"So," you might wonder, "How does this '24/6 (I don't work Sundays) courier' celebrate Christmas?" I'm not sure how good a picture these few paragraphs will provide, but here goes ...
As usual, a couple of weeks before the holiday a check-list arrived with the weekly invoice, asking us each to tick when we would be available over this period. I checked the slots for Monday and Tuesday, and left the rest completely blank. In former years I've tried all patterns. Sometimes I've said I'll be available most of the time, held myself in readiness, and spent days listening to a silent phone. On other occasions I've selected certain days to work and have finished up with a half-decent week. It all depends when in the week the actual festival falls. Midweek like this, there's not much chance of industry doing a lot for a fortnight, so I decided to follow suit. I added a proviso that I might phone in to see if I can be useful if I feel bored with my own company, but for the moment that doesn't seem likely.
On Monday and Tuesday, then, I was 'working'. In point of fact, this meant I went to Corby and Hatfield on Monday, and to Peterborough and Luton on Tuesday - about a day's work out of the five jobs involved. As expected, I was back home about 1.0 pm on Christmas Eve and after that the phone might as well have been switched off. I recall one year, sitting in the office waiting for work on the day before Christmas Eve, I was asked how I felt about a delivery in Cork the next day. I was up for it, but after they'd checked the ferries they realised that I wouldn't get home until about 27th December, and the customer wasn't going to pay for that!
So here I am, home alone for a week or so. There are no decorations, because I don't bother with them; it doesn't seem practical, and I don't really miss them. The windowsill is full of cards from friends and relations far and near, which are much more meaningful and important to me. With 'alternative gifts' so common these days, there are no presents to open, and I value this absence. Too much money is wasted, in my opinion, by people buying things they can't afford, for people who either won't appreciate them or don't need them - often both. I'm really pleased that I'm 'giving' lots of much needed vaccine and something to make fresh water available where they're both really needed. That's not to say that there aren't some small seasonal gifts ready for me to take next week when I visit my cousin, but I'm glad to say that we both understand the cost and the value of these expressions.
When it comes to the festive meal - I confess that my culinary skills are minimal. I'm quite happy to settle for the regular fare that keeps me ticking over for the rest of the year, supplemented by a few luxuries, such as mince pies, stollen, individual microwaveable Christmas puddings, chocolate biscuits, and the like. I realise that even these could have a serious effect on my sylph-like(!) figure, but - hey - there's plenty of opportunity to diet in the New Year!
So, what am I doing with my time? You might predict, it's family history most of the while. I read somewhere that more people take up or sustain this interest over the Christmas/New Year holiday than at any other time of the year. A cousin in the US recently provided me with a lot of information that I'm slowly incorporating into my own database, and if I can bounce it back with a few additions, it will benefit us both. While I don't have TV, there are a number of programmes that I'm catching up with on replay that I wouldn't otherwise be seeing at all, and I've caught up with some reading. Of course, behind it all is my faith and my involvement at church, the details of which belong elsewhere. Suffice to say that, despite what might seem from the foregoing to be a rather dismal time, I'm really happy. I have peace within; it's a time of consolidation and reinvigoration, and when work begins again January, I'll be able to face all that 2014 can throw at me in good heart.
Friday, 27 December 2013
Sunday, 22 December 2013
A Week of Surprises
I've spoken often about the Repeating Genie, and how curious it seems that a place, once visited after a long break, will come up again maybe the same day, or later the same week. I've found in recent weeks that this is true not only of destinations, but of customers too, Now, with the green shoots of economic recovery, there is at least a plausible reason for this, as firms come out of the doldrums, and business builds once again to a level that warrants the use of a same-day courier. But I find, too, that the phenomenon also applies to roads.
For many weeks during the autumn I seemed to be destined to travel north, with very few jobs in the south of the country. The last two weeks have addressed this imbalance. With two trips to Newport last week, I thought the genie had struck and had now had its fill of the M4. Not so, for this week started with a journey to Bristol. It was an interesting - and potentially rewarding - exercise, too. I had allowed what I thought was a reasonable excess in my timing to cope with the M25 and the Bristol rush-hour, in order to make my delivery as required by 9.00 am. Whether it was simply Monday morning clutter, or a specific problem I couldn't say, but by the time I reached the M4, most of my allowance had been consumed, and I was chewing my metaphorical nails as I drove west.
Eventually I turned in the gate at precisely 9.0, parked the van in the likeliest position and made for reception to engage some help to unload these two unwieldy boxes. What I hadn't expected was that an engineer from our customer would be waiting in reception. He was there to install the equipment I'd brought, and then would provide tuition in its use. Had I been late, his tight schedule would have been impaired. As it was, he complimented me on my timely arrival, and even said he would mention this when he got back to the office!
That wasn't the only surprise this week. After four good days, I wasn't too dismayed on Friday to have just one job. It took me across country from Sandy down to Thame, and SatNav clearly decided that, since there are no clearly-appropriate motorways, the only way is as near to a straight line as it's possible to get. As a consequence, I found myself on quite a few rural, and hence uncluttered, roads and passing through some hitherto unknown villages. It was a most enjoyable experience, which was followed by the never-innocent enquiry whether or not I might be available for a job on Saturday. When I answered that I could be, provided I did my shopping on Friday evening, I was asked to present myself at 3.30 at one of our 'farmyard unit' customers in a nearby village.
The result was that, yesterday morning, I learned - in as wet a way as possible - not to make assumptions. I had been loaded with a fridge-freezer, packed and sealed in its original box, to deliver to a Lady. When one is sent to Lady so-and-so at an address that comprises a single-word house name, the name of the village and a postcode, what picture comes into one's mind? My history-soaked imagination took me to a many-roomed ancient pile in a vast estate, to which I would gain access down a long, winding and ill-kept drive. There I would be confronted by a heavy oaken door, with studs and a handle that would creak when turned, opening to reveal a quarry-tiled barn of a kitchen. I would be helped to carry the fridge in from the van by an ageing servant, taking care not to leave dirty footmarks on the floor as I did so.
My van, by contrast, took me to a pleasant country lane, with meadowland on one side and on the other a sequence of houses and bungalows, some of which were part of a modern estate running behind the lane, while others had drives that opened onto it. I turned down a short, straight and well-surfaced drive at the end of which was a decent-sized bungalow, with a double garage and a convenient turning to the front door. When I pushed the bell, I looked through the falling rain at the closed curtains of what I took to be the lounge window and realised that I'd hopelessly over-compensated for my tight timing to Bristol earlier in the week. The door was opened quite promptly by a petite, grey-haired lady in a dressing gown. With no hint of annoyance at being disturbed so early, she brightly told me that I was delivering a fridge, explained that there was a back door and suggested that I reverse the van toward it while she go though the kitchen to unfasten it.
By the time the van was in position and the doors open, her Ladyship had re-appeared at the now-opened back door. The fridge was quite easily tilted out of the van, and stepped across the remaining few feet of the soaking wet concrete to the door. There was just enough leeway to edge it up onto the threshold, and once the mats had been removed, through the utility area and into the kitchen. A few moments of polite conversation accompanied the inevitable collection of name and signature on my sheet and, with the business of the day done, I could retrace my steps, stopping for a much-longed-for breakfast at the Route 23 Diner before heading home to the rest of my pre-Christmas weekend.
For many weeks during the autumn I seemed to be destined to travel north, with very few jobs in the south of the country. The last two weeks have addressed this imbalance. With two trips to Newport last week, I thought the genie had struck and had now had its fill of the M4. Not so, for this week started with a journey to Bristol. It was an interesting - and potentially rewarding - exercise, too. I had allowed what I thought was a reasonable excess in my timing to cope with the M25 and the Bristol rush-hour, in order to make my delivery as required by 9.00 am. Whether it was simply Monday morning clutter, or a specific problem I couldn't say, but by the time I reached the M4, most of my allowance had been consumed, and I was chewing my metaphorical nails as I drove west.
Eventually I turned in the gate at precisely 9.0, parked the van in the likeliest position and made for reception to engage some help to unload these two unwieldy boxes. What I hadn't expected was that an engineer from our customer would be waiting in reception. He was there to install the equipment I'd brought, and then would provide tuition in its use. Had I been late, his tight schedule would have been impaired. As it was, he complimented me on my timely arrival, and even said he would mention this when he got back to the office!
That wasn't the only surprise this week. After four good days, I wasn't too dismayed on Friday to have just one job. It took me across country from Sandy down to Thame, and SatNav clearly decided that, since there are no clearly-appropriate motorways, the only way is as near to a straight line as it's possible to get. As a consequence, I found myself on quite a few rural, and hence uncluttered, roads and passing through some hitherto unknown villages. It was a most enjoyable experience, which was followed by the never-innocent enquiry whether or not I might be available for a job on Saturday. When I answered that I could be, provided I did my shopping on Friday evening, I was asked to present myself at 3.30 at one of our 'farmyard unit' customers in a nearby village.
The result was that, yesterday morning, I learned - in as wet a way as possible - not to make assumptions. I had been loaded with a fridge-freezer, packed and sealed in its original box, to deliver to a Lady. When one is sent to Lady so-and-so at an address that comprises a single-word house name, the name of the village and a postcode, what picture comes into one's mind? My history-soaked imagination took me to a many-roomed ancient pile in a vast estate, to which I would gain access down a long, winding and ill-kept drive. There I would be confronted by a heavy oaken door, with studs and a handle that would creak when turned, opening to reveal a quarry-tiled barn of a kitchen. I would be helped to carry the fridge in from the van by an ageing servant, taking care not to leave dirty footmarks on the floor as I did so.
My van, by contrast, took me to a pleasant country lane, with meadowland on one side and on the other a sequence of houses and bungalows, some of which were part of a modern estate running behind the lane, while others had drives that opened onto it. I turned down a short, straight and well-surfaced drive at the end of which was a decent-sized bungalow, with a double garage and a convenient turning to the front door. When I pushed the bell, I looked through the falling rain at the closed curtains of what I took to be the lounge window and realised that I'd hopelessly over-compensated for my tight timing to Bristol earlier in the week. The door was opened quite promptly by a petite, grey-haired lady in a dressing gown. With no hint of annoyance at being disturbed so early, she brightly told me that I was delivering a fridge, explained that there was a back door and suggested that I reverse the van toward it while she go though the kitchen to unfasten it.
By the time the van was in position and the doors open, her Ladyship had re-appeared at the now-opened back door. The fridge was quite easily tilted out of the van, and stepped across the remaining few feet of the soaking wet concrete to the door. There was just enough leeway to edge it up onto the threshold, and once the mats had been removed, through the utility area and into the kitchen. A few moments of polite conversation accompanied the inevitable collection of name and signature on my sheet and, with the business of the day done, I could retrace my steps, stopping for a much-longed-for breakfast at the Route 23 Diner before heading home to the rest of my pre-Christmas weekend.
Saturday, 14 December 2013
A 'Matchsticks' Week
There's a story - probably apocryphal, but you never know - about an American tourist who looked out of the coach window, and down at his itinerary, and then said to his companion, "It's Thursday; this must be Belgium." It's that same fogginess through which I'm peering today, as I see filled shopping bags on my kitchen worktop and think to myself, "It's Sainsbury's; this must be Saturday!"
The week began with a kind of forced holiday. Last Saturday as I drove to church for the regular monthly coffee morning, I noticed that my battery warning light was flashing. I spun around the penultimate roundabout and went instead to the garage, confident that there would be someone there who could tell me how serious this was. It was serious. The battery wasn't charging, and the only power I had until they could replace the alternator was the fast-diminishing charge that it presently held. I decided that I'd leave the van at the garage on my way back from church, rather than use it over the weekend and risk being stranded somewhere. At least the garage is only ten minutes' walk from home. Consequently I walked to church on Sunday, had a lay-in on Monday, and only ventured forth when the garage called me mid-afternoon to say all had been fixed.
No sooner had I got home and phoned the office to say that I was no longer the proverbial 'cowboy without a horse', than the week took off. Within an hour I'd been given a job to an industrial estate on the outskirts of Peterborough, and on the way received instructions for a 7.0 collection the following morning for Norwich. The pattern for the rest of the week was set when, on the way back from Norwich I was given a job for Reading, and before I'd picked this up a further call suggested that once I'd done so, I might like to collect three boxes from a firm of advertising agents in nearby Hitchin for Newport. As darkness fell on Tuesday, therefore, I was delivering custom-made festive garlands to a cafe franchise in a supermarket 170 or so miles from home.
I stopped for a rest and a meal at Membury services, but not before I was asked if I'd be able to make a 7.30 collection in Letchworth on Wednesday morning. This went to Haverhill - a regular run - and the day looked like being a tame follow-up to the previous day's exertions. From Haverhill I returned via the office for the weekly paperwork exchange, and then home for about an hour, which neatly coincided with my landlord's agent's quarterly visit. I hadn't met this particular member of staff, who usually admits herself with the office key. On this occasion, with her key poised over the keyhole, she was somewhat startled by my arrival. Introductions were made and, after a brief but pleasant exchange, I bade her farewell and sat down to open the Christmas cards that we had collected from the doormat on entry.
