The Postal Service is heading into its busiest time of the year.

Now is the time to get holiday packages in the mail if you want them to arrive on time.

“There are three rules for holiday mailing — mail early, mail early, mail early,” says Sequim Postmaster Greg Emerick.

“The outgoing mail is already pretty heavy, about two times normal.

“The really heavy volume hits about two weeks before Christmas.”

Port Townsend Postmaster Jim Espenson says the Postal Service doesn’t anticpate delivery delays as a result of the anthrax scares that have closed mailrooms and postal facilities in three states and Washington, D.C.

“Things have been flowing rather well,” says Espenson. “Nothing has changed as far as transportation.

In Port Townsend, officials expect up to five times the normal load of 40,000 letters and 1,500 parcels a day, Espenson says.

The last two Mondays before Christmas are traditionally the two biggest mail days of the year.

The rest of this story appears in today’s Peninsula Daily News, on sale throughout Clallam and Jefferson counties. Click on “Subscribe” to get the PDN delivered to your home or office.