Dale has inspired me

Earlier this week my blog friend Dale of Colorado had written a post on his blog to express his feelings on a hot topic. He says he began his blogging days for recreation and didn't want to step on any toes but as he grew he realized he wasn't being honest with himself. He was making friends with bloggers who basically try to live their lives in Christ and Dale thought this conflicted with his non-belief in Christ. So he posed an indirect question to his blog friends and others that read his blog. Will he still have friends on the blog if he was honest about his feelings?

Man I sure hope so. From my seat honesty goes a long way. It goes further then anyone trying to convince me of anything I am not sure about. After reading Dale's post and making many comments regarding the post I thought I would come clean. You see, I have never made it public that I dislike, mail carriers, mailmen, postmen, whatever you call them.

You are probably asking yourself, why? Or saying who gives a rat's butt. I mean why in the world would you dislike a socially accepted and community endeared profession. Heck, Norman Rockwell painted them into the fabric of America. Many characters on TV sitcoms have made room for a mail carrying character. Seinfeld had Newman, Cheers had Cliff, Kevin Costner played a futuristic postman. Pirate, how have they hurt anyone? What's your problem anti-mail carrier seadog?

Let me tell you, I have attempted three different times in my life to befriend mail carriers and each attempt has been thrown back into my face. Ten or eleven years ago when the Pirate bood was much smaller we lived in an old house on Kansas street. And there was a mail carrier that seemed to have close friendships with the long standing residence in the neighborhood. So I thought I would be civil and make small talk with him every chance I got. He always responded with a look like he doubted my intentions or that I was trying to get more from him.

Then I tried another angle. I started sharing mail carrier jokes with him. You know the ones that have some dim witted over worked yank, going "postal". Well, guess what? That only made him more weary of me. Then one day he infomred me that I needed to do something with my dog or I was going to have a real problem with him. When he told me this I thought he had me confused with the folks across the street who owned a blood-thirsty Rottweiler. A rottweiler that had gotten its butt kicked by Mrs. Pirate. (a different story for a different time) A rottweiler who only had a small white picket fence between it and all the creatures it desired to eat. But no the postman was miffed at my toy sized weiner dog, Crosby. Apparently Crosby had been sending him bad vibs and failed to use a stamp. That's all I could gather from the request.

So I asked the serial killer wannabe why he had a problem with my killer weiner dog. He told me every time he walks next to my back fence the dog goes nuts and barks crazily at him. Then one day the dog was out front with one of my little boys and the dog chased him down the sidewalk. Keep in mind this dog was the size of a Converse's Chuck Taylor shoe.

I explained to him that the dog was harmless. He then went on a diatribe how people like me have no idea how dangerous little dogs are. He told me the dog hates him and he was seriously worried.

Hates you? I asked. How in the world could he know anything like that?

He told me that they had done studies and proven that dogs hate the uniform of mail carriers. We then stood on the sidewalk debating the intelligence of a dog. I tried to explain to him a dog doesn't know a uniform from a bathing suit. He argued the opposite. I told him I figured the dog only saw this guy come around every day and walk up on the porch and steal something from their owner's black box on the wall. We never got anywhere with this debate and eventually parted when we moved to the current residence.

Then about five years ago our new mail carrier, a Son-of-Sam look alike told me that he was worried about our little weiner dog. He told me that the little dog had chased him down the driveway the other day and he was concerned for his safety. He too used the uniform hating dog theory on me. And he m entioned that the dog had been sending him mental messages of how the dog intended to defame him. Somewhere in the discussion I mentioned how I thought it was weird how mail carriers tended to buy into stupidity quite easily and that may be why they are known for their poor inner-employee relations.

After no mail for a week I decided to contact the postmaster general to see if my debtors had lost my address. I explained to the Postmaster General how our current mail carrier and I disagreed on dog psychology. He said he would talk with the lunatic when he returned from his route. A short while later the Postmaster General called me back and asked me if my address was such and such and I told him it was. He said he found all my mail stuck in a plastic bag in the mail carrier's desk with happy faces and a slash drawn through the happy face on most of my mail.

He then asked me if I could move my mailbox out to the road and away from my house. I told him I could if it meant I would get my mail.

The killer weiner dog has long left us for a mail route in the sky and the mailbox out near the road began to attract our local meth tweekers. So after the third attempt to steal my mail was thwarted last month I decided to move the box back to the front porch. I mean all my neighbors have their mail brought to their front porch and I have always thought the mailbox out by the road looked out of place.

Then last Wednesday the weather was nice and the sky was blue here in the Willamette Valley so I took advantage. I went and bought a new bottle of "Round-up" and began killing weeds in my front yard. Mrs. Pirate who has Wednesdays off, and I were out in front doing the yard thing and enjoying the weather. Along came a new mail carrier. It being a nice day and Wednesday a day of inspiration, I met the mail carrier as he strolled across my lawn with kindness and a "how you doing on this fine day" greeting.

Standing about a foot taller then me he walked up to me and asked me who gave me permission to move my mailbox up to my porch. His demeanor was direct and rude.

What do you mean who gave me permission?

Yeah buddy, you need to get permission from the Postmaster General to move your box.

Hey BUDDY! All the neighbors have theirs on their front porch. I just wanted to blend in.

He then got inches from my face and told me if everyone moved their box it would add three hours to his day.

Then I remembered a postman killed his supervisor the other day in Baker City, Oregon (Mrs. Pirate's hometown) because she added time to his schedule.

Gulp...