![](\"https:\/\/www.usps.com\/ecp\/asset\/images\/586204-L0.jpg\")
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Today is my youngest nephew’s sixth birthday. A week before, I took a box to the dollar store and filled it up with toys I thought he might like. Then I stopped at the post office on my way home from work, proud of myself for planning so far ahead.\u00a0 I wanted to use the self service kiosk, so I didn’t bother to address the box, since the machine would print out a giant label that would cover up the address anyway. I simply wrote “Happy Birthday!” on the side of the box.<\/p>\n
It started pouring rain just as I got to the post office, so I dashed inside, cradling the box to try to keep it from getting wet.\u00a0 I spent about 10 minutes with the machine, getting ever more frustrated as it wouldn’t accept any of my inputs when I was trying to type in dimensions or the address. Maybe the touch screen was misaligned.\u00a0 I somehow managed to finally get to the class options, and the only two it gave me were the most expensive: Express Mail (overnight) and Priority (two day).\u00a0 No parcel post, no first class parcel. I looked over to the counter, and there wasn’t a line.\u00a0 But I was reusing a box with my own address on it, and I didn’t have anything to cover it up!\u00a0 I had no option but to try again the next day, which I figured would make my package arrive late.\u00a0 Furious, I stormed back out to my car.<\/p>\n
The next day was sunny and clear.\u00a0 I’d taped a piece of paper with the address over the old box label.\u00a0 I arrived at the post office after work to find a long line waiting for the sole clerk. I had a lot of things to do that evening, and standing in line at the post office was not one of the things I wanted to do.<\/p>\n
Finally, I was next in line.\u00a0 The woman in front of me was complaining to clerk that the kiosk wasn’t working.\u00a0 No kidding!\u00a0 “Well, there’s nothing wrong with a little human interaction!” replied the clerk pleasantly.\u00a0 For some reason, that response just made me even more angry.<\/p>\n
At last it was my turn.\u00a0 I threw my box on the scale and wielded my credit card before the machine, ready to pay the postage and get the heck out of there.<\/p>\n
“Who’s birthday?” asked the clerk, reading my message on the side of the box.<\/p>\n
“My nephew’s,” I mumbled.<\/p>\n
Without even asking me, the clerk pulled a sheet of CELEBRATE stamps out of a drawer and started affixing them to box.\u00a0 “You’re going to be the cool aunt,” he said, sticking six of them on the box and then carefully cancelling them all with a rubber stamp.\u00a0 Of course, I already AM the cool aunt.\u00a0 But this wouldn’t hurt.<\/p>\n
“Now,” he continues, “Would you like it to get there in 7 to 8 days or Priority mail 2 days for 30 cents more?”<\/p>\n
I paid the extra 30 cents.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today is my youngest nephew’s sixth birthday. A week before, I took a box to the dollar store and filled it up with toys I thought he might like. Then I stopped at the post office on my way home from work, proud of myself for planning so far ahead.\u00a0 I wanted to use the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nonclassified-nonsense"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4159"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4159\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4162,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4159\/revisions\/4162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nachzen.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}