A few days ago, I walked out to get the mail. When I got there, I was quite puzzled by the sudden appearance of this:
NO, not all the dirt and grime on our mailbox. That’s always been there and has no projection of being removed any time soon.
A raised, green reflective dot, about the size of a quarter, had suddenly appeared.
Why? Who decided that I needed a reflective dot on my mailbox? Isn’t it a federal crime to mess with mail or MAIL CONTAINERS?
So I started looking around.
Across the street: Freddy and Christie had the very same dot.
(You can see it’s reflective properties in that picture)
I widened my investigation. Next door: They had a RED dot!!!!
In fact, upon further investigation, most of our neighbors had the RED dot.
But then, some neighbors had no dot at all (for instance, Alice had NO dot, which assuaged my fears that they were marking bloggers).
(Then again, Freddy hasn’t blogged in about 10 1/2 decades, so he most likely wouldn’t have gotten marked in that case)
Ali and I did an unofficial mailbox survey while out on a walk yesterday and discovered that:
- 33.65% of mailboxes had no dot .
- 64.35% of mailboxes had red dots.
- In the whole neighborhood, there were only two houses with green dots. Ours and Freddy and Christie’s.
I am quite puzzled as to the meaning of these dots.
Are we marked for execution?
Or are all the red dots marked for execution and we’re marked to be spared?
My un-fun, logical theories are:
- There’s a new person doing the newspaper route who can’t read numbers, so in true equal opportunity form, someone went through and marked with colors. Maybe green means we get the weekend papers only, red means daily, and no dot means no paper. (I need to survey Alice and Freddy and Christie’s paper practices to help prove this theory.)
- Maybe they are related to garbage pickup. (Although this would be a riot since we’ve never paid for our garbage pickup due to being completely unable to get them to send us a bill. Half the time I think that they just pick up everybody’s garbage without regard to the fact that we have no sticker, and the other half of the time I think that it must be on auto-draft out of the former house-owner’s checking account, and in a very un-accounting like fashion, they never look at it. Oops.)
My preferable, more inventive theories are:
- Someone is going through and marking the excellent neighbors (green), the bad neighbors (red) and the neutral or hermit neighbors (no dot). We are being classified and a neighborhood caste system is being created. Which means, of course, that we are at the top echelon of neighborhood caste society. YESSSS.
- A city is finally looking at annexing us and is surveying the neighborhood for people who already have code violations. Like, for instance,
- The man with 200 white homing pigeons in his backyard (housed in 6 huge birdhouses) = non-annex material.
- The people with the skateboard park in their backyard = non-annex material.
- Freddy and Christie, with their immaculate yard, house, and fence = annex material.
- But then again, we have a green dot. So I guess that blows that theory.
Anyone else have any theories?
Or better yet, has anyone else had any mysterious mailbox dottage happen in your neighborhood?
I’ve seen the dots too. I think it has something to do with the paper routes and which houses get the daily, weekend or Sunday papers. But I did enjoy reading your theories…especially the good/bad neighbor ones!!:)
they did that here a few years ago and it was about which papers each house should get.
Let us know what you figure out!
In our old neighborhood the dot was based on your garbage pick up service. But why there are two colors….not sure about that one. Would love to know what you discover the truth to be! :) Fun post.
That would make me curious too, but I do know the paper people usually put dots of some sort on peoples mailboxes…so that’s probably the case here.
I have no idea about the dots – but enjoyed reading your theories! Very creative. Will be interested to hear if you ever figure it out!
Maybe they think the ones with green dots are aliens? And you are marked for destruction, good-luck-with-that ?!?
We have a green dot and we get the weekend paper. I think that is the right theory, although I like the other’s as well. :)
Things that may you go
hmmmmmmmm………….
Please keep us POSTED
on what you find out.
:)
I’m going with the caste system…. you could totally rule the neighborhood. Haha!
Alice=No newspapers….I steal mine from work (or read them during lunch!)
I really hope they don’t use them for garbage because a) I don’t want you guys to get in trouble and b) I really enjoy putting my quarterly stickers on our cans with the cute pictures!
I really like the annexing theory….let me know what Freddy and Christie are doing to get the green dots with their yard and such, we’re getting their with ours!
LOL.
Be worried when the dot is on your front door.
-FringeGirl
Oh my gosh I am still laughing… this is hilarious! This is so something I would be doing- coming up with all kinds of theories and speculations. Drives my husband crazy!
I just came across your blog from Fab. Frugalicious and I will have to visit some more. Please update on this dot situation!
I think it may be squirrel-related. You know what I’m talking about.
LOL!
Ouch calling me out on my lack of blogging! It’s true work is totally getting in the way of my internet life! Must….regain….work..life..balance!
I am actually a newspaper carrier and can tell you that each carrier has their own color coding method. Personally I do it so that in case of an emergency someone can take care of my route and my customers still get their papers. I also used them when I first took over the route until I learned where all my customers were.
Hope this helped.
I think the paper guy over here is part of the conspiracy. I also was just labeled with a green dot in both my mailbox and the newspaper box (attached to the bottom of the mailbox). I think I have been marked for some kind of government project, perhaps it’s because I have been reading about free masons and their New World Order plan, or because I am waiting for pope John Paul to resurrect and take over the world. I’ll keep you posted with my findings.
Its aliens deciding who to probe and who not to probe when they arrive.
I wonder if FEMA could convert storage units into holding cells… some storage units hold like 500 units. perfect size for holding cells