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They (whoever they are) say it takes more muscles to frown than it does to smile. So why the heck are we all salty all the time? Technically, false, it takes more muscles to smile than to frown—12 versus 11—but the difference is so minimal, the question still stands—why are we all so salty all the time?!

Why do people insist on using elaborate hand gestures in response to a kind request to take a high-decibel, long-term telecommunications procedure to a locale where it will not deprive anyone of sleep, furthering their spinal pain? Why all the salt all of a sudden? Odd, but it happens.

More Info: Reddit

Everyone deserves some good ol’ high-quality sleep. Not everyone however, respects that and then has to face the consequences

Image credits: Stephen Bowler (not the actual photo)

A Redditor recently talked about how they had to whip out an air compressor to out-loud a guy on the phone outside just to get some rest

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Image credits: gopherpunch

The air compressor, by the way, proved very effective as the ultra-decibel conversationist hit the road and continued their phone call elsewhere

Image credits: idleman (not the actual photo)

A Redditor by the awesome nickname of u/gopherpunch recently shared their frustration mixed with petty revenge on the appropriately named r/pettyrevenge subreddit.

The story goes that OP threw out his back. In turn, he got some muscle relaxants prescribed and rest at home came naturally. What didn’t come naturally was the loud booming voice coming in from beyond the window.

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Apparently, some guy was acting like an NPC with a broken chain of programming outside and couldn’t finish a call for what ended up being 30 or so minutes. He also couldn’t stop talking loudly. There simply was no /kill command for this action.

So, OP, in his medicated stupor, tried to draw the guy’s attention and get him to stop without having to move as it hurt to do so. Two attempts later, there were reactions, but none that would lead to a satisfactory result. Third time’s the charm, right? No. OP stood up for this one, and, while peeking out the apartment, grumpily, but kindly asked the man to move elsewhere. Anywhere! Just not here.

The man, however, chose violence and flipped OP off, saying it’s a public place. All right, probably not the reaction he expected, but one he could definitely react to. And since it’s a public place, then they both can be loud to their heart’s content. So, OP made the effort to go and grab his air compressor and set it to stun- sorry, set it to full blast.

The result was that the man was being loud, but got out-louded by the contraption and had to relocate soon after. Victory, indeed.

Image credits: laineema (not the actual compressor)

Folks online approved. Besides the praise, some wondered why people even choose to go down a path of I don’t give a hoot. And one commenter gave a spot-on explanation: the polite, civilized ones are never the loud ones in the first place. It’s the entitled, inconsiderate ones who cause a ruckus, which only fuels their barbaric ways when they are told the world does not revolve around them.

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Others related to the story, as apparently back injuries are more common than one might think. One guy explained that they use an air horn with a vuvuzela (“a mind-numbing torture device made of cheap, brightly colored plastic,” according to the Urban Dictionary) on the end. Another commenter one-upped this and said to use an air horn with the vuvuzela and double* the scare factor (*mileage may vary).

And, in good Reddit fashion, others shared their stories of loud, obnoxious people, providing some nice solutions to the issues at hand. For instance, if you live above a store that disregards alcohol sale rules during nights and the police aren’t doing jack-you-know-what about it, why not disguise a Bluetooth speaker and blast something very taboo over it to scare off super drunk folk?

Image credits: William Krause (not the actual photo)

However, with all due respect to OP’s creative solution (and those of the commenters), there is more than one way to solve this issue.

In times of conflict, we gotta maintain our cool and stay civil. So, being considerate, communicating, and polite will go a long way. You can never know if someone can’t help it (e.g. they’re in the heat of the moment or maybe they just have a booming voice). On the other hand, they might also not help being entitled and rude. So caution is advised!

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But that’s not all. You can also minimize noise efficiency during sleep. You know, noise-canceling earbuds or even background noise machines are a good start. But you can also go wild around the house: thicker curtains, a rug, or even go crazy and buy those sound-absorbing tiles with the cool patterns they use in recording studios.

And if all else fails, embrace it. Our brain filters out a lot of junk throughout the day, and that applies to sleep too. Bored Panda reached out to Jimmy “That Sleep Guy” Dotson who explained that there’s this really cool thing called habituation that might help folks sleep better.

“Habituation is when the body learns to ignore non-threatening stimuli. From my experiences, its based on the individual on how ‘immune’ you can get to sleeping in a noisy environment. I like to think the military sleep technique can really help build up that ‘immunity’ to loud noises, but the the technical term is ‘habituation’. Military in the warzone have to get some sleep too.”

Jimmy also noted that, while self-medicating into sleep is the easy way out, it should only be a temporary solution. He argues that the body can get heavily dependent on external sources to help produce melatonin. In turn, it will make it hard for the body to produce it naturally.

“The military sleep technique is an all-natural way of getting to sleep in loud environments. I use it in strange hotels and even round noisy kids!” added Jimmy. Be sure to check out more from Jimmy on his website where he talks about all things sleep, how to optimize and make the best of it, and also has reviews of products that could help get the job done.

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So, what are your thoughts on any of this? Leave a comment in the comment section below, explaining what you would have done (yes, you can one-up the vuvuzela tactic) in OP’s case!

Folks online loved the story, giving it 3,600 upvotes and sharing their own stories and ideas for keeping loud folks at bay