on time delivery

Have you ever looked at the blue post office drop box and wondered, do they really pick up the mail at the precise, posted (ha, pun intended) time?

I dropped off my Jr. High mailing at one of those boxes today. That is what I wondered as I walked away from the box. It was about ten after five. Did they already pick it up?

Will it still go out tonight?

I'm not in a rush. The mailing can wait until tomorrow. It was just a thought I had...

Would it be suspicious if I sat outside the post office one day waiting to see if they really do pick it up at the exact time?

Probably.

If not suspicious, perhaps weird.

I won't do it. But I will continue to wonder, is the service prompt?

I was fooled

Around 1:30pm I checked our mailbox. It was still pretty early for our mail to have been delivered, but I thought I'd check.

No mail, yet there were footprints in the snow through our yard. That is a sure sign that the mailman has been here. I had a couple of cards to put out, but since I missed the mailman, they can wait until tomorrow.

It's the rare occasion when we don't get mail, but it does happen. But not often.

Later, I went across the street to deliver a thank-you card to our neighbors. They watched the house, fed the cats and brought in the mail while we were gone last week. I also needed to get the house key back!

When I left, I noticed a second set of footprints in the snow.

Our mailbox was overflowing!

We had at least a dozen pieces of mail.

I think I mistook the first set of footprints as the mailman's when it must have been the meter-reader.

Oh well, the outgoing mail will still wait until tomorrow.

Stop means Stop and Green means Go!

Of course there are more important things in this world; like hunger, war, disease... but when did we as a nation stop caring about traffic signals?

Sure, you can go to Naples, Italy and take your life into your own hands and the hands of others, and cross the road without any traffic signals for pedestrians or drivers (we've been there and done that, it is exciting to say the least).

Here in the good ole' U. S. of A. we have traffic signals. Maybe we could save the government some money though, and just get rid of them since no one seems to mind them.

Why is it when the light turns green, people don't go? I have learned to wait and count to three before honking. In Jersey (one of the very few things I found that I liked about living there), if you didn't go immediately when the light changed, everyone honked. Having moved there from Savannah, it was a blessing.

And on top of why people don't pay attention to traffic signals, why does my mail carrier refuse to do their job? I left out two pieces of mail to be picked up. They were in bright green envelopes, hanging from the little hook (our mailbox is attached to our house, not out at the street like modern subdivisions). After they missed it yesterday, I decided I would leave them out to get picked up today. You know, give the carrier a second chance.

Apparently they don't want my mail. The carrier did not pick it up today either. So I took it to the Post Office during outing of being stuck behind people who didn't go and almost being killed by the people that weren't stopping, and the woman at the Post Office asked if we had received mail.

Yes. Both days. But what you're telling me, is that if the mail carrier does not have mail to deliver it is not their job to also pick up mail???

What then, exactly, is the job description of the mail carrier? Because I think I want that job.