In England, most people don't have mailboxes, at least, not where I lived. It's true. What they have instead is an ingenious little flap that allows the postman to push the mail in so it can't come out again. Typically, your mail lies on the mat until you pick it up. But when we moved away from England, we had to get a mailbox, because mailboxes are what they have in many other places in the world.

We must have looked at hundreds of the things. The ones that were meant for rolled up newspapers. The ones that would allow anyone to take your mail back out – and many more. Finally, we settled on the one we have now. It has a big flap at the top, but once the mail is in, you need a key to get it out. OK, so it's no good for newspapers – but we tend to go and get those anyway.