1995apr18. Post Office Visits I Have Known (addendum).
Random Day, 1990: Arrive at Post Office, pick up X mail. Minutes later, mail bomb goes off.
Random Day, 1991: Arrive at Post Office, pick up X mail. After a ten-minute drive to work, I find my co-workers glued to the radio; an ex-postal employee just shot up the place. “But I was just there and ... ewwww ... “
April 15th, 1994: Arrive at Post Office, pick up X mail. Am accosted by person of unknown gender, dressed in (what appeared to be) a large eagle costume, passing out pads of paper and pens. The side of the pen reads:
UNITED STATES POSTAL SERVICEApril 17th, 1995: As staff Macro historian Neal M and I walk up, we notice a now-familiar tv news truck parked outside. Momentarily forgetting the day’s proximity to our nation’s fine tax deadline, I run through a quick mental checklist: “terrorists?” “ebola virus?” “comet?” Lot of people with suits on, can’t be any type of unexpected tragedy. Pick up the mail (a ton of bills), and I’m stopped as I exit by someone from Edy’s Ice Cream Inc.: “Want some free ice cream?” “Hell yes!” Neal already had picked up his share, and we had a fine ice cream eating time while watching a WHAT-TV greenhorn making the annual tax day puff piece broadcast. Someone from Edy’s slipped him a bar just before he went on the air, in a brilliant piece of product placement. Could you think of a more worthwhile job? I mean the ice cream people, not the reporter. Imagine, giving away ice cream, for free! Who’s going to argue with that, except those wussy lactose-intolerant gimps? This gets me thinking that this free ice cream gig is going to line me up with random babes, so I confront the elderly lady holding the big free ice cream bag:
Old Town District
“Service” is our last name.
“Can I give out some ice cream?”And RIGHT THEN, of course, she gives a bar to what was to be MY future WIFE in that PARALLEL DIMENSION in which MRS. FRUMPY didn’t have such an ATTITUDE!!! But I got free ice cream. Of course, as we’re leaving, somebody dressed up as an eagle gives me a flyer announcing a food drive. I’m having a problem with this eagle thing, I really don’t understand the motivation behind it. I think it’s my reluctance to relate the concepts of “taxation” and “freedom,” but don’t worry, I'll get over it. There was some sort of demonstration there, according to people I talked with later, but all I saw was a car plastered with placards that had the words “tax” and “Levin” jammed into various forgettable sentences. I rate the effectiveness of this demonstration to be 0%.
“No. Only people associated with Edy’s ... my son works there.”
“Just three bars.”
“Nope.”