Today was just one of those days. Woke up feeling unusually mentally and physically sluggish, and a solid breakfast and strong cup of coffee did nothing to dispel that.

Then I discovered that yet another important piece of mail had gone astray before getting to me. This has happened to me a number of times since we got a new postal carrier in April or so. The most amusing incident was when my rent bill was returned to my landlord marked "No such address," which must have left my landlord wondering what she'd been charging me rent for all these years.

I got pretty fed up about this. So I phoned the Berkeley post office to complain.

And had an aggravating conversation with a supervisor. I explained that my mail wasn't getting delivered. We went through a few preliminaries, like what my address was.

"Is your name on the mailbox?" Supervisor asked.

"Well, yeah. I think so." When we moved into this place 6 years ago, the landlords stuck little plastic Dynamo labels with my and Daniel's surnames on the box. There's also a list of resident's names and their mailboxes posted on the wall next to the mailboxes.

"Make sure your name is on the box. Because if your name isn't on the box, the carriers won't deliver the letter."

Okay, that one's new to me. One, I thought that what a letter needed to be delivered was, like, a correct address. Two, it's not like all my mail fails to be delivered. Just some. Three, I still get letters addressed to former tenants of this place. But okay. So, what happens to the letters that don't get delivered? I ask.

"They bring the letters back here, and we hold them for ten days, so you can pick them up." Her tone is clearly saying, "See? We hold your letters for you, so you can pick them up, so don't hassle me about your mail not getting delivered!"
I refrain from asking how I am supposed to come and pick up my mail if I don't know that it hasn't been delivered. I decline to point out that there is no mechanism for notifying me that this mail needs to be picked up. Question not the procedure of the bureaucracy. It is Procedure. I just ask what happens to the mail after it's been held ten days.

"We return it to the sender."

Well, it's been over a month since this particular piece of mail should have been delivered, and the sender hasn't gotten it back. But before I can point this out, Supervisor goes on to explain that she will look in the post office for anything that's currently on hold for me, and she'll have it redelivered, and in the meantime, I should make sure that my name is on the mailbox!

"Okay, but-"

Click. Supervisor hangs up on me before I can ask whether there is anything else I can do to track down this very important piece of mail.

Yeah, way to go, P.O. customer service.

Upon further conferring with the sender of said important piece of mail, we determine that it was delivered to me after all. Or rather, the envelope was delivered to me, minus most, though not all, of its contents.

I don't think it was a case of theft. I do remember that the envelope had arrived looking pretty beat up, but since it did contain something that I was expecting to receive, it didn't occur to me at the time to ask whether it was also supposed to contain other things. The missing stuff wasn't that attractive a target for theft - a check that, as far as I know, no one has cashed, and some magazines. My guess is that the envelope was simply handled roughly, that it opened and spilled some of its contents, and some kind postal worker probably resealed it without realizing that some of the contents were missing. No malice necessary.

But nevertheless, I'm not feeling real happy with the USPS right now.

The rest of the day was kind of eh. My brain never did really wake up, and I felt scattered and unable to focus. I left work early, and wandered around Borders. Daniel phoned me and read me the first 300 words of his first Clarion West story. They were a good 300 words. I got some garlic chicken stirfry, and it was good garlic chicken stirfry. I did a little fiction writing. All of this put a better complexion on the day.

I came home, and inspected my mailbox, and damned if that stupid little plastic label hasn't fallen off.

So I laserprinted an Avery mailing label with "W. Shaffer" and "D. Starr" in 24 point Arial Bold, and went down there and slapped it on the box. There will be no further confusion about whether there is a W. Shaffer at this address!

I probably need to send query letters to some magazines who might very well have actually sent me responses sometime in the past month or two, but that will wait until another day.

I'm going to make some tea now.