Dull and Boring to form transatlantic partnership?

Today is no ordinary day in Boring, Oregon. For tonight, Boring people vote on whether they'd like to pair up with Dull folks.

It's up to the town's planning organization to decide whether or not to accept an offer of partnership from the village of Dull in Perthshire, central Scotland.

While Dull is keen to become Boring's "sister community," with just 84 people to Boring's 10,000, the UK Press Association said, the Scottish hamlet is too small to be twinned officially with its larger American cousin. 

That hasn't stopped Dull community councillor Marjorie Keddie speculating about the "very eye-catching road sign" the partnership could occasion.

"People are inclined, when they see the sign to Dull, to stop their car – it doesn't matter whether there's anyone behind them or not – and jump out," a chuckling Keddie told Scottish news network STV. "And if there's Dull and Boring, they'll be twice as bad!"

Boring, too, is getting excited. According to local paper The Sandy Post, Boring Community Planning Organization chairman Steve Bates wants the two communities to be "a pair for the ages."

Boring is named after one Joe Boring, who founded a homestead in the area in 1856, the Post said. 

"Over the years, we've always heard jokes about Boring," says descendant and lifelong resident Bob Boring, "but my dad used to say, 'It's a name, not a condition.'"

Dull, meanwhile, is thought to have got its name from a Gaelic word for either meadow or snare, the BBC said.

Dull's council has already approved the motion, so it all comes down to tonight's vote.

Things look promising. According to the Post, "no one can remember anyone speaking against it in the past several months."