We had the longest, most hilarious debate at work on Friday. It all started when I walked with Sarah to the post office. There was one of those bells on the counter that said “ring for service,” and nobody up front, so I did as instructed and rang it for service. This caused Sarah to freak out. When the postal employee came up front to help, she started apologizing profusely for my behavior, even making excuses for me (“Sorry about that…he likes to Ring bells”) that, quite frankly, made it sound like I am not all “there” in the head.

First off, I don’t “like to ring bells.” What I like to do is follow instructions, and when there is a bell on the counter with a sign saying to ring it, I’m going to ring it! So there was no need to beg for my forgiveness. What was I supposed to do, stand around waiting for the postal employee to wander up front whenever it was convenient for him? He was hard at work sorting mail in the back and probably appreciated hearing the bell. Even if he did not appreciate it, too bad – it was sitting there begging to be rung. Literally. He can be mad at his boss for putting it there, but he’d better not be upset with me.

So I got back to the office and was relaying this story to my team. Not A Palindrome said, “I will sit in a waiting room ’til I die before I ring a bell.” This naturally led to a bigger conversation about bells – specifically, doorbells. I wanted to know if she and Deb were knockers or ringers. And for the next 45 minutes, we engaged in a spirited debate over the issue.

Not A Palindrome’s issue with bells stems from the fact that she doesn’t like to make a lot of noise. I countered by saying a loud knock is more disturbing than a ringing bell, but she explained that she knocks softly. When I asked what happens if they don’t hear her, she said she’ll knock again and again, progressively louder, until they finally do hear her – a process that takes three times on average by her estimation. I told her that she’d only have to ring the doorbell once to get the person’s attention, which meant knocking was an inefficient method, but she said she never claimed it was efficient, it’s just what she does.

Deb is a ringer like me, but makes some concessions for knocking (e.g., she’ll knock if there is a baby in the house, or it’s early in the morning). My question is, what constitutes “early”? I’m up by 7:00 on weekends, so you can ring my bell all you want on a Saturday morning and I’m perfectly okay with that. But maybe the other person is a night owl who likes to sleep in late; they might consider 10:00 early. So I’m wondering, what is the cutoff? Are we drawing demarcation lines in the sand at a certain time of day to separate knocking from ringing? And how on earth do we come to an agreement? Hell, if you work the graveyard shift, 3 p.m. might be early while 2 a.m. is lunchtime. It’s madness.

Complicating matters further, Deb said it also depends on whether the person knows you are dropping by. If they’re expecting her, she’ll knock. If not, she’ll ring the bell.

Why does this matter?!?!

In any case, I found the whole thing very eye-opening, and I’m curious: are you a knocker or a ringer?

Tara and I had quite the urban adventure Saturday. We took the light rail train into Portland (just a week after the fatal MAX double stabbing that made national news…ugh) and walked to the PSU farmer’s market. Our long, wet winter and spring have delayed the hotly-anticipated arrival of fresh berries, but finally – finally! – strawberries were available. That alone made the trip worthwhile.

After grabbing a bite to eat, Tara turned to me and asked, “How adventurous are you feeling today?” I was in the mood to step outside of my comfort zone, so we hopped onto the Portland Street Car – a new experience for us both – and randomly explored some parts of the city we’d never seen. We alternated between street cars and MAX trains and shuttle buses and eventually found ourselves at the International Rose Test Garden. Talk about taking advantage of mass transit! Planet Earth owes us big time for yesterday. At least the weather was perfect for urban exploration – overcast and in the mid 60s. We got home around 5:30 and enjoyed a low-key evening with a simple dinner, BLTs and corn on the cob, and a Netflix movie (“Black Mass” with an unrecognizable Johnny Depp playing notorious Boston gangster James “Whitey” Bulger).

Nobody knocked on our door or rang the bell all evening, I’m happy to report.