I don't have a "sleep problem" myself, but my other family members do. There are no laws regarding curfew in our locality, so many of my neighbors sing loudly to no end, sometimes until 1:00 in the morning. I don't have a problem with that but my mother and my grandmother does and my brother gets annoyed too. So I can solve the sleep problem in two ways: (1) get my neighbors to stop singing loudly, or (2) do something so that my family members can fall asleep even in the midst of singing. I do favor approach #1, although approach #2 is worth considering too and opens up plenty of leeway for creativity.

1. A Crash Course in Creativity
Challenging Assumptions: 100 Solutions
I don't have a "sleep problem" myself, but my other family members do. There are no laws regarding
curfew in our locality, so many of my neighbors sing loudly to no end, sometimes until 1:00 in the
morning. I don't have a problem with that but my mother and my grandmother does and my brother
gets annoyed too.
So I can solve the sleep problem in two ways: (1) get my neighbors to stop singing loudly, or (2) do
something so that my family members can fall asleep even in the midst of singing. I do favor approach
#1, although approach #2 is worth considering too and opens up plenty of leeway for creativity.
Possible solutions:
1. Report the situation to the local police who will then take care of the errant singers.
2. Go out and tell the neighbors not to sing at night.
3. Go out, along with other neighbors who are annoyed at the singing, and tell the neighbors not to sing
at night.
4. Place a signboard at the gate which says: "Sing At Your Own Risk!"
5. Place a signboard at the gate which says: "Singing At Night Is Dangerous For Your Health!" They may
not take the idea seriously, but that may help them become more considerate.
6. Blast lullaby music outside your house at 9 PM. Hopefully, everyone will fall asleep by then.
7. Get rid of, or destroy, the table where the singing neighbors usually talk, so they'll be forced to talk
(and sing) inside a house.
8. Try to convince neighbors that singing at day is more enjoyable than singing at night.
9. Gently tell neighbors to sing inside their houses and lock the doors. All noise will stay confined in their
homes. If they can't sleep because of that, they ought not drag someone else with their fates.
10. Ridicule the neighbors' singing abilities, except when they're drunk. Hopefully, the ridicule can help
them convince themselves that singing isn't for them.
11. Play a boring soccer game in the neighborhood. Everyone, including the singers, should sleep in a
short while.
12. Just fire the soccer ball to the singers! Then claim that it was by accident, but that should traumatize
them a bit. ("That's what you get by singing - bad karma!"

2. 13. Sing louder than them so they'll surrender. Even if no one falls asleep, your family will admire you for
fighting back.
14. Conduct a game for the neighbors' children to play at night, so the neighbors will think of the
children more than they can think about singing.
15. I've noticed that the singers' merriment are due to drunkenness . Tell the barangay chairman (in the
Philippines, the leader of a government division consisting of 50-100 homes) to ban drinking beer
outside homes so the singing will be confined inside the neighbors' homes.
16. There's a superstition in the Philippines: Bad singers cause raining. Tell the neighbors that floods
happen frequently in our city because of bad singing.
17. Publish a 500-word letter to the editor (to a local tabloid, which everyone is likely to read) regarding
the effects of singing at night. They'll pick it up and the neighbors themselves will condemn anyone
among them who sings.
18. Just say "Shhhhhhhhhhhhh!" in a calm manner to the singer when he or she sings. That may do it.
19. From the balcony, get a pail of water and throw it in the road while someone is singing. Do that
everytime someone sings. The rest should pick that up,
20. Prove to them: Alcoholic beverages cause them to sing excessively; alcoholic beverages are bad for
their health, so singing is bad for their health. Talk about dumb logic!
21. Remind the singers that their children won't be able to sleep well because of excessive singing.
22. Create a community petition based on #21.
23. Remind the singers that their children may fail in school if they keep singing, which can distract
children from studies and deprive them of sleeping time.
24. Tell the neighbors something about Fliptop videos, currently enjoyable in the Philippines:
https://www.youtube.com/user/fliptopbattles. They may begin watching the excellent videos in their
homes instead of singing, which they're bad at.
25. Tell them to take voice lessons so that whenever they sing, we're getting more than the chagrin
we're earning for not sleeping. (And many of them may even quit becoming bums.)
26. Organize voice lessons in the neighborhood. Maybe the children who learn from these voice lessons
will begin criticizing those who sing badly.
27. Propose as a rule that no one be allowed to sing outside their homes after 10 PM. So they'll get
drunk at 9 PM and then they'll get railroaded into their homes when time's up.
28. Tell the bum neighbors to sing in the afternoons instead and play Bingo games at night (as they play
Bingo games in the afternoons and sing at night). After all, bad shaking of the bingo chips container is
more bearable than bad singing.

