Is it just me, or does anyone else find the boxed-in messages in the upper right-hand corners of business reply envelopes faintly insulting? A recent example:
PLACE FIRST
CLASS LETTER
STAMP HERE.
Without the proper
postage, the Post
Office will return
your mail.
Wonder of wonders, I actually got a reply envelope the other day that had absolutely nothing printed in the upper right-hand corner. Just white space. How refreshing!
Don't be insulted. Something like 25-30 years ago, the utilities began refusing to accept bill payments without postage. Seems many customers were sticking them with them cost of delivering payment.
If you find it offensive, just don't put a stamp on it. Just put the destination address in the return address spot.
mail fraud be damned. 
>>destination address in the return address spot.
Many of the bills we get come with this already preprinted on the envelope.
> Many of the bills we get come with this already preprinted on the envelope.
That's is pretty much the rule nowadays.
I do agree with Rapunzel though - when one does have to put a stamp in the corner that the requests it, the command is often very rude. I have the feeling this is nothing new to the philatelist and his branch, but.
Don't put the stamp there. Put it in the lower left corner, the lower right corner, anyplace but directly over the recipient's address. The rule is that there has to be postage on the front of the envelope, according to my USPS neighbor. Upper right is simply conventional. And NO ONE here is conventional!
Re: Put stamp here etc....
Yes, this constant over-explaining is driving me mad.
We bought a new car the other day, the first really new one in a very long time. It is obviously built to be driven by an idiot. When you open the engine all the parts that have to be touched by the user are bright yellow, like something out of toytown, it takes all the fun out of trying to find the thick black oil coated dip stick thingy that you are supposed to check when adding oil. Much as I love the car (I really do love its retro shape) it is giving me a headache when I drive it. "Beep - You haven't touched the brake pedal to prove that you are still awake, "Beep - you can only remove the ignition key with the car in park" (learnt recently to my great embarrassement that you can't start an automatic if it isin't in park 
, "Beep - you've opened the door with the lights on", "Beep - you haven't fastened your seat belt yet", "Beep - the handbrake is still on" - I can work all those things out for myself without getting a headache! The other day, I wanted to listen to the radio while waiting for someone. I gave up - you are obviously not allowed to sit still - too many beeps! Aaaaargh!
Nobody seems to have mentioned the obvious reason for the little box in the right upper corner of business envelopes. When the Post Office first started using machines to cancel the stamps, they had to have the stamps applied close to that corner. If the stamps were applied elsewhere, the letters had to be hand cancelled, which was costly.
Beep - ...Beep - ... Beep - ...
One of my favorites was the car which, when you opened the door without removing the key from the ignition switch first, clearly and crisply stated, "A door is a jar."
>One of my favorites was the car which ...
Thanks Faldage. I knew that there was a word post hiding there somewhere. You also reminded me of my first joke!
a word post hiding there somewhere
And it was pronounced so distinctly: Ay door is ay jar (ay, not uh jar).
Don't put the stamp there. Put it in the lower left corner, the lower right corner, anyplace but directly over the recipient's address. The rule is that there has to be postage on the front of the envelope, according to my USPS neighbor.
or break up the total postage into multiple stamps, and sprinkle them randomly over the envelope, and make the USPS cancel each one separately. I think they may even be on the back of the envelope, so long as the address can be read.
or break up the total postage into multiple stamps, and sprinkle them randomly over the envelope, and make the USPS cancel each one separately. I think they may even be on the back of the envelope, so long as the address can be read.
...and then we wonder why the good folks at the USPS go postal...
(is that a global expression?)
thats what we do with "birthday cards" and other fun mailings.. we put on a wide varity of stamps.. 1 cents, 2 cents, what ever.. so that the required postage is made up of a motley crew.. it started when i was i a child, grandparent's tried to interest us in stamp collecting.. and thought we would enjoy getting an assortment of stamps.. we did, even if we never started collecting them! US over seas postage is 60 cents.. some times i use 10 one-cent, 10 two-cent, a ten-cent, and a twenty-cent.. 22 stamps! if fills a large percentage of the envelope!
