I have promoted the United States Postal Service to the top of my Public Enemy list. Once again they have made another poorly thought out blunder in their efforts to save a few dollars. Only this time, it effects me and plenty like me directly.

I sat back and only scratched my head when the main post office sorting center in Lynchburg was closed and moved to Roanoke eliminating a bunch of jobs and cutting service. As it is now, if I mail a letter or a bill from Forest, VA, approximately 5 miles from the Lynchburg Main Post Office, to an address in Lynchburg, it goes to Roanoke where it is sorted, shipped to Winston Salem, where it is sorted, shipped to Richmond, where it is sorted, and then back to Lynchburg where it is sorted and finally delivered. It now takes 14.2 days to get a letter 5 miles. I could have walked it there in that time.

Nor did I do anything but scratch my head a couple of years ago when the postal rates were raised 2 cents and the Postmaster General was making $800,000 a year, every postal worker got some type of bonus and the service managed to loose 2.8 billion dollars.

But now, I'm mad.

They took out the drive thru mail box at the Forest post office. The savings for this brilliant move is about $0.33 per day or the amount of money it took to pay a postal worker to walk 20 yards from the post office to the box and empty it.

I'm disabled, at least temporarily until my hip replacement next week and the couple of months of rehab following. If I need to mail a letter or a bill, I have to park, get my cane or walker out of my vehicle, cross a busy shopping center access road, up a curb and into the post office and to the box. This morning it was 16 degrees and thankfully not snowing. Then reverse back to my car. That takes me about 10 minutes and requires me to take an extra round of pain pills when I get home.

And what about those with permanent disabillities like my father was, or the elderly that are now forced to do the same. Are they now expected to depend on a friend or family member to do another menial task and diminish what little self respect they have left? 

The post office says that there is a drive thru box at a nearby Kroger Store but it is for a passenger in the vehicle. If I go at it when I am alone in my vehicle, I must go down a one way driveway the wrong way, taking a chance on getting a ticket,  or go thru the same problems of getting out in the weather and struggling around my vehicle to get to the box.

And, you people are saving what it took for one person to walk 20 yards. Nice!!!!!! And you wonder why you continue to loose billions of dollars every year.

Please feel free to comment and add other Post Office nightmares to this post.