neighbours have installed the ACTUAL SUN on the side of their house?

[tigerlover1]

So the neighbours are having their house renovated, all very normal, lots of banging and sawing etc. Fine, I can cope. But today the builders installed what I can only describe as a star-level security light.

Previously they had a normal little motion sensor light — you know, the standard “pop out to the bins without tripping over the cat” level of brightness. NOW? Now it’s like they’ve strapped a NASA-grade solar flare to the wall. I swear my bedroom is lit up like I’m orbiting the sun closer than Mercury. If I open the curtains I half expect David Attenborough to narrate the birth of a new planet.

And the sensor?? Oh. My. God. It’s going off ALL night. Breeze? On. Moth flapping its wings three streets away? On. Me blinking too loudly? On.
I’m lying in bed feeling like I’m sleeping on the set of Interstellar.
WIBU to ring the builders tomorrow and politely ask if they can angle it down a bit or maybe ?

🤣😂🤣

You've made me laugh out loud which is no mean feat today thanks @tigerlover1

(As an aside... it always baffles me when someone writes an hilarious OP and people respond all po faced..)

Da heyll, boi

Does it really matter? Like it or not, AI is here to stay now. So we may as well use it.

I don't care if you used Elon Musk and Demis Hassabis chained to El Capitan to write your post @tigerlover1 - it was hilarious

And you're not being unreasonable.

Honestly OP speak to them and I’m sure they will sort it out straight away. This was us a few years ago . DH put up the outside Christmas lights and the woman across the road knocked two or three days later . The poor woman was mortified but she said her bedroom had lights from DHs display shining straight into it and it was like a disco. Obviously we sorted it asap

Some people can actually write, you know? Just because many, many people are lobotomised these days does not mean there aren't still some genuinely smart people around.

It's a shocker I know.

Yes ! I don’t even know you @tigerlover1 but you are brilliant ! It’s very peep show style I love it please also narrate my life !

Definitely point it out to them first and ask them to change the bulb and the angle.
If they don't, perhaps a nice mirror would do the trick.

Off to google em dashes and en dashes.

I find the prevalence of AI really irritating, precisely because it means that my one talent - and I don't have many to start with - is now routinely dismissed. A lot of the key factors of AI, particularly in terms of vocabulary and punctuation, just so happen to be key components of my natural writing style. As a child of early social media I also got used to utilising bold and italics a lot as they were ways of adding nuance and meaning to a fairly limited form.

So now I can't bloody write an email for work or a social media post without some utter arsehole coming along and accusing me of using AI. Like, no, I'm just good at writing. Don't take that away from me - it's literally all I've got!

I feel your pain, OP. On every level.

I write like this, never used AI. Some people just enjoy writing and using expressive language!

Not saying that the op did or didn’t use AI but I asked Chatgtp to create a light hearted post about a neighbour’s security light shining in my room and this is what I got.

Hi all,
I’m hoping for a bit of advice—or at least some sympathy—from anyone who’s ever tried to sleep while living next door to what I can only assume is an experimental NASA landing beacon.
My neighbour recently installed a security light. I’m using the term “security” loosely here, because I’m not sure what it’s securing other than my inability to ever sleep in darkness again. When it switches on, my entire bedroom lights up so brilliantly that I half expect to see crops growing on my duvet.
Honestly, the thing shines directly into my window with the intensity of a thousand suns. I’m starting to feel like I’m orbiting the thing. At this point, I think my circadian rhythm is synced not with daylight, but with my neighbour popping out to put the bins out at 11pm.
I’ve tried closing the curtains, but unless they’re made of lead, nothing seems to stop this celestial event from happening nightly. I’m one light burst away from being photosynthesised.
I don’t want to annoy the neighbour—we get on fine, and I’m sure they didn’t intend to recreate the surface of Mercury in my bedroom—but I also enjoy sleeping without sunglasses on.
Any suggestions on how to approach this politely? Bonus points if the solution doesn’t involve me rotating like a planet to avoid direct exposure.
Thanks in advance, from your local, sleep-deprived satellite. 🚀✨

My two immediate neighbours - one attached one just next door both have what I think of as excessive security lights - one side lights my bathroom so no switching on of lights is necessary at all for night visits - it is motion sensitive but as OP says a gnat breathes and the entire neighbourhood is floodlit for nepharious activity. The other side doesn't direct into my house but lights up the whole neighbourhood for around 200 yards - so I can see across out lane over the fence to the other side of the road and down a cul de sac. I like that we have no street lights immediately, I like seeing the starry night but if I want to see it I have to position myself and not move for 15 minutes so the neighbours lights don't come on - none of them venture anywhere beyond 9pm as elderly as well so even more infuriating. They are not the only neighbours like this. The one at the back has two quite close together and my MIL infamously asked if that was the trains in our station coming in (which incidentally is the other way lol) and another who is around 10 houses down the road was robbed in broad daylight, felt the need to install a light that beams out so strongly it lights up another of our bedrooms and can't be looked at directly.

Hmmm.

Red, rests her head gracefully on her chin, whilst staring in a baffled manner worthy of a catalgue pose as she her life choices and ponders whether she's been mistaken for AI on MN - since 2009.

My NDN had a WW2 searchlight on his effin barn. It's like a giant light sabre right in your eyes all night and it comes on if a squirrel farts.

Sickening.

This happened to me. I spoke to the neighbour, it was a block of flats and I guess they spoke to someone because it got dimmed. It was a bright green light coming right into my house.

Definitely complain. It's considered "light trespass" and your local council will investigate and act because it is affecting your sleep and your quiet enjoyment of your property. Our NDN installed similar – but not quite as bright – and when we cited light trespass they made sure they were turned off after a certain time at night and the motion sensor is off all the time.

Why on earth are you putting up with it?

My neighbour did this it seemed to illuminate my kitchen instead of their garden. They live across the street and aren’t directly opposite. They seemed to realise and adjusted it pretty quickly. Definitely tell them op.

Most councils have light pollution rules and that is definitely in breach. Our county has 'dark skies' rules which state the maximum lumens and the angle.

Basic rule is they must not cause a statutory nuisance through glare or light trespass. If you are in a conservation area the rules will be more exacting.

I'd look up the rules on your council Web site, and then go and have a word. If they won't remove it, report them.

I sympathise OP.

Also, please consider writing prose. I loved reading your OP 😂

Brilliant! 😅 We have similar, no need to put on a light when the neighbours behind have forgotten to turn off their ‘preventing prisoners escaping the high security facility’ style spotlight! Fortunately, it shines into the bathroom, not the bedroom, although we have blackout blinds and shutters in the bedroom.

I do feel very sorry for the local pipistrelle population, it must be very disorienting.

I had this problem with a neighbour who backs onto my back garden too.
Any passing cat, fox, etc would set the bright light off.
I ended up getting black-out curtains.

We had some neighbours who had a very bright security light that went on and off like a bloody lighthouse all night. Eventually I told them and it turned out to be a faulty sensor. They were completely unaware that it was happening.

You need to go all David Thorne on them:

https://27bslash6.com/halogen.html