Threadjacking!

[Spikes]

Still though, it’s a grand old forum

'Appen.

[JayzusB.Christ]

I see more foxes in the city these days - they're everywhere and they don't give a flying fook about human proximity.  I do hear them out in the countryside where I live though - their mating calls would scare the absolute bejesus out of you, and I'm convinced that the Banshee legend started with them.

Welcome back, Spikes, from another old-timer.

[The Doctor Alt 8]

Awww I loves that series...

[Funt Solo]

We had a bear pass through town a couple of years ago. Also, something took one of our ducks - but mostly that seemed about the killing - they didn't seem to eat much of it. We're assuming it was a trash badger (i.e. racoon) because it figured out how to unlock the coop. Problem solvers, those guys.

We gave away our remaining duck - as it felt bad to have a lone duck living in the same place her buddy was murdered, and we weren't in the market for another. The woman that took her has a bunch of pet ducks that she liked to cuddle - and, from the photos, it looked like our duck was going to have a much happier life with a flock, more room to forage and a bigger swimming area.

(That was Jane-Duck. The murdered one was Janet - who was literally a lame duck. Jane's brother, years earlier, we had to give away when he matured and became highly aggressive. He went to live as a duck-stud. Lucky duck.)

[The Doctor Alt 8]

I have a nasty suspicion that a certain neighbours are taking advantage of the fact that postal and delivery workers are unable to read the difference between my flat no and block address and just the street address. Things and mail that we were supposed to receive just don't arrive and at the end of last year I had to claim my BT wi-fi kit from them after the engineer told me he had been sent to their address not mine. So I could prove that mix up. Today the specialist cat food that I have been told has arrived (And has NOT arrived HERE) is the latest of things. (Dorian is becoming a fussy little devil and this is an attempt to get him to eat more that a few cat biscuits and cooked king prawns). These people have never approached me with mis-directed mail and I think I only got the wi-fi kit back after I sent them a polite note. Yet I have returned mail for THEM I have got by mistake. Problem is I can't PROVE it so I can't confront people about it.

[JWare]

Doc, I think all you can do is periodically drop round their place with the cheeriest most neighbourly smile on your face, hand over their mail, and ask them if they happen to have any of yours.
That makes it a meeting of neighbours: not a confrontation.
It’s harder for them to casually rip someone off if they see that you’re a real person and if they know that you’re likely drop around anytime your mail goes missing.
If they turn out to be ignorant pigs then try the cheery neighbourly community spirit thing on the postie. Become a face rather than an address. That might help.

I should add that I have no experience at all in this matter. I’ve been living in a small inner-city terrace for the past 19 years and we all happily sign for each other’s parcels.
It only took five or six years to convince the neighbours that, even though I was born all of two miles away, I was actually pretty harmless (for an outsider, that is). We’re parochial, so we are, and proud of it.

[The Doctor Alt 8]

Oh I couldn't agree with you more. A good relationship with neighbours is priceless. I just irritated that if they have the parcel, knowing what happened last time they couldn't of just said "You want the flat across the road mate!"

[Dandontdare]

And although it's a pain in the arse, you can almost always get a refund unless they've got proof of delivery.

I once had a a missing parcel logged as "handed to the receptionist" (presumably one of the cats who roam around our flats when I'm at work)

[JayzusB.Christ]

I should add that I have no experience at all in this matter. I’ve been living in a small inner-city terrace for the past 19 years and we all happily sign for each other’s parcels.

I lived on a boat in a boat community for 4 and a half years, and now live beside the same communities in a cabin that legally doesn't exist.  Locating your deliveries is a life-long Sherlock Holmes case.