Wait A Minute, Mr. Postman
My neighborhood has one of those centralized mailboxes — the kind resembling kindergarten cubby boxes — situated right at the entrance to the subdivision. Every afternoon I line up with all of the other moms chauffering kids home from schoo.
We take our turns pulling up to the mailbox, parking and getting out to walk around the other side of the mailbox (situated solely for the Postal carrier’s convenience), and then scurry back to our van before the other moms get impatient or the kids start screaming. On rainy or snowy days this is miserable. On windy days, one of us inevitably loses a piece of mail and delays the whole process as we chase after it.
I hate that mailbox. I envy folks who can walk to the end of their driveway to send off letters, cards or payments.
Remember the “good ol’ days” when there were U.S. Mail boxes in front of banks, schools, libraries and grocery stores? Those days are gone, man, and apparently not just here in Leavenworth.
Meanwhile, that asinine neighborhood mailbox of mine has a slot that only accepts standard-sized envelopes. So, for the past week I’ve been driving around with a 5″x6″ postage-paid envelope containing a DVD I need to return. Have I been able to find a mailbox? Not until today, when I finally located one… at the post office…the one place where a mailbox is not needed!
Meanwhile, postal rates have gone up. Again. Frankly, I fail to see why we should have to pay more to send mail when we’re having to do more of the work involving the sending of the mail. Between email, online billing and bill-paying and UPS home delivery, I’m ready to kiss my Postman goodbye.
*never tease someone who is dieting* *never tease someone who is dieting* *never tease...
I hate using the USPS, but we have to use it to sell on Half.com, unfortunately. I may start using UPS to send eBay stuff, though. we ended up getting stuck with an entire roll of 37 cents stamps and had to buy 100 2 cents stamps. that’s completely obnoxious!
I hardily agree! It’s a shame that we have to “lock” up our mail for fear of identity theft and other such nonsense. I try to send most of my things per email. Much, much easier and overall cheaper!
Girl, about the only thing USPS has done lately that I actually like is being able to go online to schedule home pickup and print off mailing labels. If it weren’t for that, I wouldn’t sell anything on eBay ever.
The USPS has the old AT&T attitude; “We don’t care, We don’t have to.”
My neighborhood has one of those things as well. I do like the security of the lock box, but we have to cross a busy street to get to it.