Scott Bradford: Off on a Tangent

Let There Be Mail?

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While it is not the official creed of the United States Postal Service (USPS), everybody has heard the old saying: “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”

USPS has quoted from this saying itself in advertisements and other materials, so it would appear that they approve of the sentiment. Snow is the first poor climatic condition listed.

As such, I’m always a little surprised when USPS suspends service. They announced a suspension on Saturday due to the blizzard, and while I haven’t heard anything from them since I certainly didn’t get any mail yesterday. Will there be mail today?

I’m no fan of the Postal Service, and haven’t been for a long time, but lots of stubborn organizations—particularly doctors and other medical facilities—have not embraced the Internet age and still want bills paid by mailed-check (or even mailed-credit-card information). For the time being, this is still a public service.

Between USPS’s failure to obey their own [admittedly unofficial] creed, and VDOT’s failure to clear our roads, I’m starting to wonder if I can trust the government.

That was a joke.

Update 2/14/2010: For the record, mail was delivered to our house on Saturday, 2/13/2010 . . . for the first time since Friday 2/5/2010. Yes, you read that right. Our incredibly reliable USPS decided to skip an entire week.

Blizzard of 2010 Photos

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I’ve been loving the Blizzard of 2010 here in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C. Normally I would have just sat-tight for a day or two, but Melissa’s art show wasn’t canceled so I was out in the thick of it. The Subaru, once again, handled it beautifully. Today I went ahead and dug Melissa’s car out too. Here are some photos!

Busywork Ate My Posts

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Yes, I know I’ve been horrible at keeping the site updated this week. Between work, weather, Melissa’s art shows, getting everything migrated to the new phone, and so on I just haven’t kept up with it. I will try to get back into a regular posting cycle next week.

I am enjoying our little blizzard. I am a snow lover and this stuff is great. We’re somewhere around 25″ I would guess. Melissa has a show in Chantilly today and tomorrow, so we and the Subaru got to have a little winter adventure. The car (and driver) handled it just fine, but the roads are really bad. Worst I’ve seen ’em.

Other than that I just have a ton of time-eating busywork-some of which terrible overdue. I owe Melissa some work on her site, bills to pay, etc. Hopefully I can get a lot of that kind of stuff done tonight. I’ll also post some blizzard pics.

Another Blizzard? Bring It On!

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I love winter weather. After five (or more) years of non-winters with moderate temperatures and little or no snow, we’re finally making up for lost time. In December we had a good blizzard (well, blizzard by D.C.-area standards), and we’ve since had two more accumulating snows. Now it’s looking like we’re going to get another one on Friday and Saturday—possibly even another blizzard. The National Weather Service has issued a winter storm watch and is projecting over a foot of snow, and possibly up to 20″.

I love it! This winter is shaping up to be a great one for us snow-lovers.

Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.