The Winged Messenger

Had another small amount of snow overnight, nothing to get excited about but adding to the now annoying amount in the yard, a combination of ice, slush and snow making it all a mess. Had to clear by hand more than I wanted to as good chance the awaited delivery by Hermes, would mean van got stuck. Angie had to take a few tries getting out with my Polo.

I waited in all day for Hermes watching all the contrary notifications coming from them and Amazon. At one stage Amazon was showing Hermes had tried delivering at 7:44 and 8:44 in the morning! Absolute rubbish. There was fresh snow to show no vehicles, we have security cameras and no notification notes stuck in the letter box. At about 16:45 I gave up, wrote Amazon a "whats going on" tweet and then left by car with Luna to the village and a walk. Stopped off at first house to get our newspapers deposited there in a newspaper box and at that very moment, the Hermes van appeared from a side street. Waved him down and got my parcel! It was now 17:00 on a Saturday. No point in discussing anything with the driver!

We did the walk on the cleared farm track which was better than anything else. As it was now under 0°C, it was still pretty treacherous with the daytime melt now freezing. Saw MrJ our friend & hunter & state forester returning to his car and ended up having a long chat. Haven't seen him personally for over a year and now find out he's been back - workwise - in our area since March with his own forest area. He had had to work good 250 km away in northern Bavaria to broaden his forest experience and qualify for a management position which he now has back home. His boss retires in December and I think he has MrJ in his sights as his successor. MrJ in a typical German way isn't quite so sure. Germans work to live, and if they are happy doing what they are doing, are not always so keen on taking on more responsibility. Money isn't everything.

It was very dark before Luna and I got back to the car. After dumping Luna back home, did a quick supermarket shop in Ottobeuren .... for beer!

Not a productive day. Snowblower parts not coming until Monday but a heavy dump of snow due Sunday/Monday night!