Now that it’s November, it’s already time think about mailing your holiday cards and gifts. One early deadline has already passed, though Post Office spokesman Rich Watkins says it wasn’t a big one. Just the deadline for the cheapest overseas or “surface” rate for shipping packages to Africa or Asia has passed, a cuople of weeks ago. But most of the important deadlines are still ahead of us, even if they’re fast approaching. Especially for our troops overseas, you still have a few weeks. The deadline depends on the service you select for sending your package, and to see all those options and their various deadlines, he suggests going to the post office website, “The post office that never closes,” USPS-dot-com. Watkins says while a lot of people have computers and surf the net for things besides the post-office site, he doesn’t think e-mail will ever replace Christmas cards. He laughs that he’s rarely seen a holiday-greeting email someone printed out to put on the fridge or mantel, adding the post office expects a large volume of traditional holiday mail to be sent again this year.
