Comeflywithme - how did you manage to restrain yourself? I'm normally a very calm person but I think that one would have sent me over the edge.
I ususlly find that most pax are quite good at not pressing the call bell for just anything, but once people see someone else do it, then it becomes a free for all. I also have noticed that when they are used it is often coming from the same passenger most times, unfortunately some pax don't seem to understand that you have 250+ other passengers to look after on board. I have noticed when positioning on various airlines in the US you rarely hear the chime in comparison to the UK, the one time I saw someone use the call bell, the stern FA that answered it made it very clear that they were not impressed.
Call bells are a bugbear for most of us but I dont think we can hope for some airlines to discourage passengers to use them for anything but emergencies as they are another way the airline sees as providing a service to passengers - it would be negative
PR if we started doing PA's to that effect.
Yes we can feel like a dog answering to its master - once on a drinks service a passenger started whistling loudly at us as we were serving other pax in the row in front, I pretended not to notice and finished serving, but the steward on the opposite end of the cart shouted "Has anyone seen a dog anywhere? this gentleman seems to have lost his dog" which had all the passengers around laughing, and even the guy concerned saw the funny side. Shame i'm not quick enough to think of it myself!