8:34 p.m. - 2004-09-21
Hey...He's My Mailman

Shut Up Larry, He's My Mailman

Let me set the scene. I have become freindly with the mailman...the mailman at work...Oh it is all so innocent so don't expect a juicy story here, but he is my mailman and I don't like interferance by other people in our little dialogue we have every day.

I don't know how it started, but I guess that this mailman decided to start poking fun at me about catching me doing a cross word puzzle during slow times when he comes to deliver the mail. I forget how long we have been trading snaps and insults but it is a daily ritual that I look forward to and hey, the mail man is kinda cute.

Howard was involved in this little ritual before he retired and everday, when the mailman would come, Howard would come flying out of his office and the two of them would good naturedly gang up on me.

"She saw you coming and hid the crossword puzzle." Howard would say while I was obviously working on the billing. Then the two would laugh and I would trade a snap back and we would see who could come up with the best one liner for the day.

OK, I know that it is not dignified nor business like but it is fun. Now that Howard is not there, it is just me and the mailman and we don't want anyone else in the club.

When Chander first joined our company, he tried to get in on the joking, but soon realized that he did not have the chemistry to compete in our little game and backed off.

I don't think Larry even knows we are playing a little game.

They put Larry back in the truck. Graveyard shift. He can at least stay sober enough to drive in the wee hours of the morning and then we can send him home and he can drink till he passes out sometime in the early afternoon and then go to bed and wake up sober enough to drive. The beauty of this is that not only do we get Larry sober, but we get rid of him during the day when he tends to talk incessantly.

Our little plan only half worked though. Larry returned from his nighttime run....sober and in good shape. He then told us he was going out for something to eat and he would be back. Well, we knew something to eat was going to be something to drink and when he came back, he had that "I love you man" look on his face and prepared to talk our ear off for the next two hours.

My mailman came and I razzed him about his 4th vacation in a row and teased him a little about hiding mail under his porch. He told me that he didn't have much under there because he was good at burning it....same ol, same ol snaps...but this is how we warm up. I have not had my mailman to play with all week and was looking forward to our little game when along came Larry the Drunk Love Muffin.

He misunderstood something the mailman obviously said to only me and went on a diatribe about some guy he knew who was a stressed out mail man and jumped from tangent to tangent to tangent to tangent, talking for the next 10 minutes until his monologue landed on some story about fishing in Wisconsin.

My mailman kept glancing out the door and at his watch. It was obvious that he didn't want to be detained by this drunkalogue any longer but was way too nice to interrupt Larry. Finally I could stand it no more. I yelled at Larry. I said, "Larry, I don't think our mailman has all day to listen to you go on and on and on."

Larry apologized and wandered into Dan's office to bend his ear....the guy just won't shut up and here his shift was over and he could go home and he wouldn't leave.

I was a little bent out of shape by not getting to trade snaps with my mailman, but when I looked back up at him, there was a devilish look in his eye and he pointed to my computer and said, "I'll let you get back to your cartoons." Out the door he sailed and got the last word in. Damned Larry, I had the winning snap and it had long vanished from the creative bank in my mind when Larry started droning.

Tomorrow, Howard, who is retired but is being retained as an advisor until Dan gets his hands around the job and things are working smoothly, promised to come in and talk to Larry about his drinking. I hope it helps. Larry is really not such a bad guy....just extremely neurotic. Sober, we love him and he is just another colorful character at Midtown Pallet. He is one of our strange bunch, but drunk.....well not even oddballs like a drunk. Larry need help and he respects Howard. For Larry's sake as well as ours, I hope that this talking to will embarrass him into really getting some help with his drinking, his thinking and his life.

But until then Larry...He's my mailman and there is no more room in the mailman fan club.

P. I. Yarnsmith

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