animals

"can you close the gate, I have an animal you know!" No fucking kidding you old sack, I've seen your wife. I think this whilst other words tumble past my lips. Stuck in suburbia with retired, boring, bored, gate loving twats. I explain to the gentleman that I left it as I found it but he goes on: "but gates are made to be closed aren't they?" Yes, repeatedly on your skull.

tear stained letters

It's a time of contrast. Compare and contrast. I'm being bounced around these weeks, used and dumped according to who's sick/been sick/hungover. For a few frantic days I'm delivering half of a walk for a postie who's recovering from a (2nd) stroke ('you don't get a third!' states my mum chillingly)

the little fella

'Screwfix' apocalypse. These chunky odes for screwed up people are in abundance today; some homes even getting 2: mail the size of a brick jammed through their letterbox, taking the draught excluder with it, how ironic. if that weren't enough to drag around the village, 'saga' mags to boot...and here's me in the village of the damned, the same decrepit faces trundling round the village every day, zimmer frame in hand(s)...grinding a rut in the pavement. Then I see the cat, dangling halfway out of the front bay window.

fiery globe

"you won't get any answer there mate. Half of 'em are all fucking dead, they just haven't bothered to bury 'em yet." With that the mystery (council worker? cat burglar?) man produces a bunch of keys and lets me in the side door to the impenetrable flats. Shit, I was hoping for a no access scenario, take some mail back. I've spent an age buzzing my way through the many delightful cominations of flat numbers (1a, 1b, 1c...up to 11d) trying to get into these Godforsaken places...'trade' button? Don't make me laugh. They haven't worked for years, if ever. They may as well have put 'burglar' buttons on.

worktime learning

Tuesday: the supposedly quieter day thus staff are reluctantly manhandled upstairs for the weekly 'work time learning' session. An opportunity for us to 'have our say' and hear the latest management doctrine. It's usually a nervous line manager reading from a head office email: "we are investing millions of pounds towards a better future" "be sure to wear shoes in the winter" and so forth. Staff shuffle uneasily, glancing furtively at the clock. "any questions?" followed by a pregnant silence. We rush back downstairs like kids at the school bell.
The latest mantra from head Office is "mail volumes have dropped 10%" thus justifying various cutbacks/savings. It's hard to believe. Voume may have dropped but weight cerainly hasn't. People love their tat catalogues.

mush

Autumn rewards the weary soul with fruits of it's labour; Winter can lay a sparkling blanket of silver frost; Spring rejuvenate the coldest heart with bursting green promises of Summer; and then Summer, it gently pours buckets of cold water down your back and into your shoes.
It rained today, and rained a bit more. Saturday of all days. The dreaded early rise whilst the world slumbers..passing pissed up revellers on your way to the office and facing a drunken gauntlet of "hey postie/wanker!!" Scaring the scavenging seagulls (keeping the streets clean of vomit/kebabs), a mild sense of achievement before work.

harder faster

Monday's used to be the easy days but not anymore. If you're a reserve, covering holiday leave/sicko's then they're even worse. Every week a new walk to learn. No training, no welcome, no nothing. Find the right frame and go. A strange empty frame looms over you, a bewildering array of street names and numbers flash before your ragged eyes and you haven't even picked up a letter yet. Chances are, the first one you pick up will probably be a missort so you waste extremely valuable minutes desperately scanning the huge huge frame and names and numbers and colours, and missing bits..where the hell is it?? It's not here mate...move on...you inwardly scream and feel the sweat forming- the minutes turn to hours...everyone else is off for a coffee...shit, there's mountains of mail to wade through..stuff in the stupid pathetic slots in seemingly random order...Oh God, help me...

the magic word

I ask the guy to "print and sign here please". I proffer the docket to sign. It's obvious he's drop down pissed. I hand him the pen and he bandies it around mid air while I follow the nib with the book. Talk about the pinning the fucking tail on the donkey. It's 10a.m. and he's shit faced. I noticed the garden straight away at the beginning of the week. Filthy toys strewn like plane wreck victims. A huge (once white?) three piece leather suite with glass table, now shit streaked and full of empty shot glasses. A large rusty barbecue. The same fiery faced gumbo mate slumped in his trundle-trolley, grizzled and pickled in white lightning. Fucking hell, I thought Ryelands was rough but this one street matches it and then some. Dogs? How about stray horses??