THE GOOD BUCK

Category: Life

  • Irony is not O’Sullivans autobiography

    Another quick one. After swopping my shifts (and escaping the freezer, huzzah!) and effectively working two weeks 2-10, I finally got to go to Taekwondo on Sunday. There we were all practising what we needed to pass our gradings. This should have given me a clue, as on the website it said the grading was the week before, when I’d had to work due to the (bloody) great escape.

    After putting me through my paces Sah bum nim said can you make it for the grading on the 29th? I was dead chuffed as I thought I’d missed it, said "oh yes", thought for a minute, then realised, that was the only day they could get me in for a (hopefully) final four hours training before my truck driving test.

    Bottoms.

    She said "it’s all right, we aren’t leaving ’till 12.30".

    My lesson is 12-4pm!

    Bleeding typical.

    I said that I had my HGV driving test that day (got it slightly confused off the top of my head), so Sah bum nim said "you’ll have to see if you can cancel it." (!)

    Two thousand pounds, near enough, a month or so wait for a re-test, and I should reschedule it so I can take a grading!

    OK, I would really like to take it (time is not on my side when it comes to succeeding at physically demanding tests) and I have to admire her single-mindedness, but real world I can’t not take this test!

    On the subject of driving licenses, today is the big day! My license is now clean, my endorsements have run out. I could send away for a new clean license, but it would cost £17.50, so I might as well wait until I pass my test and get it taken off when I get my new entitlement put on. I think it’s free, if not it saves paying for it twice. It’s not like I’m desperate for another job anymore. I plan on staying where I am until I’ve passed this test, the artic one, and seen a secure driving job. In the current economic climate I’m clinging to my job.

    Also on driving, I’ve put the Micra through it’s MOT, cost worst part of £400 to get everything sorted, MOT’ed and re-tested. Still, that should be that. And now I’ve stopped trying to slide it I shouldn’t crash it, thus should not need to cough up next time.

    I was cursing the crap-heap before I put it into the garage, then had to ride the six (ish) miles to work, then back, on a push-bike that’s stuck in top gear. My arse was killing, and the small of my back was that bad that I had to get up and stretch off after four hours sleep! I picked it up, and was stroking it saying "I love my Micra, I love my Micra."

    In work I have a problem. The boss has his two sons working on the department (Sugar Ray, and Stallone! I guess the dad was into boxing! "He’ll grow up to be a fighter with a name like that."  – I’m guessing was the thinking-See ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’.

    Anywho, the lads are twins and like peas in a pod. I have real issues remembering peoples names, and putting two indistinguishable lads on the same shift as me is tantamount to mental cruelty.

    Luke moved out again yesterday, gone back to his bint’s. So I came in from 6-2, absolutely knackered as it was my first shift so I couldn’t sleep the night before, took the car to the garage for it’s retest (didn’t even check it over, rolled it onto the ramps shone a torch under for effect, that’ll be £20, please. Bastards!) then had to come home and run Luke and all his crap to his chicks (who wasn’t in, knowing we were coming was around her mates, and hadn’t given Luke a key). Then I get in today and Wendy says Luke had been on the ‘phone saying it was all over between them and he was coming back, (so I was supposed to go and pick him and his crap up again) but happily they decided to give it another go an hour later, so by the time I got home Bucky’s removal service had been cancelled.

    Better get off, was only supposed to be saying about my grading, but it’s all come pouring out. I have to be up for work in under six hours.

    Toodles,

    Buck.

  • Free at last, free at last…

    Huzzah! I am free from the freezer! I have been permanently transferred to de-kit.

    There are, as always caveats and addendums. Every silver lining has a cloud, but I’m free from the freezer, my worst ever civvy job! Deep and sincere joy.

    The pea (s) under the twenty one mattresses, are that I was on 2-10, went in yesterday and the manager said I was supposed to be on 6-2 this week (so I had to double back -finish at 10pm, back in for 6am-) which has left me a tad tired. I’ll be off to bed as soon as I post this. Also he told me “and it was your day off yesterday” (which, inevitably, I’d just worked). This means I’m not off this weekend as I was on the freezer rota and have to work through to next Friday before I get a day off.

    Which has the knock-on effect that I won’t be able to take my TKD grading on Sunday, and that’s that for another three months.

    Ho hum. Niggly irritations.

    Still, I’m in an OK job, that I can do, without threat of disciplinary action leading to being sacked, and I’M OUT OF THE FREEZER!

    Oh, and it was my sinus’s. No longer done in with that.

    Happy Bucky!