<<break up the postage>>
I mean, hulloo..oo? Anybody home? What's this, national torture your neighborhood clerk week?
Hey! I only tried it once, as a college sophomore, to see what would happen. It was of course classically sophomoric, but some would say I've matured just a bit since then!
"You're only young once -- but you can be immature forever!"
zactly what ofTroy said... if you crowd stamps into the traditional upper right corner... they cancell it automaticaly anyway and usually miss a few so you can reuse them... I mean, collect them
JazzO - Put on yer stripped "PJ's" with the number over the pocket... were going for a long walk...
actually its not mail fraud... but your utility can refuse them.. so your bill won't be paid.. Con(solidated) Ed(ison) of NY does refuse all postage due mail, no matter what the return address (but you can pay for no fee over the phone.. and if you call from work...)
here in the US they are inclined to throw you out of the hosptial the minute you wake up from recovery, so if you send a get well to the hosptial, & you want the person to get it...put on a stamp, and their home address as a return. then the post office will in effect forward it for you.
(when toll road were cheaper, we sometimes would pay the toll for the car behind us.. (total strangers..) and tell the toll collector a story.. then the driver behind us, would try to track us down.. great fun.)
I think that the expression "going postal" has disseminated to the farthest corners of the Earth ...
I think that the expression "going postal" has disseminated to the farthest corners of the EarthWell, it had definitely got to New Zealand!
You know, it's a shame that we United Statesians don't force only the
good parts of our culture onto the rest of the world...[irony e]
I'm with Helen on this one. When I send something out of the country to someone I know has kiddies I tend to try to put a variety of stamps. I usually pick the fun ones with animals and such.
I never really thought this would be annoying to the post office people. Why would it be so?
<<annoying to the post office people
If you're asking me, it's not using different stamps I mean, but pasting them all over the envelope so they have to chase them down to cancel them--kind of thing can get annoying during the course of a long day.
kind of thing can get annoying during the course of a long day.
yeahbut: I imagine the public annoys postal-workers in this way, on rare occasion -- but far less frequently than the postal-workers annoy the public.
Herewith my last post on this subject: treat 'em nice and watch their work improve.
No matter where thou art, the part of your postal service you see when you go in to purchase stamps is not even the tip of the iceberg; for every "front desk" clerk and every route carrier there are probably eight to ten other employees, sorters, cancellers, truck drivers, personnelists, supervisors, managers, secretaries, mechanics, maintenance people, electricians, programmers, computer operators, etc.
I've talked to some of these people, and though they are pretty well paid the working conditions in the bulk postal facilities are something out of the 19th century. In general supervisors and managers care not a whit for the employees but only for the bottom line. And the bottom line is important in the US postal service because it gets no subsidies from the government.
These people can be treated pretty miserably, and since it's invisible to the public it's more difficult to understand going postal. The worst part is that managers and supervisors tend to promote in their own image, so these bad practices are perpetuated.
TdE
put the stamp ....in the lower left corner, the lower right corner, anyplace but..
and did you know what messages you were sending with this practice? For those to whom it matters, this is a language post. I was staying with an aunt this week end, and she produced a book, from about 1937, "The News Chronicle Book of Everything" (or thereabouts). It had a big section on superstitions and fortune telling - " because they are so popular, there must be something in it" - but in this section was a couple of paragraphs on "the language of stamps". Here is the code they listed:
Top Left, Upside Down = I love you
Top Left, Crossways = I love another
Bottom Right, Crossways = No
Bottom Right, Upside Down = Yes
Bottom Left, Normal = Do you truly love me?
Bottom Left, Upside Down = I am angry with you
Bottom Left, sideways = I long to be friends with you
Top Right, Upside Down = Friendship
Top Right, Crossways = Kiss
Top Right, Normal = Business Correspondance
Centre Left, Upside Down = I am engaged
Has anyone else heard of this? Used it? Suddenly realised they have a secret admirer at the business that has been bombarding them with mail?
