The Worst Weather for Mail Carriers

“Benedetto,” our postman, rings twice and arrives again in today’s blog post.  Yesterday, I spent an hour chatting with him — “chatting” means me listening to him and not saying a word — and enjoying his wild windings and I’ll share some of the learned fascinations with you.

• “Children’s Museums” are for kids up to eight-years-old.  You don’t take a kid over eight to that kind of museum because they’ll be bored.
• Rappers ruined the Tribeca neighborhood by buying up all the buildings and closing the restaurants and shops so they could live there.
• The New York City Subway runs North and South for a reason — so you can walk East and West — you don’t take a cab to go sideways!  Don’t fall for the long blocks!
• No Saturday delivery means the entire Post Office system would have to close down for 24 hours.  You can’t keep the mail moving and not have people around to get ride of the mail piling up.  Today, the mail runs 24/7.
• The worst day for delivering mail is Monday because it includes the “Sunday pile up” followed by Thursday and Friday.  You want something important delivered on time and early in the day?  Make sure it arrives on a Tuesday or a Wednesday.
• A “Pivot” is extra deliveries added to your own route because one of the other carriers working around you in the same Zip Code is not working.  You “Pivot” and turn around and do their route after you finish yours.  Sometimes the managers take you out of your routine Zip Code and send you “somewhere else.”
• Summertime is the worst for working Pivots because, on average, seven people a day are on vacation in this area — and that means everybody has to work extra Pivots if you want to or not.
• You get paid for working eight hours.  Anything over that is overtime.  Walking a route helps stretch you into the golden hours.  Don’t sign the overtime paperwork if you’re late just because you’re walking a route back to the office.
• The Post Office will reimburse you for gas if your drive to your route, but you have to wait a long time to get paid back.  Walking your route without using a car is always the best, cheapest, and most money-making way to deliver the mail.
• The worst days to work is when it rains all day during the Summer.  You’re hot on the inside under your rain gear and you’re getting soaked on the outside.  After an eight hour shift, there’s nothing dry left on your body.

There you have it — the mail carrier update on spinning the world from our beloved “Benedetto!”