3. 29. Give neighbors a reward for singing, do so a few times, then withdraw the reward suddenly. That
ought to be a good way to suddenly sap off their interest in singing.
30. Punch the neighbors while they're singing (if they're drunk). Then run. Chances are they won't be
able to catch you and they'll forget all about it afterwards, but make sure there are no witnesses.
31. Destroy the microphone, radio, or videoke machine that they often use.
32. Play a street soccer game with the kids while the neighbors are singing and the radio or videoke
machine is in use, or organize one such game Just hope that any of the kids kick the ball to the radio or
videoke machine, which will get smashed.
33. Same as #32; only this time the game's basketball.
34. Buy the neighbors' videoke machine and charge others to sing. At least you have control over when
someone sings.
35. Tell some children out there that the videoke machine is an arcade machine, and let them tinker the
buttons. They should do some short work of the machine.
36. Encourage the drinking of more alcoholic beverages so that the neighbors will become more drunk,
which will leave them too intoxicated to sing.
37. Do #36, but with other people nearby. So neighbors who attempt to sing while too intoxicatedly
drunk will get ridiculed. Perhaps a fight may ensue, but that's surely more entertaining than the usual
average run-on-the-mill singing.
38. Encourage the children of the errant singers to sing more instead of their parents. Their voices are
tolerable.
39. Do unpleasant stuff while the nrighbors are singing, such as declaiming poems from E.E. Cummings
or repeating a news report again and again. (Then when someone asks you why, tell them it's for school
and for the good of their children.) They may stop singing because of the association with stuff they find
unpleasant.
40. Plan a quiet nighttime activity that your neighbors will find interesting, so you'll be doing community
service as well as making the neighbors take time off from the bad singing.
41. Laugh in front of your neighbors everytime they sing. (But you run the risk of being hurt, especially
when they're drunk.)
42. Tell the children to do #41. At least they run less risk of being hurt.
43. Do #41, but try to influence some of your good-natured neighbors and their children to do it too.
Then you won't have to do it after you have ingrained the habit in them.

4. 44. A good reason why there's no incentive for children in our neighborhood to fall asleep early is
because they keep playing computer games at the nearby Internet cafe. What if no internet cafes are
open to children at 10 PM, except for urgent schoolwork that requires printing. That way children will
have to sleep early and will complain because of bad singing.
45. Promote the virtues of sleeping early among the neighborhood children. Perhaps the children will
tell that to their parents, so instead of singing, the parents will sleep early too.
46. To operate a videoke machine one must enter numbers corresponding to a particular song. Find the
clear books that contains the lists of songs (over 10000) and mess up with it in some way. That way no
one can operate the videoke machine.
47. Related to #46. Get hold of the videoke machine in some way and interchange the button
placement. After all, the buttons are easily detachable. Then when someone sees that they're playing
the wrong songs because of the faulty buttons, they may quit using the machine and may even quit the
bad singing altogether.
48. Agree with some progressive-thinking neighbors that everytime someone sings loudly at night, all of
you will rush to the errant person's doorstep and demand to stop the singing.
49. Play loud children's songs in front of your home at night. The neighbors will find it odd, but at least
they will find it shameful if they sing badly while you're playing children's songs.
50. Do as the neighbors do. Sing badly in front of your home. Once they condemn you, they'll feel like
they have condemned themselves.
51. Lock all doors and windows when the family begins to sleep.
52. Place shock-absorbent covering on the walls and doors of the house, so no matter how loud the
neighbors sing, the sound won't become intolerable.
53. #52, but only on the rooms of the house. (Less expense)
54. Before sleeping, place earphones to fully shield one's ears from the noise outside.
55. Tell your family to drink milk before sleeping, so that they'll be more relaxed, more likely to tolerate
noise, and more likely to sleep well (because of tryptophan).
56. Tell the family to place pillows on top of their heads while sleeping (but not atop their faces such
that they may suffocate).
57. Tell everyone to read a book before sleeping. When reading a book, (1) it is possible to bear the bad
singing at a stretch and (2) it is easier to sleep afterward.
58. Encourage the drinking of sleeping pills. (Heck, this is a solution that I wouldn't recommend at all.
The long-term repercussions are just too unpredictable.)

