I live on a major Auckland street, on a section between two other major streets, and the roar of trucks bothers me at night and then wakes me back up at around 6am. I already wear silicon earplugs but these trucks are very big and very close and very frequent. So I was thinking of buying a noise cancellation device like the Marpac but then jumped online last night and found this great site called Simply Noise that streams various sounds for free, and lets you download an hour of them for as little as a buck.

I’ve now got files of waterfalls, thunderstorms, ocean waves and brown noise. You’ve probably heard of white noise before, but did you know there was brown and pink as well? Apparently the white contains all frequencies, the pink has high and low, and the brown is made of the lower frequencies, generating “an ancient rumble”. Now I can play the burbling brook on my iTunes and stream the Brown at the same time to create a soothing sound block! Next I’d like to get some of these sleep headphones.

Ultimately, however, it will be lovely to live somewhere quiet where the only sound is of a real babbling brook, or crashing ocean. Even the chirruping birds of suburbia will be an improvement on the roar of a city highway!