In our community, you must call the utilities companies before you dig any kind of hole. So, when we moved into our new home, I called them before digging a hole for our mailbox, and they came to spray-paint the ground the next day.

I'm an engineer, so I was having a bit of fun that afternoon deciding which colors were water, sewer, and electric services. Then I came to a strange symbol they had spray-painted close to the curb. It didn't match anything I had ever seen on any engineering drawings. It wasn't a symbol for a transformer, or an underground meter, and I just couldn't figure it out. It was a semi-circle over two dots, with a full circle around the whole thing, with another dot right in the middle of the circle.

As I stood and stared, I began to walk around the marking. When I got to the other side, I realized it was the international symbol that told me to dig my hole right there - It was a smiley face!

Received from Joel Townsend.

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