I am just venting here, really.
But I'm totally frustrated with Postcrossing right now. I love the quick mystery of sending a postcard to someone else, anyone, somewhere in the world - and love the surprise of pulling the received postcards out of my mailbox.
...but sometimes I get fed up. And I'm just feeling like sharing that right now.
For a while I felt like being magnanimous, and I checked the box in my profile that said "I prefer to send to repeat countries" or something like that, to offset the huuuuge numbers of people signing up from a certain unnamed very huuuuge country. But my postcards to that country either take forever to arrive or inevitably expire. Honestly, I just dread seeing that unnamed country come up on an address, because it means I am sending a postcard out into the void and it's unlikely ever to arrive. Also, a neighboring huge country - Russia. I have had postcards arrive to and from Russia, but something is going on over there lately that is waaaay slowing down mail delivery there (though I receive postcards from Russia in about 2 weeks lately).
Due to the number of postcards I've sent through postcrossing, I'm allowed to have 10 traveling at any one time. I've got 2 traveling to Russia right now - one for 34 days and one for 39, one to the huuuuge unnamed country (had 2, but the second one expired) for 35 days... and here is the frustrating part much closer to home. I've got one traveling to Canada - our neighbor to the north - for 21 days! That user hasn't logged in for 20 days, though, so I'm betting it's arrived and they just haven't registered it. And another to the USA, still here on the Eastern seaboard, that's taken 14 days!
Good gravy. Harrumph.
(Of note: Postcrossing's own blog recently noted the volcano effect on postcard delivery. I noticed this in my own mail, nice to see them mentioning it all official-like.)
And then I remind myself how many awesome postcards I've received and wonderful people I've connected with via Postcrossing... and I get happy when I see an address in Finland or Germany or the Netherlands, because those always arrive (and get registered!) right quick. And in the spirit of balance, I'll mention that I sent my first postcard to Switzerland recently, and it arrived in FOUR DAYS. I can't even get a card to my family in the midwestern USA that quickly!
Anyone have any other Postcrossing stories to share?
