King Of Postage and eBay

Oh my, I am prolific right now. This weekend I sold no less than 70 items on eBay. Yes, seventy items. Nothing of any great importance - the odd DVD here, the occasional pair of ski trousers there, a 2001 calendar, and so on - but I remain very pleased (and slightly surprised) at the worldwide demand for my bits and pieces.

Spain, Germany, Czechoslovakia (as was), Australia, Russia. The demand for my items is universal. It is a wonderful thing. Since I sold most of these items for 99p plus postage, it's not really about the money (although a few items did go for a surprising amount), it's really about the space which these items are no longer taking up in my home. And that has to be a good thing, since if I don't put a move on I'll be crossing the two-year anniversary of "tidying up", and that really would be going on a bit long.

In any case, whenever a large number of items need to be posted, the King of Postage swings into action. And today your King has been vigorous, wrapping up parcels and packets aplenty. Many once-used jiffy bags were re-used, in order to save the many dolphins of the rainforest. Much brown paper was used in the wrapping up of the larger items. Sticky labels and sellotape in all directions, a veritable whirlwind of activity has been seen here for the past few days.

On Monday and Tuesday, many smaller items - the ones that fit in a postbox - were dispatched on their way to the eagerly waiting buyers. Today, it was time for the King to take the bigger parcels and packages to the Post Office.

Normally, the Post Office is a dismal affair, as much time is spent queueing behind ordinary non-Kingly people, often clogging up the place with non-postage related activities. People wanting travellers cheques, renewing their car tax, a confluence of nuisance and delay.

But today, upon entering the establishment... no queue. In fact, no customers at all. Clearly the place had been cleared in advance of the King's arrival, in order to ensure that business was transacted without delay. I very much approve of this situation. I walked straight to the counter (without even having to walk around the little maze-style queuing system around the back of the shelves of cardboard rolls and birthday cards) and offered my regal instructions.

"These all have stamps on already, apart from one," I said. The ladies behind the counter flushed red with obvious excitement at being in such proximity to such an accomplished King of Postage. I began handing my packages across the counter. A small faux-pas as one of the ladies made a motion to move one of the packages onto the weighing scales -- as if they were going to put all of my regal items THROUGH THE TILL LIKE SOME KIND OF COMMONER! Her more experienced colleague shot her a swift glance to indicate that this would not be good for anyone. I pretended not to notice this clear breach of Royal protocol, and did so with good humour, since it is of course not everyone who is accustomed to such Kingly procedures.

Package after package after package, and then, finally... the one item to be stamped. A clear honour for the postage staff, as you can imagine. "Small packet, Airmail, International Signed-For, please." An expensive high-rolling request at the best of times, but in the presence of the King, a once in a lifetime opportunity. Both ladies blushed with pride (and perhaps arousal) at being called to my imperial service in this fashion. Nonetheless they were able to secure the required sticky labels and barcodes, and even managed to type the crazy foreign address into their automatic computer.

Our business conducted, I thanked the ladies very much for their time, and bade them farewell.

"Hail to the King!", I am sure I heard one of them say, as I left.