Tag Postage

Gratefully yours

Michael 13 Comments

Yes, November is Gratitude Month and before it is over, we will also have celebrated Thanksgiving in the USofA. (I wonder… In Canada, Thanksgiving is celebrated in October. Is October Gratitude Month up there? C’mon, Canadian readers, fill me in!) To be honest, Thanksgiving and Gratitude Month in any country are not what I was thinking when I typed in that title. I was thinking more along the lines of letters. No, not A B C letters. Correspondence letters.

I was just at the post office buying stamps, stamps that have gone up in price again since the last time I bought them. (I go back to 5 cent first class postage, 4 for second class. Do we still have second class postage?) (Anyway…) As I was swiping my debit card through the card swiper I was thinking to myself for as often as the price has gone up, what a bargain postage still is. For 66 cents you can send a letter or card up to one ounce anywhere in the country. (For the curious, 4 sheets of paper + envelope is about an ounce.)  For $1.50 you can send that same card or letter (or one very similar) to 130 different countries, as close as Canada (remember than next October if you want to wish a Canadian friend Happy Thanksgiving), or as far away as Australia (the Australian territory of Norfolk Island celebrates Thanksgiving the last Thursday of November so you better and get your card to the post office now since it will take 2 to 3 weeks to get there). (I said it was a bargain, not a rush.)

I still write cards and letters, and not just at Christmas. There is something wonderfully personal about getting a greeting in the mail among all the sales flyers and invitations to open a new credit card. (But as much as you will hear me complain about spam email and text messages, I will never disparage junk mail. Those bulk mailers are spending a lot of money on postage and keep our postal expenditures manageable.) If you want to really say thank you to a friend for nothing more than just being a friend, you’d be hard pressed to come up with a more delightful way to do so than with a card or a hand written letter. Hand printed works too.

That’s all I got for now. No, one more thing. As I was resetting clocks over the weekend I realized how, even in this day of everything being connected (and/or “smart”), how many clocks I have that still need set by hand. And I still haven’t gotten to the cars. How about you?

Okay, so now get out and send your best friend a thank you card for putting up with you. Heaven knows they likely deserve one!

Speaking of best friends, deep friendships exist to remind each other that people are lovable without having to perform for it. But not without having to work for it. Read what we have to say about the work it takes to love somebody in the most recent Uplift! Love’s Struggles. (Approximate reading time – 4 minutes. That’s not so bad.)

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Fasting than a speeding bullet…

Michael Leave a comment

I got no mail yesterday. Real mail. In the mailbox mail. Brought by the guy driving the funny looking jeep. Honestly, I don’t remember when I last got no mail. There’s always some mail from some body every day. So what if most of it is from people wanting me to compare auto insurance, get a hearing aid, or use their coupon for 20% off my entire purchase. It’s still mail.

It’s still mail and it’s still a bargain. And it’s a bigger bargain than it was the last time I wrote about the US Postal Service. (See Second Class, All The Way (Nov. 10, 2014) and Neither Snow, nor rain, nor Congress, nor a Polar Vortex, etc., etc. (Jan. 9, 2014).) Since then it’s actually gone down 2 cents for first class postage. I know. I’ve actually used it quite a bit lately. On outgoing mail even. I’ve sent 10 or 12 pieces of real mail to real people so far this month. At $0.47 per, I spend a bit less than $5.00 a month on postage.

Now you’re going to say, “But e-mail is free.” Well… really? Unless you’re sponging off your parents’, children’s, or neighbor’s Wi-Fi, that e-mail is costing you something. Admittedly I’m not a big e-mailer. Over the last couple of weeks I sent about 2 dozen e-mails, let’s say 40 pieces a month. My Internet service costs me about $59/month. Or about $2 a day. A bargain in its own right but if you look at the tangible evidence of that service, my outgoing e-mails, that service costs me about $1.50 per day or $45 a month.

“But what about that service? “You ask. “Snail mail is a slow as … oh, you know while e-mail is instantaneous” So real mail it isn’t a fast as the proverbial projectile fired from a deadly weapon. Most of my correspondence gets to its recipient the next day, and almost always in 2 days. Is there anything I have to say that can’t wait a day or two?

I don’t know. I’m thinking that’s sort of a pretty cool superpower. Cheap, efficient, warm-fuzzy inducing. I think I should send more letters.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Second Class, All The Way

Michael 1 Comment

It was during the first week of November this year.  That’s when He’s mailbox saw its first Christmas card.  Just like other years it was from a fund-raising organization.  And just like other years it was indeed a real Christmas card.  Unlike other years it came seven weeks before Christmas – impressively early even by fundraiser standards.

