(Leaf?) Blowers

I can understand why it’s necessary to use a leaf blower to clean sidewalks off after mowing.  It’s irritating, and who ever cared about a few hundred tiny pieces of cut grass, but whatever. 

What I don’t understand is why the landscaping company that handles the grass at my apartment complex felt it necessary yesterday to use those damn noisemakers twice.  The first time was around 9:15, just after they finish edging (ya know, weedwhackers?). That’s cool, I’d just gotten out of the shower and was about to go to bed.  That lasted for a while, and I settled down to fall asleep.  Then the mowers start in, and that keeps me up.  OK, now it’s 10:30 and I really want to fall asleep.  Mowers finally turn off, great.  And then the leaf blowers start up again?  Couldn’t they have saved themselves 30 minutes (or more) of work by waiting to get rid of the clippings until the very end?  Don’t even get me started on the fact that there’s not really any grass within 20 or 30 feet of my bedroom window, but they apparently still felt it necessary to blow gravel around or something, right outside of said window.  As it was, I didn’t really manage to get to sleep until well after noon (mild insomnia, plus all the noise, plus the fact that I didn’t fall asleep fast enough so I got hungry again, etc etc etc).  OK, so it was actually some time between 2:30 and 3 before the glorious attack of the Z’s.  I got about 8 hours of sleep (more or less), but now my body clock is going to be fucked up for the rest of the week.

Thanks, landscaping guys.  You really brightened my life.  Can we do this again next Tuesday, when I’ll get maybe 6 hours of sleep (if I’m lucky) before my weekly conference call at 3 (which is also always on Tuesday)?  I mean, I managed to get out of it this week, but it makes me look bad if I miss it too often…