THE GOOD BUCK

  Wendy was looking for a hobby so I bought her a surprise present of a clarinet. It’s well cool and looks like this: And breaks down into a natty little case like this; Unfortunately she likes it, so there goes another bonus present. She only mentioned it because she loves the decrescendo, (glissando, they are calling it on youtube) from Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin (here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXrwIHcNB5o ) That is our task for tomorrow. It has got me back to my sax. I’ve not had time enough to sleep, never mind anything else these last few months, so sax practice has taken a serious hit. The longer you leave it the more daunting it becomes. When the clarinet arrived though I thought I’d have to have a go. Just kept making a horrible squeaking sound. Wendy could get it to blow notes, I got squeaks. (Think it might be broken!) In frustration I broke out my sax. So, all for the good. I’ve since realised the embouchure is totally different. You hold your mouth the same, but apply next to no pressure. On the sax it’s a firm bite from the top teeth, taught bottom lip over bottom teeth. The clarinet you just rest on your taught bottom lip. Still have some way to go before either of us are knocking off the tune above.   I got myself some new ‘natural running’ trainers. They say that modern trainers encourage injuries by placing all that padding in the heel, encouraging a heel-strike running technique. Apparently this jars unnaturally and causes shin-splints and knee injuries. The latest thinking is by removing the heel padding, having more or less a flat running shoe, that you run as your body wants to naturally, landing on the balls of the feet and absorbing the impact. They said on the website that because you are removing an inch or so off your heel that until your muscles strengthen and adjust you should do no more than a half a mile run. Increasing by no more than 10% per week. Naturally I scorned all such mamby-pamby, sissy-boy, nonsense.  I wore them around the house for a few days then as soon as the gym was open (today) went for a good run. I thought 5 miles was a girly enough distance to try them out. To spice it up I ran half a mile at a stupid gradient then for good measure just kept putting the last quarter mile faster and faster. Ended up running at a sub 5 minute/ mile speed. Fine and dandy. So I hopped on the push-bike machine and blasted out half an hour on that. The last five minutes of which were at killer pace as I wanted to get it to 8 miles. (I don’t know how I’d been so slow at to need to blast it, must have been the run.) I staggered off the bike and back on to the running machine, thinking to do another 5 […]

OK, I’m more or less a truck driver now. I still struggle with the more difficult reverses, but have the standard one cracked. A few things have come to my attention though. To whit; car drivers. Not all, obviously. The two main categories are coffin-dodgers and women. Again, not all, but when I’m screaming at some moron I’m about to plough forty tonnes of truck through, it always seems to be one or the other. All the competent women and oldsters want to form vigilante gangs and eradicate those who besmirch your record. For instance, my mother is a woman and an excellent driver, my dad is due for retirement later this year (which, by an arbitrary judgement could have him nudging the ‘oldster’ bracket)  but is a professional driver. So it’s not a sexist or ageist remark. As we know, sweeping generalisations are always wrong, but it just so happens that the conspicuous dickheads are almost without exception from those two categories. With half the country being female, and a growing percentage being elderly it is perhaps not to be remarked upon. But I have. Then, in justification have laboured the point to death. Ho hum.   Anyway, that was but a throw-away remark as pre-amble to my main point; ie, Things That Piss Me Off,(Driving Subsection) Volume III, Chapter 134. 1, People entering a motorway off the slip road. You are in a car. The merest dab of the pedal on the right will send you hurtling to the dizzying speed of 57 mph. This is faster than any truck is supposed to be able to go. Therefore, do not tootle down the lane at 45mph and expect to join the motorway. There is a damn good chance there is a car beside, or speeding towards the truck you are suicidaly trying to bully, preventing it from moving out a lane. This leave the trucker with the option of trying to pull up with the momentum of said forty tonnes pushing him (/her) on, or crushing your tiny little car like a beer can and laughing about it all the way home. (OK, that might just be me.)   2, If you felt the need to stop on the hard shoulder, illegally, then having resolved the emergency for which you had no choice but to pull over (say, having found little Johnny’s next DVD) and your car then miraculously works fine again, DO NOT sit there, static, with your indicator on. You don’t try and join a motorway at zero mph. Use that lovely hard shoulder that everyone else has left clear for real emergencies, to get up to speed, then merge. You moronic twat!   3, People who drive at less than 55mph. Anywhere, really, but particularly on a motorway. Give me your keys and go and stand against that wall. Yes, the one with big posts before it and the pock-marked brickwork.  As for those who drive at 53mph until you are almost on top of […]

