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Pushing The Postal Envelope
Alexander Burke writes: "The Annals of Improbable Research has a sidesplitting account of their research into exactly what the USPS will tolerate. They mailed various items -- ranging from the absurd to the grotesque, usually without packaging -- to various real domestic addresses. Said items include a hammer, a rose, a ski (!), a tooth, a brick, a helium balloon, a bottle of water, and many more. It's pure craziness, and definitely worth a read!"
A friend once mailed a letter to another friend by simply describing her house and its location (ie, the 2 story brown house 3rd on the left on Whatever Road). It arrived.
I worked for UPS once.. and watched the guy next to me put his fist through a couple boxes. Could have been monitors or fragile china. Who cares? You knew the risk when you shipped it. The people who work there are basically part-time slaves with no benefits and massively overworked. When I first started at UPS I was careful about package handling and did just like the videos showed. But, towards the end -- I used to take big, HEAVY metal car parts and throw them into boxes as hard as I could - try to see how much shit I could damage in one toss. Hey! You haven't *seen* damage until you've watched something fragile get caught in the gears and stop the conveyor line! Holy sheep shit!
it's because of people like this that the postal rates have just increased!!! luserzsadfjhdafjkhlkjhasdf!!!
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$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Yes, but you're talking about the exception to the rule. In decades of mailing things I've NEVER had any problems with the USPS. Everything gets there within 5 days in a usable condition. Surely you can expect it to get scuffed a bit from being handled but that's what envelopes and packaging is for. It's certainly no different than UPS or Fedex playing package football with your boxes of replacement China marked "exremely fragile!". :-) I think the USPS deserves a lot of credit for the kinds of shit they DO put up with. Now that I've said that, I will admit I don't use the USPS at all anymore as I pay all my bills online. Much cheaper. :-)
Of course, you have to doubt the sanity of someone who thinks getting down on their knees and mubling an incantation will get them a perfect afterlife where they are waited on by angels.
Every religion is ridiculous if you choose to look at it in that way. Every religion is correct if you choose to look at it in another way.
The two secrets to success: 1- Don't tell anyone everything.
-13
That's as may be, but it's still relying on government to enfore the postal monopoly on first-class mail. Because FedEx isn't allowed to start delivering small non-time-critical envelopes for less than the Post Office does, the Post Office can reap monopoly profits on that service.
I play Nerd-Folk!
Then they'd sue you back to the the industrial revolution. Not worth the risk.
Free Mac Mini. Yes, I'm
And UPS manages to 'roughhouse' anything you send via them. I recently had a delivery of computer parts which were totally destroyed by UPS. The box looked like someone had dropped a 16lb bowling ball from a 2 storey window on to the box. Inside was a motherboard, hard drives, processor, RAM, video and network cards. Pins and packaging were all broken mashed together, quite a mess. UPS ended up with the $1100 bill to replace them though.
The replacement package arrived a bit better, but STILL had knocks on it. Does UPS play football with these packages?
I used to get packages via the USPS from my girlfriend (now my wife) when I was living in England and they all arrived in REALLY good condition, even fragile items like ornaments.
I'm left with the impression that UPS doesn't actually give a shit about the quality of its delivery system, 'just so long as it gets there'. It's no damn good delivering something if its broken in the process IMHO.
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Delphis
A repost of a comment as an article is just fine by me, and this is the kind of news that never really goes out of date until everyone's heard it already.
I don't think most people even read the comment. I didn't.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
If you go back to Edmund Burke, who wrote the definitive text on conservatism, you'd see that conservatism is more "people are dangerous, and thus should have constraints placed on them."
Yeah, these "researchers" put the postal workers through a little grief. But from the looks of it, the workers themselves were more often amused. :)
Also, they took the time after the whole thing was over to buy chocolates for everyone they tortured. That seems to me to be fairly respectful.
"You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocketship underpants don't help" -- Calvin
Memepool was running this story like 2 months ago. Slashdot is getting slow now that it's run by a bunch of corporate drones. What happened to the "bleeding edge" ?!?!?
Well, I hope so. And I hope he never got to whatever it was. People who do things like that deserve all the petty hardships we can throw at them.
Randall.
On a visible but distant shore, a new image of man;
Property law should use #'EQ, not #'EQUAL.
Did the USPS lose them or did the Aussies? How can you be sure it was the USPS. Don't blame anyone until you have the evidence.
photosMy Photostream
The poor guy who had to figure out what to do with the moldy and stinky cheese deserves a medal
He does? You are kinda free with the medals, aren't you?
The person who was forced to break the brick into little pieces to check for drug content probably had better things to do.
Better things to do? Probably not, if his job involves breaking bricks to check for drug content. Besides, I am not a big fan of War on Drugs and if USPS does break brick apart to check for cocaine inside (which I doubt very much), it would be my pleasure to send somebody a brick once in a while.
And the person who had to lug the snow ski to a mailbox probably does not get enough medical coverage by the USPS to make up for the dent in his back
A ski weights what? A couple of pounds? If that will make a dent in his back, he has bigger problems than weird customers.
Give 'em a bit of respect
I don't see how sending a brick, or a rose, or a ski, or a.... through the mail consitutes disrespect for people working there. Or are you arguing that all pranks and that kind of humor in general is evil and should be strictly verboten?
Kaa
Kaa
Kaa's Law: In any sufficiently large group of people most are idiots.
Amen, brother.
-Splat
Saying that witches don't exist is like saying Christians don't exist. Witchcraft is a valid and recognized religion.
Of course, you have to doubt the sanity of someone who thinks taking a lock of their hair and chanting to it will make them fall in love or whatever...
Wouldn't it be simpler to get a drug-sniffing dog to examine the brick BEFORE destroying it? Anyway if it had contained drugs, wouldn't it better to ship it and then arrest the recipient AFTER delivery?
perhaps a female dog urinated on the brick before they sent it. the male dog could still smell it and went crazy. or the senders could have been doing drugs before they sent the brick, leaving a residue on it. the dea thought the brick contained drugs so they smashed it. if it had drugs they would have found a similar brick and had it delivered, but since it didnt they sent the pieces to the owner.
since an explination wasnt given for how they came to the conclusion it had drugs we just wont know.
use LaTeX? want an online reference manager that
-- john
it's probably something that you unknowingly agree to when you ship with usps.
use LaTeX? want an online reference manager that
-- john
Nope, the reason we are losing the "War on [Some] Drugs" is because it is stupid to involve cops/judges/jails in a futile attempt at changing people's behavior. Drug use (not all use is abuse) should properly be a medical issue not a legal issue.
