R2-D2 Set to Collect Mail for the US Postal Service

The U.S. Postal Service announced today via the Associated Press, that it is going to a galaxy far, far away to collect the mail. This summer marks the 30^th anniversary of the opening of the first Star Wars movie, and to commerate the event, the U.S. Postal Service is employing a certain short, stocky little robot; yes, R2-D2 is going to transform some 400 mailboxes nationwide into a likeness of himself. The Postal Service and Lucasfilm Ltd. commemorate the movie launch with these "wrapped" mail collection boxes. The resemblence of the mail collection boxes to R2-D2 is uncanny.

You may recall R2-D2 was the shorter of the two droids and his trusty sidekick was C3-PO. Both of whom showed courage and bravery in the face of being short circuited by various means. Both R2-D2 and C3-PO became endearing symbols of all three original Star Wars movies, and remain fan favorites world wide. The duo also served to add some comedic bits to the otherwise dark trilogy.

Now a word of warning to all Jedi masters across this great land of ours, do not tamper with any droid covered mail box you may find. It's a federal crime to in any way mess with a USPS collection box. Have your picture made with the faux R2-D2, drop a few letters, if you still write them, or bills into the boxes, but do not try and "un-wrap" the mailbox. Lest you end up doing time in Darth Vader's evil grasp.

The R2-D2 mailbox wrap is part of a promotion for a new stamp to be announced March 28, according to Anita T. Bizzotto, the post office's chief marketing officer. "It's a little teaser for the upcoming announcement and we decided to have a little fun with it," she said.

So, instead of going out late one night and trying to make off with R2-D2, just wait for what can only be a series of Star Wars stamps. If the series is anything like previous special edition stamps, such as Elvis, James Dean and the classic movies set, there should be some really nice collectible pieces put out by the USPS. There is likely to be a run on the stamps whenever they come out, but fear not; should you miss out at your local post office, it is likely that the collectibles will show up on Ebay almost as soon as they go on sale.