DEAR SUN SPOTS: Thanks for your great column. You surely help a lot of folks in your readership and beyond.

I have a beautiful snow globe that is many years old and the water is turning dark. I would love to find someone who knows how to replace the water or could do this for me. Thanks again. — Gail Roberts, Kenro@megalink.net

ANSWER: Sun Spots found several services online, among them www.snowgloberepair.com, www.snowglobecentral.com and http://tinyurl.com/n62o4c. The last site has no email, but offers a phone number (507-645-4571) and a good tip: Don’t send your globe during the winter or it may freeze and break.

Readers may know of someone local who offers this service.

Another option is to try and fix it yourself. Sun Spots found a few hints on doing so at http://tinyurl.com/89rxdud

DEAR SUN SPOTS: Do you know why my monthly payment check to Central Maine Power Co. is mailed to Newark, N.J., as is my Time Warner Cable check? Do we not have companies in Maine who could process our monthly bills? — No Name, Auburn

ANSWER: For answers to this question, Sun Spots approached the company spokesmen. At Time Warner, Andrew Russell responded that the payments “go to Newark because that’s where the bank that processes our payments is located.”

Although Time Warner serves customers in Maine, it is not a Maine-based company, so it is not surprising that they use an out-of-state bank.

As for CMP, their spokesman, John Carroll, wrote the following to Sun Spots:

“We consolidated some of our billing operations to an outside vendor in early 2011 for better efficiency. The vendor was selected based on a competitive process. I don’t know if any companies from Maine submitted a bid to provide the service, but apparently no company in Maine offered to provide the service as economically as our present vendor.

“This decision will help keep rates low for customers by keeping our company’s costs low, but we were able to find new positions in the company for all of the employees who had formerly worked in our remittance processing and wanted to continue working for CMP. No employees left the company involuntarily as a result of our decision to contract out for these services.”

DEAR SUN SPOTS: Is it possible for you to check whether you have any item about marriage in your paper within the last month and half between two individuals? (Names withheld from publication.)

I would appreciate very much if you can help me with information on this subject. He seems to have gotten married, and as far as I am concerned we have not gotten divorced yet. Best regards. — No Name via email

ANSWER: Sun Spots did not turn up the names No Name sought, but that doesn’t mean they haven’t gotten married. The Sun Journal runs logs of public records such as marriage, divorces and births, but it is dependent upon the local town and city authorities to provide them, so there can be a considerable delay.

If you know in what town or city they got married, you can visit that town office or city hall and inquire. Or you can continue to search the Sun Journal by going to sunjournal.com and searching for those names.

This column is for you, our readers. It is for your questions and comments. There are only two rules: You must write to the column and sign your name (we won’t use it if you ask us not to). Please include your phone number. Letters will not be returned or answered by mail, and telephone calls will not be accepted. Your letters will appear as quickly as space allows. Address them to Sun Spots, P.O. Box 4400, Lewiston, ME 04243-4400. Inquiries can also be e-mailed to sunspots@sunjournal.com.

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