Robert Small, The blog thereof.

The postman whistles as he walks down the path, knocks three times and presents the occupant with their post. He declines the cup of tea and returns to his bicycle to continue down the lane. Arriving at the gate he enters the next house, inspects a new baby and incurs a cup of tea. Three doors down he informs old Mrs Wilkinson of the new baby’s name and tell her of the latest plans for the cathedral in Rochester. He meets everyone with their post and a brief friendly conversation, in fact, the entire local community is held together by the postman. He carries local news around and provides a daily visitor to the aged.

I’ve only ever twice spoken to my post woman, both times were a result of  her trying to avoid being involved with her duty of delivering the post. I’ve many a time caught her, or some other worker attempting to avoid presenting me with my post. For some reason they prefer to write out a slip telling me that they don’t think I’m there without bothering to try the bell. It’s a sign of the times. No longer is there a vibrant community between the men and women who stay at home, in fact, rarely is anyone at home between nine and twelve. No longer does the postman share information or make light upon days of the aged and infirm.

Indeed, the world of malady is shown through the lack of conversation with the deliverer of the post.

Kind regards, Robert.

One would expect that a post office might provide fast and efficient movement of post from one place to another. Would one expect travel insurance and a phone service? It’s strange, I’ve become more and more aware of the different services they offer. I do wonder how they can provide all this and yet claim the need to close so many post offices in the aid of economy.

On Friday I went into the local branch of the post office and bought myself travel insurance, it’s actually a very good deal. I also changed a reasonable amount of money into dollars and euros, I should be able to have a few cups of coffee when I’m sitting in Amsterdam. It’s nice, the post office workers are all friendly, helps when you’re doing something you’ve never done before and something that you’re a little unsure how you can do and what you can get out of it. Travel insurance is not something I’m highly knowledgeable about and I felt just a little lost buying it from the nice gentleman aptly named Fred. He passed me over to a nice lady, I forget her name, who proceeded to fill out the forms for me and provide me with a booklet which informed me that I’d get a few hundred if I were hijacked or a few thousand if I missed my flight, I decided to pass on the hijack offer.

Contemplating my situation over a cup of coffee I decided that I was glad the post office was also involved in travel services, it’s good to support something other than a supermarket or a major bank/building society. I feel rather loyal to our postal service, it is after all rather British. Whatever people say, it is very good when it works. Strikes and unfortunate incidents with things getting lost don’t help, I hope all this will clear up soon.

The post office also offers a credit card, banking, telephone and broadband, and I dare say several other services. Is this diversification sensible? It didn’t work for Sainsbury’s, sideways expansion is a risky business. I believe their banking services are very old, they also seem to be farmed out to the Bank Of Ireland and not their own. I dislike middlemen, the concept rarely helps the consumer, this time however they seem to be offering something which does help the consumer. I’ve never used their banking services, only their postal and travel services.

This blog post has been something of a spilling out of ideas and thoughts, something of an explanation to myself for my own thoughts. You’re lucky to be privy to my thoughts.

Kind regards, Robert.