That's life in the new age
(and the three Steven Taylor fans out there get an earworm)
On Tuesday afternoon, I ordered some compensatory treats (and one essential) from Amazon -- I got a phone headset (essential), and a new copy of Imajica, and Companion to Wolves and Black Sheep. And at noon-thirty on Wednesday, my apartment manager signed for them. And that would be pretty impressive if that shipment had come out of Seattle. But it was actually out of Kentucky. I ordered at about 2 PM. By 8:30, robot minions (I assume) had assembled three books (including one that MUST be in the deep stacks) and a headset. Someone packaged it. By 8:30 EASTERN TIME, three and a half hours later, it was out the door. UPS got it at about 2 in the morning. At 3:30 in the morning, it had been sorted for departure. At 5 AM Pacific, it arrived in Seattle (which I suspect is actually the airport sorting facility, because the transit times are improbable otherwise), and was out the door again at 5:30. At 6 AM, it arrived at the Tukwila sorting facility. By 6:30, it was loaded on a truck for delivery. It arrived at my apartment office at 12:12, after the driver attempted to deliver it to our door. From this we can conclude:
1) Bar codes are, as the early pioneers promised us, THE BOMB.
2) $80 a year is a hell of a deal for Amazon Prime.
3) Online shopping is not really less of an instant gratification thing for me than trying to find time to shop in person.
4) Any second now, someone will bring me a float chair and liquid breakfast, because it's all so u/dys/topian.
5) Our ease of shipping blinds us to how big this country really is.
6) I am going to spend a non-zero part of my weekend reading hot wolfboy sex (I'm assuming. I could be wrong. But the Amazon reviewers seem sorta pearl-clutchy for it to be chaste pure dancing-with-wolves.) (It will have to be pretty hot to top Wen Spencer's hot wolfboy sex.)
In other news of the strange new world, I have a debit card that ties directly to my HSA, so when I have eligible expenses, such as doctor co-pays, I can just pay with the little debit card, and there is no dance of reimbursement. And if I try to use it to buy Mt. Dew and Ding-Dongs, it gets declined. Seems good.
On the other hand, getting Baz's birth certificate seems like it will be a pain, with notary public steps.
On Tuesday afternoon, I ordered some compensatory treats (and one essential) from Amazon -- I got a phone headset (essential), and a new copy of Imajica, and Companion to Wolves and Black Sheep. And at noon-thirty on Wednesday, my apartment manager signed for them. And that would be pretty impressive if that shipment had come out of Seattle. But it was actually out of Kentucky. I ordered at about 2 PM. By 8:30, robot minions (I assume) had assembled three books (including one that MUST be in the deep stacks) and a headset. Someone packaged it. By 8:30 EASTERN TIME, three and a half hours later, it was out the door. UPS got it at about 2 in the morning. At 3:30 in the morning, it had been sorted for departure. At 5 AM Pacific, it arrived in Seattle (which I suspect is actually the airport sorting facility, because the transit times are improbable otherwise), and was out the door again at 5:30. At 6 AM, it arrived at the Tukwila sorting facility. By 6:30, it was loaded on a truck for delivery. It arrived at my apartment office at 12:12, after the driver attempted to deliver it to our door. From this we can conclude:
1) Bar codes are, as the early pioneers promised us, THE BOMB.
2) $80 a year is a hell of a deal for Amazon Prime.
3) Online shopping is not really less of an instant gratification thing for me than trying to find time to shop in person.
4) Any second now, someone will bring me a float chair and liquid breakfast, because it's all so u/dys/topian.
5) Our ease of shipping blinds us to how big this country really is.
6) I am going to spend a non-zero part of my weekend reading hot wolfboy sex (I'm assuming. I could be wrong. But the Amazon reviewers seem sorta pearl-clutchy for it to be chaste pure dancing-with-wolves.) (It will have to be pretty hot to top Wen Spencer's hot wolfboy sex.)
In other news of the strange new world, I have a debit card that ties directly to my HSA, so when I have eligible expenses, such as doctor co-pays, I can just pay with the little debit card, and there is no dance of reimbursement. And if I try to use it to buy Mt. Dew and Ding-Dongs, it gets declined. Seems good.
On the other hand, getting Baz's birth certificate seems like it will be a pain, with notary public steps.