Many years ago we kept a simple Brita water purifier jug on our kitchen countertop. When my husband was in the throes of renovating and updating our kitchen about a dozen years ago we thought why not a built-in water purifier? And we bought locally an American Standard kitchen sink tap set with a built-in water purifying capacity. It required that the carbon filter that was part of the set be replaced at regular intervals, with a newly fresh one to be installed.

At first we were able to procure fresh new carbon filters by American Standard for this special tap set through the same local source where we had purchased the tap set itself. The set didn't come cheap, but it came with a lifetime guarantee. And over the years of constant use American Standard has dutifully as per its guarantee replaced failed parts, free of charge.

Changing the carbon filters is another thing entirely. We discovered of late that the large big-box store of American origin located locally from which we had bought the tap set and subsequent filters no longer carried them, but affiliates in the United States did. We had meant to drop by and pick up a few of them when we had been on holiday in New Hampshire, but once there it had slipped our minds.

The alternative was to order from various outlets online, but we found shipping costs to Canada to be prohibitive.

A week ago my husband called American Standard to ascertain directly from them whether their filters were available at any Canadian sites, to which the answer was in the negative. But the sales representative to whom he spoke offered to send a replacement cartridge free of charge. Apparently, it arrived in the mail yesterday. I say apparently because though it may have arrived, we are not in possession of it.

A key had been placed alongside our mail to be retrieved from our little mail cubby in the group mailbox up the street from our house. The key was linked to a particular parcel box located in the bottom half of the group mailbox. When the door was opened, a vacuum greeted us; nothing inside. Evidently the parcel, package or whatever it was had been erroneously placed in an entirely other box, not the one to which the key we'd been left connected.

We attempted as of yore to contact our local postal station, but to no avail. Cut-backs and 'improvements' in customer service were no longer through person-to-person engagements, but electronic in nature. A recorded message informed of a 1-800 number to call to register concerns. Which was done, and which elicited to our surprise, an email announcement that bounced into our Outlook email account, informing us of a "ticket" number, and that our concern would be addressed in the space of a day or two at most.

How Canada Post obtained our electronic email connection information is beyond us, but then life is full of mysterious happenings including privacy, if one assumes entitlement to it.

A short while later another automated announcement landed again in our email account to inform that the "ticket" had been closed because the matter had been resolved. How this is presumed to have taken place is beyond our knowledge since no further information came forward.

How helpful of Canada Post.