I am hesitant to even mention this, it’s so perfect for me. Even though I’m not superstitious I still don’t want to jinx it.
First off let me relate how I got here.
As you know I’ve not been applying for full time jobs because of nerves about the driving assessment.
The agency work has been really scarce and then when they did get me a day’s driving it was for DHL/ Iceland, the company and depot I had to leave because they wouldn’t let me drive for them! That was irritating.
Then, before they’d let me out on the road they made me do hours of paperwork, a drug and alcohol test and then a driving assessment!
After all that they sent me on an easy run, luckily. I know how hard some of the stores are to get in though. Having to back across carparks that have moving cars and customers. Scary stuff. To be honest I really don’t want to do it now I’ve tried other driving. However, if it’s a choice between a shift for them and a week without pay I’ll do it.
That was my situation and stress level. I’d passed an assessment I didn’t know I was going to do, which left me eligible to do a job I really don’t want.
I thought ‘Screw it! I may as well apply for other jobs, an assessment is not as stressful as an Iceland store delivery.’
So I did. I applied for something called Igloo logistics and for a couple of different agency jobs. The agencys haven’t got back to me. After I’d rang about the full time Igloo job, (and written the email, updated, tweaked and attached the CV, etc) I went on their website to check I’d got the right email address. The Jobcentre advert had said some experience, their website said minimum of two years. I emailed it anyway then gave up on it.
The chap rang me back, asked if I’d had my license for two and a half years (I said I had in the email, but only six months driving experience) I confirmed, he told me to come in for the induction /interview thingy.
I went for it today and it is perfect for me.
It’s just trunking (where you pick up a trailer from a massive depot and take it to a massive depot, maybe shuffle a few trailers around the yard, then straight back to base, go home.) You can pick which start time suits you 0500-0730, 1100-1400, or 1700-2130 (something like that), it’s £9.14 basic, time and a third for all over eight hours each day, Sundays always time and a third. He said it’s the easiest driving job going and it’s well paid. Also, they have outgrown the Appleton depot so they are having another one built ‘”near Ikea”, ie on my doorstep!
I put all my paperwork through today, I’ve got a driving assessment on Thursday. If I pass that I should be driving this Sunday.
I so want this job. It’s exactly what I want and need. And it’s full time. And days. (So I can train, and sleep at night.) And you don’t touch the load. Just pick up and drop off the trailer. In big yards.
This is the time when it really sucks bottom having no deity to beg. No Tarot cards to try to divine the unseen. Just me. On the day. Pass or fail.
The irony is, I will probably have done a better drive for DHL/ Iceland because I didn’t want the job!
Please, please, please let me get this job.
In other news, a long time chum of mine (we’ll call her Flo Brant, for the sake of anonymity) is getting music lessons for her sax! Yay! Go Flo!
Wendy is still interested in learning her piano, I am getting back up to speed (to the pitiful level I was previously, anyway) on my sax and beginning to get to grips with my misery-stick. (Oo-er, mrs!) My clarinet.
I’ve been off training for the last four or five days as the damage to my calf (from overdoing it with these new ‘natural running’ –natural hobbling- trainers) had become too bad to carry on. Today I finally got around to doing what I’ve been putting off, since possibly the Outlaw, and went for a swim. Only an hour, but it wasn’t half as bad as I’d built it up to be in my avoidance. I was working on learning a bilateral breathing technique as the swim for Ironman Bolton is the opposite way around. I need to be able to ‘sight’ on the side that I currently don’t take out of the water. Ace. Lots of drinking of baths water and near drowning then. Still, I got a few good breaths in. Couldn’t do any when I first started swimming, on either side.
If I get this job I’ll be slapping the money down for IM Bolton, the Cornish half Iromnan distance triathlon, (I’ll thrash it’s sorry arse this year! Vengeance will be mine!) and that Lake District trail running marathon. Again.
Got to get it. This could be life-changing.
GOT. TO. GET. THIS. JOB!
Fingers crossed for me (told you I wasn’t superstitious!)
Buck.