Trina Machacek: Spring cleaning: My inbox

The debate continues in my head. Do I want to clean down to the shine of my house or do I want someone else to find the sparkle under last year’s deposits of dirt? The question comes up every year as I start counting the days down to spring.

There is one thing that only I, and you, can clean all by ourselves. Our inboxes. This task came up just a few days ago when one friend was trying to send another friend some information via the cyber highway. The sender sent and a few seconds later, ding. The note bounced back.

So, the sender, just like I would, re-sent as there may have been an error in the address. Send. Ding. Bounce. Undeliverable. Now at this point I usually think it is me. Because it usually is me.

You know, I wasn’t holding my mouth right or my glasses read the wrong dot com as dot net. But the second time the sender actually reads the reasoning as to the bounce. Come on, have you really ever done that? Me? Nope. I will now as this is what I learned.

It seems there are various reasons things come flying back when you know you have sent the right thing to the right place at the right time with the right dot whatever. Well. This time the sender sent correctly, BUT! Yes, an overstuffed but. The receiver’s inbox was full. Full?

That happens? How? I sometimes don’t go get my snail-mail for a few days, OK, sometimes over a week. But my mail still gets put into my little mailbox. Even when it is quite full, I get a key to go to another box and pick up the overflow.

We have great people in our Eureka Post Office! But a full inbox? I was under the assumption that the internet was infinite. After all, if there is always room for J-E-L-L-O, how could an inbox ever be full? (Admit it you sang the Jell-O song, didn’t you?)

The curious George, uh Trina, that I am, I of course Googled why an inbox is full. I actually put in, “How come an inbox says it is full when it isn’t.” I got back, “Air pumps to fill tires.” HAHA so I tried again and remembered that Google doesn’t speak Trina.

Short and to the point Machacek. Success. Apparently, we have a memory limit to our email accounts. Limit! A limit of words? Whoa Nelly. I got sweaty palms at the thought of limiting my words. Deeds maybe, but never my words! Little beads of sweat popped out on my forehead.

I read a bit more. In short, the articles told me to keep my spam clean, keep my trash clean, and keep my inbox clean. How clean is clean I wondered. I couldn’t read any further. I don’t want to know what my limit is. Knowing that would keep me on the edge of my keyboard.

Knowing that I may be getting close to being cut off just when I have such important words to write made me… Well, I got up and had a cookie. I was that upset. With milk. HAHA.

I am very fastidious about my email. I get very nervous that at some point some scammers might get in and do all sorts of things I have heard about. Stealing my names and addresses. Poking in places and putting things in hidey holes that can send things out that are really not from me. So, I clean my spam lots of times a day.

I move things from the inbox to separate folders – when I think about it. So luckily, as far as I know, things sent to me have not bounced back to the senders. Oh, how would we even know that was happening? Well, there’s a conundrum.

How would I know if my inbox was sending things back? I mean it’s not like people sending me things could email me and tell me that their notes and letters were being refused by my server, because my inbox is full and I wasn’t able to get notices that my inbox was full, because well you know, my inbox was full. Now there’s a circle of life. AARRGGHH!

In the end my two friends discussed this a bit on Facebook. I had to chime I, because, well I am me. The receiver, who needed to do the cleaning, suggested I should write about this. Now I will endeavor to send this to her. Fingers crossed.

I suppose, just like me trying to decide if I should clean or have someone else spring clean my house, it would be smart of me to let an expert clean. Yes, expert, definitely.

Trina Machacek lives in Diamond Valley north of Eureka. Email itybytrina@yahoo.com.