Going Postal

I spent the last two weeks training for my postal job. The first week was easy... 3 days of job training, and two days of driver training, all the the classroom. Plus one day of hands on driver training in a mail truck. I can parallel park that thing like a pro, but I hope I never have to. It would be especially difficult on the job because I'm not allowed to back up. Ever. Parallel parking is all about backing up. lol. Anyway, the second week was definitely more taxing. The hottest week in St. George so far this year (but probably we haven't seen the end of that) and I was out in a mail truck doing curbside delivery for 5+ hours every day. 112 degrees. Except Thursday because I had to do Saturday and boss had to make sure I wasn't getting overtime. So I only did the indoor work on Thursday, and then I went home.

I think I'm getting the hang of it, but I feel soooo slow. Before I go out, I organize mail in delivery order for about 700 individual boxes. Some of it is already in delivery order, but I have to put all the mail into the slot that belongs to each house. I'm trying to remember where all the streets are on my mail case, and I've gotten better but it's really hard because they all have similar names in my neighborhood. Sandsage, Sandstone, Silverstone, Stoneridge, High Ridge, Summerhill, Spring Hills, Spring Valley... you get the idea. I guess it could be worse... they could be numbered streets. After I get it all in order and put reminder cards for packages in the right place, I load everything into my truck and set off for my day in the sun. If anyone was wondering, mail trucks do not have AC. There is however a little fan that blows the hot air off the dash. For two days, I drove with Gary Bogenhagen, who is the regular on my route. He drove the first half of the first day, and I drove the rest, and all of the second day. Both days we made it back by 4:30, which is on time, so I figured I would be ok. He does it a lot faster, but I wasn't too worried about that.

Saturday, I was driving completely alone, and I had more packages than I had ever seen. I didn't get out of the office until almost noon. Around 1:30, Emily came and took my last 2 trays of mail and the packages that went with them. Around 3:30, Sam came and took half of my last tray. I still only made it back to the office by 4:30 with maybe a minute to spare. On the way, my truck overheated and shut off. Luckily it started again before I had to get towed. Just imagine if I had actually delivered all on my own. It would have been like 8pm before I got back.

Now that training is over, my only scheduled days are every other Saturday, and the whole third week of August when Gary is on vacation. Which means I have to wait almost 2 weeks before I get to try again. But on the upside, there aren't very many two week intervals before the weather becomes bearable, at which point I think this is actually going to be a fairly enjoyable experience.