The Christmas Cake Chronicles continued...

Immediately following my first Christmas Cake Saga post, I contacted Royal Mail again, who sent me back to Amazon, who sent me directly to United States Postal Service, here after called USPS. 

"Where's my darn cake?" I whinged.  I might have been a little snarky too.   Maybe.  

Within hours of the USPS-Pettit First Contact, the USPS started a multiple-times-a-day email communication thread, designed to keep me posted (ha ha) of the package's progress through the system, "while in transit."  I was quite pleased.  And slightly mollified.

On January 5 the USPS emailed again committing to a delivery date - January 10. I spread the good news far and wide.  I was very pleased.  And a little skeptical.

You see, it snowed along the Eastern seaboard.   I-95 shut down completely, where a 50 miles-long, snow-stranded traffic jam sat for 24 hours.  I figured the cake was stuck there and mentally added another day or two to the delivery time.  Then it snowed again, great swathes of grocery store aisles lay empty: "No chicken, no salad, no milk, no bread...no deliveries for the past four days," moaned the store manager.  Hmm.  But USPS remained optimistic with the Jan 10 delivery date, and now I know that was a very clever tactic.  

On January 8, I came home from a long walk in the woods to find a smallish box on the doorstep with various custom labels and Royal Mail emblazoned proudly on the front, and a set of tiny red numbers and check-mark clearly put there by the Brazilian Customs officer. He or she left nothing else to explain the chronic delay at their end, but never mind.

The cake has arrived, defying the I-95 Snow Jam, flying in the face of late deliveries, beating the anticipated delivery date by two whole days.  How wonderful.  I was very, very pleased.  In fact, I was ecstatic.

We put on the kettle, got out the good china, and tucked in: tea, a slice of very well-matured fruit cake and a lovely piece of red Leicester cheese all the way from Wales.  Sometimes life doesn't get better than this.  Even my hubs partook and declared the taste combination, "Not bad." 

I will make plans to order again but earlier in October or even September, so that the Christmas Cake has time to travel around the globe before landing on my front step.  Or, a better idea, why don't I just spend the time and make the darn thing.

P.S. I'd offer you a slice but it's all gone!