Free Shipping at UPS

Besides hosting one of the greatest author day events in the history of organized education last week, with free books for every student, I think one of the teachers at the elementary school has just given us all the gift of free shipping. Allow me to explain.

Yesterday, UPS showed up with a good-size box addressed to me from Warrior Sports – the company that I bought Son Number Two’s lacrosse gear from. I hadn’t ordered anything from them recently, so I had no idea what it could be. Son Number Two tore into it and produced a box of Lucky Charms cereal, a package of cookies, a book of stamps, and a Happy St. Patrick’s Day greeting card addressed to him.

This seems like a strange thing for Warrior Sports to be sending my son. Are they just the most Irish, most customer-centered company in the entire world – so much so that they send strangely random and personalized St. Patrick’s Day gifts to every single one of their customers every year? Seems unlikely, but here we are…

Upon opening the card, it had a nice note wishing our son a fun-filled St. Patty’s Day, signed, “Love, Mom & Dad.”

Uh… Hmm…

Honey, did you get a second job at a hockey and lacrosse equipment company and forget to tell me?

No? Me neither. Umm… what the heck is going on here?

Then we flipped the box over and saw the second UPS label – the one with a white sticker covering up the bar codes – and my handwriting in Sharpie marker on the flap of the box.

Mrs. Smith – Fifth Grade – Room 12

*sound of light bulbs turning on in my brain, illuminating the dark, confused, hazy cloud*

Ohhhhhhh! Now I understand what is happening here!

This was the old box that Son Number Two’s lacrosse helmet came in, that I then re-used to hand-deliver a big stack of books to Mrs. Smith’s classroom last week. Mrs. Smith then repurposed the box as a St. Patrick’s Day care package for her son, who is presumably in college and enjoys sugary cereal and snacks and never writes home to his parents, and also shares a first name with my son. No one noticed the old UPS label from Warrior Sports on the bottom of the box, since apparently, I opened it upside down the first time. No one, that is, except for the UPS sorting machine that noticed two conflicting labels and kicked it out to the UPS This-Box-Has-Two-Labels-Fix-It guy, who then chose to cover up the bar codes on the wrong one. So, the very coincidental box came back to my house.

So, we peeled the cover-up sticker off the correct bar codes and put it over the other ones, then grabbed the packing tape from the garage and re-taped the cellophane packaging on the remaining cookies as best we could. Then we bundled it all back up for the poor, starving, possibly pre-diabetic college student.

Off we went to the UPS store, where we waited in line to talk to the young lady at the counter. I explained the situation to her and told her I wanted to make sure the label would still work to get it to the college student so he could finally write a letter home to his wonderful parents who have excellent taste in cookies, demanding to know what happened to over half of them.

She said, and I quote, “Oh, sure, no problem. It will get there. The labels don’t expire.”

“OK, great. Thanks.” Wait. What?

The labels don’t expire? How can that be?

The first label did work twice to get the box to my house…

*sound of more light bulbs turning on in my head, although this time much slower, like they were on dimmer switches*

Um… does this mean what I think it means? If you have someone you regularly send things to, I’m pretty sure you never have to pay for shipping again. Just ship it once back and forth with the labels on opposite sides, and never remove the labels. Then simply cover up the other label every time you want to send it back, for free.

I feel like, as a multi-billion-dollar worldwide corporation, UPS would have figured out a fix for this, like for instance, having the labels expire, but here we are.

Thanks, Mrs. Smith, for the life hack! And a very happy St. Patrick’s Day to the young Mr. Smith. Study hard, write your parents, and for goodness sake, don’t forget to brush your teeth.

As for the rest of you, enjoy your free shipping while it lasts. They’re bound to catch on sooner or later.

In the meantime, you’re welcome, America.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2019 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Tracking

The internet is a wonderful invention. I’m not sure how three hundred million people all watched the same cat video within a day of each other before the internet was invented, but thank God we can do that today. Seriously, today. There’s another one. Why are you reading this? Wait… just kidding. Come back.

While watching hilarious lip-synced parody music videos, sharing cell phone videos of people dumping ice water on their heads, and posting pictures of your lunch are all very important, the single greatest use of the internet is obviously the ability to track your UPS package’s every single movement across the country.

It all starts with that glorious email from Amazon. “Your package has shipped!”