Then there is the racial aspect, where Blacks and Latinos are thrown into prison for drug violations on a disproportionate basis. Most of the violence that comes about from enforcing drug laws takes place in the barrios and ghettos of AmeriKKKa. If there are valid scientific reasons for this racist policy, where are the scientific studies showing that Whites are not affected by drugs at the same rate that minorities are?
The "War on [Some] Drugs" is just the White man's way of maintaining power over minorities. The crime rate is going down, so why on earth would "fiscally conservative" Whites throw and more more money at the "law enforcement/criminal justice" complex if not to continue suppressing this country's minority citizens?
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You think being a MIB is all voodoo mind control? You should see the paperwork!
A man who wants nothing is invincible
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You think being a MIB is all voodoo mind control? You should see the paperwork!
A man who wants nothing is invincible
A liberal judge will rule against the cops more often than a conservative judge will. If a cop lies about probable cause, then he will have a harder time persuading a liberal judge than a conservative judge that he actually has probable cause, mainly because the conservative judge is more willing to believe said cop on the strength of his word than the liberal judge would.
So in the context of my original post, conservative was EXACTLY the right word to use...
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You think being a MIB is all voodoo mind control? You should see the paperwork!
A man who wants nothing is invincible
Why? Is it because counter to your protestations, you DO care about our skin color? Minorities are then not "casual users", huh? I think you meant to say "White users"...
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You think being a MIB is all voodoo mind control? You should see the paperwork!
A man who wants nothing is invincible
221 B baker street is the sherelock holmes museum. pretty small and expensive (7 bucks for a look see) but nicely preserved.
I have received several postcards from friends on vacation, addressed something like this: "Small white house across from the railway station, with Land Rover in the driveway". :-)
A)bort, R)etry or S)elf-destruct?
I'm talking about a US zip code for a city outside of the US. All the US mail I get here in Melboure Australia seems to be bar coded with 00194+0000.
Anyone want to send me a letter? I wonder what would happen if you mailed it to
Tim
86 Nicholson
3065
with the 00194+0000 barcode.
The US seems to have a ZIP code for at least Melbourne. It would be cool to see if someone from the US could mail a letter to your friend with [name], [postcode], [zip+5 barcode for Australia]
It doesn't matter if the UPS guy knows you or not. Anymore, they just drop the box at the door, ring the bell, and run back to the truck, whether a signature is required or not. Used to be they'd leave things with the neighbor.
FedEx is starting to get used by a lot more companies. Their prices are competitive and the packaging is unmolested. A box we got from UPS the other day had a big gashed/crushed spot in it. The UPS guy said we should tell the sender to pack their things better. Uh....
Let's also look at the labor situation. UPS is completely unionized, at FedEx, only the pilots are.
A guy I knew in college played this game with a friend of his who lived across the country. They would find strange objects to send to each other, write the address and message on the object, and mail it.
Some of the things they sent:
*A (plastic) jar of peanut butter (with a piece of chocolate inside...they had a thing for old Reese's commercials).
*A toilet seat.
*One side of those plastic "wet floor" signs.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Other strange things that have come through the system include an unwrapped matress, a freshly severed bear's head, LOTS of tires with no wrapping, a car bumper that looked like it had been ripped off the car, complete with the license plate, boxes of live crickets which usually break open so you have crickets loose all over the place, individual car parts with no wrapping. Rank food is quite common on return items.
Not to criticize your findings of strange items, but according to UPS's shipping guidlines, tires and bare metal parts are quite acceptable if common sense is used, however some of the items you mentioned would have never left my store they way you described.
Nonetheless, I agree with UPS's reliability. For a retail shipping outlet I actually *see* what goes into these brown boxes (yes, I did a severed bear head too for a taxidermist).
IMHO, I think USPS should get out of larger parcels altogether (12x12x12 max). Their tracking systems, claims process and customer service is horrible. They need to be deregulated like NSI was over internet domains and start making shipping/mailing a open market.
- Slash
Years ago I heard from a postal worker about having to deliver mail to "The third house on the left past the gas station on route 101", and it actually got through!
Yes. The USPS is surprisingly accomodating about addresses like that, especially if your destination is a small town where the postal clerks know everyone by name.
(Especially since doing that would result in them seeing some... unpleasant... things fairly frequently.)
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Obfuscated e-mail addresses won't stop sadistic 12-year-old ACs.
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
generally, when no one comments, it is not a discussion, it is a monologue. What made you think that we weren't having a discussion here? I mean, you replied to me, I reply to you, someone else might reply, so what is the problem? Discussion.
I'm thinking that, if it is in a balloon, it is in fact wrapped. And hey, there is some helium naturally in the air, I would guess then that we are all transferring a bit of unauthorized helium around with us everywhere we go. Saying you're lightening the plane, yeah, okay, but you are still taking up volume, so they have a right to at least a bit of postage, even if it is not measurable on the postal scales. :P
No need to want anything more than that, but the problem many people have, often you don't get that much: mail that takes ages to get delivered, is lost, or arrives in damaged condition (even if packaged properly...).
Say no to software patents.
Ten times a day? Wow, not very devoted are you? I'm reloading at least 100. :)
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"What do you want me to do? Whack a guy? Off a guy? Whack off a guy? Cause I'm married."
You're not?? Then WHO THE HELL WAS IT!!!!
"I'll take the red pill. No! Blue! AAAaaaahhhhhhhhh"
- Monty Python meets the Matrix
- If the brick was from a historic building or being sent for lab analysis, why the hell are you posting it in the general mail. You should be using a courier or hand delivering if it's that important.
- Why should the government refund you the postage when the item was delivered but it was a stupid thing to post. The first thing I would think on seeing a brick is why the fuck would someone mail a brick except to piss off the mailpeople or to hide something.
- If they thought it might be a bomb (and you could fit a pretty nasty bomb into the size of a brick) and they blew it up, that would leave, um a demolished brick. What should they do if they simply thought it MIGHT contain drugs, say to themselves "well it MIGHT contain drugs, but we can't be sure so well just have to deliver it and hope for the best".
