RING AROUND THE RING

It turns out there’s a whole community behind the Ring Video Doorbell installed on my front door.

Well, it’s next to my front door.

You don’t know where I live, unless you also have a Ring Video Doorbell and are familiar with the secret side button double-click action that generates a map of all other Ring Video Doorbell enthusiasts’ exact location across the greater continental United States, including address, phone number, secret phone number, and credit score.

If you lack a Ring Video Doorbell, your other method of locating me (or anyone) is based on whether you have a 21st-Century Child, for if you do, this Child could undoubtedly scroll some binary code faster than I eat a chicken wing and provide you with my exact weight, height, address, and susceptibility to phishing schemes – all based on the middle three letters of my last name.

But since you don’t know where I live because I can tell neither of these options apply to you, I’m very comfortable pointing out that my Ring Video Doorbell is not hard-wired to my house and thus is as easy to steal as the freshly delivered, barely recyclable UPS package on my front porch.

It’s just sitting on a screw. The Ring. I didn’t even install the screw – the screw came with the house.

You’d want my Ring Video Doorbell. What it does is…well, when you press the button it makes a ring noise, like the doorbell you grew up with. Or when you walk by, it kind of scans you and sends an X-ray to the National Security Agency, also like the doorbell you grew up with. Oh and your phone beeps, etc., when either of these things happen. So you know when you have a visitor or walker-by-er. Or possibly an intruder, which would be bad, and is why I’m currently pitching Ring International Pricing Concern, LTD, on my idea of a Ring Exploding Video Doorbell. But so far no contract attorney or industrial engineer will take my case/project, despite the promise of a lucrative payment at an undetermined future date.

Along with providing ringing noises and security, the Ring Video Doorbell has this propensity for recording the ludicrous behavior of squirrels during the day (what a life!), possums during the night, any car that drives by no matter the distance to the curb or how many times you’ve messed with the settings, and your neighbors’ various antics.

The neighbor thing is really interesting. For example, I receive unsolicited electronic communiqués from my Ring app in the form of “neighborhood alerts”…

[I think they call them this for the same reason CNN overused the “Terror Alert Level” in the early 2000s – that Green-Blue-Yellow-Orange-Red/low-to-high anticipated violence thermometer – without explaining that the system was never intended to go lower than yellow: to scare the holy bejeezus out of us so we’d watch more]

…that include fascinating, albeit brief anecdotes from people I don’t know, including this notice:

Stolen chair – Person took chair and tried to depart in loud pickup truck. I was able to chase down truck and recover the chair. (Accompanied by a blurry “before” shot of a backyard patio set, less one chair, followed by a clearer “after” shot, plus one chair.)

This begs the question of whether the retail value of the hijacked chair was remotely worth the physical harm that could befall a homeowner in the speedy pursuit of a possibly armed cat burglar escaping at a hasty, likely reckless speed in the middle of the night in an attempt to reach the Main Hideout with the coveted prize of that single non-Adirondack chair.

The real question here is, how brave is this homeowner? That’s the juice, I mean come on, storyteller guy, you can’t leave that part out. Don’t be coy.

Did you dive into the back of the truck, grab the chair, and combat-roll out the other side? Did you attach yourself to the hood of the truck à la Raiders of the Lost Ark and have an extended fight scene that included you almost getting knocked to your death but instead you were able to use your bullwhip to attach yourself to the undercarriage and…?

“Nope. I’m good. I just recovered the chair. Nothing more to say. Just another day in the life of a Real Hero.”

Maybe the human homeowner didn’t do any of this. 

Maybe The Ring did it all, communicating with other supposedly inanimate things like in that movie Heavy Metal where the cars come to life. That makes more sense and at least explains the unreasonable amount of humility my fellow Ring Owner displays. I bet The Ring communicated with a Dodge Challenger that rammed the thief’s truck, got the chair back, and returned it to its rightful owner. 

Either way, I want to get rid of my Ring. It’s leaving me vulnerable to judgement and scrutiny. I mean, what are people seeing in my neighborhood alert?

Unshowered homeowner goes to mini-mart, returns with beer and gum.

Car prowler extremely disappointed after discovering nothing of value in man’s Subaru.

Man accidentally picks nose in front of neighbor during early morning dog walk.

Yes, I think I’ve about had it with this thing. If you want a free Ring, just come on by and grab it. You already know where I live.