merkelga, thanks for your comments! How amazing that four years after this original post, you in Western NY, and I in Minnesota, heard that same previously unheard owl sound within days of each other! Those original posts were the same time of the year, though... It must be THE time of the year that babies become a bit more independent, yet still call for their mother (and father?) The Cornell Bird site has a live camera on some Barn owls, which I was watching earlier this month. Right now only one owl is in the nesting box, but there were more before. http://cams.allaboutbirds.org/channel/42/Barn_Owls/#_ga=1.204917079.6720657.1436669248 I'm glad you've been able to see your owls there, even two together! I haven't heard or seen the ones here since a few days after my post. But to me, that's the fun and exciting thing about observing God's creation: you never know what you'll see, and when, and where, so it's a bit of a mystery and a pleasant surprise! Happy Summer :)

well, the sssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhh noise is when it exits defrost mode and goes back to regular heating cycle. Sometimes it can be louder than others when coming out of a long defrost. If it doesn't always do that I wouldn't worry about that.

When I first moved in here, there was a loud noise that woke me up several times at night. Turns out, it was the defrost cycle of my fridge, which is very loud. I guess I'm used to it now, because I hardly ever hear it anymore. I used to live in an apartment by a train track where a train went through at 3 a.m. every morning and blew the whistle. The train yard and switching station was about a half-mile down the road. I never even heard it after awhile. It used to scare other people that came to visit. They'd say "What's that noise?" and I'd say "What noise? Oh, that's the trains."

I wanted to provide an update to close the thread. I had the washer exchanged with the same model. The replacement doesn't make any noises at all. The 'load sensing' also takes longer than the previous one with the defect and the drum spins during sensing (old one didn't really sense and turn at all). The defective unit would start sensing, make that weird buzzing/humming noise (which started getting worse compared to the recording) - and then go to washing immediately. Sensing would last a couple of seconds. The new unit senses for much longer and actually turns the drum during sensing. The old one didn't and I though that was normal (never had a front loader). I guess it makes sense in retrospect. This should help the next person that has a similar problem.