The South African Post Office has surpassed themselves again.

Whenever postage rates go up, people joke that the increase is to pay for more room for storage - delivery times are usually good, but can be horrendous at times.

Two and a half (2.5) months ago, I sent some papers through to my parents.

This week I got the letter back - marked for return to sender, with a stamp saying "Box closed."  The stamp was signed by Hugo on either 12/6 [i.e. 12 June] or 12/8 [i.e. 12 August] (not very clearly written,) so they must have used their extra storage for this letter either before or after stamping, as it only arrived back this week - 25 August.

One wonders if the delivery to the PO Box was attempted from the outside of the Post Office, because obviously from that side it is closed, so that the general public can't scratch through other people's post.

The PO Box in question still works, and has received letters sent since that date.

A scanned copy of this stamp can be seen below.

An aside: they have currently got the most peculiar postage rates.  In previous years, things were usually a multiple of 5 cents to make change easier.  Now, for a standard domestic letter, the cost is R1.77.

International airmail prices are still logical amounts - R4.25 for a standard size/weight letter to countries outside Southern Africa.  But how to come up with that by adding postage stamps together is something they never thought of.  Two standard stamps - R1.77+R1.77 - comes to R3.54.  And they don't seem to produce a 71c stamp.

Justice Often Served by Jury Nullification - Cato Institute

This article really interested me ... while it could result in a huge amount of abuse, it could certainly do a lot of good.  Too many people are prosecuted for silly reasons, it seems, here and in the USA.  We have no such system here.

A common question I get from people disturbed by these kinds of cases is, "What can we do?" Well, here's one thing the average citizen can do: Serve when you're called to jury duty, and while there, refuse to enforce unjust laws. If a defendant is guilty of harming someone else, certainly, throw the book at him. But if he's guilty of violating a bad law, or if you feel the law has been unjustly applied to him, by all means, come back with "not guilty," no matter what the judge, the prosecutor, or the evidence says.

Not only is this your right as a juror, some would say it's your obligation.

The friend at work I mentioned - he missed the rugby due to the SAA strikes.

He came back with a story about someone he met at the airport - 1500 guests invited to a wedding, food etc. planned for the wedding, and the bride and groom were the ones who missed the wedding - thanks to SAA!