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I had a postage-paid package to mail. Everything was ready, I just had to drop it in the drop box. But when I got to the drop box, I saw a warning that anything over 13 ounces must be taken in person to the clerk and must not be put into the drop box. Something about heightened security concerns…

So instead of just dropping off the box, I now have to go into the post office. Normally, I drop off mail on my way to work, which is well before the post office opens. Change of plans – I will stop by the post office on the way home from work.

Usually when I go to this post office, there is a long line. They have the equivalent of a postal ATM (a machine that dispenses stamps instead of cash), but last time I needed that it had 3 people in its line. So I did not have very high hopes to begin.

But it was 3:50 pm on a Thursday, so I didn’t expect that many people in line. Aren’t these people supposed to be at work? Maybe they’re wondering the same thing about me…

There are a handful of people in line already, with 2 people being served at the 2 open register/counter thingies. I am about the 6th person in line. At 4:00, 10 minutes after I got there, I was the 5th person in line. The one postal employee finally finished helping the one guy who had been at the counter the whole time, apparently with a complex postal problem.

Okay, now the line can start moving.

Nope, it’s 4:00 and that is apparently the end of his shift. So he leaves the counter and goes through the back hallway, leaving one postal employee to handle the now 10 or 11 of us in line.

The guy ahead of me remarks that there are 6 counters available for use, but only one person working. I agree, why waste all that space? Maybe they’re keeping it for the Christmas rush.

The worker guy comes back to the counter! Maybe he just needed a little break. Nope, he grabs some keys and leaves us again. The guy behind me keeps cursing and mumbling.

The worker guy comes back again. This time he opens and closes a drawer before leaving. The guy ahead of me comments that “he’s just teasing us now.”

At 4:05, a replacement worker opens up the counter that the worker guy had vacated. Okay, the next shift is here. The line starts moving – far counter takes the next customer, near counter, far counter, now it’s my turn. The mumbling cursing guy behind me makes sure I know that it’s my turn to go to the counter.

I tell the clerk lady that I’m not sure how much this thing weighs and the mailbox said to bring it in person. She takes the package and says “No, it’s fine” without even weighing it.

I’m leaving the counter about 10 seconds after I arrived there, but I’m leaving the post office about 20 minutes after I arrived there. The post office has a nice big sign out front that says something like “Open later to serve you better”. I don’t want better service later – I want better service now. But now I know why they say that – they need to stay open later to accommodate all the customers still waiting in line when they close.

Or is the plural of hoodlum hoodla?

Anyway, Saturday morning, when I left for the store, I didn’t notice anything wrong at the end of the driveway. Slightly later Saturday morning, when I returned from the store, I noticed right away that the mailbox was missing.

It was a white mailbox, so it was rather noticeable. I doubt that it was there when I left that morning, because it is across the road from the end of the driveway. As you drive down our 300-foot-long driveway, you are facing the mailbox the entire time.

But just before I turned back onto our driveway, I noticed it was conspicuously missing. I got out of the minivan and looked around. I expected to see it damaged, lying nearby. But there was no sign of it anywhere.

People have hit the mailbox before and broken it. Our driveway is the first one off a major road, so people who missed something often use our driveway to turn around. (Because of that, whenever I miss my turn and need to turn around, I use the second or third driveway, not the first.) When those people hit the mailbox, at least they leave it alone – either on the ground next to the mailbox post or dangling from it.

Since there was no sign of the mailbox, and since it was only an hour or two until the mail was supposed to arrive, I figured I needed to put a replacement mailbox up immediately.

All you thrower-awayers out there, especially those who have tried to convince me that I shouldn’t save everything: take note. I did not need to go buy a new mailbox because I still had my old one in the garage. I had replaced the mailbox a few years ago because the number stickers were peeling and the paint was wearing away. When I installed the new mailbox, I did not throw away the old one, even though there was ostensibly no use for it any more. I just put it in my garage because it was still functional. And when I had need for a mailbox, it was right there for me.

This incident has furthered my resolve that yes, I really do need to save that, whatever that may be that I feel like saving. If anyone asks me why I am saving something, my answer will be that I might need it someday. And you never know when that will be (although it usually works out to be just after you throw it away).