5. 59. Have everyone exercise for 30 minutes at night so they'll become sleepy at night and physically fit
too.
60. Have everyone solve abstract reasoning puzzles before sleeping. Perhaps they'll get hooked and
they'll fall asleep more easily if they get tired of it.
61. Design a pillow that can cover one's ears when sleeping, and at the same time comfortable for one's
head when lying down.
62. Design earphones that can double up as a pillow.
63. Design a blanket that can double up as earphones (and can double up as a pillow too!).
64. Place a sound-proof barrier on one's bed that can be lifted up at will everytime someone outside
makes too much noise (and which can be let down quickly when not in use).
65. Make the sound-proof barrier double up as a blanket too.
66. Write a book before sleeping. It will be easier for you to fall asleep at some point. When not
sleeping, at least you're productive.
67. Sleep on another room which the noise will be less likely to reach.
68. Make a room inside a room and treat that as a "sound-proof" zone where anyone may not just sleep,
but also work with full concentration.
69. Design a sound-proof bed - a bed which reduces noise heard by anyone who lies down in it.
70. Bring a radio or a laptop and listen to music you like before sleeping, so that you won't have to bear
the bad music from outside.
71. Hug a pillow before sleeping (and while sleeping) so you can concentrate on the pillow instead of the
noise. The pillow may even black out some of the bad music.
72. Remove all sound-reflecting objects inside the rooms where the people sleep.
73. Design clothing that incorporate noise-blocking headphones that don't come off when you are lying
down.
74. Do #73, but put pillow and music-playing capabilities as well.
75. Get a night-shift job that enables you to sleep at daytime. (This is a bad solution, though, when the
only problem is dealing with bad music noise.)
76. Create a support group for people bothered by bad videoke music, not only when it makes it difficult
for them to sleep, but in general.
77. Do #76, but in the form of an online forum.

6. 78. Have meetings with family members about ridiculing the bad singers outside.
79. After doing #78, try to make comic strips out of them.
80. Do #79, but try to have the comic strips published online or in actual print.
81. Spread the word about bad distracting karaoke singers online, preferably in a Filipino forum. Perhaps
that should bring greater publicity to the problem.
82. Encourage singing at night among the neighborhood, especially when drunk. Then one of these days
the singers will fight (there are cases in which singers have been killed because of bad singing of the
song "My Way")
83. Call the schools where the neighbors' children study, so that the teachers will be alerted of a
possible distraction in the neighborhood that can cut down on study time and sleeping time. They can
proceed to tell the students not to tolerate bad singing at night.
84. Report the problem of bad singing to a public affairs radio or TV show.
85. Petition for a barangay-wide ban on private videoke sets and a ban on the use of any videoke set (on
a restaurant or anywhere) after 9 PM.
86. Elect as barangay chairman or barangay board member someone who promises to eradicate the
problem of bad singing that distracts people from sleeping. And make sure that he or she sticks true to
any promise made on that matter.
87. Criticize any barangay chairman or barangay board member who won't deal with the problem of bad
singing in public.
88. Post a "Bad Videoke Singer" poster on the home of anyone who sings badly and distrubs sleeping
people with that.
89. Do as they do. Sing a nonsense song while they're sleeping, so that you'll be even.
90. Put the community videoke set in a place where no one will be distracted should anyone sing in
public.
91. Put a glass barrier (as large as a telephone booth) on the community videoke set so that anyone who
sings badly can keep the bad singing to himself or herself.
92. Remind neighbors that the failing grades that the children receive in Music may be due to their bad
influence.
93. Encourage the playing of board games at night; the kids may get hooked and may invite the parents
to play along.
94. Do #93, but expand it into a neighborhood club.

7. 95. Everytime someone outside attempts to sing, shout at them not to sing. That is often enough and
may very well deter future instances of bad singing.
96. Everytime someone outside attempts to sing, throw a stone at the roof of his or her house. That is
often enough and may very well deter future instances of bad singing, with the added advantage of
stealthiness.
97. Ask the neighbors up front if bad singing or disturbing others is the legacy they want to leave to their
children.
98. Buy a dog who will bark incessantly everytime someone sings loud enough to distract people who
are already asleep.
99. Buy a chicken instead.
100. Or just sleep well at night, with knowing that you don't have the same personal problems that they
have.