During the day, I work at home. Sometimes I’m in my office; sometimes, for kicks, I hang out on the couch in the living room. The back of our living room faces the back of another apartment building. A few months ago, I noticed that there was an exorbitant amount of phone ringing coming from one of the apartments. Since I have little else to do during the day than obsess about things that annoy me, I began listening to the ring very closely and discovered that it changed tone. It was always essentially the same, but it wavered in ways ringtones do not waver. Eventually, I figured out that the ringtone was actually coming from a parrot. It is a pretty talented parrot. Not only does it do a ringtone, it does a very convincing “you have a voicemail” message from a cell phone.