[Boatanchors] Parcel Smashers and the like

[Ian]

Many Christmases ago my wife had a package that she had overlooked that
needed to be sent and I went to the UPS COMPANY location 10 or 12 miles away
to keep her happy.

 

They had a couple of tents in the parking lot with clerks to weigh and do
the paperwork and get your money.  

 

After they took my wife's parcel I spent 10 or 15 minutes browsing and
observing.

 

They had a large trailer at the end of the tents and I watched as several
young men took large and small packages, including ones that said FRAGILE
and THREW them from the end of the tents perhaps 20 feet in front of the
open end of the trailer into the trailer and many of the small packages
banged at the back end of the trailer as they hit and fell to the floor.  It
became obvious that the 3 or 4 "throwers" were competing to see who could
throw the parcels the farthest and hardest against the end of the trailer.

 

Not long afterwards I received a receiver and accessories for it in 2
different packages sent to me in California from the midwest - quite large
ones and examining them after they appeared when nobody was home on the
front porch, the sender had scotch taped light weight brown paper around the
light weight boxes that were used.   Some very loosely wadded newspapers
around the equipment and very amateurish attempt to help them to arrive at
their destination intact.  However the boxes had no appearance that they had
just been on a couple of thousand mile journey and looked like new.

 

The boxes and wrappings had no sign whatsoever that they had been handled
and no rips in the loose lightweight brown paper wrapping.

They had been shipped FEDEX.   I discovered that FEDEX had an office only a
couple of miles away from me and that with my credit card that I used for
business I also got a discount that appeared on my CC statement for whatever
I shipped.

 

That made me decide that I was never again going to deal with United Parcel
Smashers which I knew would have pushed those bulky boxes onto the driveway
or the asphalt of the street in front and they would look as if they had
been handled carelessly.   I decided then I would give all my business to
FEDEX.

 

I had many years before when Greyhound was a real bus line used Greyhound
and was happy with their care of the large packages but as somebody pointed
out you have to go to their location/bus station to get the packages.

 

I also was aware that for something large and heavy if you are taking it
along a train route (in my case San Jose to Los Angeles) you can have a
large and heavy box put into the train car below where the passengers sit
and the last time I tried that they didn't even charge me extra for the
heavy package.  Guess they assume it was large hand luggage and there were
many students going to school on the train.   But here again, you have to be
there while the train is stopped to get the package off the train and in my
case I was in the same train car as the package. 

 

Gee, this reminds me that I REALLY need to get control of all the spaces in
the garage occupied by receivers, transmitters and the like that I put away
and never go around to testing and repairing and "playing with."  Hate to
think of my kids and grandkids throwing out some piece of what was at the
time "top of the line" gear that I never did get around to playing with and
repairing!!!!