The studio has an annoying policy of writing the date in pencil on the back of pieces that come out of the bisque kiln. At least, it's annoying to me. The graphite burns off if it's fired again in the glaze kiln so it doesn't affect the piece permanently. It annoys me because the extra handling of already fragile pieces could potentially damage them. I wrote a message on the back of this one saying "You don't need to write the date on me. All of my work is picked up promptly," but I was the one to unload the kiln so it didn't really matter.