Warning: May Cause Hearing Damage...

About a year-and-a-half ago, I got sick of cheap-ass ear-buds breaking down on me every six months and splurged on a pair of Shure SE110 noise-blocking in-canal earphones. These things are awesome. The foam around ear-bud helps to seal my ear when the earphones are in (think foam ear-plugs), so I can listen to my music at a reasonable volume without worrying about having to block out all the ambient sound around me. The foam doesn't block out everything, but I estimate, even when I have the ear-buds in with no music on, about fifty- to sixty-percent of the surrounding sound is cut out.

I listen to music while I walk. On my work commute, I have my music on from the time I leave the apartment until I sit down on the bus. While on the bus, I turn my music off because I read. But I leave the earphones in, because I like the noise reduction. hile they don't cut down on all noise, my ear-buds mean I don't have to hear all those whispered conversations about the neighbour's dog. Or the music of that idiot halfway down the bus who has his volume up so damn high, through his own earphones, that he can't help but share whispers of death metal, or thumping bass, with everybody within ten feet of him.

My Shure ear-buds cut all that crap out.

At least, they did until today.

The guy five seats down from me has his music on so high that I thought the seal on my ear-buds were faulty. Nope. Then I looked around because I thought somebody had a boom-box going. Nope. Everybody has earphones in. Seriously, how deaf do you have to be to need the volume up *that* high using bloody earphones?

Finally, after ten minutes, and everybody else with earphones getting off the bus, I've pinpointed who exactly is listening to the really, really loud new-age opera. I think it's actually Yanni. And it's giving me a facial tick.

Jackass.

I can't just go up to him and slap him. I guess I'll just have to turn on my own music for the rest of my trip, or until he gets off the bus.

Jesus. I can still hear his damn bass. Even through Guns N' Roses' "Welcome to the Jungle".

(Oh thank God. He got off the bus.)