It’s that time of year again.
The weather is getting cooler, the leaves are changing colors, and the doorbell keeps getting rung by annoying people that need to bugger off.
I thought I’d made this perfectly clear with the very stylish and attractive “NO SOLICITING” sign I’d nailed into our front door. It certainly cut down on solicitors dramatically, and on the few that it didn’t turn away, I could simply point to the sign. Most then would just say “Oh, sorry. Have a nice day.” They simply hadn’t seen it. If they tried to push a product anyway, they’d now failed Hanlon’s Razor, got a glare, and a door slammed in their face.

Imagine my surprise when I started encountering political campaigners who’d been coached to tell me “Campaigning isn’t soliciting”. Now, I’ve since reviewed the law, and they’re technically correct. Soliciting is accosting someone to attempt to convince them to purchase your services. Those shilling politics and religion aren’t offering a service, but instead want your time–something many of us value far more greatly than our money. It seems the appropriate response to this is to put up a sign similar to “NO TRESPASSING” or “NO UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL” or something equally grimace-inducing that would simply make the neighborhood less attractive. (It also confuses delivery drivers just dropping off your online purchases.) What’s worse, many of aforementioned, unwanted individuals that aren’t interested in knocking on your door simply find somewhere to cram flyers. (See: Litter) Most love to shove it into those contractor grade railings that have the curls at the end as they can wedge paper in there. I’ve literally filled mine in with expanding foam so they can’t do that. I’m putting serious thought into replacing the house’s door handles because they like to try to cram them behind that. Coincidentally, if they get close enough to do that, it means they can clearly see the NO SOLICITING sign!

To counter all unwanted guests, my brain started coming up with ideas whether I liked it or not:
The original idea was just a garbage bin, labeled appropriately. It sends a clear message.
This grew into the idea of a box with only a slit in the top. What wouldn’t be immediately visible was that there was no bottom, so anything they dropped it would fall out…directly into a garbage bin beneath.
Mandy suggested adding a shredder, but I pointed out that wasps feed themselves, are waterproof and hate people disturbing them at their home more than I do. They seemed like very effective guards.
While less terrifying, she prefers to draw bees, and it’s funnier to say.

I’ve not yet implemented any of these solutions, but I’ve already 3D printed a large “NO POLITICS” sign and placed it on the door. Should this fail, more drastic matters will be taken…