Friendship Swap

How exciting to be able to join the Friendship Swap with Kristina McCarthy again this year !

Today I received a parcel from Cheryll - my partner .

On arriving home this morning I saw the postal van parked across the road on the grass verge. Ooo yeah I thought - some little bits and pieces I've been purchasing on line have arrived and maybe my Friendship Swap parcel has arrived.

I know the mail can be slow up here but I was getting a little worried as Cheryll let me know the parcel was on its way prior to going on her holiday. And there was a reminder from Kristina about sending and noting receipt of our parcels via emails. I had a couple of other parcels overdue but put in a claim to eBay for one and received a credit only yesterday.

The postal gent waved to me and I crossed the road to retrieve the parcels only to be told - 'Sorry about the late delivery luv". I didn't understand his comment when he added that he had a couple of letters for me as well.  Now this is the parcel delivery man not the postperson who delivers around 2pm.

I said to him that I thought the parcel went missing because when I saw that he number of the house was one digit out it was my fault. He then asked me to read the letter prior to opening the parcels. And he said it twice. Now this was an odd thing to be told so perplexed I took the letters and the parcels inside the house.

I spoke to my Mum as I walked in about what the parcel delivery man said. I then opened the  first of the letters only to find an apology letter from Australia Post, the second letter read the same. Apparently both these parcels had been allegedly stolen and luckily retrieved and the matter was still in the hands of the police.

I sat stunned.

Both parcels were unopened - thank goodness for that. Only the larger of the boxes had ripped brown paper. I quickly opened the smaller to find that it was the parcel Id just got a credit for and I which I had also left neutral feedback for as this was the second parcel I had paid for from this particular seller.

I called eBay and had my comment rescinded immediately and then contacted PayPal to resend the money back to the seller. After all I had received the goods.

I was a little worried about the second parcel as I recognised Cherylls name and address on the back of it. I opened the box to find all the bits and pieces still in there. I will upload pictures and make comments on that later.

I think I am still stunned as only two years ago I sent out a parcel that went missing from the local post office I lived near at the time. This was never found and I had to put in a claim for things I had bought and made for another friendship swap. Difficult to put a value on things like these. It took months to get the claim finalised and I felt like the person to whom it was being sent and the organiser of the swap may have thought I hadn't sent it. I can't believe I'm on the other side of it this time. That's twice in three years!

So I'm not sure if the parcels went missing from the front door or otherwise, though I did speak to Australia Post who assured me it wasn't from the house - I was almost in the car to go apply for a P.O. box if it was!

So a topsy turvy day it has been with me not even able to access my Blog for hours. There seemed to be a block to me accessing this tonight as well.....note the late hour of this authors notes LOL

Wishing us all a better day tomorrow - I will be volunteering some time in handing out how to votes for the weekends election before heading home to complete the last few items for my market stall on the weekend. And if my dogs are lucky ( or otherwise as they may think)  - they will have major haircuts when I get out the clippers out.

Yours in craft and life - Dee