Life

The fish were telling us something

Our family is not a “pet” family. We have experimented a couple of times. We have had fish a couple of times in the past. Most of the fish lived a reasonable life, and then perished. Usually, they had plenty to eat, and often they had plenty of playmates.

Well, our most recent trip down the pet road, has not been quite as pleasant……our three fish lasted only a couple of months. The first fish died, apparently, due to some failure on our part while we were on vacation. The fish crawled up into a shell in the fish tank, and, it seems, couldn’t find its way out. His death would be considered “normal”. The other deaths have been deemed suicide. After the NORMAL death, my wife cleaned out our the fish tank. It wasn’t REAL dirty, but the mega-food pellet we put in while we were gone, does get messy. She pulled the fish out of the fish bowl and put them in a cup temporarily. And, the next time she looked at the cup, one of the fish seems to have jumped out of the cup. And, once he was discovered, he could not be brought back.

The last is the hardest to believe. The fish bowl is a BOWL. It is curved at the top. And, this morning, as I was getting breakfast, I saw something on the floor by the trash can. Upon closer examination, I discovered it to be the LAST fish. So, we now had to be led to believe that the fish JUMPED out of the bowl. And, we are talking a jump of very nearly 2 inches in height. And, then, we need to believe, he flopped on the counter for 6 inches or more. Then, when he fell to the floor, he may have flopped some more–but, not much. He was pretty crispy when he was discovered. No formal ceremony was given.

Are we ever going to have pets again? Likely, we will . But, we may need therapy before we do…

My Post Office Friends…

The Ebay business I purchased a few weeks ago has continued to get the sales it seems to have gotten before. My sons and I prep the orders, and we place the items in the USPS Priority Mail boxes. I print the labels and sales receipts and stack them for my trip to the Post Office to mail. Someday, I will be ambitious enough to use my scale and to learn how to do the customs paperwork on-line, but until then, I have my post office friends.

  • There seem to be the regular visitors who check their PO Boxes every morning at about the same time. One man and one woman come specifically to mind here. There is also a gentlemen I see about once a week. He brings a big bin in and walks out with it full–he has one of the BIG PO boxes.
  • There is the fellow Ebay seller. I am not sure what he sells online, but he unloads his “Critter Catcher” truck of 3 to 4 items most every morning. He did give me a piece of advice as to what Post Office in the city always has plenty of Priority Mail boxes available.
  • The staff also has its personalities. Most of them are men, but their are two women. The crankiest of the gentlemen is nice enough, but when you look at him, his body language says, “Cranky”. The ladies are very helpful. When I purchased the business, I was not sure how to best use the “self-help” machine to mail my Priority Mail boxes. She sat over my shoulder and confirmed I was making the right choices. Now, I use the machine most of the time, but I have had a few international orders. So, until I do the online paperwork, I have to use the staff.
  • Truly, the most interesting personality is “Bob” (not his real name). He appears to be a permanently happy man in his early 50s.. He yells “Hello” and “Good Morning” to all he sees. I believe he may even shake hands with some of the staff through his PO box. I have seen him at the gas station next door, and he was getting his donut and coffee and giving all he met the same friendly treatment as his postal friends.

I list the people I see at the post office regularly, but the real focus is on Bob. He may not have been blessed with all I am blessed with, but he is very happy and spreads happiness. Some may be annoyed by his lack of a volume control and others by one of his other challenges, but he is happy and he will certainly be missed when he is gone. Sometimes people don’t remember what big things you did, they just notice how consistent you were while doing it.

Visit from the crick in the neck

Daddy [me] suffers from an annual [or more often] visit from the “stiffest neck in the Midwest”. And, after two visits this fall, I needed to come up with a solution. Beside the obvious why do I need a solution to my fall/winter neckache?

  1. My wife makes fun of me when I have a stiff neck by looking up at me with a mocking stiff neck impression.
  2. Sleeping REALLY stinks.
  3. Getting out of bed is more a rolling out of bed because my neck won’t allow me to lift myself up. (I said it got STIFF)
  4. Driving is rough–looking left, right and left again when coming out of the driveway is an opportunity for my kids to see what their dad will be like all the time when I am REALLY old.
  5. At church, the bank, or anywhere I go people look at me and try to figure out if it was a sledding or car accident.

Well, no more….I hope. I have decided to give up sleeping on my stomach. One theory is the night chill in our room causes it. So, if I sleep on my side or stomach, I am not exposing my neck directly to the chill. (the sheet or pillow or whatever protect my neck) And, I pop a couple of Advil in the morning if I feel my neck is wavering between stiff/flexible. [Another theory is possible neck strain from shoveling snow etc.] So, December was free of stiff necks, and I am hopeful my stiff neck will reduce its visits to annually, or even further apart…