I really do appreciate all of the helpful comments. The noises continue every morning. The odd thing is that even though these neighbors are retired and are home all day, they only make significant noise early in the morning, between 6 and 8. What I've wondered is why they can't do whatever it is they're doing in their home office any other time of the day. I was hoping they would get that idea when I wrote the times that we usually leave the house in the morning. If she denies that they make any noise in there, when I can clearly hear them, then it seems clear that they are not willing to be helpful, and have returned to their activities with gusto.
Here's the thing you have to understand though - if you aren't willing to change your habits (go to bed earlier/wake up earlier) why do you think they should? Its unreasonable to ask they change their habits to suit your needs when you could just as easily change your habits to suit your needs.
The thing with noise is it travels strangely. I live in an apartment. When I moved in the lady downstairs from me started complaining about the excessive noise I made. The terrible bangs and crashes and other sounds. At first I tried to accommodate her and change my ways. But the complaints kept coming. She called management one day over the "jumping" going on in my apartment that day. I had been at work all day. The only one home was my at the time 13 year old, 9lb, arthritic cat who by that age wouldn't jump off anything higher then the arm of the sofa. Then the next month she called management again to complain about noise at night. I came home for 4 days in Europe to that message. Clearly whatever she was hearing was either not from my apartment or was amplified in ridiculous ways. The final straw was when she called me up one Sunday afternoon and gave me the most vile telling off I have ever heard in my whole life over me vacuuming. Vacuuming. At about 2 or 3 pm. Oh the nasty, awful, cruel, verbally abusive things she said over my noise making.
I never once cared a hoot about trying to be quiet after that. Even if the noises were originating from my apartment these were normal life sounds, that were somehow changing as they traveled through the walls and floor.
I now have a neighbor to my side, new as of a few months ago. I hear strange banging, thuds often. Sometimes wall shaking thuds. Very odd sounds indeed with no rhyme or reason or rhythm. But I'm also on my co-op board and the president lives below these people and she has never complained about the noises (and trust me, she would). So whatever they are, the sound isn't traveling down, only over. So I chalk it up to apartment life and do my best to ignore it.
And that's what you need to just do. Just go on with your life. Ignore your neighbor's noise. And ignore their crabbiness. If you want to ignore them totally you can do that, if you want to ignore there was an issue and just smile and wave and wish them a nice day, you can do that too. Do whatever works best for you, as clearly that's what they are doing (whatever works best for them). Don't grant them power over your life, but also don't expect to wield power over theirs.
