It’s a busy time right now and I have Deliveries arriving around the clock. The funny thing is, I feel like I’m on a hidden camera show because I recently put some radical panel curtains on the front door that allow me to look out, but for outsiders not to see me. For the most part. At night, you can see vague images, but then I hide behind bigger furniture lol, and besides, deliveries don’t normally arrive at night.

So I’m sitting there, in my right mind, working on my laptop as Delivery after delivery arrives.

The first delivery involves two extremely large items. The guy knocks on the door, wanting to see if anybody is home.

“I’m here,” I reassure him.

The packages were so big that he didn’t want to unload them without the knowledge that someone could sign for it. Then he brings them and basically throws them on the front landing.

“Umm, can you place them under the overhang?” I ask.

“They’re heavy,” he informs me. “Where exactly do you want them?”

I show him and he hems and haws. I thank him profusely and when he leaves, I body shove them into a better position. Another sausage-like wrapped rug is rolling off into the distance, apparently having arrived earlier. I can’t keep track of this.

The next delivery guy is hot on his heels and tosses a boxed table and chairs in the middle of the front walkway. What? I go to chase him down and he’s gone before I emerge. I believe our two dogs have trained these guys to move it- move it. Nobody’s trained them how to make a proper delivery, unfortunately.

I check labels on all of the packages to see what company did what in terms of delivery style. The successive guy is a postal employee and tosses a lighter-weight box, I kid you not, like a frisbee. No doubt, he sees all of the huge boxes that are too big for me to drag inside with my hurt wrist, and he assumes that nobody is home.

Au contraire. I see it all, frisbee freak. I bring it inside, slit it open and thankfully, all is well.

Delivery number five arrives about an hour later, same day. He drops it in the middle of the walkway, I kid you not. Running to the door, he also disappears before I can grab the doorhandles. These guys are slippery.

My mouth drops open. This is a fragile shipment with the tape ripped open and the box smashed. Too heavy for me to move, I decide to check out the contents tomorrow. I have my fingers crossed.

So I go outside, push it behind a pillar, go back inside, and lo and behold, the minute I turn my back the same delivery guy of the smashed-to-smithereens box is back, a bit confused because his box moved a few feet, but he checks on its label and drops three more boxes nearby in haphazard fashion. Amazingly, this time the items are not breakable and the boxes are totally intact. I run to the door, but miss him again.

Online, I see that the last three boxes have been announced as “Delivered!” in an e-mail to me. Yet, there should be more. I look up the order history. Turns out that I have multiple orders of similar items from two different retailers. Another hour passes and the other order pops up as available for pick-up at a nearby location, saving me some shipping costs. Yet, this shipment, part of it, has already been picked up, while displayed as still being there. The second part of the order, the one that I want to get, is shown as available, however, much be picked up by… yesterday. And this e-mail is my first notice.

I spend the next 20 minutes trying to get past the gatekeepers and finally into an online chat with customer service. They say they’re confused. They’re not the only ones. But they assure me that the earlier items have been picked up as I reported, and that the new items are waiting for me.

Even though I was just notified that I had until… yesterday… to pick them up.

Folks, it’s dangerous out there in the world of door-to-door deliveries. Makes me feel like just going out, walking into a store, buying something and taking it home.

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