The post office has rules and regulations. If your postal people aren't following their own regulations there are steps you can take. You have to be strong enough to go to a supervisor, maybe even a district manager. My postal lady has a little cardboard cutout. Anything over 1/4" thick requires extra postage. She pulls out her template to see if it will slide through easily. I now know the rule so I try to make my envelopes as flat as possible, even with seeds in them. A family member worked for the post office. Here's what they taught me: 1. Print in upper case letters the name, address, zip code. Make it as plain as possible. 2. Print "Hand Cancel" directly under the stamps in permanent marker or dark pen. Underline it with 2 lines. I put as little information as possible on the return address corner. I put my address and zip code, not the town and often not my name. This means it CAN be returned to me, but the post office will have to work harder. It's my opinion many workers will look at that and prefer to try to mail it to the intended recipient. I have an opinion that colored envelopes, envelopes that look like cards, etc. get better service. Even without a card in it, I rarely get a colored envelope back. I buy them at Goodwill in plastic bags. They are always treated better than something that is the same size as junk mail. Know your envelope dimensions and costs. Non-traditional envelope sizes cost more. Plastic envelopes cost more. Buy a small postage scale. Don't worry about digital, just one of those your grandmother used to have. You'll know the size of the envelope, the thickness and the weight. If your postal worker gives you trouble go over their head. They won't like you, but they need to do their job and be fair. If they're doing it to you they're probably doing it to other people. There is a vast difference between local post offices and we're all frustrated by it when the rules are the same. Some workers act as if they are the mail police and they are the Police Chief like some of those people who lead you to a seat on a roller coaster. They act like they have the power to deport you and you're just trying to ride a ride. Post Office: Can't live with 'em. Can't live without 'em.

breezygirl, That's a great question for the factory. The CC installation instructions are TERRIBLE wit respect to the regulator and gas pressure and their role in the installation. I've also wondered about the role of the regulator in all of this because I assume the factory adjustments are made a certain gas pressure. Without the regulator attached (or with the regulator attached but adjusted to a different pressure) the gas pressure on the CC at home will be different from the gas pressure on the CC as adjusted at the factory. I don't know how sensitive the CC adjustments are to gas pressure -- they may not be sensitive at all or they may be sensitive depending on the gas pathway design in the CC. Perhaps more relevant to us is *how sensitive is the CC simmer setting made at the factory to a different gas pressure as used in the home*? Again, this may or may not be an issue, but I think you should call the factory about your installation without the regulator. There is some possibility this is a building code and safety issue as well... Thanks for your comment and please report back. Billy

hhireno explained it perfectly. DH is going to the appointment also, we're not sure if her husband is going...he claims he's 'not up to it'. This is his MO...he has given up on life years ago and while perfectly healthy, has become an invalid, and she's his primary caregiver. It's pretty sickening. And the reason I am going is she has asked me to go for the reasons hhireno mentioned. She has one other son, who lives out of town-this is the anti-Buddha BIL. He is essentially worthless and she makes excuses for him not being able to come help her. She is the queen of making excuses for others! Her DH has children but he's pretty much estranged from them, due to his attitude on life. They may or may not offer to help her, but I've already made it clear that I WILL NOT step in to help him...that is entirely up to his children. I'm not happy about her depending 100% on my DH because it'll be too much for him to handle. He's got a mysterious health issue going on-long story-he's gone thru virtually every test known to man and they STILL can't pinpoint the issue. That has been causing me a lot of stress, as well as him. He wants to be there for her, and will, but he can't do it all...his business is at it's busy season, he's got order he HAS to get out; he's also sick, etc. If he were her only option for help, then I'd be ok with him doing it, we'd manage, but there are others who CAN help, she just doesn't want to put them out. I guess what is getting to me is that she's already ruled out offers of help from others and is expecting DH to do it all. I will not tell him I don't like that, it's his right to do what he feels he can do for her, but I don't have to be happy about her essentially taking advantage of his being self-employed. That is also a deeper issue...everyone he knows tends to think that because he works from home he's available to drop anything and do their bidding. He's not good at setting boundaries, so he tries to serve everyone and he and I ultimately suffer the consequences. So again, her wanting him to do everything is an issue of his not setting the boundaries. I am not going to do any more than I want to do for my own well being. My role is essentially going to be the one who transcribes the pertinent information. Others can take it from there. But having been thru this with my father and her once before, keeping it all written in a note book helps with every appointment, doctor, pharmacist, etc. That's all I'm going to do, be the recorder-the rest of them can figure it out. Oh, and I'll be an advocate for my DH...if I see it's getting to be too much for him, I'll direct someone else to step in for a change.

I'm not even sure what The Eye is, and I have to admit I didn't click on a link to Trisha's B&B--if I even saw the link: I sort of have a tendency to skip right over those--so I'm not exactly sure what we're apologizing for, but whatever it is, I'm in. Trisha, if I said something that made you feel bad, I'm sorry. I was helping some friends move a while back, and they had a ton of stuff & no money for movers, so a bunch of us all pitched in & helped, although by the time we were done, sitting around rubbing our aching backs & popping aspirin, we agreed we would have been smarter to pitch in money to pay for some real movers instead of doing it ourselves. Oh, well, live & learn. Anyway, the point is this: they had a ton of stuff & there was a narrow hall & a twisty staircase & rooms & doors at odd angles, and every way we turned with a big box or bulky sofa, we were always stepping on somebody's foot, and if we somehow avoided that by backing up in time, we managed to knock someone else down the stairs in the process. It was like a Three Stooges movie without any laughs, although, if you ask me, that would describe all of their movies. Anyway, it was one scraped shin & stubbed toe after another, and you never heard so many mumbled apologies in your life. After the first ten minutes, they were already getting annoying, so I suggested that, to save time--and breath--we all issue blanket apologies to everyone else, to cover all the clumsy, stupid things we would do to them over the course of the day, and that we all accept everyone else's blanket apologies for the things we knew pefectly well they would be doing to us. That way, when I hit my head on the cabinet door somebody else left open, it had alredy been apologized for, & when the coat rack I was carrying caught somebody else's belt loop & tore it, same thing: all forgiven ahead of time. So, so easy, and I decided to try it again, when the occasion next arose, which it seems to have done. So--whatever rude, tactless things I say about anybody's unfortunate choice of paint color or predictable accessories--and with three month left in the year, there's bound to be a bunch of them--well, I'm sorry. What can I say? the truth hurts. And whatever bitter, hurtful comments I get back regarding my smug, know-it-all tone, well, I'm sure they're well deserved. Even if they're not, all is forgiven. And with that, I'm out of here for the night. have a great evening, friends. Trisha, have a good weekend, enjoy your guests & we'll try things again next week. M.