The Gift Basket

Tuesday after work we found a package waiting for us on the front porch of our new house. The box was festively decorated with red and white stripes and had been shipped from Goodies for Goodman.

The package was addressed to the former owners of our house. Underneath the address label written (in bold) was the phrase PERISHABLE: OPEN IMMEDIATELY.

The box wouldn’t fit in our refrigerator, so we put it on the kitchen table. The clock was ticking.

I’ll be honest — my first instinct was to rip the box open while singing Feliz Navidad at the top of my lungs, but Susan wouldn’t let me.

Next stop? The web.

I tracked down the addressee on Facebook and sent him a message. This is what it said:

Hello, my name is Rob and my family and I purchased your old house in Oklahoma. Today a gift package arrived on the front porch. It is from “Goodies from Goodman” and says it contains perishables. There is no other “from” address on the outside of the box. Would you like us to reship it to your new address? I hope you answer soon because it smells good and I had an early dinner at the Chinese Restaurant in Piedmont …

I rechecked his Facebook page a couple of times and discovered that he hasn’t updated his page since August. Dead end.

I then turned to Facebook and Twitter and asked the masses what I should do. The vast majority of people said eat it. I knew if I ate it, Susan would track down either the sender or the recipient and reimburse them. Sigh.

Then I checked out Goodies for Goodman’s website. Some of their gift baskets contain fruit. Some contain nuts. Some contain chocolate. Some contain … ham.

PERISHABLE: OPEN IMMEDIATELY

Around midnight I opened the box and found a shrink-wrapped basket. I saw some fruit and chocolate and nuts and cheese and crackers and, thankfully, no ham. Although the box itself wouldn’t fit in the fridge, the basket would.

There it sat, overnight.

Wednesday morning I opened the shipping label. Written on it was a message from the Shields Pipe Corporation, wishing our former home owner a Merry Christmas. Knowing that Susan would never let me eat anything out of that basket without permission from somebody, I tracked down Shields Pipe Corporation on the web, found their contact information, and called them.

I explained the situation to the receptionist, who transferred me to someone else. I explained the entire situation a second time: we received the package, it wasn’t for us, yes the address was right, no we don’t have a forwarding address for the old owners, no the box wouldn’t fit in my fridge, yes I opened the box, no I hadn’t opened the basket, no I hadn’t eaten anything out of it yet, yes I would like to. Then I got a response I wasn’t fully expecting.

“Can I call you back?”

A few minutes later my phone rang, and I got the response I had hoped for. “Looks like you got yourself a free gift basket. Have a Merry Christmas, and enjoy the food!”

Wednesday evening, we did just that.

(Morgan wanted me to point out that when I asked everyone to “say cheese,” she was literally holding up cheese.)

3 comments to The Gift Basket

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