Sweet Lord in Heaven, thank you. That was an excruciating seventy-five minutes of waiting since I hit the “Place Your Order” button.

Sign in.

Go to “My Orders.”

Sign in again. Why? Oh, well, whatever.

There it is; there’s the beautiful picture of my merchandise. Look at it. I can’t wait to have it in my hands! And there’s the best button in the whole world; right there next to it in all its glorious yellow awesomeness: “Track Package”

I wonder how many miles it has traveled already? Oh, boy! *Click*

January 19, 2015, 7:42 am - A shipment label has been created. Tracking information will be available when the package arrives at the carrier facility.

I thought you said it shipped? You just sent me an email. It’s still sitting on your desk, isn’t it? Ship it already!!

January 19, 2015, 1:32 pm - Package has left seller facility and is in transit to carrier.

What the hell were you people doing for the last six hours? 

January 19, 2015, 1:23 pm, Chester, VA, US - Package received by carrier

Now we’re talking. You guys are finally using time travel. The trip from the seller’s facility to the carrier took negative nine seconds! Wait a second… If you guys have time travel, why can’t I just have my stuff three days ago? And when will this technology be available to the general public?

(note to self – see if Amazon sells time machines yet. Also, rent Hot Tub Time Machine again)

January 19, 2015, 1:30 pm, Chester, VA, US - Package has left the carrier facility

OK, a seven-minute turnaround is pretty good. Waaaay better than that six hours last time. But, again with the time travel question…

January 20, 2015, 12:49 pm, Louisville, KY, US - Package arrived at a carrier facility

An entire day to get from Virginia to Kentucky? I just looked at a map, fellas. They touch. Did the driver have to push the truck the whole way? And what do you mean “a carrier facility?” Shouldn’t that be “the carrier facility?” Did he just push the truck into the first place he found in Louisville? Do they know where my stuff is supposed to go?

January 20, 2015, 3:31 pm, Louisville, KY, US - Package has left the carrier facility

Now it’s “the carrier facility” again. I guess he got it to the right one. Seriously, though, three hours to unload a truck that a guy could push? Seems a little weak. Is it on another broken truck? Train? Plane? Give me more information, dammit. Kentucky is a long way from California! (Come to think of it, I think both states are very happy about that.)

January 20, 2015, 10:04 pm, Mather, CA, US - Package arrived at a carrier facility

Mather is an airport. OK, that means you had it on a plane. That would have been good information at 3:31 pm. I’m just sayin’. Wait a second. The time change is in our favor coming west. Why did it take nine and a half hours to fly from Kentucky to California? Was he in a WWII biplane? Did he go east and fly over Europe? It’s 10:30 pm now. Why hasn’t my package left Mather yet?

January 20, 2015, 11:28 pm, Mather, CA, US - Package has left the carrier facility

That must have been some line to taxi to the gate. Or did he have to get out and push the biplane?

January 21, 2015, 12:58 am, West Sacramento, CA, US - Package arrived at a carrier facility

OK, now seriously. An hour and a half? Mather and West Sacramento are like three miles apart. Did he walk the package over? Besides being inefficient, at that time of night, in that neighborhood, that is not smart. And again with “a carrier facility?” I guess if I was walking around down there at one in the morning with a bunch of packages, I would probably duck into the first place I found, too.

January 21, 2015, 2:17 am, West Sacramento, CA, US - Package has left the carrier facility

Why are you guys even up at this hour? And more importantly, why doesn’t this say “Out for Delivery?” You’re taking it to another “facility,” aren’t you? C’mon, I’m awake, too. Just drive it over here.

January 21, 2015, 4:54 am, Rocklin, CA, US - Package arrived at a carrier facility

All right, fine. I’m in Rocklin, so I guess bringing it to “a facility” in Rocklin makes sense. I’m ready for it any time… Hello?... Hello?...

January 21, 2015, 8:21 am, Rocklin, CA, US - Out for delivery

Seriously? You’ve had it for over three hours now. You guys have just been sitting there staring at it, haven’t you? Fine, whatever. Just get it here please.

January 21, 2015, 3:34 pm, Rocklin, CA, US - Delivered

Seven hours to drive three miles!? That took almost as much time as it did for the guy to fly the biplane from Kentucky to California. It’s about damn time, is all I can tell you. I really needed this new lint roller!

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2015 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!