Are you shitting me?

Post offices are not my favorite places to visit. They always develop into a very needy codependency that I don't like to encounter. "You need this form, stand over there." "Sir I'm on break soon if you can't fill in the form timely...". And usually there's about as much warmth at Post Office on the west coast as there is at the DMV. My old post office was housed in some crazy building with turrets (towers not swear words) and had the worst counter attendants and post master brought in from another dimension. There is no possible way that those people are human. No way. Enough civil service bashing (sorry Bruce P)

I say that, until today. I was mailing out bday cards and gifts and wanted to use the automated postage scale machine thingy. There was quite the line for the counters, I smiled as I made my way to the machine's area adjacent to the lobby. A woman was loading packages into it like it was a Friday afternoon in Santa's north pole workshop before an "Elf Gone Wild Weekend" happy hour was about to start. She leaves and jams the chute with her last one. No biggy I think, I'll do my postage here and counter drop the rest. Chutes and Ladders!!! The Universe is jammed up. The credit card processing won't work. I informed the patron behind me of this. He just thought I had lousy credit and tried it himself. Scowling, I made my way to Hands Across The Post Office. Doubting Thomas followed moments behind, shaking his head and avoiding eye contact. The line moved better than I thought and not before long I was being called to a clerk. I gave him my out going cards, bought stamps and he began weighing the packages. "By the way, the self automated package machine is out of order. So you should know," I said very nicely. The clerk raised his head, looked me in the eye and said, "Job Security," with the wryest smile you've ever seen. Humor. At the post office. Humor. At the post office. I pert near peed. Something between an exhale and laugh and a cough came out of my chest and the clerk smiled greater. At the end of the transaction I pulled my amex from my fold of cash and handed it over. He then commented how he had a similar wallet and produced and wallet made of cardboard and duct tape. I told him the color was fetching and the style trendy. He was pleased with this transaction. Business over I wished him a good day, and left.

It's not uncommon to find characters in Los Angeles. People regularly exercise at the park on a tightrope, or leave gyms with juggling pins. Sometimes you can even catch the nice man in the matadors outfit riding his bicycle with the basket of silk flowers on the handle bar through Calabasas, and I won't even start about The Cat Lady (I'll tell you another time). But to find a character, in civil service at the post office, with great timing...........are you shitting me?