Well, now, what the fuck?!? (April 8, 2009)

So on the last day of March, I mailed a box of books to Indiana. Someone had paid me $400 for these books, and I'd been sick for almost a week, so they were delayed a bit. I packed them neatly into the box, and even put some styrafaom in there on top of them to keep them from tumbling around and getting their corners all messed up. 63lbs worth of books. Almost, if not totally, in mint condition. I duct taped the box up nice and took it the the post office and sent it on its way, via media mail. 

Yesterday afternoon, I got a phone call from the person I sent the books to. And he was pissed. The box I sent came that day, but thats all that remained of the package I sent out. The books had been taken out of the box, and replaced with 6 random shitty books. Oh, and a bunch of church pamphlets. Some trash and newspaper. My original box had another half box taped to the bottom and a plastic bag tied over it.

So, naturally, he calls me, all irate. Now, I'm irate. Not only do neither of us have even so much as one of those books, which are fairly hard to find and not all that cheap, I have to pay him back $400. We are going to see if there is anything the post office can do, but as I seem to have neglested to get insurance on it, I'm going to assume they're just gonna laugh in my face.

It says on the side of the box that it was $23 some  to ship it. That cmes out to a 63lb load. The box that was delivered weighed less than 10. Thats really the only thing we have on our side right now. And it isn't much. 

So, I thought, there goes a good chunk of my tax check...
Which was supposed to be in my account on "Monday or Tuesday." Well, yesterday totally qualified as Tuesday, and yet... I checked my account online, and where there should have been about $20 left even without a tax check in there, there is a negative balace of $38. For whatever reason, when I checked my balance the other day before making an order online, it told me that I had about $67 in there, which sounded about right.

I fancy myself as somewhat of an optimist, really. I think there's kind of a bright side to just about everything but politics. But you know? With this shit and the other shit I'm dealing with, I have never EVER wanted to just drop dead (by whatever means necessary) this much in my entire life. 

Fuck this ride, I want OFF.

By the by, if anyone has any HELPFUL advice on the books issue, do let me know. And for the record, saying "Next time get insurance on it." isn't helpfiul and will probably just piss me off all over again.