Man, GROW UP. Scheech, lawsuit over a brick, you MUST be a yank (no offence to sane non-sueing US citizens)!"I'll take the red pill. No! Blue! AAAaaaahhhhhhhhh"
- Monty Python meets the Matrix
Every now and then we get mail with my name and our 5+4 zipcode on it. So yeah.. mail sometimes comes without the normal street address. [Even really fast when you send it with the barcode on it. ;-)]
Don Armstrong -".naidnE elttiL etah I"
http://www.donarmstrong.com
I guess people assume that because it's the government, it can't be efficient, despite receiving proof that it's a pretty well-run system every day in their mailbox.
Actually, it is a self sustaining private corporation. It happens to be owned by the government but it is not the government. This happened as part of the Postal Reorginization act, passed into law in 1970. Prior to this change, the post office had been overwhelmed, and was unreliable and inefficient. Major hubs were completely clogged, the Postmaster General had no control over the wages of the workers, the condition of the vehicles and buildings used, etc.But it's a fact that ANYBODY wandering the streets so high that they are a risk to others should be jailed. In the same way a drunk person wandering the streets causing injury to others or damage to property should be jailed.
But as long as they aren't infringing on other's rights, you are basically correct.
Where you become drastically wrong is that shit about race. Nobody has claimed that Caucasians don't use drugs, and I don't know of any studies showing that Latinos or Blacks use statistically more drugs than Whites. Most minorities who are in jail for drug convictions got caught for something. For socioeconomic reasons, proportionally more minorities are involved in dealing drugs (this is based on my personal observations, and uh... "purchases"). Trafficking and dealing are the primary targets of most enforcement, far more than users.
Also, in general, minority community standards seem to make it more acceptable, or at least a more regular practice to use drugs in places that are out in the open, in communities that are more heavily policed due to generally higher crime rates (i.e. the barrios and ghettos you referred to). This is purely logical, although it may have unfortunate statistical results in your mind. I would counter that if the people in those ghettos weren't shooting each other all the time, the cops wouldn't be riding around looking for people to arrest in those neighborhoods and wouldn't have to use any means necessary to supress gang-related activity, etc. You would counter that my brutal white suppression of your economic chances has resulted in that situation. I would counter that many minorities have faced worse situations when they first came to this country, but they prioritized their children, their families, and educations, and within a generation or two they were out of their ghettos.
My point? Work to eliminate the backdrop of violent crime in your community by reaching out to children and lobbying for educational opportunities for all people. Then take some damned responsibility within these communities to care for your children and instill them with values that emphasize education and success, not the "coolness" of being gang members, or stealing, etc. Don't blabber to me about oppression. The vast majority of Americans don't care about your skin color, but rather about your behavior. If you want success and you go for it, you will get it. As for the War on [Some] Drugs, we should all be united against this silly waste of our money. Let's put those dollars into education and work training programs as well as drug rehabilitation for hard-core addicts who are a threat to themselves and society. Leave the casual users alone, legalize the distribution channels, tax it, and I'll open up a cannibis shop. :)
by this guy here.
Nah.. actually I have a script that checks the front page every 10 minutes and sends any updates directly to my cellphone.. =)
How about creating a new slashbox that has like the top20 news from last week or so. This way we could have some good articles showing longer and maybe prevent these silly reposts after a week. Those people defending the repost based on the fact that they don't read slashdot every day(what?!?) would be happy and those of us who do reload the front page 10 times a day didn't go insane..
Well, 5+4 zipcodes are a bit different from Australian postcodes. Aussie postcodes are 4 digit, and in a city generally cover an area about 1.5km to 2km square. 5+4 zipcodes, on the other hand, are so hi-res that they can easily distinguish down to the level of individual houses. After all, in 9 digits there's a billion possible codes, and only about 0.25 billion Americans.
For another of my friends, you don't need to write his street address on the envelope, as his family have moved several times within the one postcode. So on the envelope, you just write [name], [postcode], AUSTRALIA; and that's all.
Speaking of High School, a guy I knew, as a final farewell to everyone that ever pissed him off during the course of our school years, wrapped up a shoe-box of his excrement, toe-nail clippings and shower drain spooge and mailed it to people. This was all wrapped in sealed bags so the smell would not give it away.
It was sick and childish but it's better than killing those people I guess. And point being, the mail service delivered it without question.
"Draw them in with the prospect of gain, take them by confusion." Sun Tzu
The funniest story I've heard is a letter addressed to (*ahem*, quite some time ago of course):
:-)
Mark Twain
God knows where
Several months later, the sender received the reply:
God did
// TODO: fix sig
I shipped several extremely well packed boxes across the country and the majority had some damage, including one that was filled with packing peanuts that in spite of being *double boxed* and having enough strapping tape to look like graph paper, was destroyed. It also looked like someone had dropped a huge weight on it, causing the sides of the box to rupture.
If it's remotely fragile, I tend to think of UPS as a way of shipping something old, getting something new. On the positive side, their customer service has always been very good in cutting the check for damaged goods, just don't send those one-of-a-kind items if they're breakable.
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I think they covered this when one of the first Anime stories was posted and they made an anime icon for such stories. The general slashdot opinion was that anything that was 'interesting' or 'cool' was fit to post.
Umm, Part time UPS employees get full benifits. There was a big teamsters strike about that a few years ago.
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Free Mac Mini
Philistines...,p>
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
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Stay tuned for some shock and awe coming right up after this messages!
What about a bag of crap? How about some rotten meat? Cmon let's get some real tests done.
2 years and no mod points. Join reddit. Because openness is good.
To my mind, the question is not if but why that might work. But then again, I'm a Christian.
You should see the addresses that mail workers in remote parts of Brazil have to decipher! They're of the 'over the hill, across the river, three kilometers down...' quality.
why dont you try to read the article, it might have info on that.
A blog about stuff.
good reason.
A blog about stuff.
Would an American care to enlighten us non-us residents as to how these times compare to the usual delivery times of the USPS? Six to seven days is quite a long time and I just wondered whether that was usual for packaging in the US.
oojah
Do you have any better hostages?
