Quiz show

I hate it when customers try to stump me with the old question
"How much does it cost to send a first class letter to Khazakistan?"
I feel so inadequate. I guess i should know all this stuff off the top of my head, but lately i feel lucky if i remember what day it is.

Last week, a kindly oldish customer wanted to know the denomination of all these stamps from the past that don't have their value on them, just the picture. i stared blankly at the Tulip, the Bird, the Heart...yeah, i've seen them all before but do i have a clue what their values are? i stalled for time while in my head i was cursing the person that made the executive decision to create all of these "priceless" stamps. i had to admit that i was stumped but told them that i could find out.
i wanted to say " why don't you just slam a few on there and hope for the best?" but i held my tongue for the 8,0000th time.

which reminds me of the classic .."Do i have enough postage on this ?"
how many times have i wanted to put my hands out to imitate a scale and then "weigh" them carefully and then thoughtfully throw them some totally random number like ..$1.62"..just to see if they could tell that i was BS-ing them.

it's like ground hog's day..this crap just keeps happening.. and i'm never ready for it.

search for the ultimate postal ring tone

about two weeks ago, my 20 year old pal jessie stopped by for a visit.
i hadn't seen her for quite a while and we were catching up.
at least we were trying to.
her cell phone was ringing every two minutes.
instead of being annoyed,
i was actually getting into it because she had such a cool ring tone
that every time she got another call, i wanted to get up and dance.

i have a pitiful tracfone and up until my meeting with jessie, an equally pitiful
pre-programmed ring tone.
after jess left, i summoned my techno-savy 11 year old son and told him the time had come for me to cough up the cash and buy my first ring tone.
he scanned through the menu and we listened for just the right song...
one that was cool, yet meaningful.
one that made a loud statement about my life.
after much searching we found it.
i believe this should be the official ring tone of mail carriers across America.
every time your boss walks by, blast your ring tone...
mick jagger belting out Beast of Burden !
it's so much more subtle than Take this job and Shove it.
and, oh yeah, i can dance to it.

why are you so late? part two

i am so late because i have to stop every 5 minutes and
explain to all of you pissed off customers
why i'm so late.
got it?

why are you so late?

why are you so late?

how do we explain it diplomatically?

i try to be brief and break it down to 3 things.
people can't take in more than 3 things.
the 3 things are:
1) they changed our start time to 8:00 from 7:00
2) they adjusted (read added on to our routes)
3) it's summer, which means we're covering vacationing co-workers routes in addition to our own...often working 10 hour days.

i have found there are two distinctly different responses to the above info.

1)" i have never gotten my mail so late in my life..who do i call and complain to?"
and
2) "boy, i'm so sorry that you are working such long hours,
it must be terrible for you."

i love those people in the 2nd camp.

unfortunately, one of my adorable customers hails from the first camp and will not accept that she is getting her mail at 3:30 even though i assure her that others on my route are getting their mail as late as 5:30. she stands out there and glares at me, as if she thinks that everything i told her is a steaming crock of poop and i'm actually just extending my 2 hour lunch to a three hour lunch. this from a women who hasn't gotten a piece of first class mail in weeks.

i'll just have to pray for her ..
as i know she is praying for me...
to bid off.

odds

where would i be without YAHOO homepage giving me such luscious factoids as the following:

Odds of dying from a dog bite: 1 in 20 million.
Odds of becoming a saint: 1 in 20 million.

i wonder how many mail carriers have died from dog bites?
i have a feeling i know how many mail carriers have become saints!

still have 9 lives left

it's summer.
what does that mean?
it means that every tom, dick and mary on my route is having some kind of home improvement project done.
for the most part, that's no big deal.
if the driveway has been resealed, you walk around it.
if the house is being painted, you try not to walk into the ladder as you're fingering through your letters.
these are not life or death issues.
when it comes to roof projects, that's another story.
first of all there is usually a heap of crap all over the lawn: old shingles, new shingles,nails pointing skyward,tools, lunch boxes, boom boxes. crossing the lawn feels like you're playing a twisted game of contractor hopscotch.
then there's the roofers themselves.
if you can see them up there, you cross your fingers and hope that they can likewise see you.
you run up to the mailbox as fast as you can, hoping that they will wait till you're gone before they toss down the roofing debris.
sometimes they are so involved in their work, or their conversation, that you feel it's necessary to give them a little shout. hopefully they can hear you above the boom box.
many times it comes down to saying a quick prayer, putting your head down and running like hell...

over the course of my career, i have faced this scenario hundreds of times.
i came upon roofers yesterday. i knew they were up there but couldn't see them. i could hear their voices coming from the back side of the house.
normally, that would be enough to make me feel safe, but for some reason, as i approached the mail slot, i had the distinct feeling that i was going to get nailed(no pun intended).
i crammed the mail through the slot and hadn't stepped more than two strides off the property when i heard an incredibly loud sound about 10 feet away.
still no roofers in sight, but on the ground where i had just been standing seconds before was a tool belt with a nail gun that had somehow fallen.
it could have been lights out for the mailgal.
another day,
another bullet successfully dodged.

six degrees of seperation

yesterday i was walking the beat,
wearing a golf visor (i almost never wear a hat of any kind).
three guys were hanging out on the front porch of one of my customer's homes.
i knew two of the guys, but not the third.
the third was a gentleman that looked to be in his 70's.
they were all having a good time and started chatting me up.
one of them asked me about my golf visor logo..and i told them about my brother phil's golf apparel company. eventually guy number three asked me where i was from and i told him that i grew up in fairport mostly.
he told me that his best childhood friend had coached and lived in fairport.
turns out,he was talking about my dad. they grew up together in a small town about 45 minutes outside of rochester.
he told me some stories about my dad and grandparents..he knew my aunt, uncle and cousin..
if it wasn't for my visor i don't think the conversation would've gone beyond the weather.
it's a small, cool, world...after all.
i can't do it justice describing it here but it gave me the chills.