Andy Chase

Last Wednesday night I buckled under and ordered Night of the Tiki from Amazon.



Being the sneaky bastards that they are, they recommended another book right before I was ready to check out: Paper Engineering for Pop-up Books and Cards. That one made its way into my shopping cart as well.



I was pleasantly surprised to learn that my books had already shipped by Thursday afternoon, and I've been checking that magic tracking number several times daily ever since. My books arrived in Van Nuys last Friday, and this morning at 11:00 AM the status was updated to OUT FOR DELIVERY, which I took to mean that the box had been thrown on a truck that would be stopping by my neighborhood today.



Thus, much of my day (and evening) was spent in eager anticipation; I've been wanting Night of the Tiki since last September, and I'm excited about the paper engineering book because as it turns out, I've had a few ideas for some origamic architecture that I just can't figure out how to do in the one-piece, 90 degree format I'm familiar with.



But, no package today. The suspense would be significantly reduced if I didn't know that my books are sitting in a UPS facility within a few miles of here; knowing that they're on their way and most likely getting here sometime this week would be enough.



Oh, those brown shorts-wearing bastards! I just checked the tracking number again, and at 9:00 PM it was updated to read VAN NUYS - TOLUCA CA US PACKAGE MISSED, NO DELIVERY ATTEMPT MADE.



Now, I know I'm not having a dishwasher shipped to me or anything, but my Amazon package can hardly be small enough to have been missed if it was rattling around the back of an empty UPS truck. I wish Amazon would work something out with stores like Borders where I could order online(with Amazon's discount) and pick the book up my own damn self.



They had better not show up when my wife is out buying food for the snakes tomorrow.