Crappy Service Report: US Postal Service...

Look, I know first hand that when you are doing something on a massive scale like shipping hundreds of thousands of pieces of mail and packages every single day, something bad can happen and it really isn't that someone intended to do a bad job. Sometimes, shit happens. Or sh*t happens if you are offended by such foul language.

So when the post office got in a wreck and burnt up some of my mail, frankly, I was pretty pleased that they stuck it all in a pouch and sent it to me (still wet from the fire hose) with a letter of explaination and an apology.

But let's face it, we don't pay 11 cents for postage anymore. In fact, while my daughter was here in town last month, she spent quite a pretty penny to ship two boxes of stuff back to New Jersey, utilizing the services of the US Postal Service.

The boxes were both fairly heavy which she paid close to $70.00 for, to be shipped at the parcel rate (or as we call it, slow boat to China). Yea, for that price, she went ahead and added the little feature where you can get on the internet and track the status of the boxes, but when the lady at the counter asked about insurance, I just shrugged my shoulders and said no. I figured, and this is me using my Lottery playing brain to think, what are the chances that the USPS could catch my mail on fire more than once? Hey, I quit playing the Lotto right after my big $120 win on the notion that that bolt of lighting ain't gonna strike twice, and look how much money I've saved since then.

So, here's the deal. One of the boxes contained a sewing machine my wife bought about the time my daughter was born when we lived in Italy. So, we have had this thing for 20 years, but it is a lot better quality than what you are going to get at Wal Mart or wherever for the cost to send it.

When she got back to Sopranoland, she dutifully tracked the packages but the strangest thing happened when she got the first box. It would appear as though somebody dropped it off a moving truck, busted all the crap inside, then simply taped the contents back together and sent it on its way. Funny, that little side trip didn't show up on the tracking log on the USPS tracking page on the Internet.So, needless to say, my daughter was pretty upset about the whole thing. She went to the post office, taking the pile of broken pieces and box as evidence but the people simply did as I did when asked about insurance - shrugged their shoulders. Live and learn.

Next time, I'm going with FedEx. You can burn my junk mail up and spend Lord knows how much money to send it to me still smoldering with with a bucket of water and ashes falling onto my slacks when I open it, but you can't track who the star performer was who chucked the box like it was jump shot with 4 tenths of a second left in the game? C'mon, people!

At least pay us back for the $1.75 we spent for the tracking service. Bastards.

Postal Report: Forget the Rain, Sleet or Snow - Fire!

You know that old deal about the US Postal Service and the slogan "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds", yea, well that ain't really their slogan. But if it were official, they could add Fire to the motto.

Turns out some semi-junk mail of mine was caught up in an accident involving a mail truck on the way to San Antonio which resulted in a fire of some sort. The USPS folks recovered all the mail that wasn't burnt to a crisp, and stuck each charred item in an envelope with an explanation and got it to the rightful recipients.Now silly me, I thought it was some sort of marketing ploy when I looked through the clear envelop and saw the charred edges of my mail, so I opened it. Now, my office pretty much smells like my wife tried to burn the place down.

But, good on the Postal folks anyway. It could have been a check from Ed McMahon or something important, so I'm glad they got it to me, still moist from the fire department and charred from the fire. Oh, and I hope the driver is okay.