Monday, December 11, 2006

potatoes and string

Can we talk about Post Offices? They're a Grumpy Old Bitch topic, aren't they? As we cluster around the slightly odd smelling counter at the back of the dimly lit shop, next to the bag of potatoes and the string, waiting in the queue to collect our old age pension we should be able to get a discussion going about this.

Personally, I think we should shut them all.

Who are these rural people, these elderly people, these people without cars in marginal communities who think they are REAL members of society?

Who the hell do they think they are?

They're not important.

What's important is money.

Is youth.

Is whether you'll vote for someone in a smart suit.

Is power.

What's important is towns.

Rural communities are irrelevant. Not enough population to be worth courting for votes. People earning below the National Average Wage are insignificiant. They contribute to society hardly at all. Why the hell should they expect their life to be subsidised if they can't afford a car, or a courier for their parcels?

So what if they live miles away from a town with a bank to withdraw their money? Fuck 'em, that's what I say! Their voice isn't even worth listening to.

What we need is more centralisation. We need to preserve the countryside and villages in aspic. It's no co-incidence that local people can't afford houses in villages - if they weren't lazy SOBs, they'd get off their arses and get real, high paying jobs. In the meantime, we can herd them in to council estates on the edges of rural towns and they'll just have to make the best of it.

Those pretty village houses should be lived in by REAL people. People with 4x4s and REAL jobs, in advertising, the media and politics. They don't need services in the villages - they'll shop at Sainsbury's and Tesco's on the way home from work or on a Friday before they leave their little Pied a Terre in town on the way down to the cottage.

Post Offices, rural shops and services. Waste of space.

Close them down. All of them.

7 Comments:

Blogger fineartist said...

Woman you breath a firey satire here, and you've said a lot that needs to be remembered.

Your sarcasm drips from this piece and pools up right in the heart.

Now what I want to know is, do you really have potatoes in your post offices? That's me, always asking the important questions. Heh. xx, Lori

3:41 AM  
Blogger Anne said...

although i live in a village in the united states, there's a sting of truth to this.
this village is part of a dying breed, as it lurches toward total disney-i-zation every year. all facade.

11:18 AM  
Blogger Lizard said...

potatoes? really? how.... quaint.

the rest is disturbing, though. I know its how the world is going here-- and to help the demise, Wal fucking mart is heading into every small town, driving out the local businesses, and somehow making the locals happy that they did it. It's a true sickening puzzle.

4:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

wait a minute, Sainsbury's? Tesco? - I thought you were writing from Canada! So there's a pandemic of rural post office closures? Being a mountain woman myself, these closures did have an effect at first - until I realized that quite right, we're all illiterate anyway, and hairy, too, so unworthy of convenient services! (PS there's one left out our way, not exactly convenient, but quaint & charming, if a potato rolled out from under the counter it wouldn't be all that surprising!)

7:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's a Post-Office Shop and sells everything from string via soap-flakes and sausages (fresh) to, well, potatoes. The potatoes are actually by the door though, rather than the Post Office counter. I'm in Wales ... not Canada :).

They've announced the closure of 2,500 branches today - I don't know yet if ours in on the list.

10:37 PM  
Blogger fineartist said...

Thank God we still have our rural post offices, and I don't forsee them trying to close them any time soon.

I have my mail brought to my house and the man picks it up because I'm a little absent minded. When we had a post office box, my bills were always late, because, well, I'm a little absent minded and I'd usually make it to the post office once a month tops...not a good thing.

But it is so cool to be able to have a post office box, if you move, the address is still intact.

Shame on them for shutting them down. Bastards.

9:30 PM  
Blogger Jennifer said...

The only place I can think of where this simply won't happen is Vermont. Long live the general store, with its sundries and cheeses and most of all the post office within!

1:54 PM  

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