceless consonants, such as the /t/, /k/, /f/, /th/, /sh/, and /s/ sounds. Words with those sounds may be harder to understand. The other sounds that come before and/or after those sounds impact how they're heard, or not heard. When speaking need to be in the same room, facing hearing impaired person. It is usual that the person seems to hear sometimes and other times does not. They can "not hear" deliberately, but ordinarily that's not what is happening at all. This is just some of the information available for communicating with someone with hearing loss. Check out some web sites on communicating with individuals with hearing loss.

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