I’m trying to find a die-cut cardboard insert for a software package I am designing. I know they exist because I have two of them that I got a couple of years ago from a company that went out of business. Finally I thought I had found one on a corrugate manufacturing website. The site even had one of those live customer service chat boxes at the top. Anita was waiting to answer all of my box-related questions.

Hi! My name is Anita. Are you looking for a box?

(I didn’t answer because I was rummaging through the website trying to figure out if they had what I needed)

We also custom make boxes to fit your needs. Are you looking for a box?

Me- Hang on. I’m not sure.

Anita- I’m sorry?

(I realized that the first messages weren’t actually typed by a human being, but were standard greeting messages designed to trick you into typing stuff to Anita)

Me- I’m putting together a software package, but the boxes they want to use are made of blah de blah board and I need something to line them with so they don’t get mangled during shipping.

Anita- Okay, like this? (shows picture of something exactly unlike what I was looking for)

Me- No. It has to fit inside the box. I have heard it referred to as a corrugate liner, a stiffener, and a cardboard insert. The box is this many by that many units of measure.

Anita- Something like this? (another picture, a little closer to what I need)

Me- Almost, but I don’t need glue tabs and it only needs to be four-sided. Let me send you a die line.

(Four failed e-mail attempts and one hour later…)

Anita- how many do you need?

Me- Only a few. Like 100 or so.

Anita- Okay, we can do 100 for $795.00

Me- Whoa. When I typed “solid platinum” I meant to type “corrugated cardboard”. I do that sometimes.

Anita- I’m sorry?

Me- Is that really the price for 1 1/2 square feet of cardboard?

Anita- Yes. $795.00 for 100. And they are corrugated.

Me- And if you leave off the unicorn fur lining, how much then?

Anita- The only other option is goblin skin, and that actually costs more.

Me- Sorry. I’m just being a jerk because I didn’t get my way.

Anita- So, too expensive?

Me- bingo.

Anita- The price includes free shipping.

Me- haha.

Anita- I know. Sort of a strange way to put it.

Me- Yeah, you built that $0 shipping charge right into the price, huh?

Anita- yup.

Me- Oh well, I guess I can always make my own. Who orders stuff like this in a quantity of 100, anyway?

Anita- You do.

Me- Touché. Have a swell day, and thanks for your help.

Anita- Let me know if you need anything else.

Me- You don’t really exist.

Anita- I know.

So not ALL customer service is inept. Anita seemed pretty ept, even if the prices were stupid.

---

So…Valentine’s Day. Here’s how it went down. The Skirt didn’t like the fly rod I gave her for Christmas, nor did she like Tawny and Cinnamon, the strippers I hired for her birthday.

I’m just not a good gifter unless I really think hard about it. If Hallmark would invent “Act like a dinosaur day”, I’d rule at it. However, all of their holidays involve love and giving and feeling and warmth and other things I’m not good at. Well, I thought hard about this holiday.

Our Red Lobster reservations were cancelled due to a dubious rating of 57 by the health department, so we ended up at some fancy joint with a “chef”, dining on mango chutney balsamic glazed Venus Flytrap salad and a special wine from twenty years in the future that is paired with that particular food because it brings out the softer oakey notes in the dressing or whatever. In all honesty I have become pretty spoiled by the food available in my neighborhood, so the ambiance and quality wasn’t entirely lost on me. They even put roses and a box of chocolates on our table. She said, “Everyone else only has one rose, and nobody else has chocolates.”

“I guess all of these other guys don’t love their girlfriends very much.”

I brought a yellow “Best Buy” bag with me to dinner. I told her she was getting a power strip and a DVI/HDMI adapter. She was as excited as one would expect. After dinner I let her open the bag (no, I didn’t get her anything from Best Buy) and watched for her reaction as she saw the real bag inside. Chicks dig jewelry (no, I didn’t get her a ring, so shut up), but having never bought jewelry before, I didn’t know how much they dug it or to what ends, or which jewelry was good and which was bad. So I did some research and figured most of it out.

She looked at it and made a noise that I thought may have been a good noise, so I coolly said, “Do you like it? I mean, it’s totally fine if you don’t because I remember where I got it and everything and the guy said he’d be at the same bus station next week so we can take it back I mean I’d rather you took it back than wear something you hate or just leave it on your dresser with the x-ray goggles I got you for our six month anniversary you absolutely won’t hurt my feelings if you don’t like it because I don’t even have feelings and even if I did they’d be made out of steel like my abs do you want a martini because I do.”

She said “Yes, I like it.”

And actually teared up a little.

I have never seen her cry before, so she may as well have been telling me she was a secret agent. Not. Prepared. For. This.

I didn’t know what to do, so I punched her in the face.

Actually I was getting all faggy and teary-eyed too, and I was mostly just confused because a big part of me thought she was really disappointed. “No, really. You can take it back. Completely cool with me. He might even give you cash for it.”

“Shut up. I love it.”

And for the rest of the evening she just smiled, which is a good thing, as I understand it.

So booyah for me. I stumbled into a win for the guys who don’t know what they are doing. And don’t fall for “It’s the thought that counts.” The thought only counts when you are a kid and you do something cute like screw up breakfast for your parents. It’s still awesome that your little kid brain thought of something besides candy. As an adult, you are better off making something happen in addition to thinking about it. Imagine if the bag had been empty and I said “It’s filled with thoughts, honey. You’re so lucky. Now gimme a kiss.”

Execution counts. Even if you don’t know how you got there.

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