A common conceit in fantasy and science fiction novels is that the characters are living “after the fall”. A great civilization came before, but it was destroyed and much of its learning was lost.

That’s how I feel about smalltalk. I picked it up on a whim a year or two ago, and it’s been a revelation.

I feel cheated. We had this thirty years ago, and I still had to spend all those years writing C, or – I shudder to remember – Java? With smalltalk, coding is fun again.

Ok, I admit that I’m a bit defensive about my love for
Smalltalk.
TheGoodDoctor gives me a sad, bittersweet smile when I bring it up. It’s the smile you’d give to a sick child who’s begging to see his puppy one last time — only you know that the puppy was run over by a truck this morning. “Sure, kid”, you say, “sure”.

This is important now because I’m thinking about doing a thing and I need to choose a language, and a look at the options makes me feel ill. PHP looks like work. Java looks like the tomb. Ruby looks like, well, like Smalltalk actually. Only they left out the best parts.

Oh – be wary of TheGoodDoctor, ladies. He can’t really write presciptions. He prints those little pads in his basement.

So I bought

this book from Amazon. I am trying to convince Fruitbat and DarkMan that
Smalltalk
is the language of
the future
(stop snickering and check out
seaside or
croquet, I’m serious, you won’t regret it) and I want to convince them to try it out. I’m looking for some introductory material that isn’t either twenty years old or hopelessly nerdish. Stop rolling your eyes at me, it’s amazing how much you can get done with just…

Oops, sorry for the soapbox moment. I’m back now. All of that, while true, isn’t really the point of this story. The only part of that matters is that I bought a book.

DHL decided, for reasons known only to them and their dark masters, to deliver my book to a post office. I called DHL to ask why they’d done such a thing, and their response was that Amazon requires it. If I have a problem, I need to take it up with Amazon.

Not a big deal, you say, the post office is maybe six hundred feet from your house! Even you’re not that lazy! For the record, I am, but that’s not important right now. The post office they delivered it to is not the one six hundred feet from my house. They delivered it, again for reasons unknown, to a post office that is downtown and to which I will have to drive. Not exactly a Khmer Rouge killed half the population of my town sort of problem but I was annoyed nevertheless. If I’d wanted to drive and get the book, the Borders is closer. Princess wants the book to come to me.

So I called the super-double-secret Amazon customer support line (which I found on
a blog — 800-201-7575 — love the blogs).

They picked up on the first ring.

I got as far as “they shipped it to a post office box and…”, and the guy said, “I apologize, sir. We will ship you a replacement overnight at no charge”.*

You apologize? Wha? But what about all of the scathing stuff I’d worked out for you? I was prepared! I was left sputtering, “but they shipped it…”.

He was having none of it. “Do you have a pen and paper, sir? I will give you the order number of the replacement right now. We will ship it overnight at no charge to you.”

I feel… disgruntled, no wait not that, the other thing. Gruntled? No, give me a second, I know it: Satisfied?

Yes. Satisfied. I hadn’t prepared for this outcome. Break out the Asti Spumanti because he said he’d call and he called.

Amazon, baby. Go buy something from them right now. Your master commands it.

* Conversation reproduced from my memory. Given the other things that my memory tells me, it’s possible that I never called Amazon at all and the guy on the phone was just trying to get rid of me so he could find out what people want on their pizzas. Further given that I’m the guy who started off by telling you that smalltalk is the wave of the future, you’re probably better off ignoring the whole thing.

UPDATE: The pizza guy must have passed along my message. The book arrived, as promised, within 18 hours of my phone conversation. Holy moley! Amazon just got a customer for life.