I re-installed the old mailbox and went back inside the house to do other things. Later that day, I glanced down the driveway and noticed something white at the end of our driveway. Someone had found our mailbox and placed it on our yard. Or maybe the hooligan who took it had a change of heart and returned it. It was rather undamaged for being torn or knocked from the post. The plastic newspaper box that was still on its post (right next to the mailbox post) was severely bent, so I know that some traumatic event happened there.

Now I am back to two functioning mailboxes. I have the old mailbox collecting mail and the newer, nicer mailbox collecting dust. Maybe I’ll wait for something to happen to the old mailbox and switch them then.

What you would do in the following situation?

You are driving home from work one Friday afternoon, and you are about halfway there.

1. You are behind someone going 65 mph in a 70 mph zone, on the freeway.  You don’t pass him because you want to exit very soon.
2. Your exit lane begins, so you signal and change lanes, while the other vehicle (a minivan) stays in what had been the right lane.
3. It is a long exit lane with a straightaway followed by a gentle curve. It is not really an exit but a transition to another freeway, so it is meant for a vehicle to be able to maintain the posted speed along the whole path. You speed up to 70 mph and therefore begin passing the other vehicle.
4. Once you are alongside the other vehicle, its driver decides to exit too. He does not signal but steers into the exit lane anyway. You notice this and know that if you don’t do something, you will be run off the road.

What do you do?

• A. Maintain your lane, but honk and gesture so the other guy knows you’re already there
• B. Slam on the brakes to avoid the impending collision
• C. Step on the gas, swerving slightly onto the shoulder in the process until your tail is clear of the other vehicle.

Before you answer the question, remember that you are in a car, not a minivan, and there are no kids with you in the car. Also remember that this is a long exit lane and the other vehicle has been going under the speed limit for no apparent reason, so if you stay behind him your trip will be even longer.

In case you can’t tell, I chose C.  And no, I did not honk or gesture.

As I watched the minivan grow smaller and smaller in my rearview mirror, I wondered if he was going even slower in order to put a safe distance between himself and me.  If he didn’t know what he had done, he just might think that I was some maniacal driver who was weaving in and out of traffic.  Or maybe he did know what he had done and was too embarrassed to let me see who he was.  Or, worse yet, maybe he had no clue anything had just happened and was just going slower because it was a curve.

The next day, I remembered that my license plate expired the week before and I never put the new sticker on the car. I had renewed the plate, but didn’t put the sticker on the car at the time because of bad weather. The sticker is on now, so I’m good.

Here is a tip that I’ve found useful over the years:

When trimming one’s mustache with a beard trimmer or hair clippers, one must breathe out through one’s nose.

One must take a deep breath before starting to trim, then exhale slowly through one’s nose while the little clips of hair are being flung hither and yon.

One can trim the rest of the beard without checking one’s breathing. But if the mustache remains get inhaled into one’s nose, they can be quite irritating.

Several months ago, I wrote about how my fingernails developed a sudden, temporary infection.  Now the nails have all grown back.  When the whole thing started, I was wondering how long it would take for them to have no sign of the infection.

Now the whole thing is over, and I can pass on to you, dear reader, the knowledge I have gained: my nails took 4-6 months to grow.

That time is the complete re-growth of the nail, from the time of the infection to the time when the last sign of nail problem was gone.

The nails at first grew bad, then they grew good again. When the infection happened, it interrupted my nails. It was like my normal fingernails just kept going like they would have, but there was not any new nail behind them so they eventually fell off. This picture is from that point, halfway through the ordeal. Click on this preview photo if you want to see the details.

The new nail started growing before the old nail was completely gone, but the new nail was warped and mis-shapen. Then everything settled down and got back to how it should be, but the warped parts of the nails still had to grow their way off my fingers. Once that was done and a fingernail was clear, with no evidence that there had been any problem, I noted the day.

