Top 10 Sounds of Los Angeles

1. The mid-night howl: Once in awhile all the dogs in the neighborhood decide to have a little chat in the middle of the night. Summer, the beautiful coyote-like Australian/German shepherd with whom I live, often participates.
2. The cat’s meow: We had one hanging around this house wanting someone to adopt it. Someone came by to take it though saying “we’re taking a bunch to get fixed if you want us to take it.” I haven’t seen it since then. But it is probably one of the five I saw hanging out across the street the other day taking turns running half way up a tree, clinging for dear life before falling back down and letting the next in line take their turn.
3. Cockadoodledoo: folks next door have a rooster that is audible usually in the mornings.
4. Rock'n'Roll: The house next to us, the non rooster house, has the garage band. They seem to have quite a repertoire—who knew you could do so much with an electric guitar and drums?
5. Ice cream trucks: At least two or three different ones every night during the week. Weekends they seem to lighten up.
6. Helicopters: They are low and loud and shine lights into your windows looking to find the “bad guys” or something. My co-worker refers to them as the Ghetto-copter. http://www3.merriam-webster.com/opendictionary/newword_display_alpha.php?letter=Gh) .
7. Seventh Grade Monologues: I am privy to any number of conversations between mother and daughters seeing as we do live in kind of close quarters. But my favorite ramblings come from one of the daughters who is in seventh grade. She has some of the best monologues announced to no one in particular. My favorite line I heard her loudly proclaim just today was “When I die I want my corpse put in death valley!”
8. Football: New as of last week, I hear loud and clear the announcer at the Coliseum- the USC football venue. They were playing Washington State. I also heard the band interjecting their spirited diddies in between the roaring crowds. While LA does not have a city team, most people ally with USC or UCLA. I hear that most are USC fans unless they attended UCLA. Me? No preference, I just know that the Coliseum parking lots are among the largest open spaces in this area and so when you drive by during the week it is spotted with locals doing laps, trying to get some physical activity in.
9. Sonic boom: this is not a common occurrence. But I can’t lie—I thought it was a little over the top when I heard it. I was on the porch talking to my father on the phone and was already having trouble talking to him over the car alarms and helicopters.

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10. Silence: surprisingly—while there are moments when multiple of the above make me daydream of living in a forest cabin-just me and the trees- there are moments like the present that are silent. And I wonder—how can I live in the middle of Los Angeles and not hear a sound?