Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Newspaper Nightmares

list on front of chart
sidebag for extra papers
Years ago I ran Kelve’s newspaper route when he quit. I thought after a few months of no discretionary income from the route, he would take it back.

Later, I was still running the route – having given up the dream of him taking it back, and now doing it because it was a good hour exercise before anyone else got up in the morning.

The only fall out when I quit the route was the occasional nightmare where I was out doing papers, but had lost my list of which houses were taking papers and which ones were not.  Sometimes there would be whole blocks of houses I had never seen before.

... pulling socks over blistered feet ...
Duncan has an abbreviated paper route. His parents help him with it on Wednesdays and Fridays. That should read, his parent – Steve, though Rebecca is known to fill in when Steve is out of town. And now I am the substitute helper, getting ready to go out at 5:30 in the morning and coming home well before 7 am. There is nothing bad about this route.

The lawns and flower beds of the homes are well tended and that slows me down a little. I stop to observe how the border plants spill over into the sidewalk. I wonder about the height of the irises or the size of their blossoms. The only suggestion I would have is to take a route that requires the run 6 days a week instead of only 2.

Kiwi comes along, Duncan says because this is her real chance to run in the morning. She doesn’t have to be on a leash and she is up and down the blocks and circling us numerous times. Rebecca has a chart carefully taped to the cart that tells us which houses we are to miss. No nightmares here.

Arta

2 comments:

  1. go duncan! that is one happy early morning face! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. We changed our newspaper delivering strategy last night and did the papers late in the evening ... which took us longer. That is because we came across a young buck eating the grass in one of the yards to which we had to deliver papers.

    "I am not going in there until he leaves. I know they can charge you," Duncan said.

    We stood quietly looking at the beauty of the animal. The owners of the house saw it, too, and opened the window, throwing out first a carrot and then an apple. I don't know how we could hear this from our position across the street, but we heard the crunch of the apple and when we did, I could almost feel the juice coming out of the corners of my mouth.

    As we finished the crescent and came back a doe had joined the buck on another lawn. We stood again to watch. All that and we get paid for doing the delivering as well.

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