On Aug 15, 7:15*pm, "Fred" wrote:
Let me start off by saying that I understand, I appreciate, and I know that
kids make noise. They are _designed_ to make noise and they do. I'm sure I
did when I was a kid.

Get real! Kids come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and
personalities. Some of them are noisy and others are quiet. Even
within the same family. I've got nine -- and I'm sure the youngest
three make ten times as much noise as the oldest six!

The difference then though, was that when we made
noise, we played out. We had a derelict piece of land where a factory had
been demolished which made do as our football pitch, our cricket pitch and
many other things. Or we used to play on the parks, in the woods or even
down at the river.

What we did not do was to create interminable noise in our own back
yards/gardens.

But you belong to a totally-different generation and grew up in a
radically-different social environment. There's no particular reason
why what you did should be normative for today's kids.

There's a family live over the back - and four houses down - from me who
have four kids of their own and who often have kids friends around as well.
At the merest hint of dry weather all the kids play out in the back garden,
creating so much noise that at least 10 houses around their epicentre cannot
use their own gardens. We've just had our first dry, sunny day for weeks but
could we get the chairs out in the garden and enjoy it? Could we hell.

About 500yds from here, round the back of the newsagents is a wood, complete
with a stream. They should be spending hours down there, exploring, climbing
trees, building dens, whatever.

Rant over *;-)

Why don't you actually get to know the kids concerned? They're human
beings, after all!