Reader of the Week!

My blog has officially reached the point where I may have to begin a “Reader of the Week” recognition promotion. Considering there are likely no more than three of you reading this in the first place, it’ll probably be pretty easy to receive this prestigious acknowledgment, perhaps even more than once or twice a month.

But we do indeed have a reader who has gone above and beyond the call of duty, responding and taking appropriate action as a result of a recent blog entry. A couple weeks ago I wrote about my tendency to get really excited about getting mail, especially when it involves the UPS truck pulling up to the house.

In that article, I mentioned that I am often tempted to mail silly things to myself, just so that I could take pleasure in having the big brown truck pull up to the house. Specifically, I thought that it would be cool to have Kleenex delivered right to the door while the neighbors imagine that I’m receiving something extravagant.

So you can imagine my excitement and elation yesterday afternoon as I was getting ready to pick Little Smoot up from school, and up pulls the giant brown truck. Naturally I was giddy, especially since I didn’t recall ordering anything that I hadn’t already received.

Since it was surprisingly warm outside, there were even a couple neighbors in their yards who were able to witness the big truck’s arrival. I’m sure they were imagining what must be inside the medium-sized box that the UPS dude was handing me. Knowing my geeky tendencies, they probably thought I was getting some sort of new electronic gadget, or perhaps a belated birthday gift or some such thing.

None of the neighbors were in the house with me when I opened up the box to reveal its wondrous contents: a new box of Kleenex! It’s worth noting that the package was also stuffed with wadded up balls of newspaper to protect the contents, as if it’s humanly possible to do that much damage to a box of Kleenex while being transported.

Not surprisingly, the return address indicated that the package came from “H. Dat,” also known here as Hoosaid Dat in his numerous and frequent blog comments. So needless to say, the first ever recipient of the Hank Smoot Files Reader of the Week Recognition Promotion goes to: Mr. Dat.

I only have two regrets regarding this surprise gift. First, I wish I had the UPS tracking number ahead of time, so I could have followed the whereabouts of the Kleenex as it made its fantastic voyage to my doorstep. And I also kinda wish I had jokingly suggested something more valuable than Kleenex in my original column, like maybe gold coins or something.

Anyway, I am forever grateful for this gesture, and you’ll be glad to know that I was able to instantly use the Kleenex to clean up some of the Pepsi that I spat out of my nose as I was laughing upon realizing what was in the box.