These items weren't delivered despite of the bureaucracy, they were delivered because of the bureaucracy. Once one of the postal workers received one of those packages, they could either try to get permission to dispose of it.(from who?), or they could just say that it wasn't their problem and pass it on to the next guy.
They lose it because people torture them by attempting to post strange objects like hammers and bones.
I should have put a smiley (tm) in there because this person obviously didn't follow the subtle humour.
One day there will be a colloquial phrase often applied to geeks ... "get dotted"; I'll leave the interpretation open to your imagination.
Now I know why they call it going postal...
This link was mentionted during Rob's recent tirade on junk mail and mailing back the offending letters.
I know.
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Fuck you too, Wes.
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Oh, Wes... I know you want me to do you, but I thought we already went over this. I'm simply not into well-used assholes such as yours, okay?
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"Absinth is an alcoholic drink containing Wormwood extract that is banned in every country in the world except for the Czech Republic and Andorra. It's a hallucinogenic drink."
Come to England, and get some in any number of shops - try Compton street.
Just taped an address to it, licked the stamps then dropped it in. Unfornunately, it was considered a "special item" or some such and required extra postage. So my friends had to go to the P.O. to pick it up and pay a little. When they did they found the postal employees throwing it around the office...
No. You are an idiot. We dont get paid to download emails. They get paid to deliver sort mail. Are we making the job harder. No. Is it going to be that much noticeable amid the millions of pieces of mail. No. If they don't like it they can quit and go into another line of work. If youre a salesperson you are expected to bend to the needs of your customers, however rude they may be. You do not expect them to be nice, makeyourjobeasier people. If they are good, if not its your job, so shut the hell up.
My dad used to work for UPS, for a total of 10 days. Things may have changed since, but he says that basically your foreman yelled at you to 'go faster, damnit' pretty much through the whole 8 hour shift. If you didn't pack fast enough, you got fired. He finally got sick of it and simply walked off of the job, leaving the foreman, whose face was red with high blood pressure, and voice was horse from constantly screaming, to do the rest of his loading work. My father was all of 18 years old at the time, with a newborn baby (me) and a wife to support, in a recession economy and he STILL walked off the job. If they still treat thier workers like that, its no wonder that your packages arrive mangled and beaten.
Of course, you have to doubt the sanity of someone who thinks taking a lock of their hair and chanting to it will make them fall in love or whatever...
That's exactly what I was talking about; I didn't mean to imply that Wiccan wasn't as valid as most other religions. Probably should have said "magic" rather than "witches".
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Nope, just insulting people who believe in magic, and those who think an angel helped them get that parking place at the mall. I have a great deal of respect for religious impulses, as long as it doesn't descend into complete superstition.
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I liked that the team at least had enough class to attempt compensation for the horrible things that the poor workers endured. One has to wonder at the kind of dedication it takes to deliver some of this crap.
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Desperation is a stinky cologne
and the most surprising thing: the severed human head only took 3 days! (hey, if they don't read the article, the deserve to believe it)
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I'm not ashamed. It's the computer age, nerds are in.
They're still in, aren't they?
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I'm not ashamed. It's the computer age, nerds are in.
They're still in, aren't they?
Exactly. I happened to see this comment posted under the 'ask slashdot' bit about returning junk-mail business reply envelopes, and thought it was hysterical. But not everyone saw it, and I don't expect the /. editors to always pick up on every interesting comment - that's why there is a sumbission system, eh?
Anyway, I'm glad they did post this as an article so I can read it again (told my wife about it but didn't have the link) and read comments about it (I've got more time today that I did when I was at work reading/skimming it the first time).
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
>This was posted just over a week ago already however
;-)
It was? I thought I only saw this linked from someone's comments, not as a top-level story. Maybe I missed it, in which case I'm glad they posted it again.
(actually, thought about submitting it myself as at seemed an interesting aside)
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
Where do all the letters to Santa (and, for that matter, the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny, and so on) go to? ----> You can send a letter to:
Santa Claus
North Pole, Canada
H0H 0H0
If you include a valid return address in the letter or on the envelope, it will be replied to by a group of retired Canada Post employees who handle letters to Santa every year and all the time.
If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!
Living in a town with 1000 people, we can play around with our "official" address quite a bit. As a lark, I had Fingerhut (for those that don't know, a mail-order catalog full of cheap and usually exremely tacky dreck) produce a self-inking return address stamp for me with "Outer Mongolia" instead of my name. After a year or so of unintended training, I discovered that my local postal workers would happily deliver mail to me with no more of an address than "Outer Mongolia + my zip code". I also got lots of interesing junk mail (thanks Fingerhut!)... "Dear Outer, You and the rest of the Mongolia family may already have won!!!!!"
I'm not so sure. I have a friend who works for the post office (in Australia as it happens) who said they like it when they get weird stuff or badly addressed mail, because the puzzle or novelty provides a welcome diversion. So maybe they enjoyed some of the less offensive items.
Everyone knows that damage is done to the soul by bad motion pictures. -Pope Pius XI
Suppose that there was an interesting comment, with a great link... why would they not then post this as a story, if it was an appropriate story? It brings something worthwhile and interesting to the fore, rather than leaving it drowned out in a sea of comments... rr
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur.
Where do all the letters to Santa (and, for that matter, the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny, and so on) go to? What about letters sent to Places like "Grandma at Grandma's House" and so on? I read in one comment that a USPS worker delevered mail to "The third house on the left past the gas station on route 101"... what about other bizzare addresses? rr
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur.
IIRC, the 221 Baker street address is currently a bank. Last I heard anyway.
How is this News for Nerds? It is definately not Stuff That Matters.
Who is this Alexander Burke, guy, anyways? He must be a real dork.
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Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
Let's see, there are 7.7 or so million American square km, which gives every 9-digit zip code it's own square 87 meter on each side.
Entirely too large for urban usage, but then I doubt that zip codes are given the same density in Alaska as they are in NYC.
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Dyolf Knip
well, yes, for the most part.
they DO get paid to do this, right?
eudas
Blessed is he who expects the worst, for he shall not be disappointed.
That zipcode, is it 32935 for Melbourne, Florida?
I've hit Karma 50 and gotten a Score:5, Troll... I win!