We like Christmas cards here.  They’ve been bought and counted and soon will be signed.  Most will get a hand written note scrawled inside it.  They will be addressed and stamped and put out for the mailperson.  Not as many as in years past but all to the best of recipients.  The most deserving.  The crème de la crème. But none of that just yet.  Not until sometime after Thanksgiving, probably a couple of weeks into December.  Even at Christmas mail only takes a couple or three days to get just about anywhere.  That’s real First Class service.

And that reminds us…back in the day when our parents were sending out Christmas cards there was Second Class mail in the US.  What ever happened to it?   Way back then one could send a card or letter by second class mail.  It seemed the only requirement was that the correspondence could not be sealed.  In exchange for the risk of just about anybody reading your mail (not unlike a postcard), postage was a penny less than First Class mail.  That was when First Class mail was something like six cents.  Today’s USPS rate sheet doesn’t even include the words Second Class but there is something called First Class for Businesses that’s cheaper than retail (read “real people”) Frist Class at 38 cents versus 49 cents.  Hmmm.  We wonder.

Somewhere along the way the post office lost its way a bit.  They’ve lost their share of mail also but that’s not the point here.  It seems to us that whether its 49 cents or 38 cents or $5.75 (that’s for Priority Mail), it’s still a deal to get a letter to any address in the country.  The other guys charge at least $13.50 for two day service and they lose packages also.  Back to the post office, it has lost its way a bit.  Between some late deliveries and salary issues, and whether to deliver or not deliver on Saturday and the general ineptitude that comes from any government agency (they say they aren’t but they really are), some people are losing faith in the service.  But every year around this time more people are planning on counting on the USPS to send their Christmas greetings to the masses.  Not by e-mail, not by text, and certainly not at $13.50 a piece.  Nope, those cards and letters are going by the old stand-by, the post office.

Most of them will go out sometime after Thanksgiving, probably a couple of weeks into December.  With their flaps seals shut.  First Class.  All the way.

Now that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you.

 

Neither snow, nor rain, nor Congress, nor a Polar Vortex, etc., etc.

Michael 1 Comment

It was cold here earlier this week.  No surprise for most of America since it was cold just about everywhere.  Tuesday we hit air temps of 9 to 10 degrees below zero with wind chills around 30 below.  We still got our mail.  He is on a driving route with his mailbox sitting at the street.  But She has her mailed walked to her door by a letter carrier who still marches up and down the street.  It’s not like they were responding to heart attacks or putting out fires.  They were delivering bills and junk mail but were still out there.

Oddly, we were talking about the postal service just a week earlier.  Seems the USPS finally got someone to approve, albeit temporarily and to expire in 2016, their request for a rate hike.  This had been a discussion in the media and in offices in late December when it was approved.  Most of that discussion started with, “Can you believe it? Stamps are going up again!”  Every once in a while Reality finally hold of the reins and pulled that Pony Express carriage to the side of the road.  (Yes we know the Pony Express was an independent hauler and not part of the USPS, not unlike UPS or FedEx today.  We’ll get that in a little while.)  Our typical response was, “But when was the last time you mailed anything other than a Christmas card?”

Here’s the Reality.  That rate hike is going to s 49 cents to pick up a letter, a payment, a birthday card, a get well greeting, Groundhog Day party invitations or whatever you can fit into a 5 to 11-1/2 inches long by 3-1/2 to 6 inches high envelope weighing up to an ounce and deliver it directly to somebody s house anywhere in the United States.  s a deal.

Reality Part 2.  She of We had a package to be delivered some 5 states away, a little over 900 miles.   This was during the rushed, shortened Christmas season of 2013.  That was the one where some people might still be waiting to get their presents delivered.  She mailed her package from the post office for the grand sum of $8.00 on the Saturday before Christmas (December  21) and it got there on Christmas Eve.

Reality Part 3.  Even though the United States Postal Service is a “non-government agency” and receives no tax money, it can only raise rates, change service levels (such as not delivering on Saturdays), or make available certain goods and services (like flat rate shipping) with the approval of Congress.  Congressmen and Senators not being able to explain to their constituents exactly what it is that they do can always make a few extra points with the voters by telling them they kept stamp prices down and everyone will continue to get to get junk mail and bills on Saturdays.  This is like McDonald’s going to Congress to seek approval for a price increase on a Happy Meal.

So is anybody happy about the 3 cent increase in first class postage?  Sure, everybody who hasn’t had his or her identity stolen while trying to pay bills on line, everybody who got their Christmas gifts delivered on time for Christmas, and everyone who actually sent thank you cards for their on-time Christmas gifts know that 49 cents just isn’t that much money to stay whole, to stay happy, or to stay in touch.

We say fool them all and start writing a letter or two!  And don’t forget those Groundhog Day party invitations.

Now, that’s what we think.  Really.  How ‘bout you?

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