My father has an ongoing feud with the mailman.

I don't know how mail delivery works in other countries. I have vague notions about slits in doors, and sedate postmen with satchels being chased by dogs. That's not how it works in my town. In my town, the postie has a motorbike on which she (usually, for some odd reason) zips from driveway to driveway, poking the letters into the letterbox. That's what it's there for, after all. Although it also comes in handy when you're looking for a house you've never been to before.

In any case, I digress. We live half way up a hill, like just about everyone else in Gladstone. (We don't all live up the same hill, of course, otherwise it would be fearfully crowded, but you get my meaning.) The postie comes down the hill on our side when she's delivering the letters. Our neighbours have their mailbox on the side of their driveway nearest us, so you see it's far simpler for the postie to just keep going down the footpath. Unfortunately, this gouges a small ditch in the grass near our driveway, and this makes my father see red.

It all started when I was fairly young.

... and now the cat is... well, caterwauling underneath my chair. I'll be back to finish this story later...