No Mail

The mailman won't deliver the mail if he can't get to the mailbox from his Jeep.

This seemed like such a cruel practice when I first heard of it - one of the things I have always been thankful for is Rural Free Delivery. A few years ago - the first time that the mailman skipped - I called the post office and sweetly asked if I could come there and pick up my mail. To this the clerk (snippy-ly) replied 'No - if we let you do that, no one would keep their mailbox clear.' I was shocked and my feelings were hurt - so we got the trusty snowblower from the church and spent hours trying to chip away at the mass of ice that the city snow plows had piled up in front of our mailbox - all to no avail - we couldn't clear a path to the mailbox - so I called the city offices and explained the problem and their receptionist very sweetly took my name and address and said that she would send dispatch a note and they would be up that evening to plow out my mailbox. This only happens a couple of times a year (for us) but I imagine the city snow plows are kept pretty busy and this time it was actually just a huge drift...

Here Jack and I are bundled up for a walk/jog - I'd call it our run - but it's almost impossible to 'run' with that many clothes and boots on...

...and this is the garden under about 3 1/2 feet of snow - the fence is 4 feet and those cattails you can see the tops of out in the field are about 3 to 4 feet tall as well. Needless to say you can't really walk across the back yard at all...