(It’s the week before Christmas and our neighbour from across the road has just come over. We’ve lived in our current home for over 15 years.)

Neighbour: “Here you go, as always.”

(He hands my dad a card, marked with our neighbour’s address but my dad’s name.)

Dad: *sighs* “Thanks, mate.”

Me: “Who’s that from?”

Dad: “My cousin. Always sends their Christmas card to number two.”

(We’re number one and have been the entire time we’ve lived here.)

Me: “But we’ve lived here for over a decade.”

Mum: “I know. But they never seem to take the hint from the return address on the envelope.”

(This year, Mum’s writing our address in the card! See if that breaks the fifteen-year streak.)

This is in the run-up to Christmas, and not surprisingly, I have a lot of online orders due for delivery. I work, so I specify my safe place is my neighbour — they don’t mind — and normally this works fine.

I check my online account to see what I’m still waiting on and find that two items I ordered a few weeks ago are showing as delivered, but I’ve definitely not received them.

I get the tracking number and go to the delivery company website. I find they have left my items in a “safe place.” They even include a photo of where this safe place was.

It was inside my full recycling bin as it was stood at the kerb waiting to be emptied along with the rest of the street’s bins. Even if they had bothered to leave a card to tell me, by the time I got home, it would have been too late anyway!

I’ve had a full refund, which doesn’t help given the items are now out of stock, but I cannot comprehend how someone can look at a clearly full-to-the-brim bin waiting outside and think that is a safe place to leave a package.

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(My dad still needs Christmas lists from my sister and me, and sends us the following text to remind us.)

Dad: “Attention, daughters. Limited time offer for free stuff. But wait; there’s more! You get free shipping and handling, also, but you must act fast to get lists in before the deadline. This offer is not valid in Italy and Turkey, but if you have turkey on your list you can still get it! Hurry, hurry, hurry!”

(My dad has come to pick me up from work. We’re just wandering around the store so he can do some Christmas shopping and I can pick up a few things while my discount is augmented — corporate’s holiday gift to the employees. He’s wandered off to another part of the store, and it should be known that he’s a bit of an impulsive shopper. I finish up my shopping and find him with a basket, filling it with items from our Hanukkah stock. I figure he’s going to give it to some of his coworkers, but he’s got an awful lot of it.)

Me: “Dad, what are you going to do with all of that?”

Dad: “Give it to your mother for Christmas!”

Me: “Except none of us are Jewish.”

(I work with my mum and our workplace is only accessible via car. You have to drive on some really rural roads. Some drivers are really not good drivers at all, i.e., hard braking because another car approaches them, not going above 20 mph, decelerating and accelerating sporadically, driving in the middle of the road, etc. This morning I am in the car with my mum driving to work when this conversation happens:)

Mum: “Oh, yeah, I got [Notoriously Dad Driver] for Secret Santa.”

Me: “Get him Driving For Dummies. Or driving lessons.”

Mum: “He’s not that bad.”

Me: “A tractor overtook him! And a double-decker bus!”

(Mum laughs, and we talk about other things. That evening on the way home, we are in a queue of traffic going really slow that’s braking constantly. Mum determines it’s [Notoriously Bad Driver]. After braking several times for no reason in less than five minutes…)

Mum: “What was that book again?”