Not really. In the UK at least it used to be a fairly common way of sending illegal things (often firearms) around -- put them in something resembling a brick.
Nice to know your mail is being monitored though.
This was posted just over a week ago already however. There's absolutely no reason to re-post something that's already been posted and hasn't changed since the last time it was put up.
All I know about Bush is I had a good job when Clinton was president.
Yes.
Geek dating!
GPL Deconstructed
I've certainly had my run-ins with the postal service on the subject of weird packages. One of my non-computer hobbies is textiles. Every few years I order a big batch of sheep's wool for me and my friends. Now, this is pretty nice and clean, considering it just came off a sheep, but still has a distinct sheepy smell.
It typically comes in one or two burlap feed sacks, with a large amount of Australian postage affixed, looking pretty sad after being kicked around a ship for a few months. (You don't want to think what it costs for air!)
One time I went to pick up my wool, I handed over the yellow delivery notice and got "Oh. That." Seems my shipment had been the talk of the office.
Another time I was home and I think the carrier was disappointed because he wasn't too happy about having to go back to the truck to get my package. Later, I was chatting with one of my textile friends, who had some wool in this order, and she said her father (a postal carrier) had complained about some idiot who received this big smelly package from Australia. Knowing the city her father lived in (mine) and the general whereabouts of his delivery area, she was very happy to know that her wool had arrived!
I lived at that address for about five years and got three orders, much more than usual for me. My postal carriers didn't like me too much.
And then there was my friend who ordered some poorer quality wool that smelled of manure through the package...
221 Baker street is occupied by a company called Abbey House... bankers I think. Haven't been to England for a few years, but it used to be that they'd reply to every letter they got.
Just down the street is the Holmes museum, which is labelled as 221B, but I think the address is really 217 or 227. Anyways, the museum is accurate to the stories all except for 5 minor things I think. Oh yes, and there's Mrs Hudson's restaurant on the ground floor... food is pretty good if I remember.
Anyways, if anyone's in London for a trip it's a very interesting way to spend a few hours, and quite easy to get to.
Actuaries - making accountants look interesting since 1949
My house is along a state highway, #287. Well, junk mail just doesnt get anything right - HIGHWAY 287 ROUTE ROUTE 287 HIGHWAY STATE ROUTE HIGHWAY 287 STATE 287 HIGHWAY ROUTE My OFFICIAl address is xxxx Highway 287 =)
A friend of mine who works for UPS managed to get a 21" CRT, and a 19" CRT with a forklift, and throw a Gateway computer at his boss. Company policy says it gets it done faster, go right on ahead.
Oh wait a minute, those probably came from a disgruntled worker's AK47.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Bees really aren't that unusual. My father kept bees, and the easiest way to get new bees is to (surprise) mail order them. So we'd get about 1000 bees in the mail when he started a new hive. Of course, we had to go pick them up, and the workers were always very glad when we arrived.
Absinth is now legal in Canada; I have seen news reports that the Liquor Distribution Branch of BC will soon start carrying it.
I adblock all animated gifs.
Blessed be the prime numbered slashdotters
"Please be advised that human remains may not be transported through the mail, but we assumed this to be of sentimental value, and made an exception in your case."
Isn't that nice... now maybe Tony can send me my fingers back, they have sentimental value...
"I've seen plays that were more exciting than this.
Honest to god... Plays!" Homer Simpson
how can you have discussion without anyone actually commenting?
You jokers can't even manage to deliver a box of cd-r discs to me within a reasonable amount of time. And then you're assholes on the phone when I try to get a shipping refund. ARGHHH. I'm actually never going to use UPS again if I can help it. BITCHES!
I suck cock for a living.
And you're point is?
Lord Arathres
stainless steel
spelling checks do good not if you have awesome grammar skill. I likes to focus on what I'm talking rather than how I'm typing. I apologizes fors the spelling error, and I hope to makes it better in the futures. I shall run my post through the Word's Spelling Checker's to it can say that there be no spelling errors but the whole statements wills lights up in green!
Lord Arathres
stainless steel
Wow, Im impressed. I really do feel for the postal workers that had to put up with that. But it is funny as hell. It really is amazing what the USPS actually accomplishes with the sheer volume of mail that goes through them. I'm surprised the $20 didnt disappear.
You used to be able to send mail locally by putting the address you want it to go to in the return place and then not putting a stamp on it which would come back with postage needed, but since it was for them anyway it worked. Cant really do that for long distances (duh).
I am surprised the hammer never made it though. The broken brick pieces are funny, Go War on Drugs!!! Shouldnt they be actually patrolling the streets instead of looking for drugs in a brick! Guess thats why we're losing that war.
Anyway I though the story was funny as hell, go read it!
Later All
Lord Arathres
stainless steel
"Why am I so fucking stupid?"
Reply: Because you are using Microsoft. Go back to a real OS like...
I then got a error in iexplore. too bad.
stainless steel
It's funny, the problems you describe are the same problems that happen to me whenever I use UPS and, to a lesser extent, FedEX. USPS has always been flawless for me. And I'm a libertarian for crying out loud. I go with what works. USPS will also deliever 365 a year (even on Christmas, depending on the type of delivery). I don't think the other two big ones do that, but I could be wrong. They also ship packages a lot faster than UPS. Everything to anywhere in about 2-4 days. I'm talking standard delivery. I've never actually met a person who had an "actual" complaint about the post office. I've always wondered where they come from. I guess they exist.
Every now and then we get mail with my name and our 5+4 zipcode on it.
About 10 zillion years ago, when I was in college, we discovered that mail would reach a dorm room with nothing but two numbers on it: The room number and the 9-digit zip code (no name, city, etc.).
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
I think of postal workers as Jim Carey at the beginning of "Ace Ventura"
Never Underestimate the Power of Stupid People in Large Groups.
I find it doutbful that the law would uphold something like that; it is much easier to prove that the sender, not the receiver is being malicious in this case-I guess the anonymous mailing took care of that risk.
for your clicking convenience http://www.cyberwalker.net/reviews/pawsense.html
It's actually self sufficent, relying upon postage instead of government funds to recoup operating costs.
Free messageboards and more! Your girlfriend's seen myWang
Congradulations! However I have no clue what that has to do with anything but...Congrats!
Richard Cantu's After You...
