Brad Hollerbach is the Director of Information Technology for the Southeast Missourian. His opinions are his own and do not reflect those of the newspaper or its editorial board. He writes this blog primarily for his own amusement and to parody the absurdities of the world we live in. He lives with his wife and two cats that don't really care for one another in Cape.

Magazine 'Free Gift' Leaves Something To Be Desired

Posted Monday, March 15, 2010, at 12:00 AM

I'm trying to reform myself when it comes to dealing with mail. And by mail, I mean the old-fashioned kind that gets delivered to your house 6-days-a-week rather than the type that shows up on your computer 24/7.

My wife and I have a tray on our home's built-in butlers pantry that we've designated for all new old-fashioned mail.

Our original goal was that new mail would only stay there briefly before being moved to the bill organizer, put into the filing file folder, shredded or pitched.

Unfortunately, that's not how it has worked out.

The mail has been getting put in the tray, but then we don't deal with it right away, so the stack gets higher and higher until we have an incident like we had last week where the pile toppled over covering our cat who happened to be strolling by in credit card check offers, bills and spring gardening catalogs.

It rather traumatized her. Rather than sauntering by the pantry like she's done for years she now gallops past it, obviously afraid that she's going to be beaned again in the head by a Plow & Hearth catalog.

Ever since the mailanche, I've been trying to be better at dealing promptly with the mail. So last Friday I was reviewing that day's pile when I came upon an envelope that I would normally toss without a second glance.

It was a magazine offer from Fortune magazine. The envelope said "Do Not Bend." I thought that was curious for a magazine offer, so I opened it up. The reason the envelope said "Do Not Bend" was because it contained a free gift enticing me to subscribe to Fortune.

It was a bookmark.

With an imposing name like Fortune, you'd practically expect the free bookmark to be made of gold just to show me that if I truly wanted to make a fortune that Fortune magazine is the-end-all-be-all, absolute only source that wannabe fortune pursuers should turn to for advice on how to both make and spend a fortune and that because Time, Inc. -- the publishers of Fortune -- had sent me a gold bookmark that I would be completely daft not to subscribe to their magazine.

At least, that's what I expected.

But sadly, the bookmark was not made of gold or any metal for that matter. It was not even made of plastic. No, this bookmark was made of cardboard and when I say it was made of cardboard, it was actually about the thinnest piece of cardboard they make. It was kind of like heavily starched typing paper.

It was rather disappointing. I could use some good fortune right now. Do you have any idea how much a pet psychiatrist costs for a cat who has been traumatized by mailanche?

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Hey, I got the same bookmark. Don't knock it, it was the perfect gift. I needed something to put under a wobbly table leg and real cardboard was too thick to to fold.

-- Posted by ParkerDaws on Mon, Mar 15, 2010, at 7:21 AM
Brad, Here is a way to deal with mail. Bring in and quickly scan each envelope and sort into 3 piles. Pile one for things you know needs your immediate attention, Pile two for things you can look at later, Pile three for mail you are not sure of.

Then take Pile three and sort into Pile one or Two. [You may have to open and take a quick peek.] Next when you are down to Pile one and Pile two, take Pile two and file in #13 because you know you will never get around to reading Pile two anyway.

-- Posted by Old John on Mon, Mar 15, 2010, at 9:39 AM
Rick, you are downright, and I mean Way downright, wicked. The very idea of sending unsolicited mail postage paid forms back to the lovely, thoughtful people who took the time and expense to mail it to you in the first place to clutter up your house and garbage can.

And you, Brad, are a huge disappointment that you did not immediately sort out the mail as you walked back from the mailbox and dispose of it into the garbabe can post haste. Instead you allowed it to accumulate and become an endangerment to the very life of your poor helpless and unsuspecting cat. You should have been charged with animal abuse.

Otherwise, I'm in a pretty good mood today.

-- Posted by voyager on Mon, Mar 15, 2010, at 5:46 PM
Rick, I must agree with Voyager that that is pretty wicked. You related to Dr. Evil by any chance? Have you figured out how to connect one telemarketer to another?

The way I look at it Voyager, the cat still has 8 more lives. It could have been much worse. Rather than a Plow & Hearth catalog imagine the results if it had been a 1970's Sears catalog? That would have been one dead puddy-tat.

Thanks for reading.

-- Posted by Brad_Hollerbach on Mon, Mar 15, 2010, at 10:37 PM

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