My nails went bad on 6/21/08

left index fingernail healed on 10/25 – 4 months
right index fingernail healed on 10/31 – 4 months

left middle fingernail healed on 12/19 – 6 months

left ring fingernail healed on 12/19 – 6 months
right ring fingernail healed on 1/2 – 6.5 months

left pinkie fingernail healed on 12/5 – 5.5 months

My right middle and pinkie fingernails and both thumbs were not infected, so there was no time to record there. Rumor has it that nails are like bones in that they benefit from mild stress of everyday use. I’m guessing that my index fingernails grew the fastest because, in my job which involves a lot of computer use, I used them the most. And I am left-handed, so my left nails grew faster than the right.

The pinkie was next, probably because of the typing and my habit of tapping my pinkies and thumbs on nearby objects, to the beat of whatever song happens to be in my head. It annoys my wife, especially when the nearby object is her.

It has turned cold outside, but our furnace is working, so that means it stays warm inside. Why do I bother telling you that? Because that means that the mice have moved back inside our house with us. But not for long.

We had been trying for a couple of days to catch the mouse. He is obviously in the kitchen. By “obviously”, I mean that he leaves a trail of pellets so that we can see where he has been. My wife was quite annoyed, because he kept getting in her stuff. She had to throw out a bottle of paprika. Paprika! The lid was chewed open and paprika was everywhere. The other spices were left alone.

So I bought some glue traps and placed them in an apparent path of his, and then I went to bed. In the morning, the trap was on the floor. There was a bunch of fur (and more pellets) in the glue trap, but no mouse.

After finding the empty trap on the floor, I threw it away and got another two more from the package (four per box). I put them in the same place, figuring that he wouldn’t change his commute, and went to bed. In the morning, the trap was moved and contained fur and pellets again, but no mouse. He must be a quick learner, but not quick enough to avoid the trap in the first place. With all the fur that’s being left in the traps, eventually we’re going to have a bald mouse running around.

Not impressed with the weak glue in the traps, I recalled that last year we had success with the Tomcat-brand glue traps. This year’s traps that are 0-for-2 so far are the d-Con brand. A friend picked up some of the Tomcat glue traps, and the third night had a Tomcat trap next to a d-Con trap, both in the mouse’s path.  And we got the mouse no problem with the Tomcat trap.

I set another Tomcat trap the next night, just to be sure we got all the mice. That first night there was nothing – no mouse, but no sign of any struggle. The second night we got another mouse. By my count, that makes d-Con 0-for-2 and Tomcat 2-for-2. We have another Tomcat trap out there still, waiting for any other intruders.

You can’t tell by the pictures, but the Tomcat trap has a thicker layer of glue. By thicker I mean deeper, not more viscous. The d-Con traps are about 4″ by 4″, and the Tomcat traps are about 3.5″ by 4.5″.

I didn’t set out to write an un-biased review of glue mouse traps, but I guess that’s what this post is.  I recommend the Tomcat traps. I also recommend using peanut butter for bait.

I had the problem for the past several years of picking at my cuticles. It was a bad habit, just biting one’s nails, but at the other end of the nails. It seemed harmless for a while, until a couple of weeks ago.

Here, for your viewing enjoyment, are pictures of my nails after the attack of the nail fungus. There were some nails that were infected and some that were not. The nails that were not infected were the nails whose cuticles I hadn’t picked in a while – the healthy cuticles. The nails that were infected were the nails with the damaged cuticles. So if you’re looking for a reason or motivation to stop the unhealthy habit of pulling or peeling or cutting or otherwise hurting your cuticles, take a minute to examine these photos.

In order to protect the squeamish – those who are reading the blog for other reasons and don’t appreciated being confronted with medical photographs – I am showing small black-and-white thumbnails (get it, thumbnails!) or preview pictures. Those who do want to see the larger, full-color version can click on the previews.

I didn’t know it was a fungal infection when it started, because it started under the skin at the base of the nail bed. It wasn’t until that part grew out that I saw what happened. Now the new nail is pushing out the old one, rather, the nail is continuing to grow as normal. The infected part is gradually being clipped away and the new part is growing in fresh, albeit soft and with a matte finish, as opposed to hard and semi-gloss that my nails used to be.