Three local jobs then quickly came my way, the third of which was a return run from Haverhill to the place where the day had begun in Letchworth. I had barely returned from that when dreams of an evening to catch up on admin were shattered. Would I please visit a local company in Letchworth and collect an urgent job to go to Redditch. When I arrived there, and found that SatNav took me to the far end of an industrial estate, trying to direct me to drive through the fence at the end, memory kicked in, and I remembered a rainy lunchtime (which later research told me was exactly a year ago) when I'd made that same discovery. I knew where to find the correct destination, and just made it as the last member of staff was about to leave. A meal in the truck-stop at Rugby, and the need to negotiate a local road closure for night-time maintenance, brought the day to a conclusion at about 10.0 again.
Thursday began in a more normal manner, and after a late breakfast and a little admin I rang the office as 'available' at about 9.30. Within a few minutes I was asked to go and meet another driver across the town, who would give me a job to go to a warehouse near Ely for a well-known London store. I had been home less than an hour when I was called to collect from a factory in Flitwick, to go to Stoke Mandeville. I'd taken a few minutes to save what I was doing on the computer, and shut this down, so when the phone went again to ask how far I'd got, I had to admit that I'd only just finished entering the address on my sheet, and was about to start the engine. That was perfect, as it happened, for I was asked to visit a warehouse in Letchworth first, and collect a couple of items for a hospital in Malpas, a repeat of a job I'd done less than three weeks ago. Unfortunately, the diversion to Stoke Mandeville made it somewhat later when I got to Newport this time, and when I arrived at Magor services their restaurant had closed.
I decided to press on and stopped at the next services, Leigh Delamare, where I arrived about 8.40pm. Good, there were still people eating in the restaurant, and as I approached the servery I could see there was food in the bins. I did have to wait a while for a member of staff to appear, however, and when she arrived the lady said, "Sorry, we're closed; we close at 8.30." She didn't seem aggressive in her manner, though, and I pressed my need, explaining that I'd just had a long and arduous journey to the hospital in Newport, and - I pointed to my jersey, bearing the name 'Letchworth Couriers' - I had over 100 miles further to travel to get home. She undertook to speak to her supervisor. I repeated my tale of woe to the supervisor, a younger and more positive woman. I pointed to the steaming food beside us at the counter. She explained that they were closed, and she couldn't take any money from me because they had cashed up for the day. I offered to hand her the appropriate amount of cash to look after so that she could process it the next day. This counted for naught, and the discussion continued. Meanwhile the elder lady (how common sense comes with age!), realising no doubt, that the food before us would shortly be chucked into the bin, was filling a plate with sausages and chips. "Do you want beans?" she interjected, opening the lid to reveal a gooey mess with few actual beans present. "How about peas?" I told her peas would be lovely. She had clearly taken over from her supervisor, who stared, helpless, at what was going on. I reached for my pocket to pay; they repeated in chorus, "No, we can't take any money." and the elder lady added, pushing the plate to me, "That's all right, love, go on."
After three late nights, two of them following early starts, I was glad of what seemed to be a gentle Friday. I rang in as available around 10.0, and was fairly swiftly sent to St Albans and Hounslow, the latter resulting from a collection at a farm-workshop in a tiny Hertfordshire village I'd never heard of. Home once more, I turned to my desk, where my printer had developed a rebellious streak and wasn't doing what it was told. With this still unresolved, I received a call for a local job to the middle of Hitchin. Then came the 'killer blow' of the week. Before I'd returned from this, I was called to collect some metal from Biggleswade that was required urgently in Thame; while still on the way there came another call, suggesting that I take this via Houghton Regis, where I could collect an envelope destined for a village only five miles away from Thame, and as I was on my way between these two collections, a third call announced a job going from Letchworth to Aylesbury. We agreed that this last one would add so much to the overall journey as to be a non-starter, and it was given to another driver.
The final job of the day, the envelope, was addressed to 'The Grange', which proved to be at the far end of a narrow lane. The journey to find it was surprisingly easy, until I turned into the lane. Round the first bend, I found myself face to face with a large saloon which must have emerged from one of the only two houses along the lane. With nowhere to turn round, of course, my only option was to reverse to the corner. Sadly my only option was to reverse to the corner, which isn't easy when the headlights of the car in front advance a yard-and-a-bit for every yard you reverse before it. Some people seem unable to consider the difficulties of driving a vehicle whose only rear vision is in side mirrors, into which one has to look forward!
As Christmas draws near, I can expect another week of this; at least I know that it will begin with no men's breakfast at the church - I shall be on my way to Bristol!
The week began with a kind of forced holiday. Last Saturday as I drove to church for the regular monthly coffee morning, I noticed that my battery warning light was flashing. I spun around the penultimate roundabout and went instead to the garage, confident that there would be someone there who could tell me how serious this was. It was serious. The battery wasn't charging, and the only power I had until they could replace the alternator was the fast-diminishing charge that it presently held. I decided that I'd leave the van at the garage on my way back from church, rather than use it over the weekend and risk being stranded somewhere. At least the garage is only ten minutes' walk from home. Consequently I walked to church on Sunday, had a lay-in on Monday, and only ventured forth when the garage called me mid-afternoon to say all had been fixed.
No sooner had I got home and phoned the office to say that I was no longer the proverbial 'cowboy without a horse', than the week took off. Within an hour I'd been given a job to an industrial estate on the outskirts of Peterborough, and on the way received instructions for a 7.0 collection the following morning for Norwich. The pattern for the rest of the week was set when, on the way back from Norwich I was given a job for Reading, and before I'd picked this up a further call suggested that once I'd done so, I might like to collect three boxes from a firm of advertising agents in nearby Hitchin for Newport. As darkness fell on Tuesday, therefore, I was delivering custom-made festive garlands to a cafe franchise in a supermarket 170 or so miles from home.
I stopped for a rest and a meal at Membury services, but not before I was asked if I'd be able to make a 7.30 collection in Letchworth on Wednesday morning. This went to Haverhill - a regular run - and the day looked like being a tame follow-up to the previous day's exertions. From Haverhill I returned via the office for the weekly paperwork exchange, and then home for about an hour, which neatly coincided with my landlord's agent's quarterly visit. I hadn't met this particular member of staff, who usually admits herself with the office key. On this occasion, with her key poised over the keyhole, she was somewhat startled by my arrival. Introductions were made and, after a brief but pleasant exchange, I bade her farewell and sat down to open the Christmas cards that we had collected from the doormat on entry.
Three local jobs then quickly came my way, the third of which was a return run from Haverhill to the place where the day had begun in Letchworth. I had barely returned from that when dreams of an evening to catch up on admin were shattered. Would I please visit a local company in Letchworth and collect an urgent job to go to Redditch. When I arrived there, and found that SatNav took me to the far end of an industrial estate, trying to direct me to drive through the fence at the end, memory kicked in, and I remembered a rainy lunchtime (which later research told me was exactly a year ago) when I'd made that same discovery. I knew where to find the correct destination, and just made it as the last member of staff was about to leave. A meal in the truck-stop at Rugby, and the need to negotiate a local road closure for night-time maintenance, brought the day to a conclusion at about 10.0 again.
Thursday began in a more normal manner, and after a late breakfast and a little admin I rang the office as 'available' at about 9.30. Within a few minutes I was asked to go and meet another driver across the town, who would give me a job to go to a warehouse near Ely for a well-known London store. I had been home less than an hour when I was called to collect from a factory in Flitwick, to go to Stoke Mandeville. I'd taken a few minutes to save what I was doing on the computer, and shut this down, so when the phone went again to ask how far I'd got, I had to admit that I'd only just finished entering the address on my sheet, and was about to start the engine. That was perfect, as it happened, for I was asked to visit a warehouse in Letchworth first, and collect a couple of items for a hospital in Malpas, a repeat of a job I'd done less than three weeks ago. Unfortunately, the diversion to Stoke Mandeville made it somewhat later when I got to Newport this time, and when I arrived at Magor services their restaurant had closed.
I decided to press on and stopped at the next services, Leigh Delamare, where I arrived about 8.40pm. Good, there were still people eating in the restaurant, and as I approached the servery I could see there was food in the bins. I did have to wait a while for a member of staff to appear, however, and when she arrived the lady said, "Sorry, we're closed; we close at 8.30." She didn't seem aggressive in her manner, though, and I pressed my need, explaining that I'd just had a long and arduous journey to the hospital in Newport, and - I pointed to my jersey, bearing the name 'Letchworth Couriers' - I had over 100 miles further to travel to get home. She undertook to speak to her supervisor. I repeated my tale of woe to the supervisor, a younger and more positive woman. I pointed to the steaming food beside us at the counter. She explained that they were closed, and she couldn't take any money from me because they had cashed up for the day. I offered to hand her the appropriate amount of cash to look after so that she could process it the next day. This counted for naught, and the discussion continued. Meanwhile the elder lady (how common sense comes with age!), realising no doubt, that the food before us would shortly be chucked into the bin, was filling a plate with sausages and chips. "Do you want beans?" she interjected, opening the lid to reveal a gooey mess with few actual beans present. "How about peas?" I told her peas would be lovely. She had clearly taken over from her supervisor, who stared, helpless, at what was going on. I reached for my pocket to pay; they repeated in chorus, "No, we can't take any money." and the elder lady added, pushing the plate to me, "That's all right, love, go on."
After three late nights, two of them following early starts, I was glad of what seemed to be a gentle Friday. I rang in as available around 10.0, and was fairly swiftly sent to St Albans and Hounslow, the latter resulting from a collection at a farm-workshop in a tiny Hertfordshire village I'd never heard of. Home once more, I turned to my desk, where my printer had developed a rebellious streak and wasn't doing what it was told. With this still unresolved, I received a call for a local job to the middle of Hitchin. Then came the 'killer blow' of the week. Before I'd returned from this, I was called to collect some metal from Biggleswade that was required urgently in Thame; while still on the way there came another call, suggesting that I take this via Houghton Regis, where I could collect an envelope destined for a village only five miles away from Thame, and as I was on my way between these two collections, a third call announced a job going from Letchworth to Aylesbury. We agreed that this last one would add so much to the overall journey as to be a non-starter, and it was given to another driver.
The final job of the day, the envelope, was addressed to 'The Grange', which proved to be at the far end of a narrow lane. The journey to find it was surprisingly easy, until I turned into the lane. Round the first bend, I found myself face to face with a large saloon which must have emerged from one of the only two houses along the lane. With nowhere to turn round, of course, my only option was to reverse to the corner. Sadly my only option was to reverse to the corner, which isn't easy when the headlights of the car in front advance a yard-and-a-bit for every yard you reverse before it. Some people seem unable to consider the difficulties of driving a vehicle whose only rear vision is in side mirrors, into which one has to look forward!
As Christmas draws near, I can expect another week of this; at least I know that it will begin with no men's breakfast at the church - I shall be on my way to Bristol!
Saturday, 7 December 2013
More Bread and Butter
It's been another of those busy weeks when most of the work has been fairly short-range, but with a couple of longer jobs to bulk it up. Monday started with a trip from Royston to Long Eaton, with a little job from a nearby village to Huntingdon on the way . . . but then it finished, because by the time I'd returned home it was almost dark, and time to look to the next day. The evening's ringing was quite fun, though.
Tuesday was almost similar. Coventry was the morning's destination, but the factory I visited was right beside the eastbound A45. In quieter times, it had had an entrance from the main road, but this has long since been locked, and grass has grown all round the gate. Instead access is now from a local road, involving a detour of several miles once I'd passed the beautiful art deco front of the building. Again home well into the afternoon, but two complementary jobs to Luton finished the day nicely, and I was also allocated an early start for the following morning.
6.00am found me at a depot in Shefford, to collect some kerbstones - special ones with inspection 'lids' - to deliver to the site of what appears to be quite a substantial extension to Bristol Parkway station. It was the preliminary to quite a long day, because when almost home I was diverted onto a local job, and then on to a strange pairing of Haverhill with Thetford that kept me out until about 9.30pm, by the time I'd enjoyed a Little Chef curry on my way home.
Thursday was quite revealing (apart from being rather wet!) After a delivery in Stewartby - a strange village whose history I have yet to learn, but is, I believe, all tied up with the former brick-making industry - I was off to Birmingham, where I delivered to an inner-city factory. As I took a sharp left-hand turn into the street, I was quite intrigued by a small estate of modern houses on the side opposite me. I then saw two Victorian warehouses on the near side, with a narrow passage between them, and the name of my target company on a board on one side of the opening. Driving down was no real problem, and the heavy rainfall made it essential, to get as close to the destination as possible. I did have misgivings about reversing out into the street afterwards, though. I needn't have worried.
As I discovered when I examined the location on Google Earth in the evening, the site is triangular, with one point being the entrance into which I now drove. The opposite side of the triangle is formed by a large building, the far side of which faces the Birmingham Canal. My delivery was to the factory on the left, and after he'd moved their lorry from in front of it, the man who greeted me indicated that I should drive right inside. I should think it was half the size of a football pitch, with a roof almost entirely of glass, so it was quite light and airy. A delivery that I had first viewed with trepidation proved to be a doddle!
