Alice Steinbach in an issue of the Baltimore Sun writes: "It begins one night in early September. While watching TV, you decide to pop some corn, so you go into your kitchen to dig out the old popcorn machine. It's nowhere to be found. Then, a week or so later, you feel a chill in the air and decide it's time to get out the portable space heater. But after an hour or two of searching, you turn up nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero. Over the next two weeks, you search for and fail to find such items as your hair dryer, kitchen shears, desk lamp, portable phone, electric blanket, transistor radio and electric blender. As the mystery deepens, all kinds of scenarios run through your head. A cat burglar. Early senility. Then, before you know it, it's the middle of October, the time when parents of coll…