Oh dear. What a day.   I’ve been working for Stobarts off and on for the last few weeks. I had one bad night with them. I dropped my digital tachograph card (digi-card, the chipped card that records all your driving data) somewhere between the truck and the office. A distance of a hundred yards or less. I spent ages looking for it, back and forth. It was dark and I couldn’t see it. I gave up, saying to the the guy who had been helping me “It must have fallen under one of the trucks. No worries, the lads will hand it in when it gets light.” I had to tell them in the office that  I couldn’t work that night, as you can’t drive without a digi-card.One driver had already gone home that night after losing his. As I was walking out, the chap who’d been helping me said “let’s just have a look in this bin”. I humoured him, as he tipped it out. There was a digi-card in it, but it was the other lad’s. We went to a bin on the yard and there was mine! Some bastard (s) had seen a card on the floor, knew the consequences for the driver who’d lost it, and deliberately binned it. I was gob-smacked. I would never have looked in a bin because it would never of occurred to me that someone would be such a wanker! And to have possibly two such wankers is beyond my comprehension. On that same night though, the guy who had been helping me look really went out of his way to help me out. There are some outstandingly good people there, but…. well, I’m speechless. The job itself is as easy as you are going to get for lorry driving. Pick up your keys and a job sheet (with one or two destinations on it).Do your checks on your unit, pick up a trailer then off you trot. Quick nip to, say, Surrey, off the motorway for a few miles, into a big yard. Either get unloaded or swap trailers, then it’s to your next destination and repeat or home. That’s it.   They had no work for Stobarts today so they rang me at 10.45 and asked if I could start a job in the next hour. I said I could so they sent me a text saying ‘DHL, Risley, start at 1130’. Shit! I grabbed my stuff and set off.   My first obstacle was there was no DHL at the address they gave me. I went up and down the street twice before asking a lorry driver. He said it had been renamed Yodel. Ah. Thanks for that. Then there was the unit. It was an old heap. It had a paper tachograph, which I couldn’t understand (so god knows how many hours I drove. I’m only allowed to drive four and a half before taking a forty five minute break, by law.) The automatic gear box […]

Not loving the occasional work of Driver Hire I had started looking on the Jobcentre plus website again. Oddly, all of a sudden, there seemed to be jobs to which I could apply. I did so. The difference it makes to your confidence, having actually done the job is amazing. I applied, saying I’d been driving. Two agencies arranged for me to register. Judging by the agency I was with, I thought I’d get on both of their books, that way between them all, I might be able to get enough work. I went to the first agency to register. The appointment was for one o’clock. I spent an hour filling in forms. As I was finishing them off (two o’clock) they asked if I could work that night. I said I could. They told me to be at Stobarts for four o’clock! Good start. Then to carry on doing evening/ night shifts until next week, have my statutory two days off, then go on to morning/ day shift. And that was that. I am now working every day at Stobarts.   So, it was two weeks in the wilderness, now I’m having to fight for days off. Today was my first day off since Wednesday. I’ve been working nights (start at eight o’clock work through until at least eight in the morning). Already I’ve twice worked the legal maximum of a fifteen hour shift. In my first week I worked eighty two hours. Eighty two hours! Count them!  I’ve been swilling coffee, popping caffeine pills and guzzling generic Red Bull. The trouble is, of course, that it takes a few weeks to adjust to sleeping in the day. I’ve been getting about five hours disturbed sleep. I’ve been knackered starting the shift. Even with all the stimulants listed above, by five in the morning, when you are on a long, boring motorway there is no way you can stop from nodding. I’ve been driving with the heater on cold air, the windows open, freezing for hours and still drifting off. I’ve had to resort to literally slapping myself every few minutes. Hopefully that is a thing of the past now. I had a glorious three hour kip today, I’m getting to sleep in my own bed tonight (YAY!) so I should be refreshed for tomorrow. After that it should be morning starts. Even if I’m up at ungodly o’clock at least I should be able to sleep at night.   Working for the same firm each time has it’s advantages. I’m getting to know the truck and how to work it, rather than getting in a different vehicle each time and not knowing how to switch things on or work the onboard computer. Also, so far, the work has been easy. Last night was a quick nip to Trafford Park, pick up a trailer and run it down to Essex, get unloaded, drive back. Job done. That Truck-Nav, let me say in passing, is the best £355 I have […]

This has been a dynamic couple of weeks. I handed in my notice at work then had the statutory two days rest I should have been having every week whilst driving. The agency rang me three times on my last week, so I was worried I was going to have to fight for my days off. Then nothing. They rang me with a job driving a Transit van to Essex for two days. Not what I wanted, but I said OK, then they said it was minimum wage. I was less than chuffed, but they said ‘could you do it as a favour to us?’ I’m not here to do favours, I’m here to earn a living. Grrrr. Anyway, I was going to do it as they’d caught me off guard, then be prepared to refuse if they tried to get me to do it again. They rang back and cancelled the gig. Which was fine by me. I’d earned brownie points by taking the crap job, then not had to do it. Super. Then nothing. No calls, no work. They tried to get me a week’s work driving a low-loader with tipper trucks on it.They asked if I’d ever driven a tipper truck. I haven’t. I said I’d be willing to give it a go, though. They were happy enough with that, but apparently the client wanted someone who could actually do the job. Fussy buggers. I finally got a job on the bin wagons for Friday. I didn’t like my first go on them a few weeks ago. Very tight situations and you have to reverse in to them. Very difficult. And it’s class 2 work, so not what I’m after and less pay. I want class 1 work. Where it’s virtually all driving forward and just the occasional reverse to worry about. You can take your time and make sure it’s all spot on then. When half of your time is spent reversing into situations that are too tight to be able to drive straight into, and you’re a newbie, mistakes are going to happen.   In other news, I’ve just ran the Warrington Half Marathon again. It was my first ever half, last year. This year, being the nearly superhuman triathlete that I am I treated it with contempt. I’ve just bought someone’s place in the Liverpool Marathon for next month, as they can’t make it. Because of a nagging minor leg injury (and laziness) I’ve only done three, ten mile runs since the Outlaw, six weeks ago. When I heard of the place on the Liverpool Marathon I thought I’d better get back to training. I was torn as the week or so before a race you are supposed to taper your training. Just enough to keep you from setting really. On the other hand I wanted to up my miles quickly and prove to myself I was still capable of a marathon. With the above mentioned contempt in mind (‘it’s only a half!’) I […]