"Delivery platform Deliveroo will exit the Singapore market on March 4, it said in a statement on its website on Feb 25.
[…]
DoorDash, which owns Deliveroo and another delivery platform Wolt, said on Feb 25 that it will be exiting Qatar, Japan and Uzbekistan as well."

https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/deliveroo-to-exit-singapore-market

#Deliveries #Deliveroo #Singapore #Business

Is the way of dealing with the myriad problems of home delivery really quite simple?

If retailers allowed shoppers to choose their delivery firm, economic logic would suggest (if delivery charges were flat) then the business should flow to the firm most acceptable to customers receiving parcels...

Might this be the answer to the frustration of missed, missing & damaged deliveries?

#deliveries #OnlineShopping #logistics

h/t Lex/FT

I often #complain the #delays & weird routes #AusPost use on my #deliveries, causing items I’m waiting on to be up to several weeks late.

Therefore, I must acknowledge that AusPost seem to have stepped up their service several notches this #Christmas period!

I am getting VERY fast delivery on my mail this month.

Now, if they could do this year round, I’d be very satisfied.

Home all day waiting
Driver summons me by phone,
Gate untouched, goodbye.

Twenty seconds late,
Parcel now on a world tour—
I live here, I swear.

Phone stares back at me,
“Unknown caller” won the race.
Amazon: 1, me: 0.

#christmas #parcel #deliveries #Holidays #haiku

Straight up lying couriers are causing me delivery *shenanigans* and I just thought this is going to be ~so much worse~ if humanity survives long enoug to settle on other planets

Courier: We're currently orbiting Pluto and need the landing and docking codes to deliver your package ..

Me: That's great! Except we live on Mars !

#Courier #Deliveries

Tues. Dec. 9, 2025: The Juggling Act

Tuesday, December 9, 2025

Waning Moon

Neptune, Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde

Cloudy and bitterly cold

Hello, and welcome to a new week, as we hurtle toward the holidays! It was -4F when I woke up this morning.

If you haven’t been following Sarah Addison Allen’s Holiday Advent calendar stories on Instagram (and I think she does it on Facebook, too), you’ve got a treat in store if you start! Each day for the first 12 days of December, she posts a magical holiday drabble. They are so much fun! You can go to her profile page and click through the various shorts.

I’m a big fan of her novels, too, and her micro fiction is just a delight.

Sadly, too, tis the season for scammers. I’ve been getting quite a few scam emails lately, and I’m sick of them. Then there are the faux “colleagues” on social media, who are trying to worm their way into getting paid, instead of just pitching. In particular, on one channel, someone started asking me about my writing (instead of you know, looking at the website in my link, or following any of the links on my marketing or reading any of my posts). I answered, politely, but the handle alone was enough to get my red flag radar going. But people are more than one thing, so give the benefit of the doubt at first. Then came the whole “offer” to beta read – which you know means if I said yes, I’d be hit with a bill. I politely responded that I do this for a living, and I’m set up with editors, copy editors, and Trusted Readers. Again, this shows that the person has done zero research. I write for a living. I’m not an “aspiring” whatever. If I was looking to hire people right now because my situation changed and someone I work with moved on, I have a wealth of people I know who know my work that I trust with it who would be paid first. I mean, I have way more people I’d hire if I was hiring than I’d ever have slots. And when I work with a publisher, they handle that aspect of it as you, know, the whole part of being a publisher. Also, if you’ve spent even a few days interacting with me across any platform, you know I loathe the term “beta reader” and use “Trusted Reader.” And the fact that you don’t know I do this for a living means you haven’t even read the bio line in my profile, which says, “full time writer.” Why would I want anything to do with someone who doesn’t make the slightest effort and then isn’t even honest in the pitch? And looking at the individual’s posts (no website is listed, yet another red flag, because in this day and age, professionals have websites), there’s nothing that gives me any indication they are a good match for my work.  Not only that, but every post to other writers has exactly the same questions as posed to me, which is another red flag. No research done, no effort to do a professional pitch. Buh-bye.

Urgh. People.

Friday morning, I was out the door by the time the library opened, and that was my first stop. Dropped off and picked up books. Then, headed to the grocery store to get some basics for the week, along with the rest of what I need for the baking. Third stop was at Wild Oats in Williamstown, where I thought I picked up the rest of the gifts on my list (but later realized I have to go back for a couple of others). But in the moment, I was happy and didn’t have to make the second stop out in that direction.

