#809 Zip Codeless

One of the many things in the last 20 years that has totally changed society is the mail that requires no zip code, email. It is a part of virtually everyone’s daily life. Not a day goes by that countless people around the world don’t waste hours of their time checking their email.
Not necessarily reading it, just obsessively checking it to see if there is anything to read.
What was once a rarity is now a ubiquity. So much so that people are having to turn into advertisers or headline writers just to get their emails read. The subject line of an email has become the single most important line in the composition.
It means whether an email gets answered or ignored.
For me, it determines whether the email gets read and dealt with right away, or pushed to the bottom of the e-heap. And God forbid an undealt with email goes below my event horizon.
My email program is set up to display the most recent 15 emails in its viewing window. I can scroll down to the rest of them but rarely do, and as the day wears on more and more dip below the horizon, consigned to the darkness of email night.
The email subject line is one of the few things standing between the sender and this ignominy. A good subject line will pique my interest, get the email read and if there’s a need for a response, get it done. But if it’s not read it’s dead.
It’s interesting to note that we still haven’t completely settled on a way to spell email. Some still spell it with a capital E. Some with a hyphen.
Personally I think it’s time we lost the hyphen, this word obviously has lots of usage.
Here’s a funny thing. You probably think the word email is new. Shortened from “electronic mail” into E dash mail into email.
True enough, in that sense.
But the word has actually been around since 1877. It was a type of pottery design pattern. The word derives from the French word for enamel.
So now you know.
Now go obsessively check and see if anyone sent you some enamel.
America, ya gotta love it.