Author: Mari

Can I blame the kid on this one?

Indirectly yes, but I saw a sign that our moving would be inevitable. And that sign was our neighbor’s “For Sale” sign. Our beloved neighbors of over a decade are moving a few blocks over for more square footage. It wasn’t a nail in the coffin, but it is one of many things, many signs that point to our eventual move.

When? I’m guessing 2 to 6 years. It really depends on who replaces our neighbors and if my work relocates to the suburban campus.

That last part really annoys me. I remember Eleanor Holmes Norton saying she helped author some rule saying a percentage of federal jobs were supposed to stay in the District. For as long as I’ve been with my agency, most of the opportunities were out in the burbs.  Since having a kid, I’m making more of an effort to go up one more GS level, and that means going out to the burbs.

Another thing, and I may explore this a bit more, I’d like to live a more Black middle class life. It was at my cousin’s wedding reception in upper PG maybe Howard Co., MD, with two beautiful words, “open bar.” Anyway, surrounded by other Black mostly educated professionals and retired professionals, I thought, this is nice. Problem, I really don’t get that living in Shaw. I do like living and being in integrated spaces. But now with my son, I’ve become extra sensitive to what impression the people in the neighborhood present. He sees the old guys on the corner, the homeless guys shuffling through and horseplaying juveniles more often than he sees the black church elders & deacons, and his retired (but very busy/active) relatives.

Shaw is diverse but the diversity is uneven. There just aren’t enough Black middle class families here. So when we talk about black white differences, it’s white rich/ black poor. It might be a different story in other neighborhoods with thicker pockets of the AfAm middle class.

In the meantime, I’m just loving the city. I’m loving the occasional peeks of the Capitol dome and the Washington Monument on my daily commute. I’m loving the fact that there is an awesome restaurant 2 blocks from my house and that most of what I need is within a 15 minute walk. Despite my complaints about 311 and various city services, I’m loving that there are apps and websites and a whole community of people here working towards making city government less sucky. Most of all, I’m loving the universal Pre-K, the one thing keeping me from going, “Let me put in a transfer to Burbsville and put the house on the market this Spring.”

If you are stuck in UPS’ My Choice where they will not deliver your packages to your home because it is set to reroute your packages to an alternative location, just cancel your enrollment.
Here’s my story.
So many years ago I suspect someone, probably my mother in law (who is currently sitting on my bookshelf), sent a Christmas gift which was stolen by porch thieves. I also had an eBay purchase that I didn’t notice that I didn’t get until weeks later (I was ordering a lot of things, don’t judge me). So I contacted UPS, signed up for their My Choice program to make sure packages were sent to a nearby liquor store. I didn’t have things sent to the house, they usually went to the Help’s work. Fast forward and because of some changes at the Help’s job, he couldn’t accept packages for a period of time.
Fine. So I ordered something off Amazon that I figured would fit in our mailbox. A few days later I get this email from UPS saying there is a problem and the alternative location I picked many eons ago is no longer available. Okay. I contact UPS and after a while on the phone manage to get them to send the package to my house. I go on-line to their My Choice website and try to change things there, but encounter a technical problem. I figured I could fix it later. I was wrong.
I had seen a few package delivery boxes outside of residences and thought I could make or buy one and have inconsequential stuff, like diaper pail inserts, parts, Keto candy, etc delivered to the house, and limit expensive stuff to the Help’s workplace. So I order a box off Amazon. UPS was to deliver it. A few days after ordering, I get an email from UPS saying they can’t deliver it. After over an hour on the phone, I get UPS to agree to send it to my house. Day of the delivery, no package. I look on line, it says it was delivered to my house 15-30 minutes before I arrived home. It was a large unwieldy package and I was doubtful someone swiped it. So I ask my neighbors with cameras if they have a UPS driver on the street at the time. Then a day later I notice on my answering machine a message I was ignoring. I ignored it because people want to buy my house. I don’t want to waste time on their messages. But it wasn’t some buyer. It was a guy one street over with the same house number who had my package. Thank goodness that my land line was listed on the label with my address. So we go over in the car to get the large, unwieldy package.
Then I test it out by ordering cheap things, like paper towels and shower caps. When delivered by USPS, no problem. But an item that was to be delivered by UPS, that stayed in limbo.

UPS Technical Service is a lie

So I kept going back to the website to fix the package redirect. But every time I tried it wouldn’t let me or said there was a technical problem. So I tried the website chat bot, and got a chat human. Who after telling me to go through the same steps I’d been going through with no success said I needed to call their technical service number, but at the time it was after hours, so I waited until the next day. So I call the technical service number, and I get a lovely young lady who tells me to go through the same steps I’d gone through before with the chat human. She tells me I need to call the technical service number and I inform her that I called that number and got her.
At the same time I had emailed UPS and tweeted my frustration. As it would be no surprise, they tell me to go through the same steps as everyone else.
On the phone the young lady pushes me over to “technical service.” Guess what? It’s a guy who tells me to do the same steps but assures me that if there is no alternative location then my package should arrive at my house. Yeah….. I decide not to argue with him, because, what would be the point? So I wait. And the package does not come to me, it is in limbo.
A fellow from UPS reaches out to me and tells me he can provide technical service. Great. Guess what? He tells me to go through the same damned steps I’d gone through with the other customer service people.
At this point I don’t believe UPS has a technical service department. The problem I was having with the UPS site was a technical problem. After about 3 hours combined dealing with UPS, I am convinced they were all reading from the same incorrect script.

So then Amazon notices the package did not arrive. This forces me to contact them. They are also limited. I can’t redirect it and I can’t get another service (USPS) to deliver it. So a refund it was.

In Conclusion

I decided to just cancel my membership and see what happened. Once I cancelled, packages, UPS packages arrived in my package delivery box.