So my friend’s birthday was yesterday, and I decided to surprise her by having a cheery spring bouquet of ranunculus flowers sent to her office as a belated birthday gift using this awesome flower delivery tech startup I found out about through Chris (via a flower delivery he had arranged for me, which produced the freshest, longest lasting flowers I’ve ever had). Me being me, I wanted it to be a surprise, so instead of double checking what her office address was, I looked it up online and chose the second address I found and had it sent there.

Then I found out that Amazon.com, her employer, has numerous office buildings all over Seattle – not just on the Amazon campus. And well, the address I chose was NOT on the Amazon campus. Actually, it ended up being a 20-minute drive away from her actual building!

The flowers eventually did get to her (and still looked quite fresh), as someone had the package redirected to her building after I told her what had happened. I was intently tracking the delivery, and as soon as I got the FedEx notification it was delivered, I was waiting for her to message me. But she never did. And my gut told me something was wrong.

It’s funny how a delivery like this didn’t work out the way I had hoped, but when I had a birthday cake delivered to another friend in Singapore – halfway across the world – that worked out perfectly.