A new record has been set in how long it takes to ship a package to or from Alice Springs. Everyone who lives in Alice has a list of shipping horror stories. High mileage vegetable and K-Mart’s Thursday shipments are facts of life here. If you’ve been here more than a few months you will have a tale of personal misery and profound frustration.
A bank which shall remain nameless, (but it rhymes with Fells Wargo) decided to abbreviate Australia with AU and managed to send my new box of checks to Austria instead of Australia. The box was posted on December 28 and eventually arrived at my house with some really cool postmarks on March 2. Sending and receiving mail from Alice is always an adventure. The quickest transit to the States has been 8 days. The checks route through Europe took 63 days; which was the standing record until our doorbell rang on a couple of days ago. Much to my amazement, the postman handed me a package that we’d given up for lost. On December 30, my dear friend Melanie mailed this package in Ontario, Canada; setting a new shipping record of 103 day! The new record is noteworthy but the contents of the package made my day.
Last July on the farewell tour, I stopped in Guelph, Ontario to visit Melanie and while there harassed her for her old fashioned aluminum ice cube trays.
Her response was a dissertation on the attributes and benefits of large high quality ice cubes. I laughed and didn’t think much more about it until I landed in the desert to discover that the refrigerator in our house didn’t have an ice maker. That wasn’t surprising to me but the fact that Aussie ice trays produce marble sized ice cubes was more than I could bear.
I swallowed my pride, called Miss Melanie to beg her forgiveness and ask where I could obtain a couple of vintage ice cube trays. She had to rally the troops by calling her mom back in Courtland, Kansas and sending her and friends out to scour antique stores in central Kansas for contraptions that make SUPERIOR ice cubes. Those great ladies were successful; the trays were forwarded to Melanie in Canada where
she added her Christmas wishes and handed the package over to the Canadian postal system on December 30. All hope had been lost so I was ecstatic to open that package this week and promptly make a tray of big study cubes that melt VERY slowly.
I bought gin when we were in Adelaide and the limes are almost ripe, looks like I had better stock up on tonic water!
A bank which shall remain nameless, (but it rhymes with Fells Wargo) decided to abbreviate Australia with AU and managed to send my new box of checks to Austria instead of Australia. The box was posted on December 28 and eventually arrived at my house with some really cool postmarks on March 2. Sending and receiving mail from Alice is always an adventure. The quickest transit to the States has been 8 days. The checks route through Europe took 63 days; which was the standing record until our doorbell rang on a couple of days ago. Much to my amazement, the postman handed me a package that we’d given up for lost. On December 30, my dear friend Melanie mailed this package in Ontario, Canada; setting a new shipping record of 103 day! The new record is noteworthy but the contents of the package made my day.
Last July on the farewell tour, I stopped in Guelph, Ontario to visit Melanie and while there harassed her for her old fashioned aluminum ice cube trays.
Her response was a dissertation on the attributes and benefits of large high quality ice cubes. I laughed and didn’t think much more about it until I landed in the desert to discover that the refrigerator in our house didn’t have an ice maker. That wasn’t surprising to me but the fact that Aussie ice trays produce marble sized ice cubes was more than I could bear.I swallowed my pride, called Miss Melanie to beg her forgiveness and ask where I could obtain a couple of vintage ice cube trays. She had to rally the troops by calling her mom back in Courtland, Kansas and sending her and friends out to scour antique stores in central Kansas for contraptions that make SUPERIOR ice cubes. Those great ladies were successful; the trays were forwarded to Melanie in Canada where
she added her Christmas wishes and handed the package over to the Canadian postal system on December 30. All hope had been lost so I was ecstatic to open that package this week and promptly make a tray of big study cubes that melt VERY slowly.I bought gin when we were in Adelaide and the limes are almost ripe, looks like I had better stock up on tonic water!
7 comments:
Wish I had know you were looking for that type of tray, no need to go to antique stores, my mom has them in her fridge in the basement.
What an awesome treat! Make mine double, please:)
oh Paula! i can always count on you to add a chuckle to my day. Happy sipping & crunching!
So we have winter again this weekend, so the thought of fresh limes is nice, and a trip outside would keep the drink cool. -11C will be the high on Sunday.
Love the picture of the Kangaroo sleeping, can you tip him over like cows?
Graham.
In a land where tap water is 80+ degrees a serious ice cube is essential!
Roos have a very low center of gravity and might be a challenge to get tipped over. Sounds like an experiment that could be done after several gin and tonics.
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