Life’s Small Mysteries

~ beetleypete

Most of us like a good mystery. Whether a ‘What if?’, or a ‘Whodunnit?’, they can often be fun to explore, or challenging to try to work out. But when they affect everyday life when you don’t want them to, then they are just plain annoying. Some of you may recognise the sorts of mysteries below, and others will have their own to tell us about. Please add your own, in the comments.

Disappearing objects.

Many years ago, I bought a Herb Chopper. It was a big curved blade, secured between wooden handles, and it came with a specially indented wooden board to use it on. I intended to chop my fresh herbs with a professional flair, and make more use of them in cooking. At the time, we lived in a very small flat in London. There were few places where anything could be stored, and we had to arrange everything carefully. It was placed in a cupboard under the worktop, and easily visible.
Less than a week later, I bought some fresh Basil, and went to get my new device to chop it. It was gone. The cupboard was emptied out, but there was no trace of the substantial wooden board, and the large, shiny chopping blade.
Even though I knew where I had put it, I duly searched the other four cupboards, a sense of complete pointlessness overwhelming me. Sure enough, it was nowhere to be seen. It had simply vanished. When we moved to Norfolk, I was convinced that it would ‘turn up’, and we would laugh at the strange location it had been found in. But no. It had disappeared, never to be seen again. And it was in good company, as many other possessions had gone the same way over the years.

The spoon in the bowl.

I do most of the washing up around here. I don’t mind doing it, and usually set to it as soon as we have eaten. I am not a person who can tolerate leaving an untidy kitchen until ‘later on’. We don’t have a dishwasher; in fact I have never even used one, let alone owned one. I use a plastic bowl in the kitchen sink, and very hot water that necessitates wearing rubber gloves to do the job. The method works well for me, as long as I always use a ‘premium brand’ washing-up liquid. When everything is clean, and stacked on the plastic stand to drain off before being put away, I tip out the used soapy water, and clean around the sink and bowl to avoid leaving any soapy mess.
As I do this, I can guarantee that there will always be one small teaspoon left in the bowl. No matter how carefully I sweep my fingers around under the water before tipping it out, that elusive spoon will evade capture, preferring to fall into the sink with a ‘clang’ instead. But the real mystery is that even when neither of us have actually used a teaspoon that evening, there is still one in the bowl.

Somewhere ‘Safe’.

Most of us like to keep certain important papers ‘somewhere safe’. Passports, Birth Certificates, Marriage Licence, Social Security and Medical Card, and those all-important guarantees and instruction manuals. I went so far as to buy a portable filing case, with indexed sections for such things, and I have kept it in sight for almost twenty years now. I placed all the papers and documents into the correct letter of the alphabet sections, and closed the lid with a click. But as soon as I needed to access any of those things, they were not there. They had magically migrated to the back of a drawer, sometimes in a different room. A few had disappeared completely, never to be seen again. One was found by chance, in the pages of a book I hadn’t looked at since 1997.
I now just leave them on the desk in the office room, where I can see them every day.
But I still expect them to vanish any time soon.

66 thoughts on “Life’s Small Mysteries”

  2. Pingback: Life’s Small Mysteries — beetleypete – Three Rivers Novelties

  7. I am shocked that a sock will invariably disappear no matter how hard I try to keep the pair together. I can’t fathom it. For decades, the dryer has eaten one sock. I’d just wish it would match it up with its mate.

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  8. Oh, yes, this happens all the time in our house! The wierdest was soon after we moved in and garlic went missing – every time I bought garlic, no matter where I put it, when I came to use it, it wasn’t there. I told a friend who clearly thought I was imagining things until he witnessed it for himself. The flat used to belong to an old lady and I suddenly felt she didn’t like garlic and didn’t approve of it being used in her kitchen. I said out loud, ‘I’m sorry Miss S, but I do like garlic and I intend to keep on using it.’ It never vanished again.
    I hope Julie’s keys have turned up by now.

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  11. We lost the car keys recently, a common enough event, but finding them was quite a task of deduction.
    A chap from Krakow (about 200km away) had popped round to see us to take some soaps back with him, chatter chatter, drink a brew, have a bite to eat, pack up soaps, bye for now…
    Later the same day I went to pick up the car keys and couldn’t find them, the usual search commenced for well over an hour until the idea struck me that our visitor may have picked them up by accident. It then took a further half hour to imagine how this could have happened and call him up.
    He had just arrived home and checked the box of soaps, sure enough he had picked up our keys ( he even remembered doing it ) and put them in the box! And there is the mystery, why?
    Luckily we had a spare set and he popped the keys in the post which arrived a few days later. But it just goes to show that you should never discount the anything, no matter how unlikely.

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    1. Perhaps I should email everyone who has ever been to the flat in London, or visited this house?
      Julie lost her house keys yesterday. They have to be in here somewhere, as she let herself in while I was out. But do you think they can be found anywhere?
      The curse of the blog post!
      Cheers, Pete.

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  16. I used to wonder where my favorite shirt got to. No matter which was my favorite it would disappear. However, I discovered that my beautiful and charming wife threw then away when they developed problems from her point of view–worn collars and missing buttons. I discovered this when I emptied the trash on a laundry day a year ago. I no longer play favorites with shirts. That would condemn them to the trash. Pity, I loved those shirts.
    Warmest regards, Theo

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  18. Too many mysteries to relate here, and some of them would sound too incredible to be true (but they are!). Not so much things disappearing (like socks), but rather things that happen that simply cannot be coincidental. I might include them in a small book someday.

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  21. I can relate! I bought a bottle of Worcestershire sauce last Wednesday in Asda, by Friday when I needed it for cooking it had completely disappeared from the shelf where I put it, I couldn’t believe it wasnt there and had everything off the shelf, but no sign. Checked all the places I knew I hadn’t put it and then went to the local shop for a replacement as I needed some for a recipe. Also I have a filing box, nothing in it is what I need when I need it!

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  22. Pete,
    I have more rows with my wife over ‘Somewhere Safe’ than anything else!

    “Where’s that thing I ordered dear?”
    “I put it somewhere safe”
    “Where’s that then?”
    Oh, I can’t remember but if you put it away properly in the first place, you wouldn’t be hunting for it now!”

    Arghhhhhh!

    I have an ‘office room’ here at home. There’s ‘stuff’ everywhere; shelves, desk, floor. I can lay my hand on anything in a millisecond!

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    1. Hi, Jim.
      I would like to say that I can also lay hands on anything in this tiny, cluttered office. But that would be a lie. 🙂
      Hope all’s well, old friend.
      Best wishes, Pete.

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  23. haha, that’s what you think – they’ll find a way to travel!
    My better-half prides in the fact that the filing system is organized. Then one day a warranty was needed – no one but no one could locate that darn thing – it had taken a walk just like your chopper-thing did!!

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  25. I think your chopper went where that missing sock from the laundry goes…..a dimension all its own…LOL

    Down here because of hurricanes we keep important things in water tight and fire proof containers….chuq

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  26. Teehee, this chimed with me… things just disappearing…. Oh, and congrats on no dishwasher – I don’t have one. And I diligently wash up every evening after my evening meal – nothing worse than dirty dishes greeting you in the morning….

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