Because Im tired and its 2:40 in the morning.
I filed an enquiry form and they eventually admitted that the goods went missing in their care. Too much hassle to collect the pittance in compo though, at least the goods weren't valuable.
In 20 years of sending stuff home nothing else has ever gone missing from anywhere.
Sorry, but lots of similar stories from mates about the US Post.
My family once recieved a letter sent to; 'mysirname' ,Ireland. We don't have a teribly common sirname but we were still quite impressed..
Over in the thread on mailing back blow-in cards with a brick attached? Or is this some sort of indefatigable synchronicity?
With just 2 items. I was 10 at the time. Item 1. A stamp. Yes, I collected stamps when I was a kid. Some collectable stamps are pretty big. I sent an oversize stamp (about as big as a postcard), wrote the address on the back and stuck a little stamp to the upper right corner. It arrived as well. Item 2. A matchbox. I couldn't fit the address on the thing so I wrote "LOOK INSIDE" on one end and put the stamp on the other. Inside I put a note with the address. It actually arrived but the mailman had a talk with my parents. Item 2. A stamp. Yes, I collected stamps when I was a kid. Some collectable stamps are pretty big. I sent an oversize stamp (about as big as a postcard), wrote the address on the back and stuck a little stamp to the upper right corner. It arrived as well.
--
If you reverse the addresses, you can send a letter without a stamp. This has been confirmed, including in different zip codes and states. May take a while though.
--
This was about 10 years, ago, but a buddy of mine and I wanted to see what we could get away with. I wrote a letter to my girlfriend on the inside of a pint-sized carton of milk (empty), then taped it back up to look like the original carton, and put the address on the outside. It got there about a month later, flattened open and stuffed inside a mailing envelope. You should have seen the looks from people in line behind me. I had forgotten all about it and was at her house the day it showed up.
We also discussed what would happen if we mailed a pineapple, with "hand cancel" written on the outside. Those spines are sharp!
As every good Canadian kid knows, its:
Santa Claus
North Pole
Canada
HOH OHO
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
I am a mailcarrier, and I have experienced the weird addresses. the worst I delivered was, a post card from Italy to Mamaw and Papaw, Slone road. From Jimmy. One man on the road had the first name of James, so I figured he named his boy after him. I noticed that the Camero hadn't been moved for several weeks so the boy who drove it wasn't at home. I saw the mother, tooted my horn* and she came out to the box. I asked her if this is from her son, and she said yes. *((I don't get out of my jeep if there is a bunch of farm dogs barking and acting protective.))
I have delivered some weird stuff, including bees. Since the Unibomber, we have been more careful about odd boxes.
Any leak from a box is considered a hazardous material, and will be treated as such.
Thanks for the good words.
photosMy Photostream
No, the lawsuit is over the fact that the USPS can pick and choose what to deliver. And that if they deliver your product in demolished form, they still expect to get paid for it.
And as to the "use a courier". No. A brick isn't a delicate product which requires a courier. The only way it'd break is if some moron takes a hammer to it...
It doesn't matter if someone mails a brick for scientific analysis, or for the joke value. As long as they pay the postage on it, the USPS is contractually obligated to deliver it.
I think you're the one in denial. Lawsuit exist specifically for the purpose of forcing someone to do what they contracted to do and then refused to follow through. This isn't receiving hot coffee and suing over the temperature, this is using the courts to force a big corporation to honor its word like you'd expect anyone else to do. The lawsuit only needs to be for the court costs and damages. In this case, $5 should cover it. But the idea is that you don't let a corporation get away with screwing around with you just because they can.
And if the cops think it has drugs in it, they can act like they'd have to in any other context. Obtain a search warrant, take the minimum steps necessary to determine if it does. They should definately notify the owner, show them the warranty, and repay any damages conducted in their overzealous search.
Anything else is simply an abuse of power.
Do you have any better way to make them own up to their bullshit?
Instead of thinking someone deserves a medal, I'd be thinking someone deserves a lawsuit. They opened the package and demolished the brick, and then had the balls to deliver the pieces.
What if that was a brick from a historic building, or was being sent somewhere for lab analysis?
Doesn't anyone see a problem with the government opening your mail, destroying it, and then not even refunding the postage?
It's not like they thought it was a bomb or anything (they'd have blown it up - and the person who went to pick it up would have been met by the cops). They simply thought it MIGHT contain drugs.
In the last couple of issues, they received a Mac Keyboard that was stripped of all its keys, save ones that had the shipping address. They have been sent clear plastic boxes with visible circuit boards that had the address spelled out in LED's, and other cool things that frankly, I am too lazy to bother remembering, save that I was surprised that they had actually arrived at the Wired offices.
Anyway, getting back on track here, Wired was promoting this kind of tomfoolery well in advance of the Annals etc. etc. So there.
Where did I put my drink?
When I worked at Blockbuster Video, I saw several drivers licenses with the address for Mailboxes etc. The apartment # was the box #. I knew it was indeed mailboxes etc, since it was right next door to us. Guess it helps keep away those stalkers who access your DMV records, leaving them to ponder how you live in a 6x6 inch box.
Suppossedly kids in england send mail to Sherlock Holmes at 221B Baker Street, which belongs to a business. The employeess enjoy reading their mail intended for him.
Years ago I heard from a postal worker about having to deliver mail to "The third house on the left past the gas station on route 101", and it actually got through!
I also, years ago, mailed off my state income tax. It required my "Mail Station" as opposed to my usual mail address (it turns out that that was really a poorly worded form, and what they really wanted was the regular address). Well, my "Mail Station" was called "Farley Station", so I entered that. Six months later someone from the post office finally figured out what the return address was supposed to be and I got my refund. I never complained about the mail since.
satire, n: 1) witty language used to convey insults or scorn; 2) a form of humor lost on most slashdot moderators.
When I get one of the MMF spams, I print it out, stick it in an envelope, and send it to:
Postal Inspector
Criminal Investigations
I've gotten mail back from several Postal Inspectors that tells me that they do indeed follow up.
(BTW, it's mail fraud if they even *ask* you to send them money through the mail in a Ponzi scheme.)
