Ch 8 Sly asks Primo to figure out how to return the watch Primo bought for him and I want to be ticked off about Sly’s burdening Primo with things Sly should figure out for himself, but then I realize that Sly is not being completely unreasonable, which makes me cranky to admit – darnit, Sly! But then Sly creates the second problem all for himself and still wants Primo to fix it

Primo buys a watch to Sly from a flash sale site. Woot ships the watch to Sly.

The watch doesn’t work.

Sly, who is retired and is, may I remind you, The Smartest Man in the World, does not try to deal directly with woot. Instead, he asks Primo to deal with it.

Sly wants Primo to help him return the watch that Primo ordered for him.

OK. Maybe I can see that for a parent who is not technically proficient and who did not place the order in the first place, meaning he didn’t necessarily have access to all the order and ship information.

If it were my mom in this situation, I would help her. I guess it’s not so unreasonable for Sly to ask for help. Man, I hate to admit that. Primo helps my mom with her computer, even though she has an associate’s degree in computer science. Oh I hate this! I hate not being able to be completely righteously indignant about something Sly has done.

Primo contacts woot, gets a shipping label, and forwards the link for the label to Sly.

Sly opens the link, prints the label, prepares the package, and mails it.

The package is returned to Sly with a note from the USPS: The bar code was wrinkled and unreadable.

Sly tries to print another label but the link has expired. Sly writes to Primo, "Please advise."

·         Is there really no procedure at the USPS to have someone process such a package manually? Would they really rather return a package to sender than read the address that accompanied the bar code? That is not efficient. I am not pleased with the USPS.

·         Is Sly, who is the Smartest Man in the World™, truly incapable of solving this problem by himself? Does he really have to delegate it to Primo?

If it were me, I would try these things:

·         Ask my postman if I can re-send for a human to read the address that is printed on the label next to the bar code.

·         Ask my postman if I can re-send with a new label without a bar code.

·         Email woot myself and ask what to do.

I would not ask Primo to solve the problem for me. I would think to myself, "I have a PhD from Michigan. I am super super smart. Doesn't everyone know that? I tell them that all the time. I am so smart that I can figure this out by myself. I am not going to ask my son, who has only a BS – he doesn’t even have a master’s degree! – to solve this problem for me because he is probably not smart enough."

What I suspect Sly thinks is, "Why should I do this work? I will see if I can get Primo to do it for me, even though I don't do anything all day but watch porn online and drink."

Primo emails woot. He forwards the response from woot to his dad with the note, "Dad, this should be enough information for you to return the watch. The customer service email and the order number are included in this note."

Seriously. The Lazy!