Yesterday, too, was interesting - although in a completely different way. Two familiar jobs began the day, first to Pinewood Studios and then over to Suffolk to a factory on a former airfield near Beccles. Returning home about 4.00, I could be forgiven for thinking that, on past performance, the working week was now over. Not so. An hour later, I was asked to collect a small consignment of wine to go to a nearby luxury restaurant-cum-golf course. I arrived in darkness, but SatNav took me to the very door. The problem was that they had already received their wine delivery. This was for an event taking place in another part of the estate. I tried in vain to locate this, following one path and then another in the darkness. Then suddenly, a young lady on a golf buggy drove up and asked if I needed any help. My explanation was greeted by an expression of delight, "You're a life-saver! That's for us - shall I lead the way?" "I'm usually told that when I visit a hospital," I retorted gently, but my problem was solved and I was more than happy to accept the offer.
On the home front, I have been pleased this week to renew my electronic acquaintance with a distant cousin in the USA. She has furnished me with some more details of our common ancestry, so once a few regular chores are out of the way I shall look forward to digging into these with a view to extending my family tree by a few more twigs.
Tuesday was almost similar. Coventry was the morning's destination, but the factory I visited was right beside the eastbound A45. In quieter times, it had had an entrance from the main road, but this has long since been locked, and grass has grown all round the gate. Instead access is now from a local road, involving a detour of several miles once I'd passed the beautiful art deco front of the building. Again home well into the afternoon, but two complementary jobs to Luton finished the day nicely, and I was also allocated an early start for the following morning.
6.00am found me at a depot in Shefford, to collect some kerbstones - special ones with inspection 'lids' - to deliver to the site of what appears to be quite a substantial extension to Bristol Parkway station. It was the preliminary to quite a long day, because when almost home I was diverted onto a local job, and then on to a strange pairing of Haverhill with Thetford that kept me out until about 9.30pm, by the time I'd enjoyed a Little Chef curry on my way home.
Thursday was quite revealing (apart from being rather wet!) After a delivery in Stewartby - a strange village whose history I have yet to learn, but is, I believe, all tied up with the former brick-making industry - I was off to Birmingham, where I delivered to an inner-city factory. As I took a sharp left-hand turn into the street, I was quite intrigued by a small estate of modern houses on the side opposite me. I then saw two Victorian warehouses on the near side, with a narrow passage between them, and the name of my target company on a board on one side of the opening. Driving down was no real problem, and the heavy rainfall made it essential, to get as close to the destination as possible. I did have misgivings about reversing out into the street afterwards, though. I needn't have worried.
As I discovered when I examined the location on Google Earth in the evening, the site is triangular, with one point being the entrance into which I now drove. The opposite side of the triangle is formed by a large building, the far side of which faces the Birmingham Canal. My delivery was to the factory on the left, and after he'd moved their lorry from in front of it, the man who greeted me indicated that I should drive right inside. I should think it was half the size of a football pitch, with a roof almost entirely of glass, so it was quite light and airy. A delivery that I had first viewed with trepidation proved to be a doddle!
Yesterday, too, was interesting - although in a completely different way. Two familiar jobs began the day, first to Pinewood Studios and then over to Suffolk to a factory on a former airfield near Beccles. Returning home about 4.00, I could be forgiven for thinking that, on past performance, the working week was now over. Not so. An hour later, I was asked to collect a small consignment of wine to go to a nearby luxury restaurant-cum-golf course. I arrived in darkness, but SatNav took me to the very door. The problem was that they had already received their wine delivery. This was for an event taking place in another part of the estate. I tried in vain to locate this, following one path and then another in the darkness. Then suddenly, a young lady on a golf buggy drove up and asked if I needed any help. My explanation was greeted by an expression of delight, "You're a life-saver! That's for us - shall I lead the way?" "I'm usually told that when I visit a hospital," I retorted gently, but my problem was solved and I was more than happy to accept the offer.
On the home front, I have been pleased this week to renew my electronic acquaintance with a distant cousin in the USA. She has furnished me with some more details of our common ancestry, so once a few regular chores are out of the way I shall look forward to digging into these with a view to extending my family tree by a few more twigs.
Saturday, 30 November 2013
Waiting ...
It goes without saying, perhaps, that in this line of work there can be a lot of waiting. For example, it was long understood that, if we got to the place of loading at the appointed time, and were kept waiting more than 20 minutes, then we would get paid 'waiting time'; similarly if, after arriving at our destination, we were kept waiting before the goods were unloaded and signed for, anything in excess of this magic 20 minutes would be paid for. There are some occasions when access to a loading bay is delayed by a rigid queuing system, and we might have to wait for the unloading of other, much larger, vehicles.
Eventually, as was ever the case, the payment system became ill-used, and waiting time was regularly claimed by some drivers on certain jobs, whether applicable or not, so a ruling was made that all waiting time had to be signed for on our delivery sheets. However, there was often no one available who was willing, or felt authorised, to do this, and in the face of all these difficulties, coupled with the fact that some customers refuse to pay it anyway, I have long since not bothered to claim it, whatever the circumstances.
In any case, this kind of waiting is small compared to the time when we can be waiting for the next job, and one bonus of my present situation, working from home, is that I can use my waiting time on something productive, from ironing to writing short stories, from reading to digging into my family history.
This week there have been a number of noticeably long periods of waiting other than waiting at home. On Wednesday afternoon, for example, I had collected a couple of large boxes from a customer to be sent by airfreight to their clients in far-off lands. The first had to be taken to forwarding agents in Uxbridge, where I followed the usual instructions to wear hi-viz clothing and enter a door marked 'All drivers report here!' Inside I found myself along with two other drivers in a small wire cage, through which we could see the warehouse staff busily going about their business, and at the same time totally ignoring us. After a few minutes, one of the others said, with characteristic irony, "They're funny things, these hi-viz jackets - they make you completely invisible!" Eventually it became apparent that out of all the staff present, only one was dealing with incoming goods, and it was well over half an hour before I was unloaded and on my way again.
As it happened my next job was to collect something left for me at the customer services desk in a Tesco superstore. Here both the customer services staff and I were the victims of 'Chinese whispers'. So far as I was concerned, I was collecting an envelope, which is what I told the already very busy staff behind the counter. Not being aware of such an item, they searched high and low for an envelope that might have been left with a previous shift for collection; phone calls were made to staff in other likely departments; the assistant manager of the store was also involved ... all to no avail. All I could tell them by way of assistance was the name and business of our customer, on behalf of whom I was collecting; I had no idea what was in the envelope, and therefore had no idea of the size.
An hour after my arrival, following extensive searches and enquries within the store, a phone call to my office, and others to our customer, from them to Tesco, and back down the chain, I emerged with not an envelope, but a hard, black A3 folder containing just a few paper notes. Apparently 'folder' had been interpreted as 'manila folder', and then 'folder or envelope', and so on. Eventually I learned that our customer's sales rep, to whom I delivered the item, had left this behind in error earlier in the day, and only discovered its loss some miles away when he arrived at his next call.
Friday morning brought more 'on-the-job' waiting. I was up early, having been deputed to arrive at a company in Waterbeach at 6.30 am to collect goods for our customer in Royston. My arrival - at half-past on the dot - caused something of a sensation. Yes, goods for our mutual customer had been processed during the night, but since they had no idea I was coming, let alone that early, the paperwork wasn't ready, and indeed the member of staff responsible wouldn't arrive until 7.0! As it happened, he was early, and prepared to get straight onto the task, and soon after 7.0, I was loaded and on my way. It gave me an unusual opportunity to admire the cleanliness and tidy organisation of a factory, and compare it favourably to those within which I've worked in the past.
Today brings me happy memories connected with a totally different sort of waiting. Tomorrow sees the start of the Christian season of Advent: a different sort of waiting - both preparation for Christmas, and a time of looking forward to the Second Coming of Christ. Almost thirty years ago, when I was studying German, my teacher recommended that those of us who were interested might benefit from paying a visit to St Michael's Church Hall in the centre of Cambridge. Here, for many years, it had been the practice of the city's Lutheran community to hold an annual 'Advent Fair'. It was, you might say, the 'original version' of the sort of Christmas paraphernalia that Prince Albert introduced to Victorian England (like our adored Christmas tree!) I went along to it at least two years, and it was as good as she had foretold.
To visit what on any other day was just a bare church hall was, on that occasion, like stepping into a foreign wonderland. There were presents and decorations to buy; there were pine decorations, the scent of which was quite intoxicating; and lovely cakes and sweetmeats, too. ... Oh, the variety of fare to eat, both savory and sweet, was truly remarkable. The event concluded with a short service conducted partly in English and partly in German, as were the carols that we sang. I visited Cambridge again in the mid '90s with an idea of going there again, but the hall was closed. I think the Lutherans have their own church building now, and presumably if the event still happens, it would be there. Nothing, however, can replace for me that special atmosphere, with the medieval stonework and Gothic windows as a backdrop.
Ah, well! Back to the twenty-first century!
Eventually, as was ever the case, the payment system became ill-used, and waiting time was regularly claimed by some drivers on certain jobs, whether applicable or not, so a ruling was made that all waiting time had to be signed for on our delivery sheets. However, there was often no one available who was willing, or felt authorised, to do this, and in the face of all these difficulties, coupled with the fact that some customers refuse to pay it anyway, I have long since not bothered to claim it, whatever the circumstances.
In any case, this kind of waiting is small compared to the time when we can be waiting for the next job, and one bonus of my present situation, working from home, is that I can use my waiting time on something productive, from ironing to writing short stories, from reading to digging into my family history.
This week there have been a number of noticeably long periods of waiting other than waiting at home. On Wednesday afternoon, for example, I had collected a couple of large boxes from a customer to be sent by airfreight to their clients in far-off lands. The first had to be taken to forwarding agents in Uxbridge, where I followed the usual instructions to wear hi-viz clothing and enter a door marked 'All drivers report here!' Inside I found myself along with two other drivers in a small wire cage, through which we could see the warehouse staff busily going about their business, and at the same time totally ignoring us. After a few minutes, one of the others said, with characteristic irony, "They're funny things, these hi-viz jackets - they make you completely invisible!" Eventually it became apparent that out of all the staff present, only one was dealing with incoming goods, and it was well over half an hour before I was unloaded and on my way again.
As it happened my next job was to collect something left for me at the customer services desk in a Tesco superstore. Here both the customer services staff and I were the victims of 'Chinese whispers'. So far as I was concerned, I was collecting an envelope, which is what I told the already very busy staff behind the counter. Not being aware of such an item, they searched high and low for an envelope that might have been left with a previous shift for collection; phone calls were made to staff in other likely departments; the assistant manager of the store was also involved ... all to no avail. All I could tell them by way of assistance was the name and business of our customer, on behalf of whom I was collecting; I had no idea what was in the envelope, and therefore had no idea of the size.
An hour after my arrival, following extensive searches and enquries within the store, a phone call to my office, and others to our customer, from them to Tesco, and back down the chain, I emerged with not an envelope, but a hard, black A3 folder containing just a few paper notes. Apparently 'folder' had been interpreted as 'manila folder', and then 'folder or envelope', and so on. Eventually I learned that our customer's sales rep, to whom I delivered the item, had left this behind in error earlier in the day, and only discovered its loss some miles away when he arrived at his next call.
Friday morning brought more 'on-the-job' waiting. I was up early, having been deputed to arrive at a company in Waterbeach at 6.30 am to collect goods for our customer in Royston. My arrival - at half-past on the dot - caused something of a sensation. Yes, goods for our mutual customer had been processed during the night, but since they had no idea I was coming, let alone that early, the paperwork wasn't ready, and indeed the member of staff responsible wouldn't arrive until 7.0! As it happened, he was early, and prepared to get straight onto the task, and soon after 7.0, I was loaded and on my way. It gave me an unusual opportunity to admire the cleanliness and tidy organisation of a factory, and compare it favourably to those within which I've worked in the past.
Today brings me happy memories connected with a totally different sort of waiting. Tomorrow sees the start of the Christian season of Advent: a different sort of waiting - both preparation for Christmas, and a time of looking forward to the Second Coming of Christ. Almost thirty years ago, when I was studying German, my teacher recommended that those of us who were interested might benefit from paying a visit to St Michael's Church Hall in the centre of Cambridge. Here, for many years, it had been the practice of the city's Lutheran community to hold an annual 'Advent Fair'. It was, you might say, the 'original version' of the sort of Christmas paraphernalia that Prince Albert introduced to Victorian England (like our adored Christmas tree!) I went along to it at least two years, and it was as good as she had foretold.
To visit what on any other day was just a bare church hall was, on that occasion, like stepping into a foreign wonderland. There were presents and decorations to buy; there were pine decorations, the scent of which was quite intoxicating; and lovely cakes and sweetmeats, too. ... Oh, the variety of fare to eat, both savory and sweet, was truly remarkable. The event concluded with a short service conducted partly in English and partly in German, as were the carols that we sang. I visited Cambridge again in the mid '90s with an idea of going there again, but the hall was closed. I think the Lutherans have their own church building now, and presumably if the event still happens, it would be there. Nothing, however, can replace for me that special atmosphere, with the medieval stonework and Gothic windows as a backdrop.
