My huge head or when they say three days, they mean three days...

I recently sent for some sunglasses through the mail because I lost my last pair. And when I say 'lost', I mean that someone stole them from my front porch. Either that, or I mistakenly threw them away or put them in a place I would never see them again.

Buying sunglasses is always a risky proposition for me because of my large noggin. My head is a bit larger than the normal-sized head, which has caused some problems for me.

When I went out for football in high school, they had to special order a football helmet for me because they couldn't find a helmet that was big enough for my huge melon. They had me try on everything they had, but nothing fit. Then, the coaches called around and got a helmet for me from a neighboring school that had gold on their helmets rather than our usual white color. It fit, but I asked, "What about the gold?"

The head coach, a fairly surly man, said, "Maybe if you turn into a player, we'll get you one." Ouch. I was on the scout team, so it didn't look good. Despite that setback, they did find one. I guess they didn't want me to attract too much attention standing on the sidelines with my gold helmet.

When I was in Army basic training, I ran into this problem again when they tried sizing me for a hat. We split into lines, and we walked down to a guy at the end, who looked you up, tied a tape measure around your head, picked up a hat, and placed it on your head. I walked up and he did just that, except when he pulled the tape measure around my head, it didn't line up with his hat sizes listed on the measuring tape.

The man grunted a surprise like, "Oh my goodness!" Then he grabbed the largest hat that he had, a 7 and 3/4 hat, and put it on my head. He tried to pull down, but it wouldn't come down to my forehead. He tugged and tugged and it wouldn't move. Of course, this led to a stoppage of the process as everyone within earshot got to come by and look at my enormous head. They then sent me to a seamstress and she measured my head. She said she would have some modified hats for me later that day.

So for the rest of that day, while the rest of the guys around me had their new uniforms and hats on, I had no hat on to compliment my new uniform. This led to several calls for me to put my hat on when a sergeant would pass by. This was followed by a laughing explanation from the sergeant watching us that my head was too big and that hats were coming. My how they all laughed...

Even in my last years of the Army National Guard, the largest kevlar helmet didn't fit right. The leather liner that you placed inside the head webbing, which then could be adjusted, didn't fit my head at all. Frustrated at the tight squeeze after a while, I resorted to wearing the helmet with no liner whatsoever. Instead, the helmet just sat there on my head amongst the webbing. I placed hankerchiefs and foam on top of my head for padding, which probably would have been dangerous had I gone to war at the time.

So when I try to buy sunglasses, (see the nice segue?) I often have to try on pair after pair until I find a pair that's just right for my huge head. One of two problems can occur. Either the head width isn't wide enough or the length of the sunglass arms aren't long enough. Sometimes, it's both.

So I was searching for some sunglasses to replace my stolen sunglasses with. I opted for some Gargoyles sunglasses, which was a brand that I had worn before with some moderate fit success. I paid for it online and selected 3-day UPS select for my delivery time. The package was due to arrive on September 28th.

I waited for my sunglasses to arrive and followed the progress online. I noticed the following progress:

Sept 25th - 4:50 PM - The package is picked up
Sept 25th - 9:08 PM - The package leaves Fort Meyers, Florida
Sept 26th - 12:03 AM - The package arrives in Hialeah, Florida
Sept 26th - 3:24 AM - The package leaves Hialeah, Florida
Sept 26th - 5:00 AM - The package arrives in Miami, Florida
Sept 26th - 8:21 AM - The package leaves Miami, Florida
Sept 26th - 9:56 AM - The package arrives in West Columbia, South Carolina
Sept 26th - 10:56 AM - The package leaves West Columbia, South Carolina
Sept 26th - 12:11 PM - The package arrives in Louisville, Kentucky
Sept 26th - 3:48 PM - The package leaves Louisville, Kentucky

Then I logged in that night to the UPS site and noticed this next entry
Sept 26th - 4:31 PM - The package arrives in Omaha, Nebraska

I'm then thinking, "Nice! I'll get my package a day early."

Then I noticed the next entry.
Sept 26th - 9:52 PM - The package leaves Omaha, Nebraska

I then started to wonder what that could mean. Was it on its way to my address? Maybe it's on its way to the delivery center in Omaha. Sadly, neither were true.

The next day, this entry appeared.
Sept 26th - 10:25 PM - The package arrives in Des Moines, Iowa.

That's right. My package hadn't arrived a day early after arriving in Omaha, where it was supposed to go. Instead, it arrived in Omaha and then proceeded to take a detour to Des Moines, Iowa. I thought for a second that maybe something was wrong with my address, but my check on my order form showed the correct address in Omaha.

That night, I checked the delivery progress again. There was a new trip for the package.
Sept 27 - 3:36 PM - The package leaves Des Moines, Iowa for the destination city.
Sept 27 - 6:22 Pm - The package arrives in Omaha, Nebraska.

Finally, my package had been shipped to the proper address. While the delivery process went to 7 different cities and 9 separate trips, I did indeed get my package on the third day. I guess they didn't want me to think that if I got it a day early, that all 3-day packages were like that.

I can picture the scene at the dock when it arrived in Omaha the first time.

"Hey, we got a small package that's supposed to be delivered on Friday, but it's Wednesday night. Should we let it go on so he gets it on Thursday?"

The dock supervisor is stunned. "No, we can't let him get it on Thursday! We need to have it go to another city so that he gets it on time. What if everyone expected all 3-day deliveries to get there a day early, too? It would causes unreasonable expectations! Send it on to Des Moines. They'll send it back when they see the shipping address."

I have nothing against the fine people at UPS, but even they might admit that a customer might consider it odd that their package took a detour from its arrival in the destination city, its departure to another city and then its arrival again in the destination city.

So I finally get my sunglasses on time on Friday, which is when they should have come anyway. I look at the package. It's a huge, long box about 11 by 14 in size. The sunglasses box is only two inches by 5 inches. It's a little overkill, but I open the box and put on the sunglasses. The sunglasses fit, but just barely. In fact, the arms of the sunglasses are cutting into my temples and cutting off blood flow. I went outside when them on to see what they were like, but after three minutes of wearing them, I could tell that I was going to get a massive headache if I were to wear them all day.

I reluctantly submitted a return request to the site I got them from with a small explanation about why. They responded later that day with a return number and address. I was instructed to return the sunglasses in a high quality box, preferably the one that they came in.

After I got off work, I went to a local package mailing store and said that I needed to ship a package by UPS Ground to Florida, where the sunglasses were shipped from. The lady took one look at the box and said, "I'm sorry, we can't ship Ground in this box."

I had noticed that the box was an Express Box. Although I ordered 3-day Select, the box clearly stated not to use it for anything but air delivery. I figured they just ran out of boxes and shipped mine in whatever they had.

I said, "This is what they shipped me when I had it shipped 3-day Select."

The lady said, "Well, they must have a deal with their shipper then."

"Can I just cover up the box and ship it that way?"

"No," she replied. "If I ship it in this box it must go by one of these shipping options (pointing to the options on the box)".

"Well, how much are we talking for shipping costs?"

She muttered to herself while typing in the address of the package and then responded, "Fifty six dollars."

I had only paid 5 dollars for the original shipping.

I laugh, "Fifty six dollars to ship this?! Umm... That's okay. I'll just find another box and ship it later."

Not an overly gripping story, but a little amusing...

Here's an image to show that I'm not crazy. It did happen.