THE GOOD BUCK

After the wag-n-drag fiasco I was quite relieved to get a nice easy job for my second outing. Trunking an artic down to Chelmsford, trailer swap and drive back. How hard can that be?

They wanted me at the Wigan depot for 7.30am. Then they rang back and said make it 9, as they wouldn’t have the trailer loaded. I got there at 9, then sat there for an hour and a half while they loaded the trailer. Slowly.

In which time I tried to familiarise myself with the truck, a MAN, which I’ve never been in before. I did what checks I could then sat around for a bit. I got bored and sat around for a bit longer. I set to trying to adjust things; the seat height, firmness, and fit. Then I thought about moving the steering wheel to a better position. There were no obvious levers or buttons so I started prodding stuff. I saw a lever so I gave that a pull. The steering wheel didn’t move but the lever was dangling down, obviously not right. I had a look to see what it was. It had a pictogram of the front of the truck with a movement arrow arcing downwards.

I have recently joined two driving agencies. Now that I have wasted two years of my life they can insure me, or blag their customers that I’ve been driving for two years, or some such. Whatever the detail, now I’ve held my license for two years suddenly two agencies have taken me on their books. Until now I’ve not even warranted a “piss-off, newbie!” email.

The first one I applied to was exactly what I was expecting. A chair, a desk and ‘phone in a room above a shop. Obviously someone setting up an agency and just getting names on their books in case they ever landed an employment contract. The woman was actually ringing firms and blagging them whilst I was filling in my details!

I have been spending my last day off wisely reading through the works of the master, Alan Moore. In particular ‘The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen’ (a wonderful collage of  fin-de-siecle fictional characters) whence upon I perused this missive and reply;

Dear Sirs-

Last post on this, promise. And I’ll make it brief.

I have some images to show for my ordeal. Unfortunately they are not very good. They seem to show me being really slow, and in the case of exiting the swim, totally shell-shocked. Which is mainly because they are accurate.  Damn!

…And that makes us mighty.”

Nine months ago, when I first discovered there was such a thing as an Ironman, I used that quote (from Mel, in Firefly) to express what I thought it would be like to have completed one. Nine months. Didn’t realize it was that quick.