One of the small pleasures of living here is the ringing of church bells. (It helps that we don't live right next to a church--we have friends who live next to a church and found the bells charming for the first week but aren't so enamoured any more with the inability to hear themselves think when the bells are ringing.) There's something peaceful about opening the back door and hearing the distant chiming of bells. Right now, all I can hear outside are bells and birds. It certainly beats sirens (DC) or helicopters (LA)...