There are currently 68 photos in the Post Office gallery. That means Donna and I have driven into 68 towns in South Carolina and parked the Miata in front of their Post Office, gotten out of the car and snapped 2 to 4 pictures. Sixty-eight sounds like a lot, but it is not many when you think of how many Post Offices there are. But just how many are there?
The original number from the Postal Gallery site that started this for me was 367, but I recently got a list of SC Zip Codes from Wikipedia and they list 541 of them. I didn?t blog yesterday because I was too busy. I was gripped by my latest obsession (used without permission), I needed to find out how many Post Offices there are in South Carolina. From about 6:00PM until nearly 10:00 PM, I was at the usps.com web site using their Post Office locater. I found quite a few zip codes on that list that don?t have their own Post Office, but I also found a few towns that had more than one post office per zip code.
I now have a number to shoot for ? 459. Here is the excel spreadsheet if you are interested: South Carolina Post Offices.xls I?m sure my total of photos will be somewhat less. There are approximately 20 Contract Postal Units (a CPU is a station or branch operated by a contractor, typically in a store or other place of business) and unless there is an obvious sign out front proclaiming Post Office!, I won?t be taking pictures of those. South Carolina has 3 or 4 universities that may have Post Offices that mainly serve the students and are walkup in nature, so I might not be able to get the Emperor in the photo. Plus there are 5 military bases and I?m not so sure they will let me in, especially after I explain what I want to visit their base for. I already have two Post Offices I couldn?t find, so there is bound to be several more before I finish. My guess is when we are all done there will be 425 photos posted in the web gallery.
Four hundred twenty-five photos with 20 on a page means 22 pages. Sixty-eight so far, divided by 425 total, equals 16% complete. Plus there is the time issue to take into consideration; I?m due a new Miata in 1364 days and I need to have the same car in each photo, so I will need to add a average of one new photo every 3 days until November 2010. The task seems kind of daunting now that I?ve written it all down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 66
What you have done so far in your Post Office quest has been more or less fun. If you try to make your new found timetable a reality, you will likely take the fun out of making the trips. You should decide whether you wish to keep the car longer or accept that the next car will be in some of the pictures. It is better to enjoy the trips as it is a good excuse for you and Donna to go for a ride together and also discover new sights and foods.
Don’t worry, the numbers game was just me fooling around over analyzing, when it stops being fun, we’ll stop if there are 391 or 91 left.