Happy Columbus Day!

Today is Columbus Day. Well, technically it isn't - Columbus Day is supposed to be October 12 - the day the Nino, the Pinto, and the Santa Claus arrived at the Americas (the Pinto, of course, exploded just before reaching the shore; fortunately, the concept of "lawsuits" had not yet been invented). However, the government decided years ago that it would be more prudent to celebrate on the second Monday in October, for a very sound federal reason: it gives federal employees an excuse for a federally extended 4-day weekend. However, ordinary citizens like you and I must go about our business as usual (unless we still happen to be on vacation anyway, like I am).

Which is why I was quite surprised to find out that the USPS tried to deliver a package for me this morning. As far as I can tell (based on my understanding of the Wikipedia entry for Columbus Day), the Postal Service is supposed to be on vacation today. I was expecting a package (namely, the cellphone I ordered for use in Israel) to be delivered by USPS Priority Mail, but not today. You can imagine my surprise, then, when not only do they appear to be on duty today, but they even went out of their way to attempt to deliver the package very early in the morning, before anyone was available at my father's workplace to sign for it. Personally, I think that they had Postal Inspectors hiding in the bushes with Secret-Service-style earpieces in their ears, watching the front door, and whispering "The coast is clear! Deliver the Shadow's package NOW!" into the microphones hidden in their sleeves as soon as the last person
left the office last night. Not that I'm paranoid, of course. Although the only flaw I can see with this line of reasoning is that in the commercial neighborhood where my father works, there are no bushes (or anything even resembling any form of vegetation, except possibly potted marijuana plants).

Anyway, upon further investigation I've discovered, to my relief, that I am not a victim of racial discrimination (although this being America, I could probably sue anyway). It seems that only express mail and priority mail is being delivered today, so an attempt should have been made. But upon calling my father, I discovered that someone WAS there at the time of the so-called delivery attempt, and they say nobody tried to deliver anything. So I don't know why USPS thinks nobody was there to receive it. Perhaps the delivery person was under the influence of the, shall we say, "vegetation" at the time. Or perhaps not. Or perhaps the truck was struck by a fallen alien spacecraft, this whole thing is just a government cover-up.

Although I doubt the government would be working on cover-ups today - they're still out celebrating their 4-day weekend.

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