Mail order catalogues overflow in the wastebaskets at the Mertzon post office. Every post day, new offerings at new prices cram the stuffed mailboxes. The passenger side of my pickup looks like a magazine rack overturned in the floor.

I rushed to finish my shopping before prices dropped. Each mail run brought more bargains. I buy all my presents from catalogues. For the first time in 10 years, just one gift was back ordered. The supplier sends a postcard every five days assuring me the merchandise will arrive in 10 business days by express mail. I've heard the same promise many times before. Last Christmas, the gift shop of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts continued promising shipment of a cherry wood rocking chair ordered in October into late February. I suppose snow finally banked so deep by the mailbox in front of the museum that the clerks stopped mailing the excuses. (Rocking chair builders are notoriously temperamental. Fitting curved rockers to pegged straight legs causes an unbalanced personality.)

Books were the sole on-line order. In October, I logged off Amazon.com after buying one hundred and forty-four bucks worth of bargains. I was so excited over my selections that I clicked the wrong place, or hit the right place at the wrong time, for my mailing address. The whole order was shipped to my pal Horace Kelton's mail service in Miami to be forwarded to him in Costa Rico. (A good website to shop is www.garagesale.com. The site gives you a chance on Christmas afternoon to buy back the presents you sent your sons and daughters-in-law the week before at a big discount. Also,www.fashionsaucer.com offers big discounts in stylish clothing.)

After four e-mails trying to divert the books to my address in Mertzon, I brought up a page of "Help" giving direction to a section headed "where's my stuff?" At the bottom of the directions, a space was reserved for comments. By then my comment was: "If that's 'stuff' Amazon.com sells, send the name of another book peddler. John Adams' Biography is not 'stuff.' The National Book Award committee didn't consider The Invisible Man by Ralph R. Ellison 'stuff.' The other eight editions I ordered aren't 'stuff.' And when my friend Horace Kelton down in Costa Rico has his hands on those books free of charge, ol' Amazon.com will stand a better chance of having the Mississippi River reserved and copyrighted for a name than getting your dough or your 'stuff' back."

Days passed without a flicker in my mailbox on the Internet. Late one afternoon, a UPS man dropped off a thin paperback mystery a friend ordered. Minutes afterward an e-mail arrived announcing, "Part of your order has been shipped. Postage charges are deferred due to our mistake. The remainder will be shipped at a later date." Suspecting a trick, I dashed an e-mail to Horace directing him to rejoice at the bonanza of books Amazon was shipping him. To give all the books for party favors except the two commemorative editions of Mr. Ellison's Invisible Man to save for special occasions. Further, I warned him to avoid telephone inquires about "missing stuff."

The final shipment to my address arrived by priority mail on the thirtieth day of November. I mailed two of the books on the fifth of December back to Miami to Horace's private mail service box for Costa Rico. Amazon.com has not responded to my scolding. I await my credit card statement to see how much my side comments cost extra. Somewhere in the on-line world there must be one human being to react and respond…

December 20, 2001