h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This entry is hilarious.

I'll give much more respect to my Postman from now on.

Frankie

Most amusing!

My friend Graham has an insidious sub-category of "letter box with basket inside" - it's "communal letter box in the front door of a tenament with tiny basket inside, where several flats don't always bother to regularly collect their mail". This manifests itself as a constantly blocked letter box, where the mail is either wet from the rain because it's sticking halfway out of the door, stolen (same reason) or muddy (the overflow lands in the puddle of muddy water you find behind every communal door in Aberdeen). Ho, hum.

I'm not a postman, but I did have a summer job delivering Betterware catalogues, so I'm familiar with several of these. One more as well (though perhaps the early morning postman doesn't have to cope with this): "Letter box with a pack of rampaging infants outside", which can be found on some council estates (where no-one has the money and inclination to provide an actual play area). Basically the kids surround you and ask intellectual questions like "Are you delivering catalogues?" No doubt the catalogues I was carrying and pushing through letter boxes tipped them off.

Being a chronic insomniac, I read this Entry at 4:30am. The person in the flat upstairs (who I can hear creeping around) probably now thinks they've got a lunatic under their floorboards. They must have heard me breaking the night-time silence by laughing like a mad thing!

Still Laughing

I am a little worried about my postman now - I am about to get a new door and therefore a new letterbox ....

Yes, anyone who hasn`t tried delivering the post would have no idea of the problems the poor old postie faces every day. I worked for a little over a year as a postman and I think this guide is spot on, and very funny.
My favorite trick with the letterbox with a dog behind was to push the letters part way through holding on very tightly and after the dog jumps up and grabs the letters just keep holding until they are ripped in two. Then push the remains in and walk off chuckling to myself. Serves the idiot right for allowing the dog access to the letterbox. One surprise i had one day was when a big dog charged the door after I had rung the doorbell because I had a registered letter and smashed straight through the lower glass panel! I keep a straight face as I waited for the owner to sign for her mail.
My own letterbox is halfway up the panel next to the door and very large for ease of delivery. I think most people would do the same if they had a taste of delivering the mail for a while.

Of course, delivering the h2g2 post is a little simpler...

* continues to giggle *

Now I think back to it, there was another dog who appeared to harbour an ambition to jump through the letter box in order to greet me himself; tricky for a labrador, I'd have said. The main problem with that was that he somewhat inhibitted the movement of the catalogue going in the normal direction.

Since I didn't say it before, this is a great article.

What an exelent guide,, I have made sure that our letter box is the best possible after our six months winter experiance with letter boxes

We used to deliver a local paper many moons ago to raise money.

This german shepard was sitting on the path to the front door, with the owner working under his car, I asked him if the dog was ok and the reply was "yes mate he's no problem" famous last words!
Getting past him was no problem good as gold put the paper in the letter box not a bad one! walked back up the path pass the dog, that's when he just moved enough to grip my bum in his teeth, just enough not to hurt but enough not to let me go!
"Hi mate" was my slightly raised voice call to the owner, too which he growled the dogs name, where he released me and so onto the next door