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Actually I find it hard too. But because of another reason. I've had some troubles with the Dutch post. My mail was consistently arriving either late, or not arriving at all. Went to complain at the Post Office, and got brushed off. Turns out that a recipient isn't a customer of the post, and so has no right to complain about delivery. seems strange that he can be held responsible than.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
Generally something almost two months old would be considered old news, no matter if it was linked to in a Slashdot comment or not. Despite this, the article still has merit both for laughts and legitimate information. Therefore, it seems to be a bit of Stuff that matters.. Also, considering my general nerdiness and my interest in the article, this posting was, at least for me, a bit of News for nerds. Therefore, it seems to fit.
Well, then I'll tell you: most of them were delivered. A few were not. A USPS guy drank the water bottle. The brick arrived in little pieces. The feather duster was pretty quick. Most things arrived within a week. A few took longer. Someone got mad about the touth.
Sometimes I think things were better during the Industrial Revolution. If people were disrespectful like this little snot they'd get fired and end up with no government spoon to feed them. Be dead in a week, or they'd learn some respect for their jobs and for other people's property.
Conservatism is essentially about "leave me the fuck alone," not "force other fuckers to stop doing stuff I don't like."
Actually, you are wrong from two different perspectives.
1) The views that you speak of are generally considered "classically liberal", which the US was founded upon. Liberal means "favoring change" which was important to the oppressed colonies.
2) Conservatism literally means "Favoring traditional views and values; tending to oppose change." Now, the US comes from a classical liberal perspective, and has since moved away from it (a matter of degree, compared with other countries). So the "traditional view", or conservative view often refers to the anti-government sentiment that you also refer to. Of course, it also refers to other classical political traits such as pro-military, racism (don't flame me), and agriculture.
-rt-
-rt-
** Evil Canadians are taking over the world. Learn about the conspiracy
Oay, but I missed the original comment. And the article was incredibly funny.
I'm glad they posted it. Do you really expect them to read every comment and not post anything already included there?
-rt-
-rt-
** Evil Canadians are taking over the world. Learn about the conspiracy
I'm going to be laughing over that one for day! :)
Last night I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know.
The cool thing is that you use these as your sole adderss in some cases. I sent a letter out with no return address and just the numbers "92115-8055" (my PO Box's ZIP+4) on the front once and it made it just fine...
Same thing goes for family names:
will often make it as well...
------------
"...and Maddest of all, to see Life as it Is, and not as it Should Be."
Excellent point. What about sentimental value? What if that was a brick from the rural farmhouse someone was born in which no longer exists? Methinks the DEA went waaaaay over the line there.
Plus, in order to make a brick, it has to be baked in a kiln at >1,000C. This would surely change any drugs hidden in a pocket inside the brick, on a molecular level. If not, then surely you'd end up with one big solidified chunk of drug on the inside?
I mean, isn't it enough to chip off a small amount of the exterior of the brick and analyze it (GC/MS, maybe?) to make sure it's really a normal brick?
--
Yes, there are a hundred definitions of conservative out there. The "people are dangerous and should have constraints placed on them" crowd doesn't have any more to do with the current 10 o'clock news version of the "conservative-liberal" spectrum than my definition did earlier, though.
There are a lot of "radical conservatives" under your "conservatives want to put constraints on people" metric -- Diane Fienstien is my favorite villian of the day, of course, and George W. Bush ranks up there on that measure, too. Some of the more folks who were far more liberal than either of the two above on that metric included Ronald Reagan, George Bush Sr., John Ashcroft (to some degree), the Cato Institute, and quite a few of the "Blue Dog" Democrats (who, paradoxically, are often called "conservative" democrats, despite being much more liberal by your definition).
The point I'm making is that there is not definitive text on conservativism. To say that there is only one kind of conservative is like saying there is only one kind of feminist, or one kind of hacker (for a slashdot definition). The words conservative and liberal have become worse than useless for labeling people and movements -- they mean so many different things to so many different people, and have accrued so much baggage that the words puts people into very useless, very high sided boxes, that do nothing to compartmentalize any actual beliefs.
Without context, conservative and liberal are almost always the wrong words to use in any conversation that demands thought.
Slashdot is jumping the shark. I'm just driving the boat.
And I guess you are GOD or just so cool as to be the one to determine what is religious and what is superstitious and judge people based on your belief, or just impose your belief, whatever it may be, on someone else.
Where exactly do I try imposing my belief on someone else? I believe everyone has a right to say and to think what they want; you have a right to believe in whatever you want. I have a right to believe that you're being superstitious. I'm posting an opinion on a public board, not coming into your house and converting you by gunpoint.
--
i would just like to say that the usps has been very friendly on many more than one occasion. did you know (up untill recently, in my area anyway) that you could mail a letter merely by taping 32 cents to the envelope? you can also send 2x4's through the mail (drilling holes in them makes them lighter, cheaper postage). on the whole, i applaud the people behind the article, espically since they ended prasing the usps for being good sports. well done.
Cogito Eggo Sum, I think therefore I'm a waffle
Enough said.
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
When I was in Prague 2 years ago, I shipped a box with 14 bottles of Absinth back to the USA. Absinth is an alcoholic drink containing Wormwood extract that is banned in every country in the world except for the Czech Republic and Andorra. It's a hallucinogenic drink.
We wrote that the contents of the box were 8 bottles of wine, because we were afraid that you are only allowed to import a certain amount of alcohol before you have to pay taxes on it (that, and it is illegal in the USA).
Anyways, the box arrived at the proper address in the USA after only 2 weeks (shipped ground/boat). One bottle was broken and one was completely empty, but the rest were unharmed. We packed everything in a very a complicated way and upon opening it, everything was the exactly as we left it. There was no tampering and I don't believe that the US or Czech post even opened the box. The empty bottle must have had a leaky lid and its contents evaporated (Absinth is 70% alcohol).
Keeping
This is all fascinating because it's true. In fact when I worked as a mail clerk I wrote a letter on the back of a stamp (tiny writing) and dropped it in the mail. It got there. Also someone sent a whole pumpkin to a guy in the office she was having an affair with. It just had a label and a stamp (machine postage stamp for in the neighborhood of $5 for parcel post.) That guy was the coolest guy in the office for a month. Then the pumpkin began to smell.
I've hit Karma 50 and gotten a Score:5, Troll... I win!
