Sunday, July 24, 2005
Clueless vs Queueless
~ The Joys of Automated Posting ~
I've been a bit slow on the uptake as far as our local post office's versatile automated console is concerned. As a result of which, I've spent time queueing when I could have breezed in and out. It goes like this: To while away my progress up the queue, I've gazed myopically back down towards that multi-menu'd console but never examined it closely. Today I did and, good heavens ... it has everything. Just to the right of the machine is a disconcertingly life-like cut-out for which I kept having to stop myself stepping aside or apologizing for taking so long ... Language Differences: The epistolary field is a vocabulary minefield on both sides of the Atlantic: When we first arrived in Bainbridge, we rented a cottage on Blakely Avenue with one of those roadside collection boxes so favored round graduation time for batting practice en voiture . I was walking out one morning and met a neighbor who greeted me with his customary disconcerting "What's up?" (Being British, nothing ever *is* up, so I'm always at a bit of a loss how best to answer that one). Anyway, in this case I had the perfect answer, that I was "Just checking the post." Well, damn me if the honest rustic didn't shoot me an odd look and, happening to be standing next to some sturdy fencing, gave it a genial kick before reassuring me that, "Yup, still there. Still holding up." Meanwhile, when I visit the UK and talk of "checking the mail", I'm subjected to childish limp-wristed gestures and foppish moues. Just can't win.
Specifically for me, it has a scale on which to place my letter and alphabetic buttons to press for the country, at which point the correct stamp amount flashes up on the screen.
