I’ve learned to love on-line shared experiences. Loved the Olympic Hockey game on Twitter. [Ellen from the future, 2025: I cannot find Tyler Stewart’s video with his reaction to the win. Rats.]
And I followed the GFY women‘s live blog of the Boob Parade, and we all got together to watch the TsunamiNon wash over Hilo.
So here’s the global event of the day:
Everyone has twittered or blogged about getting the SAME FORM LETTER from the U.S. government in the mail. We all got the letter on the same day. Our Government Can Do Anything (except provide health care for its citizens like every other civilized country).
And then we ALL said, “Dumbasses, why are you wasting money on a letter telling me I’ll be getting something in the mail?” We all practically said it in unison.
But, Citizens, is it not wonderful we all get to share this, even without Twitter or Facebook? I love this! I love the idea that some time in the next few weeks, everyone in the US will be filling out the very same form.
And I say it calls for series of parties, like when everyone in the US was watching the final episode of M*A*S*H and there were “MASH Bashes.” We need a big Census party night, or Census t-shirts.
I don’t recall being this enthused about the 1990 or 2000 census. Hm. (Oh – Gary explains that “we were so caught up in our luuuuv.” So that explains it.)
11 responses to “PARTY! Party of Two in the Household.”
The Post Office has to stand on its own now, and the government can’t bail them out anymore after the regulations changed. I think they cook up stunts like this to shove money into the Postal system, which is in desperate need of the funds to stay afloat. It’s genius, really.
Dave2 – Ohhh – you just know people are going to send letters to the post office: “I filled out my form. Expect to see it in about a week.” You’re right, I’d buy a stamp for that.
I was so sure you were going to comment on last night’s episode of House…
The resolution is fantastic!
Friend 8 – [SPOILER ALERT] – Okay, first, who wouldn’t post about poo? That’s absurd. The Mother of All Bloggers, Dooce, was the first to post about her constipation issues. Second, there is NO way they wouldnt have said “What’s your poo been like?” if they had taken a history. And if she was undiagnosed yet obviously dying they would have been capturing every bowel movement and throwing it in the centrifuge and testing the hell out of it. Heck, they even captured my poop and looked at it the first time I was in the hospital with MS. (And then they stopped the stool softener they’d prescribed. That’s all I’m saying.) And SINCE YOU BROUGHT IT UP my poop is fabulous, in fact I think it’s the best in my adult life. Colin my Colon has stopped by every day and no longer sleeps all week until Thursday. Thanks for asking.Hattie – if the resolution on the video is fantastic, you can see the shine on Tylers head, that is true. If it’s the resolution to the house episode, well, see above. I dont buy it.
I got that census letter-about-a-letter and rolled my eyes, too, but of course anything they can do by mail to boost response rates saves them the cost of sending out an in-person follow-up. Just getting bloggers chatting about it will help a bit, by reminding people: the form will arrive soon, don’t toss it out with the junk mail!
(Last time, I submitted the form and they sent someone out to double-check it. She was so very unpleasant and frankly scary that I didn’t let her into my building. We finished the questions on the sidewalk.)
Elsa – How could you fill out the form so someone would need to double-check it? Did you say there were 20 people in your household?
I can’t even imagine what they found questionable about a single-person apartment dweller. At the time, I assumed it was a random spot-check, just to make test the polling model.
However, I was
A) working 60+ hours weekly
B) deep in a whirlwind romance
so I was rarely home, and played along game of phone tag trying to make an appointment for the in-person interview. By the time we met in person, she was practically spitting blood. Relegating her to the sidewalk did not improve her disposition.
Elsa – Oh! Whirlwind romance! Well, she had to give you credit for being counted.
I remember! I figured out why Crazy Census Lady was dispatched to interview me!
And by “I remember,” I mean “I’m guessing!”
In 2000, I was randomly assigned the long form, which has maaaaaaaannnnnny more questions. One of them asks how many rooms in your home, and defines a room very carefully: “must be separated by built-in archways or walls extending floor to ceiling”; include bedrooms and kitchens; exclude bathrooms, porches, halls, etc.
But. Under this careful definition, my open-plan apartment had only two rooms: 1) a bedroom; 2) everything else. The obvious size of the place and the responses of other tenants in the building (whose apartments were more traditional 4- and 5-room layouts) probably meant my answer got red-flagged. And, of course, when The Crazy Census Lady started yelling at me and I refused to let her into the apartment, she couldn’t either verify my answer by sight or calm herself enough to ask a coherent question.
I bet dollars to doughnuts that’s the answer.
Elsa – Well that would explain it. I say this from my four room home.