DR. WALLACE: I was recently traveling with a friend, and we stayed in a hotel room together. Once we left and got home, she realized that she had left one of her smaller bags behind. I remember that she called that evening to ask whether they had found the item, and apparently, they had.

Since she left it behind, she was worried about the freight cost since it was pretty high for it to be returned to our state. Then it just so happened that one of my father's coworkers was traveling to the same city a few days after we returned. The next day, my father told me his coworker could pick up the item for my friend.

But when I told my friend about this, she declined the offer and mentioned that she'd already taken care of it. The strange thing is, I kind of know that she didn't take care of it because another friend of ours said she was frantic about it and the costs just minutes before I called her with the offer to pick her item up.

Should I reach out to her once again to see if she has reconsidered, or just let her figure it out herself? — She Refused His Help, via email

SHE REFUSED HIS HELP: At this point, my advice is to stay out of the matter entirely. She may have some ulterior motive as to why she doesn't want the bag picked up by any third party connected to anyone in your area.

It could be that there are items or items inside the bag that she does not want to be potentially seen or noticed. If it's truly important that it comes back to her directly without any intervention, she'll find a way to come up with the money and get it shipped to her. My advice is not to bring up the matter to her again at all unless she happens to bring it up to you first from here.

WAITING IN LINES IS WASTING MY LIFE!

DR. WALLACE: I hate waiting in lines! The supplies to every kind of line, lines to get food, lines to travel, even lines at a grocery store! I always feel that I'm wasting a lot of hours of my life standing in lines waiting for things.

My usual "go to" in situations like that is to look around and try to notice things more sharply. I look at how a cafe, store or airport is laid out while I'm standing there. I observe the employees and watch what goes on with them. I also watch the behavior of other customers like myself. I guess my thinking is to study business layouts and human nature in case that knowledge helps me with a future job someday. This helps a little, but I still always feel very frustrated. How can I calm down in these situations? — I'm Very Impatient With Lines, via email

I'M VERY IMPATIENT WITH LINES: My suggestion would be to distract yourself more productively if you're up for it. Make it a habit to always carry with you some interesting reading material that you normally don't have time to pursue. This could be something related to a field you may want to enter as a future career, a textbook if you're a student or even something fun that you enjoy reading, but normally don't get the opportunity to squeeze into your busy schedule.

You can also seek to pay bills online using your phone, or even send text messages to friends you only reach out to intermittently. The key is to keep yourself calm, engaged and productive and therefore not fuming at how long the lines are taking.

Dr. Robert Wallace welcomes questions from readers. Although he is unable to reply to all of them individually, he will answer as many as possible in this column. Email him at [email protected]. To find out more about Dr. Robert Wallace and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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