Ah, well! Back to the twenty-first century!
Saturday, 23 November 2013
Looking Forward and Back
This is the sort of job, as many have observed, where you just don't know from one day to the next what you'll be doing, or where; nor, for that matter, how long it will take you. It's also the sort of job where, sometimes, you get to the end of the week and, looking back, you can't remember where on earth you've been, what has filled those last five days, and so on. This was just such a week.
Although I've done nineteen jobs in the week, only three of them have been beyond 70 miles distant: Slough on Tuesday morning was one of those jobs that, a few years ago was quite regular, and enjoyable. This time, however, I discovered that the receiving company has been taken over, and its premises are now a few streets away from where I had been before. Add to that the officious manner of the receiving staff, and it wasn't anywhere nearly so pleasant. Coventry, the next day, was much better. I always prefer to go north rather than south ... there's a distinct feeling of comfort, somehow, in heading away from the M25. Although nominally Coventry, it was actually to a factory owned by a nationally-known company and located on the outskirts of a small village between two motorways, the access to which was quite circuitous, which added to the interest.
The only major job of the week, on Monday evening, was probably also the most interesting of the week. That repeating genie, of which I've written often, seems to have changed his mode of working, and now offers the same pattern at the same time each week, instead of the same unusual location two days running. This week's Monday task was a carriage-forward job to a housing estate on the edge of Derby. I was loaded with a number of quite heavy boxes, and instructed to call the recipient when I got there. Finding myself outside quite a large block of flats, with no individual address, I had no alternative. In response to my call, a young man approached me from a side turning opposite the flats, and told me to follow him a few yards down the road, and round the to a block of garages behind the houses on the side of the road opposite from the flats. I felt distinctly suspicious but, after a prayer for safety, I did as I was bid. The young man explained that the consignee was indisposed, but had asked him to meet me and receive the goods. As a matter of discipline, we are advised against leaving goods other than at the address given when we collect them. However, there was something open about this chap's manner, and coupled with the fact that he knew approximately how much he would have to pay me - and had the not insignificant amount of cash in his pocket - I decided that this time it would be OK. I left him standing outside the garage, to which he had no key, to mind the boxes and await his friend.
The rest of the week, although nose-to-tail, has been relatively local, and having exhausted the regular collection of podcasts, I've been glad sometimes to drive in silence ... just thinking. With Christmas just around the corner, there has been much to think about, of course. The annual newsletter for distant friends and family; the Christmas card list; church activities and my part in them, and so on. I've also been thinking a lot about a short story that I'm writing, trying to complete it within the month of November, but wrestling with one flaw after another that has been revealed in the plot as it progresses.
Another thought, a recollection really, that came to me unbidden the other day, concerned an incident some years ago. I was driving in Letchworth one winter's evening, and had stopped to wait for traffic on a roundabout in the town centre. BANG! there came the sound and the feel of an impact, as someone drove into the back of the van. I know I have to stop when there's a collision; this time there was no need - I was stationary. I got out, fearing to inspect the damage; fearing too, the potential impact on my work. As I walked gingerly around the van, I was met by a chap of about twenty or so, of Afro-Caribbean appearance, emerging from a maroon saloon. He looked aghast at the front of his car. The bonnet was severely bent, and a sinister puddle of green fluid under the engine, getting bigger by the second, indicated a broken radiator. "Oh, my lovely motor!" he moaned, sheepishly.
I looked at my own vehicle - amazed at what I found. There was a rip, about half an inch long - little more, anyway, in the plastic skin of the rear bumper. Otherwise, everything was intact. The bumper of the van, of course, is the step of the door, and really solidly made to bear the weight of a man, and much more. I commiserated with my adversary in his loss, we acknowledged that the collision was his own fault, since he had taken his eyes off me to look at the roundabout, and, since I could do nothing to assist him, I carried on my way. I could sympathise with his predicament since, although this was more serious, the circumstances were exactly the same as my own first accident. This happened at a roundabout on the Norwich ring road, when I was driving the van I wrote about last week, that I found great difficulty in parking.
What goes around, comes around. The moral of the story, if there is one, is that, if you're angry with a white-van man, there are more effective ways of expressing your feelings than ramming his van!
Although I've done nineteen jobs in the week, only three of them have been beyond 70 miles distant: Slough on Tuesday morning was one of those jobs that, a few years ago was quite regular, and enjoyable. This time, however, I discovered that the receiving company has been taken over, and its premises are now a few streets away from where I had been before. Add to that the officious manner of the receiving staff, and it wasn't anywhere nearly so pleasant. Coventry, the next day, was much better. I always prefer to go north rather than south ... there's a distinct feeling of comfort, somehow, in heading away from the M25. Although nominally Coventry, it was actually to a factory owned by a nationally-known company and located on the outskirts of a small village between two motorways, the access to which was quite circuitous, which added to the interest.
The only major job of the week, on Monday evening, was probably also the most interesting of the week. That repeating genie, of which I've written often, seems to have changed his mode of working, and now offers the same pattern at the same time each week, instead of the same unusual location two days running. This week's Monday task was a carriage-forward job to a housing estate on the edge of Derby. I was loaded with a number of quite heavy boxes, and instructed to call the recipient when I got there. Finding myself outside quite a large block of flats, with no individual address, I had no alternative. In response to my call, a young man approached me from a side turning opposite the flats, and told me to follow him a few yards down the road, and round the to a block of garages behind the houses on the side of the road opposite from the flats. I felt distinctly suspicious but, after a prayer for safety, I did as I was bid. The young man explained that the consignee was indisposed, but had asked him to meet me and receive the goods. As a matter of discipline, we are advised against leaving goods other than at the address given when we collect them. However, there was something open about this chap's manner, and coupled with the fact that he knew approximately how much he would have to pay me - and had the not insignificant amount of cash in his pocket - I decided that this time it would be OK. I left him standing outside the garage, to which he had no key, to mind the boxes and await his friend.
The rest of the week, although nose-to-tail, has been relatively local, and having exhausted the regular collection of podcasts, I've been glad sometimes to drive in silence ... just thinking. With Christmas just around the corner, there has been much to think about, of course. The annual newsletter for distant friends and family; the Christmas card list; church activities and my part in them, and so on. I've also been thinking a lot about a short story that I'm writing, trying to complete it within the month of November, but wrestling with one flaw after another that has been revealed in the plot as it progresses.
Another thought, a recollection really, that came to me unbidden the other day, concerned an incident some years ago. I was driving in Letchworth one winter's evening, and had stopped to wait for traffic on a roundabout in the town centre. BANG! there came the sound and the feel of an impact, as someone drove into the back of the van. I know I have to stop when there's a collision; this time there was no need - I was stationary. I got out, fearing to inspect the damage; fearing too, the potential impact on my work. As I walked gingerly around the van, I was met by a chap of about twenty or so, of Afro-Caribbean appearance, emerging from a maroon saloon. He looked aghast at the front of his car. The bonnet was severely bent, and a sinister puddle of green fluid under the engine, getting bigger by the second, indicated a broken radiator. "Oh, my lovely motor!" he moaned, sheepishly.
I looked at my own vehicle - amazed at what I found. There was a rip, about half an inch long - little more, anyway, in the plastic skin of the rear bumper. Otherwise, everything was intact. The bumper of the van, of course, is the step of the door, and really solidly made to bear the weight of a man, and much more. I commiserated with my adversary in his loss, we acknowledged that the collision was his own fault, since he had taken his eyes off me to look at the roundabout, and, since I could do nothing to assist him, I carried on my way. I could sympathise with his predicament since, although this was more serious, the circumstances were exactly the same as my own first accident. This happened at a roundabout on the Norwich ring road, when I was driving the van I wrote about last week, that I found great difficulty in parking.
What goes around, comes around. The moral of the story, if there is one, is that, if you're angry with a white-van man, there are more effective ways of expressing your feelings than ramming his van!
Saturday, 16 November 2013
Back to Normal?
This week the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, said, "The recovery has finally taken hold." From my lowly standpoint, I'm inclined to agree with him. This week, for the first time for quite some while, I felt deprived of the benefits of working from home. Although they did still exist, the minutes between 8.0 am and 6.0 pm when I actually did something productive on the home front were very few. There's not room here for a whole diary, but let me pick out some of the highlights.
Monday found me in the centre of Norwich, wallowing in a whole festival of memories from (ahem!) well over 40 years ago. My delivery was to the long-established family firm of Jarrold & Son. Early in my working life I had a job at a shop just around the corner from them in Exchange Street. Having just passed my driving test, I took great delight in driving the firm's van, but when it came to parking it in their garage, it was a different story. The garage was down a narrow passage, and this was decades before I had learned the wisdom and technique of reverse entry! The poor van suffered many a blemish, each one lowering my reputation by another notch!
As I left the 'fine city' by way of the Newmarket Road, I passed the Eagle Tavern, and the nearby Eagle Walk, at the end of which in the 1960s was a motor-cycle dealer. Here I paid a visit one day, accompanied by a more knowledgeable friend, to equip myself with independent transport. I discovered that, even then, the price for something really worthwhile was just beyond the limit of my resources. What I liked was a 200cc. Francis-Barnett; what I came away with was a 175cc BSA Bantam, which had started life fired by a magneto, in other words it made its own electricity as the engine rotated. A previous 'clever' owner had modified it to work with a battery, more like a car engine, and this modification gave me many a scary moment as it refused to work, letting me down sometimes at home, but equally at my destination, with no ready means of getting home again. After I'd acquired a car, I sold the Bantam to a local dealer, who later told me that he'd never been able to get it working again, and had to re-build it in the original mode so that he could sell it!
Monday finished like the last two Mondays, with my 'invoice and paperwork' visit to the office being greeted with 'something else for the evening'. Unlike the last two, however, this one was quite a bit longer. It took me to a new destination, the Golden Jubilee National Hospital at Clydebank. This seemed very well appointed inside, and as I left (about 2.30 am) and looked back at the floodlit elevation down the avenue through the car park, I said to myself, 'My word, - it looks like a palace!' Research after my return reveals that it was built on the site of a former shipyard as a private hospital with adjoining hotel, and was acquired by the NHS as a completed unit in 2002 (thanks, Wikipedia!)
Wednesday (after a good night's sleep!) offered two pairs of jobs, one nearby, the other at a comfortable distance. One of each pair was a return to somewhere that had proved difficult to find on the first visit - it's one of the advantages of doing the job for eleven and a half years that I now know where to go on these occasions. In the morning I made a delivery to an 'office in a garden' which is situated at the end of a row of cottages in a south Cambridgeshire village. Many Cambridge post codes were changed a few years ago, and we have a shrewd idea how to amend any that SatNav doesn't like, but it doesn't work when the original one had an error in it as well! In the afternoon I went to Leicester, taking some veneer to a construction firm whose premises are at the far end of an industrial cul-de-sac at the end of a Victorian housing estate. Fortunately, the road name struck a chord as I wrote it down, and once I was in the area, I knew what to look for.
I never cease to be amazed at the way my mind can switch from something I'm listening to, onto a completely different track. As I listened to 'In Our Time' on BBC Radio 4 on Thursday morning, which this week featured Shakespeare's The Tempest, one of Melvin Bragg's guests observed that Prospero had been born on the island, and saw it as his own. At this point my 'switch' clicked, and I remembered something I'd heard in a programme a couple of years ago. Someone was interviewing a middle-aged southern European gentleman, who said with amusement, "My son's wife is expecting a baby; now that Croatia has joined the EU, it will be born in Europe. My son was born in Croatia; I was born in Yugoslavia; My father was born in Italy, and his father in Austria. We have lived in the same village for over a century." How the shape of the continent has changed down the years.
And so to yesterday, another very full day. I began with a delivery to Coventry, ironically to yet another destination which I had difficulty locating when I first went there. While still on my way, I was asked to make a collection in Milton Keynes on my way back, from Bletchley Park, "The home of the code-breakers" (as the sign on the road outside says). I took this to the office, for someone else to deliver into south London, and after a few minutes' rest, I was sent to collect something in Letchworth for a firm in Shirebrook, Notts. No sooner had I got this than the phone rang, sending me just around the corner to another customer who had something for Congleton - "and while you're in the area [so-and-so] will give you a job for Monday morning to Northampton". As I made my way up the A1, the controller called again. "When you've dropped the first one of those," he began, "call me, because I've got a collection in Oswestry - which isn't a million miles away! That can be delivered tomorrow morning, if that's OK with you." Such courteous phrases only come when he realises that he's asking something 'above and beyond the call of duty' ... and I'm pleased that they do come - I could imagine some people who would take such co-operation for granted, and look on it as a right to ask for it.