  • Just is

    Hi again. Things are moving at break-neck speed. I said I was working in another department (De-kit) for a few days last week, and that I suspected the manager was sounding me out about a possible transfer over there. Well, I had one day back in the freezer (and remembered just how much I hate it), then half way through my shift yesterday the freezer manager told me he’d received an email from the de-kit manager, asking if I would like to transfer over there permanently!

    I immediately said "YES!"

    This prompted my manager to ask if I’d already been approached over it, as normally people would ask what their shifts were and such-like. I said it was the first I’d heard of it, but whatever the shifts "it’s better than this. Death’s better than this."

    He didn’t have any details, but he had already sent a return email asking for them, assuming I’d want to know before deciding. I’ve been off today, so hopefully tomorrow I’ll have all the details. The only ones that really concern me are how soon I can start, and at what time.

    There are a few things I’ll need to sort out, that I’m still on 2-10 (or day off) on the day I take my driving test (again) in the morning, and if at all possible that I’m still off this Sunday.

    Sah bum nim hasn’t contacted me, and I am working every club night this week so I’ll not see her, but I think it’s the Taekwondo grading this Sunday. I feel a bit cheeky asking to take it after letting the club down by not competing last Sunday. I’ll leave it until Friday, if she’s not contacted me, I suppose I should send an email. If she is going to be petty she can always ignore it until it’s too late. I might not even be off, if it’s an immediate start in de-kit, with a different rota.

    Also hanging on any potential new rota are repairs to the Micra. I thought it was going to fail it’s MOT, so have been refraining from spending any money on it until I knew how much it would cost to set right. I put it through today, and really the main damage is a ton of welding on the front cross member. There were big lumps of rust flaking away in my hand when I got round to changing the bumper, that’s when I thought it would fail.

    Anyway, a brake pads, welding, a tyre and two new gaiters, and two bulbs. They quoted me £200 for the lot. They didn’t pick up on a knocking sound at full lock on the steering, but when I questioned them they said it was probably the CV joints (the things the gaiters would have been protecting if they weren’t split). Possibly another £90, with labour.

    It looks like I’m stuck with the mighty Micra for another year. I’m not going to get a reliable car for £290.

    To tie in the de-kit and the car (and the money-pit that is Taekwondo) when I do get transferred, I can start hammering the overtime. Perhaps do 10-10 on my 2-10 week (when I won’t be able to go to Taekwondo anyway) and work my days off in the week on 6-2. Wait and see. At least it is an option again.

    The other main thing on my mind is this bloody cold I’ve had for coming on a fortnight now. I keep thinking I’m over it, and it keeps coming back and kicking seven bells out of me. I woke up this morning (said I woke up this morning, and I heard a disturbing sound. Sorry, Blues Brothers digression) with it heavy on my chest, and hour later I was good enough to do my hour’s TKD work out, then by five this afternoon I was back on the Lemsip, I’ve just taken some more paracetamol, and my head is killing. (Though I’m beginning to wonder, belatedly, if it’s not my sinus’s blocked up). 

    Poorly Bucky.

  • Breaking News

    Just a quick update on breaking news; I have been in a different department for the last two days at work, it’s graft and apparently everyone hates it over there, but compared to the freezer, I love it! The manager there told me what a good job I was doing, so I replied "gizza job!". Then today he was questioning me on whether I liked it, what shifts I worked, whether I liked it in the freezer.

    ( To prove that every cloud has a silver lining, I was able to convince him of my loathing for the freezer using that nasty incident last week as an example. He asked whether I liked it on that department, I said "it’s better than the freezer. Last week at Tae Kwon Do I was kicked in the bollocks twice in three minutes, and that was better than the freezer!")

    Anyway I think he was sounding me out for a possible transfer. It’s boring, hard work, but so much better than the freezer.

    The other potentially good news is that I have found out that Eddie Stobbarts will take you on if you have a class 2 HGV license (old money. Rigid big truck, the license for which I’m currently trying) and train you to class 1 (articulated) and give you a job upon passing your test. You have to stay with them for at least a year, but on the face of it that would seem ideal. Paid to train for a whole week, further training afterwards, and a driving job (the majority of the HGV jobs I’ve seen advertised demand a minimum of experience). I’m not sure what the catch is yet, whether it’s poor wages or what, but it’s definitely worth looking into (assuming I ever pass this current license!).

    Oh, and I may be on my way out. I seem to have contracted a potentially terminal dose of man-flu! Poor Bucky! *Sniffs disconsolately* 

  • This, and indeed that

    Hello again. I’m bored, so looking to spread it around.

    Wendy’s off god-bothering, Luke (her adult son) is messing on his computer and there’s bugger all on the box (for a change).

    I tried to write this out about half an hour ago, but whether because Luke has run his PC through this one to our (annorexically narrow) broadband connection or the gods of literary whining had had enough, the connection was lost and with it my words. Irritating.

