Monday, August 27, 2012

More Sign Language and Alphabets and the Postal Service's Sense of Humor.

So, I was kinda bummed when I realized I had to stop printing the ASL fabric. Honestly, the drawings took a while, and I just love all the happy little hands. But I had always planned to use them for more than just the fabric, and last week I finally had a chance to get it done! I promise I'll stop bombarding you with alphabet posters (eventually), but I am really enjoying doing them right now, and I plan on utilizing my kindergarten education to it's full extent.
Kinda fun, right? I wanted to do something really simple and graphic; that would be educational but not so institutional that it wasn't good for juss bein' purdy. Biased though I am, I think it came out pretty nicely.
So, obvs, it's in the etsy-- I've got the 8x10's up now, and shall be putting up 12x18's soon.
Now, friends, let's chat about me. A-duh, it's a blog, it's what I do. One of my many character flaws is my overdeveloped sense of "fairness". This sense of being the Ultimate Authority on Justice just happens to only pertain to following rules that I want to follow, and that, when not followed by others, tend to inconvenience me. They're all deeply first-world issues, the epicenter and victim of all these various injustices always happens to be, uhhhhhhm... Me?

One major trigger is proper driving practices, which would require a WHOLE other post to adequately cover. I have the most self-righteous road rage you have ever experienced. My blood pressure goes up a bit just thinking about all the different driving-stupidities I encounter regularly-- I CAN RANT FOR HOURS. Again, though, whole other post.

One of my other big issue is with lines. Or queues, for people from fancy-pants countries. I would like there to be a nationally instituted set of rules for standing in lines, which would be posted prominently in all public places where lines might occur. Like, ok, in a line at the bank, I HATE it when people don't fill out deposit slips beforehand. Especially when I am filling out my slip when they get in line, and then end up behind them as they do it when standing in front of the teller. Once I actually asked a man if he could move over so that I could make my already prepared, ahem, deposit. He did, and despite the bank employees thinking I was kinda insane, I felt triumphant for the rest of the day. Same thing with customs forms at the post office, same thing with people at the front of a long line who ask long series of questions when the answers to them are stated clearly on POSTERS on the WALL, with BIG LETTERS. These people are LITERATE. Grr.

But, ok, I have gotten off track. Set up for the story: I am a big fan of trivial rules.

I send a lot of letters and packages via the USPS, and I have a system, so pretty much everything I send, I have sent hundreds of times before in the same way. And if I have any concerns about shipping something, I make sure that it is OK'ed by the nice folks at the post office. So, a few weeks ago I was surprised and a bit peeved to get a package returned to me, addressed identically to MANY before it. I was so irked by the injustice of it, that it took me a few minutes to realize that the USPS had told me a HILARIOUS joke. (note: names and addresses were not blurred out in real life.)
cannotbeprocessed01

You see, some rule-lovin' postal worker had decided that the return address on my letter was in the wrong place. Because of this, they decided that the envelope could not be processed. And since it could not be processed, they would have to send it back to the UN-PROCESSABLE return address. Never mind the fact that a return address is not even a legal requirement to mail a letter, it's actually entirely optional, and the fact that I had mailed the package in-person at the post office, so it had been accepted and stamped by a human postal worker who saw no problem with it. This fine inspector had decided that I should be informed that my cutesy stickers were NOT appreciated, ahthankyouverymuch, and that I really need to get my act together with my return-address-protocol.
cannotbeprocessed02

Seriously? It's hilarious. Maybe even worth the money I had to pay to re-send it. The women at my PO thought so too, and you KNOW they deserve a laugh at the system's expense. Have I learned my lesson? Probably not, but I did get to complain about something on the interwebs, so.

2 comments:

arajane said...

ok, first off, i'm pretty sure that we are kindred spirits, because i complain about pretty much the same stuff. and i'm VERY BIG ON RULES. so i enjoyed your post office story so very much.

secondly, i received my alphabet print and love it even more than i can express. but then you threw in the ingrid sign language print and i nearly lost my shit! gah! you are seriously the best ever. thank you thank you thank you for making my day, my week, my month.

rachel said...

Er.... did you mean Britain when you referred to 'fancy-pants countries'? Because we Brits ARE the best people in the world (sorry, Russia) when it comes to queuing. We are orderly, patient, quiet, unenraged, and we can do it for hours, usually because we have to, as staff cuts have closed down every service window but one. If you listen carefully, you may catch a timid whisper from someone who has just about lost the will to live, about time having no meaning in this post office/pharmacy/supermarket/airport check-in, but if you need to pop out of line for a minute, you can be pretty sure that someone will keep your place for you till you get back. But wait until someone tries to push in - usually the ruthless elderly with sharp elbows - and see what happens!