Somebody Stole My Package.

[The Sage Nabooru]

.....This was a perfectly ordinary, brown package that came in the mail. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

 

It was sitting on my front porch today. I never saw it. But my neighbors, who happened to be outside while I went out to search for it in the cold January air and wonder why it hadn't shown up yet, informed me that shortly after the mailwoman had delivered it, a kid from a rather, um, suspicious family down the street had watched in fascination as he played with his loud siblings in the cul-de-sac. (By "suspicious" I mean the kind of people who wake up an entire suburban block with their screaming drunken protests when they get visited and arrested by the local sheriff after playing with a stolen Caterpillar machine in their backyard at three in the morning.)

 

He just headed up the street from the cul-de-sac, walked up my lawn, looked around carefully, and then grabbed the package and put it under his shirt, before making his way back to his house.

 

And nobody did anything. Except report it to me later.

 

Now it really wasn't that important a package, just some blank paperwork that was supposed to be filled out prior to my visit to the hospital this Thursday for surgery, nothing that that kid or his family could get any kind of information from, nor was there any value therein. It was juuuuust barely too big to fit in the mailbox, and the nice lady who called me from the hospital informed me that it would be so and I would receive it today. Now I am going to have to make a special trip to the hospital to fill out the paperwork in time.

 

Now on the one hand I realize, What could I have expected them to do? Run after the kid? Call the police, or what? I can't honestly say I would know what to do had I witnessed a similar situation.

 

I guess I'm in that bitter hole when you are forced to realize that some little brat got away with something, and there's nothing you can do. I know there's not much I can do in this hole....but it's close to bedtime and I'll soon be sleeping over it, so I'm going to smolder for the time being.

[Legion]

It seems to me that someone ought to care enough about this little delinquent to discipline him. The life they save might be his own. What's to prevent him from growing up to be a big delinquent?

[Mythra]

That sucks. I don't understand how anyone can just pilfer another person's property and live with it.

 

Look on the bright side, though. Imagine the disappointment when he found out that the contents were of no value whatsoever to him.

 

Good luck with your upcoming surgery. Hope all goes well.

[The Sage Nabooru]

Well I'm beginning to wonder - what CAN you do when someone steals your package? I mean, you could report it to the police, but I doubt they'd put much investigation into "Someone stole my box with the collectible Star Wars Mountain Dew cans from eBay and I think it's that kid from down the block".

 

You can put a confirmation number on it, but really, what can that do? Prove that it showed up, but if you didn't see the thief and no one else did, what can they do but simply show that somebody had to do it?

 

Anyway, the people next door have a giant mailbox with a lock on it, and maybe I'll convince the ol' parents to purchase one. Or move out sooner than I'd planned.

[Lycorth]

Yeah, a big mailbox that locks is a good thing. A little punk like that may be too worried about getting caught to bother trying to open something like that, and can perhaps deter future annoyances.

[♦ nivek ♦]

Sage...

 

Ya CAN call the po-po and have them "take a report"...

 

Big fuckin' deal... The lady who told you sure didn't want to "get involved" or she would have called the PooOoOOLices herself. How kind and thoughtful of her to tell you, a smallish young lady, about the 'hood punk 'n thug corps raiding your postbox..

 

Po-po show up, without the witness willing to get involved, "..there is nothing we can do!".

 

Been there, done that. Got a Post Office Box..

 

Had 'Big Brown' deliver a highly time sensitive and expensive box to my door, shoved out of the truck and they ran for their truck barn.

 

Box contained a rather rare and hard to replace WW1 German machinegun I had sent out for refinish and repairs. The box was marked in BIG BOLD letters "DELIVER TO ADDRESSEE ONLY, WITH ID AND SIGNATURE!"

 

Yeah, right, 35k usd machinegun, dumped off, box beat to shit, boot printed and handled with and by shitheads.

 

ONLY way I KNOW the forking box was delivered was one of my versions of your 'hood kid tried to take the 95 pound box off the doorstep and deck, cops saw him draggin' to street and stopped him.

 

*I* got in hot water for "allowing " my machinegun to be STOLEN.. Yeah Sage, *I* got in the big.shits until someone figured out that *I* didn't leave the flarking thing out there...

 

UgghHHHH.... No easy answers unless you have a large size guy around that likes to fix problems...

 

k, problems fixed whilst you wait, FL

[Piprus]

Sage, I think the kid needs to be held responsible. Stealing mail from someone's property is a Federal offense, and although your package was worthless to him, if he stole that he would also steal valuable materials. He needs to answer for his actions.

[Kurari]

I would at the very least call the police and tell them about it. They'd go down the street and talk to the kid regardless. It might scare him to know that people are watching.

 

And yes, get a post office box. Our mail lady is a complete idiot. Fed Ex and UPS can figure out that the best place to put a package would be on the doorstep under the covered porch. Not our mail lady. Walking up seven steps is just too much for her (yet she seems able to do it just fine when we have to sign for anything). We haven't had packages stolen, but they've been left in strange places, out in the weather, and stuffed into our bushes and destroyed because we couldn't find them in time to rescue them from the weather. We've lost books, artwork, and electronics because of this astounding display of incompetance.

 

Oh yeah, we complained big time to the Post Office about this abusive behaviour of our property, and their decision? They decided that they just won't deliver packages to us anymore because we were bad and complained to them. The nearest post office is a half hour drive away in an awkward place.

 

So I have a PO Box near my work. They hold my packages nice and safe till I show my ID.

 

And Nivek, I'm LMAO at the idea of some little shit trying to haul a 95 pound box right to the cops. It's not a funny situation especially since you got in trouble, but the idea of that waste of flesh walking right into cops with a machine gun is hysterical.