As I wrote here last weekend, I was planning today to go to the record office for some research before watching a football match further into Suffolk. I think it was when I was asked to collect the second afternoon job, the one to Congleton, that I decided that, with no evening in which to prepare, and not too much sleep anyway, this plan wasn't going to happen. In the event, having collected the goods from Oswestry about 9.30, I wasn't home until around 2.0 am, so this morning was taken up by a comfortable shopping trip, and the admin of the day before. The journey to mid-Suffolk solely for a football match had been ruled out long ago, which was why I had intended combining it with a morning in the record office; instead I went to my local club, Arlesey Town, who had an FA Trophy tie against Marlow, which they won 2-0.
Normal again? Watch this space!
Monday found me in the centre of Norwich, wallowing in a whole festival of memories from (ahem!) well over 40 years ago. My delivery was to the long-established family firm of Jarrold & Son. Early in my working life I had a job at a shop just around the corner from them in Exchange Street. Having just passed my driving test, I took great delight in driving the firm's van, but when it came to parking it in their garage, it was a different story. The garage was down a narrow passage, and this was decades before I had learned the wisdom and technique of reverse entry! The poor van suffered many a blemish, each one lowering my reputation by another notch!
As I left the 'fine city' by way of the Newmarket Road, I passed the Eagle Tavern, and the nearby Eagle Walk, at the end of which in the 1960s was a motor-cycle dealer. Here I paid a visit one day, accompanied by a more knowledgeable friend, to equip myself with independent transport. I discovered that, even then, the price for something really worthwhile was just beyond the limit of my resources. What I liked was a 200cc. Francis-Barnett; what I came away with was a 175cc BSA Bantam, which had started life fired by a magneto, in other words it made its own electricity as the engine rotated. A previous 'clever' owner had modified it to work with a battery, more like a car engine, and this modification gave me many a scary moment as it refused to work, letting me down sometimes at home, but equally at my destination, with no ready means of getting home again. After I'd acquired a car, I sold the Bantam to a local dealer, who later told me that he'd never been able to get it working again, and had to re-build it in the original mode so that he could sell it!
Monday finished like the last two Mondays, with my 'invoice and paperwork' visit to the office being greeted with 'something else for the evening'. Unlike the last two, however, this one was quite a bit longer. It took me to a new destination, the Golden Jubilee National Hospital at Clydebank. This seemed very well appointed inside, and as I left (about 2.30 am) and looked back at the floodlit elevation down the avenue through the car park, I said to myself, 'My word, - it looks like a palace!' Research after my return reveals that it was built on the site of a former shipyard as a private hospital with adjoining hotel, and was acquired by the NHS as a completed unit in 2002 (thanks, Wikipedia!)
Wednesday (after a good night's sleep!) offered two pairs of jobs, one nearby, the other at a comfortable distance. One of each pair was a return to somewhere that had proved difficult to find on the first visit - it's one of the advantages of doing the job for eleven and a half years that I now know where to go on these occasions. In the morning I made a delivery to an 'office in a garden' which is situated at the end of a row of cottages in a south Cambridgeshire village. Many Cambridge post codes were changed a few years ago, and we have a shrewd idea how to amend any that SatNav doesn't like, but it doesn't work when the original one had an error in it as well! In the afternoon I went to Leicester, taking some veneer to a construction firm whose premises are at the far end of an industrial cul-de-sac at the end of a Victorian housing estate. Fortunately, the road name struck a chord as I wrote it down, and once I was in the area, I knew what to look for.
I never cease to be amazed at the way my mind can switch from something I'm listening to, onto a completely different track. As I listened to 'In Our Time' on BBC Radio 4 on Thursday morning, which this week featured Shakespeare's The Tempest, one of Melvin Bragg's guests observed that Prospero had been born on the island, and saw it as his own. At this point my 'switch' clicked, and I remembered something I'd heard in a programme a couple of years ago. Someone was interviewing a middle-aged southern European gentleman, who said with amusement, "My son's wife is expecting a baby; now that Croatia has joined the EU, it will be born in Europe. My son was born in Croatia; I was born in Yugoslavia; My father was born in Italy, and his father in Austria. We have lived in the same village for over a century." How the shape of the continent has changed down the years.
And so to yesterday, another very full day. I began with a delivery to Coventry, ironically to yet another destination which I had difficulty locating when I first went there. While still on my way, I was asked to make a collection in Milton Keynes on my way back, from Bletchley Park, "The home of the code-breakers" (as the sign on the road outside says). I took this to the office, for someone else to deliver into south London, and after a few minutes' rest, I was sent to collect something in Letchworth for a firm in Shirebrook, Notts. No sooner had I got this than the phone rang, sending me just around the corner to another customer who had something for Congleton - "and while you're in the area [so-and-so] will give you a job for Monday morning to Northampton". As I made my way up the A1, the controller called again. "When you've dropped the first one of those," he began, "call me, because I've got a collection in Oswestry - which isn't a million miles away! That can be delivered tomorrow morning, if that's OK with you." Such courteous phrases only come when he realises that he's asking something 'above and beyond the call of duty' ... and I'm pleased that they do come - I could imagine some people who would take such co-operation for granted, and look on it as a right to ask for it.
As I wrote here last weekend, I was planning today to go to the record office for some research before watching a football match further into Suffolk. I think it was when I was asked to collect the second afternoon job, the one to Congleton, that I decided that, with no evening in which to prepare, and not too much sleep anyway, this plan wasn't going to happen. In the event, having collected the goods from Oswestry about 9.30, I wasn't home until around 2.0 am, so this morning was taken up by a comfortable shopping trip, and the admin of the day before. The journey to mid-Suffolk solely for a football match had been ruled out long ago, which was why I had intended combining it with a morning in the record office; instead I went to my local club, Arlesey Town, who had an FA Trophy tie against Marlow, which they won 2-0.
Normal again? Watch this space!
Sunday, 10 November 2013
A Time to Remember
This week started much as the last, with a Monday that appeared to come to a natural end with the weekly paperwork 'ritual', and then provided me with another job in the early evening. Last week I arrived at bell-ringing practice to announce proudly that I'd just saved part of St Albans from the agonies of a power-cut - I'd delivered the essential fuse unit to the contractors waiting by the roadside. This week I bore no triumphant tale, so arrived just in time again, but quietly. The greatest excitement of this Monday evening's delivery, to a store on Watford High Street, was being moved along by a couple of traffic wardens because the place where I'd stopped outside the shop - albeit at 6.30pm - was a disabled parking bay.
Tuesday was a day of repeats. First came the regular run to Pinewood Studios for a company based opposite my home, and then the combination of another trip to Corby, to the same firm as I've been to a number of times recently, but on this occasion for a different customer; and then on to an electronics firm on the Hardwick estate at the edge of King's Lynn. It was when I returned from this that the week took on a transparent hue (if that's not exactly an impossible metaphor).
One of the controllers had been asked to quote for a particular enquiry, and before he did so he was anxious to make sure that there was someone (I was his choice of the most likely driver) willing to undertake the job, should the quote be accepted. The job was to service three consecutive evening events, delivering our customer's goods to the first one in the late afternoon/early evening, collecting them after the event, and taking them to the next venue ... and so on. The first of these was to be in Inverness tomorrow. Needless to say, the fact that I'm writing this blog now, instead of settling in to a B&B in Carlisle means that the quote wasn't accepted. However, the pleasure of looking forward not just to a Scottish job, but this time to three venues in one (Dundee and Aberdeen in addition to Inverness), not to mention the excitement of looking out possible B&B locations in these cities, made the remainder of the working week pale into insignificance.
As I waited to hear whether my plans and the anticipated enjoyment of these next few days would happen or not, I found myself taking less delight than usual in the work in hand (or under the wheels, in my case!), even though these last three days have included a return to an events company for whom I've not done a job for four and a half years, and who nearly always come up with interesting destinations (albeit this one was only to Luton), and a trip to Cirencester. In fact, it wasn't until 5.30 pm on Friday that the 'no' option was confirmed, although by then I would've had to have collected the goods, so it was looking fairly obvious.
And so to Remembrance weekend. I don't usually clutter this blog with weekend happenings, but I think this one is justified. This year, I was asked to give one of the short Bible readings in church, which was no bother, of course, but it did tend to focus my attention - if such focusing were necessary. For the second year running, I went along equipped with a note of those people whom I've identified in my family history exercises who died during the two World Wars, and I'd like to share some statistics with you. I wonder how typical these are.
Out of the thirteen deaths, ranging in closeness from an uncle, through great uncles and various cousins to a fifth cousin twice removed, nine related to the First World War, and four to the Second. Ten were soldiers, one served in the RAF, one in the Royal Navy, and one was a Second Officer in the Merchant Navy. Out of the nine soldiers who died in World War One, no less than six died on the Somme. I hadn't noticed until today that, out of those six, it was the one who served in the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers who died on 1st July 1916 - just one of the 19,240 who died, out of the total of 57,470 casualties, on that worst day of Britain's military history. I had read recently that it was the Irish divisions who were put to the forefront of the lines, and the cynic in me wonders whether it might have been a way of dealing with a potential problem on the home front, following the Easter Rising only a few months earlier.
Let me end on a lighter note; simply to observe that, after watching one of my local football teams, Biggleswade Town, reach the first round proper of the FA Cup the other week for the first time in their almost 140-year history, I listened with some sadness to the radio yesterday afternoon as they suffered a 4-1 defeat at the hands of Stourbridge. Now my attention turns to the Vase, and next weekend, when I'm planning to watch one of 'my' East Anglian clubs, Walsham-le-Willows, who entertain Haringey Borough in the second round. If it's raining, of course, I might well find a reason to prolong my 'halfway' visit to the record office in Bury St Edmunds. I should, perhaps, be ashamed that I am, after all, a 'fair-weather footie fan' ... but I'm not!
Tuesday was a day of repeats. First came the regular run to Pinewood Studios for a company based opposite my home, and then the combination of another trip to Corby, to the same firm as I've been to a number of times recently, but on this occasion for a different customer; and then on to an electronics firm on the Hardwick estate at the edge of King's Lynn. It was when I returned from this that the week took on a transparent hue (if that's not exactly an impossible metaphor).
One of the controllers had been asked to quote for a particular enquiry, and before he did so he was anxious to make sure that there was someone (I was his choice of the most likely driver) willing to undertake the job, should the quote be accepted. The job was to service three consecutive evening events, delivering our customer's goods to the first one in the late afternoon/early evening, collecting them after the event, and taking them to the next venue ... and so on. The first of these was to be in Inverness tomorrow. Needless to say, the fact that I'm writing this blog now, instead of settling in to a B&B in Carlisle means that the quote wasn't accepted. However, the pleasure of looking forward not just to a Scottish job, but this time to three venues in one (Dundee and Aberdeen in addition to Inverness), not to mention the excitement of looking out possible B&B locations in these cities, made the remainder of the working week pale into insignificance.
As I waited to hear whether my plans and the anticipated enjoyment of these next few days would happen or not, I found myself taking less delight than usual in the work in hand (or under the wheels, in my case!), even though these last three days have included a return to an events company for whom I've not done a job for four and a half years, and who nearly always come up with interesting destinations (albeit this one was only to Luton), and a trip to Cirencester. In fact, it wasn't until 5.30 pm on Friday that the 'no' option was confirmed, although by then I would've had to have collected the goods, so it was looking fairly obvious.
And so to Remembrance weekend. I don't usually clutter this blog with weekend happenings, but I think this one is justified. This year, I was asked to give one of the short Bible readings in church, which was no bother, of course, but it did tend to focus my attention - if such focusing were necessary. For the second year running, I went along equipped with a note of those people whom I've identified in my family history exercises who died during the two World Wars, and I'd like to share some statistics with you. I wonder how typical these are.
Out of the thirteen deaths, ranging in closeness from an uncle, through great uncles and various cousins to a fifth cousin twice removed, nine related to the First World War, and four to the Second. Ten were soldiers, one served in the RAF, one in the Royal Navy, and one was a Second Officer in the Merchant Navy. Out of the nine soldiers who died in World War One, no less than six died on the Somme. I hadn't noticed until today that, out of those six, it was the one who served in the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers who died on 1st July 1916 - just one of the 19,240 who died, out of the total of 57,470 casualties, on that worst day of Britain's military history. I had read recently that it was the Irish divisions who were put to the forefront of the lines, and the cynic in me wonders whether it might have been a way of dealing with a potential problem on the home front, following the Easter Rising only a few months earlier.
Let me end on a lighter note; simply to observe that, after watching one of my local football teams, Biggleswade Town, reach the first round proper of the FA Cup the other week for the first time in their almost 140-year history, I listened with some sadness to the radio yesterday afternoon as they suffered a 4-1 defeat at the hands of Stourbridge. Now my attention turns to the Vase, and next weekend, when I'm planning to watch one of 'my' East Anglian clubs, Walsham-le-Willows, who entertain Haringey Borough in the second round. If it's raining, of course, I might well find a reason to prolong my 'halfway' visit to the record office in Bury St Edmunds. I should, perhaps, be ashamed that I am, after all, a 'fair-weather footie fan' ... but I'm not!
Saturday, 2 November 2013
Bread and Butter
At first glance, October hasn't been too bad for this individual courier. Despite my misgivings about the length of jobs, the fact that there hasn't been anything spectacular or outstanding has been counter-balanced by an almost constant flow of not-quite-local work, yielding quite an acceptable result. The downside, if there is one, is that when a late night or two do emerge from the mundane bulk, the body isn't quite ready for it.
