It was supposed to be a 60th birthday present to herself, but Rhonda King’s dream of sharing her life with a family of chirping birds ended when USPS delivered a boxful of crushed canaries her hair salon in Alabama.
“When my postmaster got there he told me, ‘Well, your birds arrived, but they’re not alive,'” King told Al.com. “This happened right in front of my clients. I was handed this box with tire tracks on it and bird carnage hanging out.”
King paid a seller in Texas $600 for eight birds and an additional $100 to have them shipped. The box was supposed to ship on Dec. 5, King’s 60th birthday, and arrive the following day. But, three days later, the smashed package arrived, missing two of the birds.
USPS made good on their promise to fix the situation, however, replacing the canaries and erasing what the AP calls “the avian horror of the first delivery.”
“They sound like small instruments of orchestra music,” she said. “It’s just beautiful, soft, harmonizing, orchestrated music.”
On Thursday, like seven small mythical phoenixes who rose from the ashes, the new birds arrived in Grant.
“They’re beautiful birds,” King said a few hours after their arrival. “They’re just picture perfect!”
“It’s not going to replace the other birds, but they did the next best thing and I’m proud of them,” King said of the Postal Service.
All in all, a good reminder of why you should never use the postal service to transport small children.