The apartment echo-amplification effect

[eveglass]

Over the last few days, as I've kept the windows open to generate air flow, I've noticed something peculiar about my apartment. For some reason, the acoustics in my bedroom (and, to a lesser extent, the rest of the apartment) are such that things happening on the street sometimes sound like they're happening in my bedroom. The sound bounces off the wall or something, so that even though the window's to my right, the conversation sounds like it's coming from the left side of my bedroom. Sometimes I'll be in the kitchen and swear I can hear someone in the living room.

It is extremely disconcerting.

I'm slowly getting used to it, but the first time it happened, when I was dozing off to sleep and all of a sudden there were people in my apartment... well, let's just say I was no longer dozing for a while.

Oh, the things we learn to live with...