This week began with a van service, followed by two and a half days of these 'bread-and-butter' jobs, the highlight of which was the satisfaction of going to Corby for the second time and knowing that I had to tell SatNav to find a way around the little stretch of the A43 that was closed for resurfacing. On the first occasion I told it to 'avoid a roadblock' and quick as a flash it responded 'no route possible', so I had to resort to the pre-SatNav technique of exploration and find my own diversion.
On Thursday there was double excitement. First, I took some fencing material to a film set on a disused airfield on the Herts/Bucks border; then came the delivery of a variety of some quite realistic mock-up body parts to the School of Medical Science at Brighton University. Then the day really took off. After leaving the university about 3.45 pm, it took me until gone 8.0 to get home. Navigating the M25 was worse than stirring treacle!
I was glad on Friday, therefore, after the early delivery of a tender to the council offices in King's Lynn, to be sent north again. Loaded with goods from Royston and Biggleswade, I set off mid-afternoon for an easy delivery in Northamptonshire, followed by a visit to Rolls Royce in Derby. With Friday's M1 resembling the treacle of Thursday's M25, I'm pleased to report that SatNav redeemed itself by finding me a wonderfully rural route by-passing the worst of the jams. Once I'd delivered at about 6.30, I didn't even consider the motorway, and asked for the shortest route, rather than the 'quickest' route to the truck-stop where I'd planned to have a meal. Amazingly, it was actually quicker than the projected time for the quickest route! When I emerged at around 8.30 I thought the motorway would have cleared. To be fair, it had, but there was a further minor delay in actually getting onto it, because of an accident virtually at the top of the slip road. However, the ambulance was on its way, and this acted as an ice-breaker, relieving the jam on the main carriageway, and releasing those of us trapped on the slip road.
I've been thinking this week about houses. One of my deliveries on Tuesday was to a business centre near Cambridge. Built on the grounds of a former manor house, it has retained some of the pre-existing cottages, and the contrast between these - which are used as offices - and the adjacent purpose-built modern units is quite striking. Some of these modern units have reception-cum-meeting areas that are clearly bigger than the floor area of my flat, and could probably contain both floors of one of the nearby cottages. I was reminded of a time, almost forty years ago, when I worked in an office that had been converted from a one-time 'comfortable residence' on the outskirts of a Norfolk market town.
Typical of such houses, the front door led into a hallway between two reception rooms each with a front bay window, with a matching lay-out on the first floor. Our room occupied part of a 'lesser' bedroom at the side of the property. Since the front of the house looked onto the garden, from the windows of our office there were views of the road, and of the car-park that separated us from the factory and main office block. Our room was L-shaped, and had space for three desks; mine faced the wall at the apex of the 'L', my colleague sat behind me facing the door, and back to the window that looked onto the car park, and my assistant, the front of whose desk butted up to the end of mine, sat beside the other window and back to the ladies' toilet, which occupied the 'cut-out-corner' of the original rectangular bedroom. I will just say that it was 'cosy', and leave the reader to consider whether or not this would meet today's regulatory requirements.
My mind was drawn back to dwellings as I left King's Lynn yesterday. Passing through a street of Victorian terraced houses, I noticed one where the light was on, although it was almost lunchtime. It occurred to me that, given the size of the windows in a average house of that period, to do anything of importance at any distance from the window would indeed require additional light all day, and not just during the hours of darkness. With the increasing cost of energy being in the news this week, it's easy to imagine that the likely occupants of such houses are likely, too, to be those whose incomes are least able to afford an increase in the cost of the lighting that's so essential to normal life there. How lucky I am to have in my modest flat a lounge window that is probably twice the size of these Victorian counterparts.
And, as a footnote, I passed on Tuesday the neglected property of which I wrote last week. I'm not for one moment saying that my comments carried any weight in this regard, but there is now no need for further worry about its future. The site is flattened, the fences removed and, so far as I could tell in one swift passing, a neat vehicle-proof ditch has been created between the foundations and the road.
This week began with a van service, followed by two and a half days of these 'bread-and-butter' jobs, the highlight of which was the satisfaction of going to Corby for the second time and knowing that I had to tell SatNav to find a way around the little stretch of the A43 that was closed for resurfacing. On the first occasion I told it to 'avoid a roadblock' and quick as a flash it responded 'no route possible', so I had to resort to the pre-SatNav technique of exploration and find my own diversion.
On Thursday there was double excitement. First, I took some fencing material to a film set on a disused airfield on the Herts/Bucks border; then came the delivery of a variety of some quite realistic mock-up body parts to the School of Medical Science at Brighton University. Then the day really took off. After leaving the university about 3.45 pm, it took me until gone 8.0 to get home. Navigating the M25 was worse than stirring treacle!
I was glad on Friday, therefore, after the early delivery of a tender to the council offices in King's Lynn, to be sent north again. Loaded with goods from Royston and Biggleswade, I set off mid-afternoon for an easy delivery in Northamptonshire, followed by a visit to Rolls Royce in Derby. With Friday's M1 resembling the treacle of Thursday's M25, I'm pleased to report that SatNav redeemed itself by finding me a wonderfully rural route by-passing the worst of the jams. Once I'd delivered at about 6.30, I didn't even consider the motorway, and asked for the shortest route, rather than the 'quickest' route to the truck-stop where I'd planned to have a meal. Amazingly, it was actually quicker than the projected time for the quickest route! When I emerged at around 8.30 I thought the motorway would have cleared. To be fair, it had, but there was a further minor delay in actually getting onto it, because of an accident virtually at the top of the slip road. However, the ambulance was on its way, and this acted as an ice-breaker, relieving the jam on the main carriageway, and releasing those of us trapped on the slip road.
I've been thinking this week about houses. One of my deliveries on Tuesday was to a business centre near Cambridge. Built on the grounds of a former manor house, it has retained some of the pre-existing cottages, and the contrast between these - which are used as offices - and the adjacent purpose-built modern units is quite striking. Some of these modern units have reception-cum-meeting areas that are clearly bigger than the floor area of my flat, and could probably contain both floors of one of the nearby cottages. I was reminded of a time, almost forty years ago, when I worked in an office that had been converted from a one-time 'comfortable residence' on the outskirts of a Norfolk market town.
Typical of such houses, the front door led into a hallway between two reception rooms each with a front bay window, with a matching lay-out on the first floor. Our room occupied part of a 'lesser' bedroom at the side of the property. Since the front of the house looked onto the garden, from the windows of our office there were views of the road, and of the car-park that separated us from the factory and main office block. Our room was L-shaped, and had space for three desks; mine faced the wall at the apex of the 'L', my colleague sat behind me facing the door, and back to the window that looked onto the car park, and my assistant, the front of whose desk butted up to the end of mine, sat beside the other window and back to the ladies' toilet, which occupied the 'cut-out-corner' of the original rectangular bedroom. I will just say that it was 'cosy', and leave the reader to consider whether or not this would meet today's regulatory requirements.
My mind was drawn back to dwellings as I left King's Lynn yesterday. Passing through a street of Victorian terraced houses, I noticed one where the light was on, although it was almost lunchtime. It occurred to me that, given the size of the windows in a average house of that period, to do anything of importance at any distance from the window would indeed require additional light all day, and not just during the hours of darkness. With the increasing cost of energy being in the news this week, it's easy to imagine that the likely occupants of such houses are likely, too, to be those whose incomes are least able to afford an increase in the cost of the lighting that's so essential to normal life there. How lucky I am to have in my modest flat a lounge window that is probably twice the size of these Victorian counterparts.
And, as a footnote, I passed on Tuesday the neglected property of which I wrote last week. I'm not for one moment saying that my comments carried any weight in this regard, but there is now no need for further worry about its future. The site is flattened, the fences removed and, so far as I could tell in one swift passing, a neat vehicle-proof ditch has been created between the foundations and the road.
Friday, 25 October 2013
When Normality goes Mad
The working title for this blog was 'A Boring Week'. Every so often you get a week when there is no actual highlight, nothing dramatically out of the ordinary, certainly nothing worth shouting about, and yet, at the end of it, the 'crunch' figure (i.e. estimate of total income for the week) is quite reasonable. So, before finding something more worthwhile to write about, on with the 'nerd' specs, and let's wheel out the stats. Although there were seventeen jobs this week, almost half of the miles were taken up by the five jobs that were more than 60 miles distant, and the average of all the rest was only 36 miles. Two of the best jobs of the week were in the evening - on Wednesday to Daventry, and on Thursday to Birmingham.
My normal weekend routine includes washing (i.e. loading and eventually emptying the washing machine) and ironing. These are usually performed on Saturday or Sunday; this week, however, ironing took place on Friday and was in fact postponed from Thursday. Why do I bore you with this domestic detail? Simply in order to amuse you with the explanation. On Wednesday morning I had a pre-8.0 delivery in Northampton, and crowned this adventure in the time-honoured fashion with the purchase of a bacon-and-egg roll at a convenient mobile hostelry (often called a burger-van). Sadly the invitation to have one's egg hard rather than soft was omitted. This omission not being recognised and resolved, the tragic, but inevitable, outcome was much eggy-dribble on jersey-front. To be brutally frank, there was egg everywhere, and the eating of breakfast was something of a nightmare rather than the anticipated delight that it usually is. Emergency laundry was the only option, with the ensuing disruption to my domestic routine.
There is something else about which I had been intending to write for some while. It concerns a regular route out of town to the south-east, the A507. More accurately, it concerns a single - and solitary - property along this road.
The story has been unfolding gradually for some while, but has now reached a crisis. This particular property stands back slightly from the road, in a broad clearing. To the rear is woodland, to the front a decent expanse of lawn, and alongside is the roadway that leads to a farm just over the hill. From the style I should say it was built in the 1960s or '70s; I'd guess that its accommodation probably includes three or four bedrooms, and there's a built-in garage. The first time I saw it I thought that this house looked smart. There was never a 'For Sale' notice outside, and I'd often reflected that I'm not in a position to take any steps towards identifying the owner, let alone to contemplate buying it. If it comes to that, given its isolated position I'm not sure I'd want to live there. But that doesn't stop it looking, on a sunny morning, in a rather modernist way, a very attractive dwelling.
As I say, the story has unfolded gradually, but I don't think you'll be surprised to learn that, being unoccupied and isolated, this pleasant property soon became the victim of mindless vandalism. Window panes were broken; the panels of the front door were kicked in; the garage door was forced open. Before long, the lace curtains had been ripped from the windows, the garage door became twisted and half out of its frame and graffiti started to appear on the door and the walls. I have to pass this way quite frequently and, as time passed and more and more damage was inflicted, it was as if the poor building was crying out to me to help it. I began to wonder just who might own it, why it was being left to be attacked in this way, with no sign of any protection or remedial action. I fantasised about tracing its owner, evaluating a plan whereby a group of capable young people might be assembled to effect repairs on some community enhancement scheme and put into a state where it might be habitable again.
Eventually, with window frames and garage door now completely removed, even if it were once possible, such an adventurous and far-fetched scheme became unimaginable and, within the last couple of weeks, the poor house has given up the ghost. Its roof has fallen in, and finally someone has decided that it is no longer safe for the casual wanderer or vandal to go inside. A most professional, metal fence has suddenly appeared all around it to discourage the ingress of those intent on further exploration or destruction. I now wonder whether, now that this safety step has been taken, it will be properly demolished and the site either re-used for housing or returned to woodland.
More likely, I fear, it will take advantage of its new enhanced isolation to crumble slowly into a ruin and die a natural death over the next few years.
My normal weekend routine includes washing (i.e. loading and eventually emptying the washing machine) and ironing. These are usually performed on Saturday or Sunday; this week, however, ironing took place on Friday and was in fact postponed from Thursday. Why do I bore you with this domestic detail? Simply in order to amuse you with the explanation. On Wednesday morning I had a pre-8.0 delivery in Northampton, and crowned this adventure in the time-honoured fashion with the purchase of a bacon-and-egg roll at a convenient mobile hostelry (often called a burger-van). Sadly the invitation to have one's egg hard rather than soft was omitted. This omission not being recognised and resolved, the tragic, but inevitable, outcome was much eggy-dribble on jersey-front. To be brutally frank, there was egg everywhere, and the eating of breakfast was something of a nightmare rather than the anticipated delight that it usually is. Emergency laundry was the only option, with the ensuing disruption to my domestic routine.
There is something else about which I had been intending to write for some while. It concerns a regular route out of town to the south-east, the A507. More accurately, it concerns a single - and solitary - property along this road.
The story has been unfolding gradually for some while, but has now reached a crisis. This particular property stands back slightly from the road, in a broad clearing. To the rear is woodland, to the front a decent expanse of lawn, and alongside is the roadway that leads to a farm just over the hill. From the style I should say it was built in the 1960s or '70s; I'd guess that its accommodation probably includes three or four bedrooms, and there's a built-in garage. The first time I saw it I thought that this house looked smart. There was never a 'For Sale' notice outside, and I'd often reflected that I'm not in a position to take any steps towards identifying the owner, let alone to contemplate buying it. If it comes to that, given its isolated position I'm not sure I'd want to live there. But that doesn't stop it looking, on a sunny morning, in a rather modernist way, a very attractive dwelling.
