July 12, 2007

• Miscellaneous Observations

  Lately I have had the opportunity to think about a lot of things.  Well, two things at least.  If "a dot is a lot," then two can be a lot as well, I say. 

  The first thing is the thought that we are so blessed to live in a country where one can criticize the post office without the threat of swift and deadly retribution most of the time.  I remember an incident a couple years ago when I became incensed at receiving a utility bill with a late charge from the city of Salem.  Please understand that I made a regular habit of always paying my bill immediately upon receiving it and had never been late before.  I took my bill to the city clerk, calmly explaining the situation to her.   Obviously, I said,  the U.S. Postal Service failed to deliver my previous month's bill as I had never received it.  We had ourselves a little laugh about the ineptness of the Postal Service.  The clerk took the late charge off, I paid, and the issue was resolved--or so I thought.  A couple weeks later, while shifting a stack of papers on the floor, what should I discover but the missing bill!  Obviously, I thought, the U.S. Postal Service is much more devious than I thought.  They had arranged for someone to break into my house, rummage among my personal papers, and hide the bill (or an uncanny semblance thereof) among those papers!  If they were capable of that, they were capable of anything.  And so when my next utility bill arrived I added back the late charge and paid it in full, vowing to restrain in the future my eagerness to blame the post office for things which were obviously their fault.

  The second thing has to do with a... oh well, it's really not that important.  Nobody cares anyway.

  • 11:39 pm
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