- brad: So, what up?
- alecm: i got a little more drilling done yesterday, only to have a panic when (unrelated) my mains water got shut off
- alecm: turned out it was a neighbour in another building doing a house extension
- alecm: switched off at the main, warned everyone else, but finding nobody at home at my place did not bother to leave a note
- alecm: i swear, karma is out to get me
- brad: Nice.
- brad: What have you done?
- alecm: i have no idea
- alecm: like rincewind i seem to have pre-emptive karma – when looking forwards to doing anything fun, repeated hurdles get thrown up
- brad: 🙂
- brad: /me is re-thinking this trip : – )
- alecm: fortunately it only affects me
- alecm: little things like taking 6 weeks to receive the handlebar end-plugs that are the right size for my bike’s new brushguards
- alecm: first pair would not assemble right (misdrilled) – second pair were the wrong size; third pair were ordered by the dealer, arrived, but he lost them.
- alecm: fourth pair eventually arrived at the dealer who mailed them to me first class
- alecm: and they took 8 days to go 40 miles.
- brad: Good God!
- brad: First Class mail took 8 days!?!
- alecm: sad thing is that this is typical for me
- alecm: bureaucracy and process is my curse
- alecm: god knows what happened in the mail.
- brad: That’s usually considered a sign of social collapse and the government offers to resign.
- brad: Back in my day, sonny… (1991)
- brad: I recall mailing a postcard to my flatmate from a post box outside the Edinburgh train station at 1730 on a Friday evening.
- brad: It beat me to the front door of my flat the next morning at 0930.
- brad: I think it was Sherlock Holmes who was bitching about the fact that they’d reduced the number of daily deliveries to only six.
- alecm: hmmmm
- alecm: now it’s “within working hours” – deliveries after 9am – and once a day, twice in some area
- alecm: but they may charge companies for that
- brad: Hmmm. Still, First Class mail is the reason there’s not much of an overnight express market in England.
- brad: Motorcycle messenger is the next step.
- alecm: well – at least they got here eventually
- alecm: but this does indicate why i have a certain fatalism
- brad: And I thought that was just a security geek thing….
- alecm: not really. as far as i can remember my entire life has been like this. it is a cause for celebration when anything ordered by mail-order actually arrives first go.
- brad: Interesting.
- brad: My karma always has me in the slowest line.
- brad: On the other hand, I get great parking spaces.
- alecm: karma is selective.
- alecm: i have no idea why
- alecm: it is a great, unexplored question of philosophy
- brad: Because, physicists notwithstanding, the fundamental force of the universe is irony.
- alecm: God really *is* an Englishman ?
- brad: I said “irony,” not “sodding, bloody-minded, parched humor.”
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