As I say, the story has unfolded gradually, but I don't think you'll be surprised to learn that, being unoccupied and isolated, this pleasant property soon became the victim of mindless vandalism. Window panes were broken; the panels of the front door were kicked in; the garage door was forced open. Before long, the lace curtains had been ripped from the windows, the garage door became twisted and half out of its frame and graffiti started to appear on the door and the walls. I have to pass this way quite frequently and, as time passed and more and more damage was inflicted, it was as if the poor building was crying out to me to help it. I began to wonder just who might own it, why it was being left to be attacked in this way, with no sign of any protection or remedial action. I fantasised about tracing its owner, evaluating a plan whereby a group of capable young people might be assembled to effect repairs on some community enhancement scheme and put into a state where it might be habitable again.
Eventually, with window frames and garage door now completely removed, even if it were once possible, such an adventurous and far-fetched scheme became unimaginable and, within the last couple of weeks, the poor house has given up the ghost. Its roof has fallen in, and finally someone has decided that it is no longer safe for the casual wanderer or vandal to go inside. A most professional, metal fence has suddenly appeared all around it to discourage the ingress of those intent on further exploration or destruction. I now wonder whether, now that this safety step has been taken, it will be properly demolished and the site either re-used for housing or returned to woodland.
More likely, I fear, it will take advantage of its new enhanced isolation to crumble slowly into a ruin and die a natural death over the next few years.
Sunday, 20 October 2013
Bells are not the Only Clangers!
The week I started on the 'first shift', i.e. I had already been given a job for that morning. However, it began with an 8.30 pick-up locally, so I was able to join my friends at church for breakfast first. These two jobs took me to Langley, near Slough, and up to Henley-on-Thames, where I had fun getting into not one but two narrow drives, each of which proved to be the wrong entrance to my target, which I eventually found to be accessible from another street (Thank you, SatNav - see the repetition of this phenomenon below).
With no other activity on Monday, I was able to go ringing in the evening - something that is becoming an uneconomic, but enjoyable habit - where we practised Oxford Bob Triples. This is a method that has pleasant memories for me because, in 1983, I rang in a quarter peal of it in honour of my father; it took place on the very day when, had he still been alive, his age would have been double my own.
After a barren afternoon on Monday, I prayed for a good job on Tuesday and, step by step, my prayer was answered. At about 9.15, the controller rang to say that, at 10.0 there would be a job ready for collection in Stevenage for Bradford. As I was just leaving home, another call came to ask if I were about to leave; the reply to my affirmative was to ask me to make a call in Letchworth on the way 'for something in the Blackburn area'. This turned out to be a private hospital in Gisburn, only 31 miles over the hills from Bradford. The weather was good, and the journey delightful. When I got there I found that the hospital is in a large park, the entrance to which is guarded by a pair of lodge houses, "of beautiful Gothic architecture, richly ornamented with figures and pinnacles carved with the greatest taste from designs of a former Lord Ribblesdale." (description and picture from the excellent village website.)
Wednesday was something of a replay on a smaller scale, with deliveries in Leicester and Peterborough, and in some ways Thursday was the best day of the working week, reminding me that, though essential to its smooth running, money isn't the only important part of life. Owing to a misunderstanding, my name wasn't added to the list when I got back at about 4.30 on Wednesday afternoon. I was asked if I were available for anything else ... although there was nothing at present. Perhaps my rather cavalier reply was somewhat foolish as it turned out, "If anything comes in, try me." The next morning, the phone was dead, until I called in at lunchtime to see how the land lay. I was reassured that I hadn't 'fallen off the radar', but a couple of hours later the boss called to see whether I was working or not. When I told him I'd been available all day, he was aghast, and not only sent me on a job right then to Colnbrook, but also asked me to collect something on the way to deliver the following morning in Thetford.
Meanwhile I had made intense, if inconclusive, progress trying to distinguish the offspring of the two marriages of a certain great-great-great uncle, as the result of which another early visit is indicated to the record office when a Saturday morning offers itself.
Friday, therefore, began early and my delivery in Thetford was complemented by a freshly-cooked breakfast at the cafe on the industrial estate. From this, I ran on to a local delivery in Sandy, and then back to East Anglia again for a collection at Great Blakenham, just outside Ipswich. I was home again - via the garage to sort out a blocked valve - by about 3.0 pm, and the weekend got off to a good start.
Yesterday was the day when there is activity in both the FA Trophy and the FA Vase. It saw the exit of my 'local favourites', Biggleswade Town, from one competition and of my 'native team', Diss Town, from the other. I missed both possibilities, for it was the ringers' annual autumn outing. We rang at four churches in eastern Hertfordshire, ending at a fifth tower that was just over the border in Essex. This latter proved somewhat elusive, since SatNav took us to the wrong side of a small hill, where we entered a private park thinking the church might be within the grounds. It was fortunate that this was the last visit of the day, since quite some time was lost as we re-traced our steps to the road and thence to the right turning instead of the wrong. This unusual level of activity, combined with a surfeit of fresh air, was quite tiring and I confess to indulging in an armchair snooze in the early evening.
Now, with the prospect of a few more showery days at the start of next week, I can wonder what work holds for me as I consider too which match to go and watch in the fourth qualifying round of the FA Cup next Saturday.
With no other activity on Monday, I was able to go ringing in the evening - something that is becoming an uneconomic, but enjoyable habit - where we practised Oxford Bob Triples. This is a method that has pleasant memories for me because, in 1983, I rang in a quarter peal of it in honour of my father; it took place on the very day when, had he still been alive, his age would have been double my own.
 |
| Lodge House, Gisburn Park |
Wednesday was something of a replay on a smaller scale, with deliveries in Leicester and Peterborough, and in some ways Thursday was the best day of the working week, reminding me that, though essential to its smooth running, money isn't the only important part of life. Owing to a misunderstanding, my name wasn't added to the list when I got back at about 4.30 on Wednesday afternoon. I was asked if I were available for anything else ... although there was nothing at present. Perhaps my rather cavalier reply was somewhat foolish as it turned out, "If anything comes in, try me." The next morning, the phone was dead, until I called in at lunchtime to see how the land lay. I was reassured that I hadn't 'fallen off the radar', but a couple of hours later the boss called to see whether I was working or not. When I told him I'd been available all day, he was aghast, and not only sent me on a job right then to Colnbrook, but also asked me to collect something on the way to deliver the following morning in Thetford.
Meanwhile I had made intense, if inconclusive, progress trying to distinguish the offspring of the two marriages of a certain great-great-great uncle, as the result of which another early visit is indicated to the record office when a Saturday morning offers itself.
Friday, therefore, began early and my delivery in Thetford was complemented by a freshly-cooked breakfast at the cafe on the industrial estate. From this, I ran on to a local delivery in Sandy, and then back to East Anglia again for a collection at Great Blakenham, just outside Ipswich. I was home again - via the garage to sort out a blocked valve - by about 3.0 pm, and the weekend got off to a good start.
Yesterday was the day when there is activity in both the FA Trophy and the FA Vase. It saw the exit of my 'local favourites', Biggleswade Town, from one competition and of my 'native team', Diss Town, from the other. I missed both possibilities, for it was the ringers' annual autumn outing. We rang at four churches in eastern Hertfordshire, ending at a fifth tower that was just over the border in Essex. This latter proved somewhat elusive, since SatNav took us to the wrong side of a small hill, where we entered a private park thinking the church might be within the grounds. It was fortunate that this was the last visit of the day, since quite some time was lost as we re-traced our steps to the road and thence to the right turning instead of the wrong. This unusual level of activity, combined with a surfeit of fresh air, was quite tiring and I confess to indulging in an armchair snooze in the early evening.
Now, with the prospect of a few more showery days at the start of next week, I can wonder what work holds for me as I consider too which match to go and watch in the fourth qualifying round of the FA Cup next Saturday.
Tuesday, 15 October 2013
And Another Thing ....
Following last week's mid-week rant about parking, here's another sound-off.
I've just learned of a friend's accident at what has to be the daftest re-design of a junction on the whole motorway system. It's the north-bound exit slip from the A1(M) at junction 9 - the nearest junction to my home. Picture the scene (as they say in all the best novels) ... It's a basic cross-roads situation so, if you exit the motorway, there are only two ways to go: left or right. OK, you could go straight ahead, but if so, why would you leave the motorway in the first place?
If you want to go left, there is an attractive dedicated left-turn lane, and you notice that this conveniently by-passes the traffic lights that govern entrance to the roundabout above the motorway. There is a sign saying that this is the lane for Letchworth (i.e. left-turning) traffic, and the words 'Keep in Lane'. What could be simpler? If that were it, then all would have been well. There are two flaws in the basic design, and the conflicting effects of these result in a greater accident potential than there ever was before.
I - When this junction was re-designed about three years ago, I think they must have been short of materials, because instead of widening the road towards Letchworth and allowing traffic from the dedicated lane to merge gently with traffic coming off the roundabout, the road width was left as it always had been, and a white line was placed at the head of the dedicated lane, with give-way markings to yield to any traffic emerging from the roundabout. You see the dedicated lane, and think there's a clear run into town, and suddenly have to stop at the top, just as if you'd not had this apparent advantage at all - Nonsense no. 1.
II - As I said above, there are two ways to go: left and right, and I would say that, overall, the traffic is about the same going in either direction, with perhaps more going left into Letchworth during the rush-hour. So why, in their questionable wisdom, did the designers provide two lanes leading up to the roundabout (i.e. for a right turn towards Baldock) in addition to the dedicated left turn lane? - Nonsense no. 2.
Soon after the revised junction opened - within hours, I should think - it became apparent to anyone with a degree of selfish cunning that if there were a long stream of vehicles queued at the give-way line at the head of the dedicated lane, waiting to turn left, you can steal a march on them by going up the middle lane, as if turning right, and once the traffic light turns green, you turn left as if leaving the roundabout, thus cutting across the path of the queue trying to get out of the dedicated lane.
This immediately reduced the value of the dedicated lane to virtually zero. It was quickly realised that there was a likelihood of traffic coming across you from the roundabout not only when the traffic lights you'd by-passed were at red - i.e. to let traffic emerge from the roundabout, having come off the southbound carriageway of the motorway or from Baldock to the east - but also when they were at green - ostensibly to allow east-bound traffic onto the roundabout. So everyone stops at the give-way line to make sure there is nothing coming before they head into no-man's-land and make their way towards Letchworth.
Matters were made worse when, a few weeks later, part of the dedicated lane was hatched out, and coloured red, to indicate that its use was discouraged if not forbidden, thus adding to the encouragement for all traffic to stop at the give-way line.
If you follow the signs, and are neither selfish nor cunning, or simply don't know the junction, you use the dedicated left turn lane and, copying everyone else, stop and check. Despite avoiding the red bit of the road, the angle still isn't a good one for turning the head, so to make sure it's safe to pull out, you virtually have to stop. The trouble is, drivers differ. At one extreme there are those who are by nature cautious, who ignore the fact that their vehicles have wing-mirrors, and/or have sore necks, and need to take time to turn their heads to see onto the roundabout. At the other extreme there are those who, like me, ignore the red zone, sharpen the angle so as to maximise mirror vision, see quickly that the road is clear, and are away. In between are a whole range of different behaviours, each posing a threat to the others, if their attention is on the roundabout instead of - as it should be - on the vehicle in front.
I have complained - and I imagine others have, too, but to no avail. "We'll watch it," is the reply. To my mind the simple solution is to move the traffic lights half-way down the slope (thus reducing the potential advantage to be gained by avoiding the dedicated lane), and to exchange the give-way for a merge, slightly widening the road towards Letchworth as necessary. Until that is done, there will be more accidents.
If I come to the head of the queue and find that I am made to yield to someone who has come off the motorway through the traffic lights, I follow him halfway down the road with my finger on the horn button - a petty and futile gesture, you might think, but at least it gives him something to think about, and it might ... just might ... reduce by one the number of selfish so-and-so's who make life a nightmare for others who try to do things the 'right way'.
If you're reading this in the comfortable confusion of ignorance, and have no interest in the petty squabbles of North Hertfordshire road-users, please don't just ignore it and wait for the next, more interesting (I hope) blog - instead, forward a link to the Highways Authority, in the hope that some good might come of it!
Thank you.
I've just learned of a friend's accident at what has to be the daftest re-design of a junction on the whole motorway system. It's the north-bound exit slip from the A1(M) at junction 9 - the nearest junction to my home. Picture the scene (as they say in all the best novels) ... It's a basic cross-roads situation so, if you exit the motorway, there are only two ways to go: left or right. OK, you could go straight ahead, but if so, why would you leave the motorway in the first place?