The USPS is an organization staffed with real people, with a limited budget, and with a legal mandate to try to deliver mail. If people do these kinds of things, their costs go up and other mail delivery suffers. And a number of poor people have to deal with your smelly cheese or risk injuring themselves on your poorly packaged item.
People here would complain loudly if a 10M file clogged up their mail queue. It seems much worse to impose these kinds of physical hazards on real postal workers.
Actually I'm basing my opinion on several experiances which I have had, not 1. Also it is on other peoples experiances that I have been told about. And I AM a genius just to let you know.
Lord Arathres
stainless steel
A rather cheap and juvenile piece, I thought.
... "reliable" did you call it?!
The USPS stole/lost all the gifts I posted home to rellies in Oz on my first visit there, I was broke at the time, so I'm not laughing. I've never sent snail-mail from the US again.
Cough, splutter
It made it through.
The friend took one look at it, wrote "return to sender" on it and stuck on another stamp. The sending friend was convulsed with laughter for several minutes upon receiving this.
We'd just done a dissection lab in high school biology... I don't remember who she sent them to, but it was at least two people. Didn't hear how that one turned out...
Ah, the fun we had when we were kids
Apparently you can't ship human remains via the USPS. Who knew? Guess you'll have to FedEx 'em. Can you see that scene? Walk in to the local FedEx office and say "Yo I got dis dead guy hear. Can youse send him to Don Carpazzio in New York for me?"
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=01/01/19/15112 33&cid=72
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
Well, my contribution towards the torture of delivery people was aimed at UPS, but it was humorous just the same.
Last summer, I tracked down a fellow from Montana who has some blacksmithing tools I wanted, and sent him a check for a few hundred dollars. A few days later, I woke up to the sound of a UPS truck pulling in my driveway bright and early:
*slam*
*swoosh* (rear door opening)
"goddamn... fuggin..piece o...hrrrrr"
*stompstompstompstomp*
*hwathump* (on my doorstep)
"...can't fuggin believe... fuggin two of 'em... arrrr..."
*stompstompstompstomp*
*hwathump* (again on my doorstep)
By the time I got my jeans on, the truck was pulling away. And there they were: one 140 lb. anvil, and one 150 lb. anvil (nice ones, too), side by side on my doorstep, no packaging of any kind -- just a mailing label taped to the side of each -- right up against the screen door so that I couldn't get out.
Served me right, I suppose.
Jon
I think not...(*poof*)
The thing that jumped out at me was the brick that got pulverized by the DEA. I want to know if those motherfucking jackbooted thugs had a warrant to destroy private property to look for drugs, and if so, what the probably cause was that some idiot judge accepted.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Yeah, they'll mail bricks, but...
Usually they'll mail them only if they don't know they're bricks. I hear there's a specific regulation about it.
It's not to keep you from mailing bricks attached to business-reply cards...
Seems a LONG time back (like before the US highway system was complete - and I mean US, not Interstate) there was a town in the upper half of lower Michigan, which wanted to build a town hall. Out of bricks.
There were no paved roads nearby, and no brick makers either.
So they bought some bricks down in Detroit and looked into what it would cost to ship them commercially. Then they checked how much it would cost to mail them first-class. First class rates are standard, with the easy-to-deliver metro mail subsidizing the hard-to-deliver cross-country and back-country stuff.
Turned out it was MUCH cheaper to wrap each brick and send it first class than to ship them.
So they did.
And the post office delivered every last one of 'em. At considerable impact to their budget.
And then the regulations were changed - before somebody decided to build a hotel or something. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Using odd languages. Some of my relatives decided to play this game a long time ago. One of the best to get through was a envelope that was entirely addressed in Tolkein's runes- address, return address and letter inside. The USPS managed to decode and deliver the letter in less than a week.
It's possible, though, that the USPS in AK has a higher tolerance because of the lack of other options for moving stuff around in Alaska. A buddy of mine said that his grandfather once wanted a Christmas tree where he lived in Kodiak (an island off the southern coast of AK) so he came to Anchorage, bought one, dragged it into the post office, and mailed it. No extra packaging, no problem.
MyopicProwls
MyopicProwls
My homepage
Give 'em a bit of respect, or at least think about what they have to put up with on those days when you want to shoot someone because of the quality of service you receive.
I never quite understood the complaints people had about the USPS; you put something in the mail, in a few days it's delivered. What more do you want? I guess people assume that because it's the government, it can't be efficient, despite receiving proof that it's a pretty well-run system every day in their mailbox. Of course, a scary amount of people in this country believe angels involve themselves in their daily lives, and witches exist, so I guess logic is in short supply...
--
I work at UPS, and ALL of the items listed would have made it through as shipped with no problems, except for the fact that they might be a bit roughhoused. It might seem strange to drop a hammer into a mailbox, but at UPS, this is par for the course. There are a LOT of individual items shipped as is, no wrapping, with just a label slapped on the side. Especially around Xmas, people will literally ship Xmas trees with a label taped around the trunk. It usually ends up in several pieces by the time it gets to its destination, but it WILL get there.
Other strange things that have come through the system include an unwrapped matress, a freshly severed bear's head, LOTS of tires with no wrapping, a car bumper that looked like it had been ripped off the car, complete with the license plate, boxes of live crickets which usually break open so you have crickets loose all over the place, individual car parts with no wrapping. Rank food is quite common on return items.
Fortunately, at UPS about 3% of the volume involves packages like this, so there are regular methods to transport them internally (they don't travel on the conveyor belts) I would imagine that the post office simply doesn't have the facilities to deal with a large number of unusual objects.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
I would advise you, though, not to put the postal employees through too much grief. Their job is tough enough as it is. When you want to send some critical and strangely sized package, just do us all a favor and use FedEx or UPS or one of the many other private carriers. And pack appropriately! The poor guy who had to figure out what to do with the moldy and stinky cheese deserves a medal. The person who was forced to break the brick into little pieces to check for drug content probably had better things to do. And the person who had to lug the snow ski to a mailbox probably does not get enough medical coverage by the USPS to make up for the dent in his back.
These are people, people! Give 'em a bit of respect, or at least think about what they have to put up with on those days when you want to shoot someone because of the quality of service you receive.
"Please be advised that human remains may not be transported through the mail."
So THAT's what happened to aunt June...
---