The last few days my morning newspaper has had a fifty-fifty chance of NOT arriving. As person who doesn't like to accidentally pour my high fiber cereal onto my computer desk, I had to uncover the problem. I discovered my "paper man" for many years had quit and the newspaper was having difficulty finding anyone to do the route.
Yesterday I ran into the ex-paper man at the supermarket. He told me he was retired on a poor pension and did the route to pay his bills, but the increase of gasoline tp almost $4.00 per gallon and the declining number of newspaper subscriptions made the job unprofitable in cost and time.
I discovered I was the last person on my block of "educated middle class people" who still got newspaper delivery. Even though I live in a large city, my former paper deliverer said, he often had to drive down two to four blocks to reach the next customer.
If you're middle-aged, you probably remember when the newspapers were delivered by paperboys on bicycles and having a paper route was the first enterprise you had in the world of work.
I don't know how many newspaper boys there still are in this land, but I don't think many of them would ride a bike half a mile to deliver one newspaper.
Yesterday I ran into the ex-paper man at the supermarket. He told me he was retired on a poor pension and did the route to pay his bills, but the increase of gasoline tp almost $4.00 per gallon and the declining number of newspaper subscriptions made the job unprofitable in cost and time.
I discovered I was the last person on my block of "educated middle class people" who still got newspaper delivery. Even though I live in a large city, my former paper deliverer said, he often had to drive down two to four blocks to reach the next customer.
If you're middle-aged, you probably remember when the newspapers were delivered by paperboys on bicycles and having a paper route was the first enterprise you had in the world of work.
I don't know how many newspaper boys there still are in this land, but I don't think many of them would ride a bike half a mile to deliver one newspaper.
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