Oy, sounds as complicated as all the different meanings in the colours of roses Rod. One colour means love, one friendship, one hate and so forth for every colour. I don't know them all (I love flowers so I am always way too happy when I get some to start analysing all that stuff) but it seems to be a something pretty well accepted.
Oh, Wordwind! I am
howling! It's his 41st, I think, that to remember the opening you sing, "Ol' Mozart's in the closet, get him out get him out get him out".
You can hear the "It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a Mozart" at:
http://www.7heavens.com/class8.htm
It's actually Mozart's 40th, and in the grand oral tradition has many variants. I learned it as ...let him out, let him out, let him out rather than "get."
Such doggerel was intended to be helpful reminders, not impositions.
There's probably a whole new thread here: jingles meant to cue musical themes and composers, like
-- Italian, Italian by Mendelssohn
-- This . is . . the sym.phony . . that Schu.bert wrote and never
-- The Blue Danube Waltz . by Strauss . the louse .
Any others singing out there?
Jackie, all I got from this link is a message saying an error occurred in the plug in this page (hence the leaks referred to above?)and then I was whisked on to the next page, which was Bach's Air on a G-string.
Bingley
But that theme will leak its way through string and brass every single time.
Especially [gasp], Wordwind [choke] [snort]--are you ready?
G-strings.
==========================================================
Bingley, I just tried the link again and it went right to the 40th. But there are other pieces there, as well. Perhaps you could try using the forward or back arrows.
Old version at
http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/u/bwross/flowerModern & bit easier to read at
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/plantanswers/publications/flowers/flowers.htmlBoth give yellow roses as a decrease of love ...when someone dies, surely love has decreased ? what do think?
My Mother's favorite was yellow roses, she didn't care what they meant she just loved them.
Why do I have the feeling we're dealing with a symbol or code without a universally-accepted meaning?
The Yellow Rose of Texas sure didn't sound like a decrease of love to me. Nosireebob. (Who was this "Bob" character, anyway?)
(Who was this "Bob" characer, anyway?)Wasn't he some mysterious character in
Twin Peaks? But then again, weren't they all mysterious? And how could you say "No" to that?
some mysterious character in Twin Peaks"Who killed Laura Palmer?"
Ah, memories!
how could you say "No" to that?
It's real easy, Cap K. Put your tongue up behind your front teeth, completely closing off the escape route for air in your mouth leaving only the nasal passages and lips open and breathe out with your vocal cords vibrating. After a fraction of a second of this, open your mouth by pulling your tongue back and down and rounding your lips. You can stop any time you want but more than a second of producing sound would be considered excessive.
Don listn to em Cap. Next e'll be tellin yew to repeat "the rain in Spain falls mainly in the plain" o'er an o'er agin.
Don't worry, bel, I didn't understand it anyway. Cain't be insulted by what ya don't know!
Cap K didn't understand it anyway
What part didn't you understand, Cap?<http://wordsmith.org/board/images/icons/sweet_innocence.gif>
I'd hate to try that first tongue maneuver with a marble in my mouth
A jazz devotee once presented Duke Ellington with a piano score that he had written down. The Duke looked at it and proclaimed it impossible to play. The score was a transcription that the devotee had made from an earlier session that the Duke had done.
So too, prominent violinists rejected the score of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto, insisting that it was impossible to play.
Perhaps they were correct.
WW notes: I have a story about losing a cat ... too absurd to tell here.
Oh, right, Dub Dub'. Dangle it in front of us and then pull it away. You get claws in your legs doing that with *some cats.
To assume that anything could possibly be absurd here is, well, aside from the obvious... asocial
.
...He can break your heart in the second movement... As long as he *repairs it by "the end".
Oh, I have tears in my eyes...you poor thing; and poor Demon.
Devilishly clever, Jazzo. I hope the bioterrorists don't get hold of this one.