On impulse, I stopped at Stop ‘n Shop on the way back. I rarely shop there anymore. But once in awhile, they have currants. Friday was the day they had some! I grabbed a couple of bags.

I’m not changing the baking roster at this late date, but I am making a batch of the oatmeal currant lace cookies for us!

I had two more errands to run on the way home. One was unsuccessful; they didn’t have what I needed. The other was partially successful. They had some of what I needed, and a substitute for what they didn’t have.

Home, hauled everything up the stairs, and it was already afternoon.

After lunch, I started baking the oatmeal-apricot-pecan cookies, a new addition this year. It was too late to start the chocolate crinkles, because of the amount of time they have to chill. 12 dozen oatmeal-apricot-pecan cookies.

They’re good, but they’re not as flavor-sparky as some of the other cookies. Chocolate chip are chocolate chip, and everyone loves them. The orange cranberry are a type of sand cookie, with a lot of flavor and a smooth texture. The molasses spice explode with flavor. The chocolate crinkles are a deeper chocolate flavor than the chips. I try to do an interesting flavor balance in the platters. These oatmeal apricots don’t quite have the pizzaz for which I hoped. I may work on the recipe over the coming year to adjust it, because I do love apricots.

I mentioned to a friend that the texture wasn’t what I hoped, a little mealy. She looked me straight in the eye, and said, “It’s right there in the name. Oat. MEAL.”

Point taken.

The oatmeal lace have a very different consistency.

Anyway, two batches made 12 dozen cookies. I have leftover pecans, so I may do a coffee cake for us when all the rest of the baking is done.

It might be a one-year-and-done, the way the maple cookies and some of the others over the years were.

I still want to find a viable lime cookie recipe for the mix. I’ve tried about a dozen or so over the years, and only one made it into the platters for a year, and it still wasn’t what I wanted. There are some good lime sandwich cookie recipes (sugar cookies with lime filling), but I can’t do the volume I need in the time I have. I need a drop cookie. The one that made it in was another type of sand cookie, but lime. It was good, but again, not flavor-sparky enough to stay.

Still working on it, and trying to tweak some of the recipes I’ve tried in the past that are close, but not quite there.

A financial scammer that’s trying to con me contacted me again, after the first attempt failed a few days ago. Bite me. I’m not clicking a link from an unknown company that falsely claims I owe money. Cybersecurity companies run seminars on this. And emailing me every day about it isn’t going to make me do it. I’ll just gather the information and turn it over to the appropriate authorities.

I didn’t make it to First Friday. I wasn’t up to it.

The ghostwriting notes came in late my time on Friday, they decided to go in a very different direction with this, which means a huge rewrite. Which I’m fine with, but they’ve had it since the end of October, and now they suddenly want instant turnaround. I can prioritize it, but I’m not killing myself to make up for the delays on their end.

Slept well, up later than usual on Saturday, much to Tessa’s dismay. The St. Nicholas night gift was our favorite chocolate orange. I prepared the dough for the chocolate crinkle cookies. While that chilled, I packed the Christmas boxes I’m sending to friends. I had just enough brown wrapping paper to cover all the boxes. I felt very accomplished, but it took longer than expected, because I wrap each gift separately, and then have a lot of bubble wrap in the boxes, too.

After lunch, I pulled out the chocolate crinkle dough and make the cookies. It made about 14 dozen, so we have plenty. When those two batches were on their way through the oven, I mixed up another batch of orange cranberry cookies just for us, since they are my mom’s favorite. They turned out really well. It felt weird to do a single batch, though!

While the cookies cooled, I read this month’s Agatha Christie book club pick, THE SITTAFORD MYSTERY. Meh. I found a bunch of plot holes that bugged me, and kept thinking, “well, that doesn’t make sense.”

Cookies cooled and packed, and I was very tired falling into bed, but a good tired.

Up fairly on time on Sunday, only to discover I forgot to prepare and schedule the coffee the night before. I had to run it through the pot in the morning! The cats’ breakfasts were on time, but my coffee was late, so I was the grumpy one.

Dashed out early, in a hail Mary to try a store that didn’t have the oval platters last year – but had a large selection this year. So I got cute snowmen plates, and now we have enough for the cookie deliveries. Phew!

I also had to stop and get ink for the printer (because of course I did), and along the way managed to get some stocking stuffers.

