People have a tendency to distrust my long-time lover, the USPS, insisting upon things like package insurance and delivery confirmation. My post office never misplaced so much as a post card. I balked whenever someone suggested such outlandish acts of treachery. Insure a package? Nonsense. Love really is blind.
I recently entrusted my dear United States Postal Service with another inanimate, government-owned object I'm quite fond of, my United States Passport, which needed to travel to the Chinese embassy in Chicago to be adorned with an employment visa. I loved my passport just enough to do something I've never done - certify my mail. You know what they say, put a lover on a leash and he's bound to run away.
Instantly, my true and faithful servant fell off the loyal service train (or interstate). Ten days after I left my well-traveled passport at the Forest Ave PO in Des Moines, it still had not arrived at its destination. Like any neglected girl would do, I started making phone calls, complete with hopeless pleas and angry tyraids delivered to automated devices that had no capacity to respond appropriately. Like a typical dishonest partner, the USPS returned with vague messages like, "Your case is open, but I can't tell you more than that until the end of the day," and "Your package is at the post office." As opposed to what, the damn zoo? The automated answering service for the track and confirm branch of the postal service actually has a statement when you ask to speak to a real person that says something along the lines of, "Just so you know, the person you are about to talk to likely does not know a damn thing. Do you still want to talk to them?"
I poked and prodded for a full two days before receiving confirmation--via the online tracking system--that my item had been delivered. There is speculation as to whether it sat in the DSM or Chicago post office undetected all those days. Jerk didn't even have the balls to call and apologize.
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