Re: The Medieval Postal Service

[Dan Lewis]

A true and recent story, that is amazingly on point:

In May of 1999, I bet my brother that NY Met shortstop Rey Ordonez could
not accomplish the not-so-impressive feat of a .340 on-base percentage.
(For those of you who are not baseball fans, fret not; there's no more
baseball involved in this story.)  I won.  In lieu of the $5 he owed, I
said he could mail me a bagel.  The catch: No packaging.  Just a label for
the stamp and for my address.  The Post Office said no; the bagel needed to
be packaged in "Post Office approved" mailing tape.  

We agreed this would be acceptable, so long as it was obvious that a bagel
was being sent through the postal service.  

Procrastination set in, and he only recently made it to the post office.
The bagel was finally mailed on 01/03/01.  A small (1" x 3") piece of
looseleaf paper with my address written on it was wrapped tightly next to a
59 cent bagel from Bagel King (which, admittedly, is a waste of a bagel).
It was brought to a post office in Connecticut (about 75 minutes by car
from Manhattan).  A label with a metered postage stamp for $1.21 was
affixed to the outside, and enclosed in even more mailing tape.  The postal
worker told my brother, perhaps jokingly, that the bagel may not reach me
here in Philadelphia, as someone my eat it en route.

(Tangent: GROSS.)

I received the bagel (and one really long hair) today, 01/10/01.  It is
both uneaten and unopened.  I'll try and get a digital picture of it soon,
in case anyone is interested.

Lesson learned:  It costs $1.80 plus one week's time to get a totally
unedible bagel from the NY City area to Philadelphia, via USPS.  However,
if a private company in Philadelphia claims to have "Authentic, Fresh, New
York Bagels" (as some do), one can be sure that for $1.80, that bagel will
come with cream cheese and a glass of orange juice.  And the USPS will
almost certainly not be involved.

Dan Lewis
[EMAIL PROTECTED]