Home, prepared the dough for the gluten-free chocolate espresso drops, put it in to cool. While it chilled, I did the Community Tarot Reading for the Week, which is up here, and some housework I hadn’t done on Saturday.

I also prepared the cards that go with the platters (they have a holiday border and a list of the cookies), and the labels for those containing nuts and the gluten-free that have to be packed separately within the platters.

Once the dough was chilled, I baked those cookies – the recipe made way more than I expected, so at least I know I’ll have enough. I also made a batch of my oatmeal currant cookies that I like so much, since I managed to source some currants. Not enough for it to be included in the platters this year, but enough for us to have a batch.

Leftovers for dinner, candles and the tree on for the Second of Advent, started reading the latest Gamache mystery, and I have mixed feelings, mostly on the structure. Did a small ceremony honoring Pearl Harbor.

There was a Krampus Ball at Wild Soul River, but there was no way, with everything else, I could put together a costume and be festive. I was just too tired. Plus, with my lack of night vision, it would have been a nightmare both coming and going. Maybe next year, I can coordinate with someone. I’ve seen some photos, and it looks like a great event.

Slept well, up at the usual time on Monday, and yes, I had remembered to set the coffee the night before. I was still tired, but a good, satisfied kind of tired. The Community Tarot Reading of the Week has lots of great potential for the week, which I love. I hope I can truly enjoy and embody as many of those cards as possible.

Fed everyone, morning routine, and then I had to get going on the week. Checked in with the ghostwriting to acknowledge receipt of the material, and that I’d have an ETA once I dug into it a bit.

Put together the cookie platter for the post office, loaded up the packages, and headed out. It went much faster than I expected, and I got the pretty holiday stamps for the cards, too. All the packages should arrive by Friday.

Came back, did two more cookie platters, got them and my mom into the car, and headed for Williamstown. We went to do her bloodwork first – only they had no order in from the doctor to do it, even though we had the printout they’d given us for it when the appointment was made. So, after sitting there for longer than we should have, we were sent home without it being done. Not. Our. Problem. Gosh, it would be nice to live in a country with healthcare.

Stopped to drop off one of the cookie platters. Had hoped to pick up a couple of things I’d forgotten on my big sweep last week, but they were out of stock, so I have to re-think. Stopped by to drop off the other platter, but the place was closed, although I’d checked the website over the weekend about hours.

Home, back up the stairs. Bea and Charlotte had both waited in the window for us. Tessa demanded the porch be opened (it was sunny), but once it was, it was too cold and she stomped back inside.

After lunch, I had to finish up a few other things. I got the audio file from the UK production of the “Inspired By” radio play. It will go live on April 26th and I’ll put the link up when it’s live. The actors did a good job with it.

It was later than I hoped when I sat down to ghostwrite, but the thing I was supposed to attend in the evening had been cancelled, so I knew I could also work later, and it was all good. I got some good work done on the ghostwriting. I will dig in deeper today. It’s a huge rewrite and it can’t be done in just a minute, no matter how much they got delayed on their end.

The scammer tried again. Getting fed up with this. Gathering the intel to turn over to the authorities. Also tired of social media trolls who try for emotional and financial blackmail, or demand one “prove” one donates enough to the “right” causes (meaning to whom and where said trolls deem). I believe that genuine philanthropy is anonymous. I’m a freelancer who struggles to get by as much as most of the people I know. I give what I can where I can, and I have my own criteria for that. It’s no one else’s business.

The block button is a beautiful thing.

Cooked dinner, read a bit in the evening. Started a novel that’s gotten a lot of buzz, but didn’t like it, so it’s going back to the library. I didn’t care about any of the characters and wasn’t interested in spending time with them. Started reading a memoir with recipes that’s more interesting.

Slept well, up early, the coffee wasn’t on. I’d filled the pot, and I could have sworn I scheduled it, but nothing happened. I hope the magic coffee pot isn’t failing me.

The morning routine went well. It’s Day 110 of the free writing, and the whole notebook is full. Lots of good material in there. I think I will keep going.

On today’s agenda: I have a bunch of cookie platters to deliver in the late morning, then a lot of ghostwriting, then yoga.

That’s the plan! Keep it simple, and get things done. It’s supposed to snow a little bit today, and snow more steadily tomorrow.

Have a good one!

#baking #cookies #deliveries #freelance #scammers #writing