I was just about to go to bed. So was Stephanie – she was a step ahead of me, already checking her email which she tends to do before bed (as well as a round or two of solitaire). Then I heard the music again. See, a couple nights recently I’ve gone to bed and heard fairly loud music. Sounded like a house party or something, somewhere down the block. But any time I’ve heard it, I’ve already been upstairs and ready for bed, and didn’t feel like putting on shoes and such to go track it down (and subsequently call the local authorities and ask if they can either put a stop to it, or at least ask them to turn the knobs somewhere off of ’11’). But this time, I wasn’t upstairs yet. So I went exploring.
First step was that I went outside and had a smoke, and walked up the block a bit. Actually, I walked all the way to the end of the block. I thought the sound might have been coming from someplace nearby, but as I got to the end of the block I realized that it was farther away than it sounded from the house. So I went back and asked Stephanie if she felt like going for a ride. She did, and we left. Headed out in her truck, cranked up the heat (it’s a bit chilly tonight) and rolled down the windows. And we headed off in the direction of the music. I got sidetracked at one point, thinking it was coming from a different direction than it really was, but worked closer to the river. And as we stopped at a traffic light, we thought it was coming from the right and turned that way. But no, still nothing nearby – and as loud as this was, we’d have known if we pulled up in front of the place. So we went basically around the block, and back at that intersection. Of course this is the second time the light turned green as we got there, so I couldn’t get a bearing on the sounds – the few times I’ve done some radio direction finding work in a vehicle paid off this evening, let me tell you :> So this time I went straight through the intersection, and saw a local police officer turn around and head the same direction I was going. “Great,” I said, “I’ll just follow him and hope he’s going to the same party.” Well, we went under Route 1, and then under the train tracks, when I just about slammed on the brakes and pointed to the left. “THAT’S where it’s coming from,” I said as I pointed to the building with all the lights, and sure enough all the music coming from it. One problem.
It’s Katmandu, which is across the river in Trenton. The sound we’re hearing, clear as if it was a house party half a block down, is a mile away or so and on the other side of the Delaware river. Surely out of the jurisdiction of the local authorities, and either way it’s a nightclub and restaurant that is licensed for that kind of entertainment.
So I guess the only thing I can hope for is that they don’t have parties until *all hours* of the night, because like it or not we’re going to hear them sometimes when they turn up the amplifiers. Oh well.. guess it could be much worse – it *could* have been house parties, complete with local drunks and hooligans. Or worse yet, all of that but hosted by the chief of police.