Austin has a photo project due today, and I thought he had it covered until he told us at 9pm last night he had not even started. So we scoured through 10 years of photos to find six acceptable photos, problem is, Bobby has not hooked up my new printer with me, so he had to take them in to be printed. He went to five different stores and did not get home until 11:30pm because he was trying to find a photo kiosk that was open that late. Of course, Austin will never understand how much we do for him, nor will he fully appreciate it, until he is at the fifth Walgreen’s in town, 15 miles from home at 11:30 pm making duplicate photos for his own child.

I have been a big fan of the show Intervention since my friend turned me onto the show. I enjoy the happy endings the most, especially when you see the entire family take part in drug education and attend the required Al-Anon meetings. I always feel angry when it says they relapsed, even though I know that is the nature of the beast.

I also often wonder how addicts in the show, and in real life, are connected to the right rehabilitation center. I know not all drug rehab centers are alike and that without the right match, sobriety may be harder to obtain. Thank goodness there are referral programs out there to help meet the needs of the addict to help them on their way to living free and clear of an addiction.

*This is a sponsored post.

Don’t get me wrong, some of our government mail carriers are great… however, the ones I have dealt with in the last 3 years, have been less than glorious.

It started in July, 2004 when we bought our very first home. When we got the house, it came with almost everything we desired in a home… except for more than one mail key.

Sometime that summer, I ventured to the closest post office, waited in line to be told I needed to wait in an office for the post master. One hour later the postmaster explains to me that I will need to go to a different post office and I will need proof of ownership, like a mortgage statement (which we had not started getting yet).

Well, time passed, I soon forgot about the mail key until I started having car problems and had to leave my van at the dealership for days on end… and if I forgot to remove my mail key, I was without a vehicle and mail.

So again I decide to go get new keys at the post office. To make sure I had the correct post office and correct ID I call the 1-800 number and ask to speak to my local office. I get a number for another post office close by and I give them a call. They tell me to bring my mortgage statements, but since it has been over 30 days I will now need $25.00.

Fifteen minutes later I get to the post office with the two things I am told to bring to be belittled and berated by a horribly nasty mail-woman who told me I needed a DEED to my HOUSE, not a mortgage statement and that I must be an idiot to trust a national worker because there is NO WAY I called someone in HER office. Even after I read the number I called (to HER post office) she insisted that I was mistaken or lying.

A few months after that horrible experience I am finally ready to put the past behind me and brave it again. So on Thursday I I head to the post office with two deeds, my property tax statement, two forms of ID, a receipt of payment for my property taxes, and $25.00. I wait 45 minutes in line for the mail-handler to ask me for a mortgage statement. OH MY GOD! I wish I saw the lady who had made me feel two feet tall so I could tell her what a moron she was! So I pay my $25.00, another $7.30 to mail a package and walk out the door.

Friday I go to check my mail and my old key will not work. After picking up my van from the dealership I head over to the post office. It is 30 minutes before they close and the parking lot is crammed so I decide to call them while in the parking lot. Thank goodness too because my keys were not there.

Saturday morning I wake up early and head to the post office. I wait in line for 15 minutes and get to the counter and she gets my keys and says “that will be $25.00 please”. I explain to her that I already paid and do not have a receipt because I was never given one. I told her I came in Thursday at 2:30pm and mailed a package to California for $7 and paid a total of $32 and some change. She told me she would not give me the keys because there was no proof I paid and a bank statement from my bank was not good enough because it was not itemized. She told me to come back and get my receipt, and her solution to me not having access to my mail was to put it on hold until I paid my $25.00 OR showed a receipt.

I was pissed beyond pissed. I came home yelling at Bobby, tearing my house apart looking for a receipt I knew I was never given… called my bank to ask if they had an itemized list by chance (on a whim, I knew better). Bobby took the highlighted bank statement for 3/29/07 and went in and immediately had a manager in front of him; of course the manager kept insisting that there was nothing he could do despite the great questions Bobby asked him “is it your policy to collect payment before service” and “don’t you keep records of what is sent where and who orders mail box keys”?

The whole time the manager is holding the keys, and Bobby had me on the cell phone explaining what the man looked like. He finally went into the back (probably to ask the worker if he remembered what happened TWO DAYS before) and finally comes out and says “it was paid” and hands the keys over. Of course when Bobby gets the keys he is dubious WHY they could not figure out I had paid since written on it is my first and last name… “lease and I.D. verified” and in the upper right hand corner highlighted in yellow is “*New Keys, pd $25.00 on 3/29/07″. Can three grown adults seriously be too stupid to understand what that meant???

Anyways, after all this crap we managed to have a nice day. I bought kaiser rolls and German cold cuts at the German store for lunch (and bratwurst and sauerkraut for dinner tonight) and we had a late lunch. We then left the boys with a sitter and had an early date night to go see the movie 300, we then had a late dinner at IHOP while we ran around town looking for a Wii. Bobby finally did find one, but he had to wait at Wal-Mart for them to arrive at midnight. He sure does spoil our sons; we all have had a blast playing with it today.

Today some friends of ours gave us three fish their son did not want anymore, an angel fish and two algae eaters. They showed up around 4pm with the fish in a bag and I set the fish (in the bag still) in the tank for them to adjust to the temperature. Well, I forgot about them. Oops!

Five hours later, when I remember, the bag is seemingly full of dead fish. Oh great, more fish I killed in the last 30 days (I accidentally dropped a baby fish out of the tank while transferring it to clean the tank); however the two algae eaters swam off, but the angel fish just floated to the bottom. The kids are sleeping now, so I am sure in the morning they will discover the missing new fish and I will have to fess up that I am a bad fish-keeper.

The new Angel Fish, aptly named Sushi had it’s very last swim, when I “buried” it at sea; it seemed so graceful as it swam in circles around the bowl and finally dipped out of sight.