November 8, 2013
Dear Everyone:
I spent last Tuesday chasing down mailboxes.
Pesky little critters, scampering all over the place.
When I first moved in, about four-and-a-half years ago, the lock on my
mailbox was always a little bit tricky.
It took just the right amount of wiggle, pressure and angle to
get the key to come out of the lock.
When I was laid up after a heart attack almost three years ago,
“Frankie” and “Jeannie” simply left the mailbox unlocked rather than
fiddle with it. After they
left, I went back to wiggle, pressure, etc.
Meanwhile I noticed that some of the other mailboxes had lost their
identifying numbers and some were deliberately being left unlocked,
presumably by the owners. A
few months ago, I put a suggestion in the official Suggestion Box to the
Homeowners Association to look into replacing all of the mailboxes.
After all, they were over 25 years old.
I got an official reply to the effect that the Board was looking into
it. Later, I found out that
a more pressing issue had pushed the mailboxes to the “back burner”.
More recently, at a Homeowners Association meeting, I was
“encouraged” to consider serving on the Board myself.
I said “OK”. After
all, I’m retired, right?
Last month, I was officially “voted” onto the Board.
And last week, I got an email from the Association president that
the local Postmaster had notified her that, unless the mailboxes were
replaced “as soon as possible” the
Postal Service would, literally,
refuse to deliver any mail to Eastridge Drive.
All 188 residences.
So mailboxes are now back on the “front burner”.
We need to decide on what style, color, make and model, and what
vendor to use to get the whole thing done; buy the new ones (with a
discount because the vendor works with the Property Management Company
and wants to stay on their good side), have the street numbers imprinted
on each box (instead of “1” through “16” in each cluster of boxes),
deliver and assemble, rip out the old ones and haul them all away,
install the new ones and arrange to deliver the keys for the new
mailboxes to all 188 residents,
Whew!!!
Not something I’d want to try and handle by myself.
In the meantime, before we can order those “cluster box units” we need
to know which street number should go on each mailbox.
So I started a list and went up and down Eastridge Drive, finding
the “cluster box units” and making sure we identify the number for each
mailbox, based on where they are as of last Tuesday.
I also looked at the various offerings supplied by the Property
Management Company and threw together a side-by-side comparison of
features and prices, which I emailed to the other Board members for
consideration. I,
personally, like the Outgoing Mail slot and parcel locker features
included in some models, so I’m advocating for one of those.
In other news…
“Alice” is currently visiting at “Jeannie’s” place.
She arrived last weekend and will be staying until this Sunday.
This means frequent trips to “Jeannie’s” place and lots of
excuses to go out for lunch.
We also, all three of us, went up to “Oakley” yesterday, where our
cousin “Perry” still has his
optician office, and picked out three new
pairs of glasses for me, and one pair of frames for “Jeannie”, subject
to her getting her eyes re-examined in the near future.
Today “Alice” and I picked up a wireless
Blu-ray player and a
router for
“Jeannie’s” place in hopes of setting “Jeannie” up with a
home network
that can download movies from
Netflix.
Early birthday and Christmas presents for “Jeannie”.
We’ll try setting it up tomorrow, when “Marshall” will be joining
us. That’s more than half
the Wood Kids in one place at the same time.
Heaven help
Concord.
Love, as always,
Pete
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