Blog Love Omega Glee: Living La Vida Post Office (2 March 2012)

Jake has finally settled on a plan for dealing with his overcrowded room. With much reluctance, he has sorted through his piles of stuff, and determined that he can indeed live without some of it. However, he has vague plans for buying anything he gets rid of back down the road when he has more space. In his mind he envisions owning a house someday with one room devoted to being a wrestling action figure museum, with all his figures on display. For now, alas, some of the wrestling action figures--please don't call them dolls or Jake will get upset--must go to new homes. Plus he could use the money since the radio station doesn't pay much above minimum wage. So, as a result, Jake has been selling his stuff online at eBay. The selling still hasn't made much of a dent in his room yet, but with each object that goes out, Jake is one step closer to being able to walk in his room without tripping on something.

Today, he's trekked his way to the post office holding two boxes, one full of history books, and the other with an Alger Hisses action figure (Jake has two and decided he could part with one, though it was cool to pretend Alger had a twin brother and use them as a tag team versus the Redbaiters). While hoofing through the slush to the post was good exercise, Jake almost wishes he could have just had the mail carrier pick up the packages instead, but he was afraid he'd be asleep when the carrier came, or, if he just left the packages out on the porch, he was afraid someone other than the carrier would pick them up. So, he gets to wait in the usual monster line at the post office instead. Even though there's six window stations, only one or two clerks are ever working. Today, it's two clerks, but one of them, Keith, a balding middle-aged fellow who likes to wear a large bright yellow "Support Our Troops" button on his shirt and listen to right wing talk radio at a loud volume much to the annoyance of his fellow clerks and most of the customers, is a master of timing. Jake's noticed during his trips to the post office that Keith will drag out or speed through a customer's window visit in order to be open to wait on an attractive woman in line. Jake watches the master at work. Keith waits on an old man getting a passport renewed, and rushes him through, getting the old man confused, but sending him off with a fistful of forms, just in time to wait on the next customer in line: a young woman in high heels. The line grinds to a halt then as Keith drags out her visit:

"How are you doing today?"

"Fine."

"I really like your hair."

"Oh, thank you. I just got it cut."

"It looks great. Now what can I do for you today?"

"I have to buy a stamp."

"Oh, a stamp! Which stamp do you want? We have plenty to choose from."

"Oh, it doesn't matter. I just have to mail this letter."

"Well, would you buy any pair of shoes?"

"Uh, no."

"Well, the same should go for your stamp! You want your letter to be fashionable just like you, don't you?"

"Uh, yes."

"Well, let me show you what we have."

Keith spends about ten minutes showing the young woman the variety of stamps available and flirting with her, while his fellow mail clerk, a middle-aged woman, shoots him dirty looks and waits on the next ten customers, including Jake. As Jake leaves the post office, he notices that Keith has finally finished waiting on the young woman, but since the long line is now entirely full of men grumbling at the slowness of the line, closes his window, and tells the other clerk, "I'm taking my break now."

Blog Love Omega Glee is a novel by Wred Fright about two bloggers who fall in love while the world falls apart, which is being serialized on his blog. To start reading from the beginning or read another installment, please visit Blog Love Omega Glee Central on WredFright.Com. If you like what you've read, or you've read all of Blog Love Omega Glee and want more Fright, then please read his first novel, which is available in print and as an ebook.