What to do when long URLs don’t work

I’ve been trying to receive a Fed Ex package for a couple days now, which has been a source of great consternation.  Since we do have a package room in my apartment building, I didn’t think to have this one sent to my office.  But Fed Ex packages, of course, need to be signed for, unlike USPS ones.

I shivered as I looked at the Fed Ex address on the door tag: somewhere in the Bronx.  (I only recently discovered the G train actually exists.  I can’t deal with the Bronx just yet.)  So I tried signing the signature line on the door tag — no go.  I called Fed Ex asking if the package could be redelivered to my office.  No go.  I asked if it could be redelivered to a Fed Ex office that’s say, not in the South Bronx.  No go.  I even contemplated having the darn thing returned to the shipper, but it’s from overseas and my French is mostly limited to “une tranche de flan nature, s’il vous plait” at the patisserie and doesn’t really extend to “please refund my money.”  So I will now be traipsing up to the Fed Ex office … somewhere in the South Bronx.

Anyway, my point in all this is that for some time now, I’ve made sure to indicate “No signature necessary” when shipping books to reviewers’ home addresses.  (My company uses Fed Ex.)  Now you can bet I will include that line if it’s the last thing I do.

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And getting to the actual point of this post, one of my authors has had a couple reviews on CBS Marketwatch, which for whatever reason, has infinitely long URLs.  (Our online travel itineraries also have very long URLs.)  Of course, it never works to email these URLs since they get detached.  The solution?  Tiny URL — go to the home page, paste in your mega URL and out pops a URL of exactly six characters.  It’s so easy I sometimes want to do it for fun.  Almost.