Key condundrums

Keys are an important part of life. You usually don't realize how important they are until you are locked out of where you want to be. Like your house. Or the post office box. Or your room in the shared apartment.

I tried to get sets of keys to all of the above. So far, I haven't succeeded. I'm not done trying, though. (Now I'm starting to get pretty pissed off about it.)

Four full-time employees are based in Key West. A rotating staff of 8 people go through Key West every 9 days. At any given time, there are at least 4 people, usually 8, who come to the fort each week, often on different days. That typically leaves two opportunities a week to bring out the mail. (That's if you don't count the daily tourist ferry, who's staff always offers to bring the mail out to us.) We've been here since November 25. We've received mail twice. I've been told we can't duplicate the mailbox key because it "isn't in the budget." (Home Depot sells keys for $1.59.) I've also been told that the person who holds the mailbox key won't pick up anyone else's mail besides their own, siting that it is a felony to pick up someone else's mail.

Here at the fort, when the wind blows a certain way at our place, it slams the front door shut and locks it as you leave. Robin and I have one key between us. Again, there are no duplicate keys. (I guess it has never been in the budget to make them, either.) When this happens, I have to track down someone who has the master key. (Yep, there's only one of those, too.) He's been on vacation since before Christmas.

I also don't have a set of keys for our apartment in Key West. Same song, same dance.

Solving these very simple issues does not require any out-of-the-box thinking here ... it barely takes any thinking at all. I'm thinking about some TV show or movie I saw where they made key imprints in bars of soap. That might be what it takes!