The Joys Of Small Town Living...

Yesterday I left the office a little early...everyone else had vacated the premises by 3pm so I decided it would be ok if I wasn't there as well. I had things to do. I thought I would pay a few bills, run to the post office, you know those things that get left behind when you're super busy. So as I'm leaving church and pulling into city hall to pay one of my bills a car pulls up right next to me, and it turns out to be the cleaning lady from church (apparently she knows the car I drive) and asks me if I would mind going up to let her into the church, so I do because I was really looking forward to someone emptying my waste basket for me. After that I go to the post office, which apparently closes at 4pm here in our little town. Since when do post offices close at 4pm...I thought it was 5...I have gifts to mail...and at this point i'd like to apologize to any friends in MN, OH, or NC who may not get their gifts in time because of the silly post office closing so early. yuck. But it was nothing that I was going to get too upset over, and after a very fruitless trip to the post office I decided to run by home and feed my darling dog. When I get there I have another nasty note from the people at the Water place...apparently each month I'm supposed to be reading my water meter when I send in my water bill. Here's the thing...I grew up in a city where people read your meters for you, so I have no idea what a water meter looks like, and on the bill it doesn't have your previous meter reading so I have no idea even what sort of numbers I'm looking for. Well it seems that your's truely has been reading the wrong meters for quite some time now...like since I moved here. But yesterday was my day. When I got home the lady that lives in the other side of my duplex was sitting out in our front rock garden and I asked her if she had any idea where the water meter was because I had yet another nasty note on my door telling me I had read the wrong meter. She points out into our neighbors rock garden (by rock garden I mean yard but we don't have yards we have rocks) and there is a little black sewer lid...heavy metal sewer lid, and apparently you have to pick up the lid and look about 2 feet down into the ground at a dial covered in dirt and THAT is the water meter. I felt pretty victorious and slightly like I had stepped back into my ancestors shoes with doing something as primitive as reading your own water meter. I guess you learn something new ever day! I guess I shouldn't complain about having to read my own meter because our water bills are really cheap...probably because they don't have to pay anyone to come around and read our junk for us. So I'll just be happy...and the water people will be happy that I've finally found the right meter!