Form fastidiousness

Maybe I'm a little oversensitive but I have to wonder at what exactly is being implied here.

Though the 2010 Census might be the most highly anticipated census ever in southeast Louisiana, a survey of forms mailed back so far shows that parishes hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina lag the rest of the nation in returning completed questionnaires.

"We're concerned about the relatively low response from New Orleans," Census Bureau Director Robert Groves said today in a prepared statement. "Every household that fails to send back their census form by mail must be visited by a census taker starting in May -- at a significant taxpayer cost. The easiest and best way to be counted in the census is to fill out and return your form by mail."

What the hell? These things aren't even due for another month. Any excuse to complain about lazy, slow responding, New Orleanians, I guess.

Heck I haven't even actually received a census form yet. This could be a function of the quirkiness of delivering things to my apartment (the difficulties of T-P delivery were touched upon briefly in this "classic" Yellow Blog item). But I'm sure I'm not the only guy in town subjected to such obstacles. It could very well be that forms have been delivered to local residents at a lower rate of success than they have been elsewhere. Or it could be that people around here (like myself) aren't as unhealthily obsessed with accomplishing minor tasks according to assigned deadlines as the rest of the country seems to be.

Or maybe we all just really really want to meet Ludacris. Whatever the reason, could we at least wait until we've actually missed the deadline to complain?