cleolinda | Gerald would be proud

What is the point of Twitter, you ask? What's it any good for? Well, customer service, for one. To catch you up, a package went missing in transit, and last night I was bitching on Twitter, as you do, and the following exchange happened:

cleolinda: Aw, HELL. I was expecting a package, and UPS claims it was delivered on MONDAY. And I was home. And it wasn't. That's not good.

cleolinda: Okay, unless I'm misreading this--the tracking thing says it was delivered to PENNSYLVANIA?

cleolinda: UM WTF THAT IS NOT MY HOUSE

cleolinda: Okay, it looks like the package started in PA, got here, something happened, and it bounced back to PA.

[various replies from concerned readers]

ThomasAtUPS: @cleolinda: Evening. This is Thomas with UPS Interactive Communications. Anything I can do to help you?

cleolinda: @ThomasAtUPS: Sure, I'm trying to find a package that seems to have bounced back to PA where it originated, and was signed for there.

ThomasAtUPS: @cleolinda: Okay. And the sender doesn't have it, I'm guessing. We can follow up on that for you if you don't mind sending an email for me.

cleolinda: @ThomasAtUPS: Sure, no problem.

ThomasAtUPS: @cleolinda: Excellent. Please send the Tracking Number and your contact info to upsfeedback[at]ups.com and we'll follow up in the AM.

cleolinda: @ThomasAtUPS: Awesome, thanks.

ThomasAtUPS: @cleolinda: And by the way, your Twilight commentaries are absolutely brilliant. Good work.

And then I died.

It's a long story, but The Package was being sent by someone to me; I was not the person who placed the order, so it was me and The Sender who were trying to jointly figure this out, emailing UPS and The Company in Question back and forth (look, all will be revealed down the line, okay?), and then Thomas the UPS Dude rides in to save the day. This morning, he tweets (man, no offense, Twitter, but I hate having to say that I "tweeted" something), "Just to let you know, [The Sender's] email was just escalated to Customer Concerns, so you should expect to hear from them shortly." An email from UPS to The Sender confirms this; she forwards it to me.

cleolinda: Email: "Since it sounds like you still need assistance with this shipment, I asked our Corporate Customer Relations team to get involved.

cleolinda: This group is essentially our SWAT team for special customer issues." BEST MENTAL IMAGE EVER.

cleolinda: Instead of black, they're all in brown, rappelling into a warehouse somewhere. "THE TWILIGHT GIRL NEEDS HER PACKAGE! MOVE MOVE MOVE!"

cleolinda: There's snipers and tear gas, and then a car blows up.

emjwriter: @cleolinda I would absolutely go see that movie. And bring as many people as I could find.

cleolinda: @emjwriter I absolutely imagine this as the beginning of M:I 3, except with my package tied to a chair instead of Keri Russell.

foresthouse: @cleolinda "ON THE DOUBLE. OUT THE DOOR. NO, WE CAN NOT STOP ON THE WAY THERE. EVEN IF WE'RE RUNNING LOW ON PACKING TAPE."

cleolinda: @foresthouse BRING THE FOAM PEANUTS IN CASE WE HAVE TO JUMP

ThomasAtUPS: @cleolinda We have discovered what happened! A voicemail has been left with the sender, asking her to call for an explanation.

cleolinda: SWAT TEAM WAS SUCCESSFUL. INTEL CURRENTLY BEING DECRYPTED.

My personal suspicion is that The Package simply got bounced back to The Warehouse because of an innocent address mixup (again: long story), and once The Company confirms that it's there, it'll be back on the road. The Company's email was also pretty funny, except that telling you what it said would give the game away. Seriously, I am of the opinion that all of this was COMPLETELY WORTH IT, just for the hilarity it has brought into my life.

ETA: Oh, man, it's time to trot out the Gerald Story for the relative newcomers, isn't it?