?#11 from My Sister’s Jar – Laughing at Myself

Tell about a recent time when you have laughed at yourself.

That’s easy.  I have new material daily.  The most recent being yesterday.  Our dear relatives/house guests, who spent their Canadian Spring Break in sunny AZ, left a few items at our home so that we would remember them after their departure.  (Come to find out, they TOOK a few things too, to remember us as well.)  There was a game card for some game system, which I don’t know anything about, but my children tell me it’s crucial for me to send it to their cousin, ASAP.  Whatever. 

Item #2 was a treasured black velvet woman’s blazer that was a critical mix-n-match article for my sister-in-law’s working winter wardrobe.  I agreed to mail it right away, so as not to dampen her apparel choices for too long.  I boxed up the coat, the game card and I threw in our left-over Easter jelly beans.  Aren’t I thoughtful?

Keeve, my youngest son, went with me on my magnanimous mission to mail the misplaced items.  We arrived at the Post Office to find a loooooooong line.  After locating the customs forms on a back table, I laboriously filled out all the blinkin’ little boxes while balancing the triplicate form on my purse.  Eventually, after having enough time to read all of the tattoos on the gentleman’s arms and legs in front of me, we arrived at the counter.  Low and behold I filled out the over-five-pound-box form and my box required the under-five-pound-form.  Another triplicate form to complete with boxes poorly designed for the amount of information required to fit in them.

With that task done, I handed the Post Officer an open 6×9″ manila, bubble-wrap envelope with a book inside…. but no address on the outside.  She flipped it over and then looked at me like my jr. high math teacher used to look at me…. like I was stupid.  I kindly asked, “Could you please tell me how much it would cost to mail this to the furthest destination in the USA?”  I thought it was a reasonable question.  She asked, “Why?”  Can they do that?  I explained that I’m going to be mailing many packages just like this one and need to set a shipping cost applicable to the entire US (for when I sell my books on my website – but I didn’t tell her that.)  She grunted, “I need a zip code.”  She probably knew all the zip codes for the major cities on the East Coast like the back of her hand…. but I don’t.  The only one I could come up with was the zip code for ZOOM.  Remember the song?  ZOOM Zee-Double-Oh-Em, Box three five oh, Boston, Mass, OOOOOH-Two-OOOOOONe-Three-Foooooouuuurrrr.  SendittoZoom.  And I simply could not get the numbers out without the tune.  Keeve looked at me like my jr. high math teacher used to look at me….. like I was stupid.  Maybe I was, but I got the shipping rate I was after.  :o) 

Climbing back into the van, I said under my breath, “Did I really just sing the ZOOM zip code in the Post Office in front of 17 strangers?”  With a grin on his freckled face, Keeve chimed in, “Yep, you did, Mom!”  We both giggled.

Tags: family, laugh, mailing packages, Post Office, son, zip codes, ZOOM