    Anywho, soldiering on regardless, to get up to date: I’ve put in for another four hours truck training and another test. Third time better be lucky, I’m fast running out of none-existent money. I’m doing as Prudence Brown requested; spending my way out of recession. If the country goes bust, don’t go pointing the finger of blame at me. As I say, it’s money we don’t have, and to make matters worse when I finally do pass, I will still only be qualified for a lesser paid job than I have now. I then need to spend another £600+ to convert to articulated to make good money. This latest license attempt is costing £420-ish! Ho jolly hum.

    It needs to be done though. I have no skills, qualifications, no trade (other than the one the army gave me "You don’t want to join the infantry, join the artillery and come out with a trade." So, now I have on my CV ‘can kill people from  32K.’  Admittedly it’s a niche trade, but well worth the three years of my life it took to acquire.) So, to return towards the point, I’ve bugger all skills, and a job that’s destroying my elbows and hastening my demise into my dads state of advanced (rheumatism/ arthritis?) knackered-ness. Now my job has deteriorated into all of the above, with added -28C! The joy just keeps coming.

    The point I was so manly striving toward, before becoming enmired in the above morass of digression, is that I have to get my license (s) and get out of my current job, no matter what.

    I thought it was going to be a lot sooner than I’d anticipated, recently. A manager had me in the office for an investigatory hearing, asking why I wasn’t achieving my pick rate. It is a measure of how much I hate working in the freezer that I didn’t even bother to bullshit. I hate it that much that if they were to sack me I wouldn’t be upset. (Destitute, bankrupt, and selling my arse down Bridge Street when the fleet came in, but not as upset as now!) So I told it like it jolly well is, and they said that I have two weeks to start hitting my target (which they know I do every shift when not in the freezer, but they won’t transfer me) or I’d be back in for another investigatory, with a view to disciplinary. The implication being that I either started hitting my score or they were going to begin the procedure to discipline me into unemployment.

    Now, as I say, I hate it, and want to get out ASAP, but there’s rarely a good time to go on the dole. The amount of debt I’m running up for the driving alone is scary. So while I couldn’t find it in me to mourn the passing of this job, I was still apprehensive at the prospect of not being able to pay my bills.

    Then I got talking to the union rep, and he said he’d be glad to represent me, as no-one had ever been sacked for underachievement. So it looks like the manager in question was just trying to kiss arse further up the food chain, by getting me running around like a fool. It wasn’t going to work anyway, but it’s a weight off my mind that I’m most likely not getting sacked in a fortnight.

    In other news, I was asked some weeks back if I’d fight for my (Tae Kwon Do) club. I was flattered, and immediately agreed. I thought it was my duty, and if I got a kicking, it would be good experience. Then, by degrees, I find it costs £20 to enter the competition, it’s in Scotland, it costs over £100 for the protective equipment you need to compete, and everyone who wanted to do well was attending a weekend seminar with Grandmaster Loh in Newcastle the weekend before, for £100, plus your own arrangement for bed and breakfast and obviously petrol to both god forsaken destinations! ( Liz)

    The final straw came when I realised about two weeks ago that I am no longer on nights, so am not guaranteed Sunday off. I checked when I thought it was, and sure enough I’m working. I sent Sah bum nihm an email asking for confirmation of the dates, got no reply, so by the time I saw her in person it was Friday before I could get a holiday form in, and I’ve not had it returned. I emailed her again yesterday, saying I was going to have to pull out, and apologising. She received that one promptly enough. Seems I have to pay £20 for even agreeing in principle to fight for the club. Got to laugh.

    On to the genuinely good news; Wendy had her first day back at the Citizens Advice Bureau on Friday. While she wasn’t unduly terrified the night before, there were certainly signs of her anxiety. In the morning I was off, so I ran her in, (she was getting jittery by then) but had to go to work that afternoon 2-10. When I got in she chewed my ear off. She was buzzing. I’ve not seen her so happy and animated (apart from about her imaginary friend, "god") in many a long yonk. Apparently everyone was really nice and welcoming, she didn’t have to do the new starter training again, they just put her to work on triage (don’t know if that’s a job specific phrase, it’s just sorting the priorities from the non, the one’s who need to be referred to other agencies, and the ones who can sort it out with a self help leaflet, and don’t need to see an advisor) then she just had to brush up on new legislation and whatnot in the afternoon to get back up to speed. She loved it. If and when she gets back to paid work, we will be laughing. Her loudest and longest, she does dearly love that job.

    Anyways, that’s about it. I’m back and blogging, and I’ve not improved any.

    Later,

    Buck.