Quest for Quiet, Revisited
I received my custom earplugs from Westone in the mail last week and gave them a few nights of testing before commenting.
The good news: They are much easier to insert than foam plugs and less noticeable when sitting and moving around upright. They’re made from a translucent white silicone that looks pleasant enough — I find “flesh-colored” plastic kinda disgusting, don’t you? — and come in a hard carrying container. The bad news: They’re not squishy when you’re resting your head on a pillow, so the pressure of the silicone against your ear canal can be uncomfortable, especially if you have a toss-and-turn night like I did last night. In particular, the left earplug has been hurting me. The plugs come with a 90-day readjustment period, however, so on Wednesday I’m going to visit the audiologist who ordered them for me and have her take a look. I could probably fix the problem myself by taking a little razor-scraping off the plug’s end, but I might as well let the pros do it. The real question is, can I get them adjusted before leaving for Australia at the end of the month? I was hoping to have them for the plane ride and hotels.
I’ve pretty much decided to return the Bose QuietComfort 2 headphones. They’re great audio headphones and they muffle continuous low-key noise pretty well, but they’re not the hi-tech solution to neighbor noise that I hoped they’d be, and I would rather spend my $302 on something else — like food and lodging in Australia, for example.
In the meantime, I’m thinking of setting up a little experiment to see if continuous white noise is a reasonable sleep solution when the earplugs bother me. Too bad my only fan is a Vornado … Whooooooosh! Look out! There goes the duvet!
drupagliassotti @ June 9, 2008