Sunday, July 12, 2009

"Secrets of the Post Office"

Dave Gathman wondered how the mail works:

Every time I dropped a letter into a mailbox (usually a bill payment that had to get there fast, or my interest rate would shoot up to 33 percent), questions lingered. Would the letter get there just as fast if I mail it at the corner "blue box" as it would if I mailed it at the post office? Would a letter mailed in the little Hampshire post office arrive as soon as one mailed in downtown Elgin? Is it true, as someone once told my mother-in-law, that "mail doesn't move on weekends?"

So we did some experimenting.
Read all about it:

Secrets of the Post Office (Elgin Courier News)

comments: 2

Matt Thomas said...

Related reading: Jonathan Franzen’s essay “Lost in the Mail” in How to Be Alone.

Michael Leddy said...

Thanks, Matt. That book has just moved from my "someday" list to "near-future." The essay is also online in New Yorker (for subscribers).