Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/05/28/start-your-monday-with-this-en.html
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You’re sure it’s no Fat Bastard on a tuba? Two blasts, must be wildlings!
(Beautiful machinery.)
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We live by the harbor now and at night
the ships often blow their foghorns.
She’s a light sleeper.
She will leap up, sitting straight up in bed.
“Damn!” “What is it, what is it?”
“I thought you farted.”
“Not that time dear.”
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- Excerpt from .”Competition”, Charles Bukowski
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I want one of those on my Mini.
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I worry we humans don’t remember how to build things like that.
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If humans can’t work out how to build something like that, then we have bigger things to worry about than not being able to build it.
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That’s some great movie making.
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Reminds me of a rather clever short film from a few years ago. (Slightly difficult tracking this one down; seems its Oscar nomination was rescinded.)
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The maintenance tweaks of the works is reminding me of MYST (like if you can get the foghorn to sound, you can get to the next age).
Also, does it play “Caledonia” on the quarter hour?
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back in the eighties channel four showed an episode of equinox and this item was about the latest early warning system (I recorded for posterity) but have since lost the whereabouts
wonder what futility closet would say
Wonderful machinery, but his made me realize I haven’t heard a steady foghorn in ages, only ships sounding when they come through the channel. 
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Could easily be a setting for the next Wes Anderson flick.
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That would be my point.
My favourite tuba/foghorn confusion is Malcolm Arnold’s “Padstow Lifeboat March”:
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it’s not necessarily the build but just maintenance makes up for a lot
Perfect solution to protect pedestrians from quiet EVs.
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Where I am, the fog horns sound and each one has a particular sound or sounding sequence. It’s weird to be in full sun and know where the in-shore marine fog is. Given the right conditions, it’s possible to hear them well inland.
There used to be a few buoys with bells well outside the harbor. I haven’t heard them in years, and I do miss them. Along with the lights on buoys, one of which, I think, changes it blink rate based on sea state, the old systems are being replaced by new silent ones.
There are some sounds now. I’m not too far away from one of the fire alert klaxons, and the tsunami alert klaxons are tested infrequently. (As a side note, I also think that the water won’t stop at the freeway. Geologists and anthropologists have stated that water made it up several of the canyons, and that would be more than the thin strip that they say is in the tsunami alert zone. But I digress…) The worst sound, and I don’t know why it grates on me, are the infrequent visits by cruise ships that seem to need to sounding off when they arrive or randomly, because why?
The thing is that there are no good recordings of those soundscapes, the combined biophony and androphony. Your post reminds me that one of these foggy or overcast nights I should get out and make some recordings. Preferably without a cruise ship horn in the background.
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When I think of Doctor Who and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop I can bring many sounds to mind. The fog horn from one of my favorite Tom Baker Dr. Who episodes is the Horror Of Fang Rock, where one of driving forces separating people on the isolated island light house is the need to keep the lighthouse light running and the fog horn blaring. This requires one person at the base and one at the top.
Trailer sans horn
Below is a link to Archive Dot Org with the sound.
Horror Of Fang Rock, BBC Radiophonic Workshop Fog Horn Sound Should automagicly jump to 259 seconds (4 min 19 seconds) into the video, other wise skip to ≈ 4:19 to hear the horn.
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Obligatory Scotland meme…