If you want to go left, there is an attractive dedicated left-turn lane, and you notice that this conveniently by-passes the traffic lights that govern entrance to the roundabout above the motorway. There is a sign saying that this is the lane for Letchworth (i.e. left-turning) traffic, and the words 'Keep in Lane'. What could be simpler? If that were it, then all would have been well. There are two flaws in the basic design, and the conflicting effects of these result in a greater accident potential than there ever was before.
I - When this junction was re-designed about three years ago, I think they must have been short of materials, because instead of widening the road towards Letchworth and allowing traffic from the dedicated lane to merge gently with traffic coming off the roundabout, the road width was left as it always had been, and a white line was placed at the head of the dedicated lane, with give-way markings to yield to any traffic emerging from the roundabout. You see the dedicated lane, and think there's a clear run into town, and suddenly have to stop at the top, just as if you'd not had this apparent advantage at all - Nonsense no. 1.
II - As I said above, there are two ways to go: left and right, and I would say that, overall, the traffic is about the same going in either direction, with perhaps more going left into Letchworth during the rush-hour. So why, in their questionable wisdom, did the designers provide two lanes leading up to the roundabout (i.e. for a right turn towards Baldock) in addition to the dedicated left turn lane? - Nonsense no. 2.
Soon after the revised junction opened - within hours, I should think - it became apparent to anyone with a degree of selfish cunning that if there were a long stream of vehicles queued at the give-way line at the head of the dedicated lane, waiting to turn left, you can steal a march on them by going up the middle lane, as if turning right, and once the traffic light turns green, you turn left as if leaving the roundabout, thus cutting across the path of the queue trying to get out of the dedicated lane.
This immediately reduced the value of the dedicated lane to virtually zero. It was quickly realised that there was a likelihood of traffic coming across you from the roundabout not only when the traffic lights you'd by-passed were at red - i.e. to let traffic emerge from the roundabout, having come off the southbound carriageway of the motorway or from Baldock to the east - but also when they were at green - ostensibly to allow east-bound traffic onto the roundabout. So everyone stops at the give-way line to make sure there is nothing coming before they head into no-man's-land and make their way towards Letchworth.
Matters were made worse when, a few weeks later, part of the dedicated lane was hatched out, and coloured red, to indicate that its use was discouraged if not forbidden, thus adding to the encouragement for all traffic to stop at the give-way line.
If you follow the signs, and are neither selfish nor cunning, or simply don't know the junction, you use the dedicated left turn lane and, copying everyone else, stop and check. Despite avoiding the red bit of the road, the angle still isn't a good one for turning the head, so to make sure it's safe to pull out, you virtually have to stop. The trouble is, drivers differ. At one extreme there are those who are by nature cautious, who ignore the fact that their vehicles have wing-mirrors, and/or have sore necks, and need to take time to turn their heads to see onto the roundabout. At the other extreme there are those who, like me, ignore the red zone, sharpen the angle so as to maximise mirror vision, see quickly that the road is clear, and are away. In between are a whole range of different behaviours, each posing a threat to the others, if their attention is on the roundabout instead of - as it should be - on the vehicle in front.
I have complained - and I imagine others have, too, but to no avail. "We'll watch it," is the reply. To my mind the simple solution is to move the traffic lights half-way down the slope (thus reducing the potential advantage to be gained by avoiding the dedicated lane), and to exchange the give-way for a merge, slightly widening the road towards Letchworth as necessary. Until that is done, there will be more accidents.
If I come to the head of the queue and find that I am made to yield to someone who has come off the motorway through the traffic lights, I follow him halfway down the road with my finger on the horn button - a petty and futile gesture, you might think, but at least it gives him something to think about, and it might ... just might ... reduce by one the number of selfish so-and-so's who make life a nightmare for others who try to do things the 'right way'.
If you're reading this in the comfortable confusion of ignorance, and have no interest in the petty squabbles of North Hertfordshire road-users, please don't just ignore it and wait for the next, more interesting (I hope) blog - instead, forward a link to the Highways Authority, in the hope that some good might come of it!
Thank you.
Sunday, 13 October 2013
Bacon Breakfast Bonanza!
It's nice when one job runs on to the next, with no time wasted in between. That's how this week started. My first delivery had to be in Horsham by 8.0, so I opted out of the church breakfast in order to miss the worst of the traffic build-up, and stand some chance of getting there on time. While this aim was successful, I didn't find anywhere nearby to get any breakfast, so my tummy had to wait for satisfaction until I got to Stevenage, where I knew the search would be successful. The phone went just as I got into the van armed with a bacon roll ... a collection in Letchworth for Doncaster, the start of quite a successful week.
As I waited for my invoice in the afternoon, I was assigned the delivery on Tuesday morning of something that was then being collected from north London, so I went home to await a call from the driver when he had arrived with it. This being done, I was free to join the ringers in the evening, where we practiced a more advanced method, which was in fact new to some, with the promise of a more demanding variation of it to follow this week, if the right people are there.
The second of four 'outside' breakfasts of the week was more assured, for I knew there would be a convenient facility parked outside a public house, just off the M6. Again I was summoned as I drove home, and when I called into the office (this being on the way), I was given details of two jobs that took up the remainder of my day. I'm amazed at the differing ways two minds can assess the same situation. As I collected the second of these, which was going to the village of Enstone in Oxfordshire, I asked whether Lotus F1, the consignee, was a new identity of Renault, to whom I had made many deliveries in Enstone in former times. "Oh no," I was told, "This is down a tiny lane, and when you think there's nothing down here, and you wonder whether you've got the wrong road, all of a sudden it opens up and there's the security gate!" I agreed, then, that this couldn't be the same place, because I recalled the entrance to the Renault site being right beside the road in open countryside. It was, though - the very place to which I had been before, now re-designated, but essentially the same as it ever was!
Wednesday's breakfast was the forerunner to a somewhat hectic, and rather aggravating morning. I had two jobs, the first being to deliver some display material to the East Midland Conference Centre on the campus of Nottingham University, within a 30-minute pre-8.0 window. With a bit of target-time-management, the second one ought to have been almost achievable, an 8.0 collection at Bilsthorpe, some 20 miles away. I left in good time, snatched an 'eat-as-you-go' breakfast at an M1 service station, and all went well, until I left the motorway. I'd heard that the Nottingham rush-hour is horrendous; I was aware of roadworks on the A453, so wasn't surprised that SatNav took me up to the next junction to enter via the A52, which was, in fact, a more direct route to my destination. Even so, I was totally unprepared to take over an hour for the last five miles or so of the journey!
The day's disasters had only begun. I arrived 35 minutes late, with four parcels, two of which were beyond my power even to remove from the van (I'd watched two quite young men struggle to get them on board the previous afternoon!) to find that the marquee where the event was to be held was empty, apart from the designated stand frames. There was no one about, apart from another driver, similarly confounded. Luckily he responded to my plea for help, and we carted these items inside. I was relieved of any obligation to reciprocate by the fact that he had a colleague with him, and instead departed into the traffic once more to make my way to the day's second challenge. I was chased by phone calls every few minutes until I arrived at 9.45, to be confronted by the apologetic news that the goods weren't yet ready - they'd be about another hour! I've no idea what had been going on behind the scenes, but I was then told that there had been an exchange of phone calls the previous afternoon to explain that the goods ought be ready by 10.0, and that therefore the courier (me!) should be deferred until that time. Talk about panic for nothing!
I called the office when I left, a little before 11.0, and then quite enjoyed my drive down to north London, interrupted by only one phone call, just as I'd re-fuelled at Colsterworth services. It was a relief to deliver in a pleasant cul-de-sac to builders who had been forewarned of the traumas of my morning, and were understanding of the delays to their consignment.
Thursday was much more relaxed, and more amusing than annoying. As I recall it, I'm reminded of Noel Murphy's song about a hod of bricks. It started with breakfast at home, and a nice convenient pair of jobs, to Sunbury-on-Thames and Basingstoke. As I came home round the M25 I was called to change direction and make for Surrey, where there was a collection for Colnbrook. I'd got about as far as the A30 exit, when another call told me that this job had been cancelled, so would I like to turn round again and head home. No sooner had I got beyond the M40 exit for the second time, than a third phone call apologised profusely, and turned me around once more - the job was back on! It then proceded smoothly, apart from the fact that it was a job on behalf of a customer in Hertfordshire, and their supplier, from whom I was collecting, didn't have the address of their customer, where I had to deliver ... and there was no mobile signal there, so I had to stop just before I got back onto the motorway to call the office for the address!
After all this, Friday seemed quite tame, with an early morning delivery in Huntingdon, followed by three nice easy local runs, one after the other, which took up the rest of the day, until I was assigned a couple of modest jobs for tomorrow, beginning with an 8.30 collection, which will enable me to enjoy breakfast with my fellows at church first.
As I waited for my invoice in the afternoon, I was assigned the delivery on Tuesday morning of something that was then being collected from north London, so I went home to await a call from the driver when he had arrived with it. This being done, I was free to join the ringers in the evening, where we practiced a more advanced method, which was in fact new to some, with the promise of a more demanding variation of it to follow this week, if the right people are there.
The second of four 'outside' breakfasts of the week was more assured, for I knew there would be a convenient facility parked outside a public house, just off the M6. Again I was summoned as I drove home, and when I called into the office (this being on the way), I was given details of two jobs that took up the remainder of my day. I'm amazed at the differing ways two minds can assess the same situation. As I collected the second of these, which was going to the village of Enstone in Oxfordshire, I asked whether Lotus F1, the consignee, was a new identity of Renault, to whom I had made many deliveries in Enstone in former times. "Oh no," I was told, "This is down a tiny lane, and when you think there's nothing down here, and you wonder whether you've got the wrong road, all of a sudden it opens up and there's the security gate!" I agreed, then, that this couldn't be the same place, because I recalled the entrance to the Renault site being right beside the road in open countryside. It was, though - the very place to which I had been before, now re-designated, but essentially the same as it ever was!
Wednesday's breakfast was the forerunner to a somewhat hectic, and rather aggravating morning. I had two jobs, the first being to deliver some display material to the East Midland Conference Centre on the campus of Nottingham University, within a 30-minute pre-8.0 window. With a bit of target-time-management, the second one ought to have been almost achievable, an 8.0 collection at Bilsthorpe, some 20 miles away. I left in good time, snatched an 'eat-as-you-go' breakfast at an M1 service station, and all went well, until I left the motorway. I'd heard that the Nottingham rush-hour is horrendous; I was aware of roadworks on the A453, so wasn't surprised that SatNav took me up to the next junction to enter via the A52, which was, in fact, a more direct route to my destination. Even so, I was totally unprepared to take over an hour for the last five miles or so of the journey!
The day's disasters had only begun. I arrived 35 minutes late, with four parcels, two of which were beyond my power even to remove from the van (I'd watched two quite young men struggle to get them on board the previous afternoon!) to find that the marquee where the event was to be held was empty, apart from the designated stand frames. There was no one about, apart from another driver, similarly confounded. Luckily he responded to my plea for help, and we carted these items inside. I was relieved of any obligation to reciprocate by the fact that he had a colleague with him, and instead departed into the traffic once more to make my way to the day's second challenge. I was chased by phone calls every few minutes until I arrived at 9.45, to be confronted by the apologetic news that the goods weren't yet ready - they'd be about another hour! I've no idea what had been going on behind the scenes, but I was then told that there had been an exchange of phone calls the previous afternoon to explain that the goods ought be ready by 10.0, and that therefore the courier (me!) should be deferred until that time. Talk about panic for nothing!
I called the office when I left, a little before 11.0, and then quite enjoyed my drive down to north London, interrupted by only one phone call, just as I'd re-fuelled at Colsterworth services. It was a relief to deliver in a pleasant cul-de-sac to builders who had been forewarned of the traumas of my morning, and were understanding of the delays to their consignment.
Thursday was much more relaxed, and more amusing than annoying. As I recall it, I'm reminded of Noel Murphy's song about a hod of bricks. It started with breakfast at home, and a nice convenient pair of jobs, to Sunbury-on-Thames and Basingstoke. As I came home round the M25 I was called to change direction and make for Surrey, where there was a collection for Colnbrook. I'd got about as far as the A30 exit, when another call told me that this job had been cancelled, so would I like to turn round again and head home. No sooner had I got beyond the M40 exit for the second time, than a third phone call apologised profusely, and turned me around once more - the job was back on! It then proceded smoothly, apart from the fact that it was a job on behalf of a customer in Hertfordshire, and their supplier, from whom I was collecting, didn't have the address of their customer, where I had to deliver ... and there was no mobile signal there, so I had to stop just before I got back onto the motorway to call the office for the address!
After all this, Friday seemed quite tame, with an early morning delivery in Huntingdon, followed by three nice easy local runs, one after the other, which took up the rest of the day, until I was assigned a couple of modest jobs for tomorrow, beginning with an 8.30 collection, which will enable me to enjoy breakfast with my fellows at church first.
Wednesday, 9 October 2013
Time for a Rant!
Twice lately I've nearly been rammed by a car leaving a parking space. I'd just filled up at a service station, and in order to re-join the carriageway I had to pass a stationery 7.5-tonne lorry. As I drew level with the cab I was confronted by the fast-approaching rear end of a BMW saloon. This was the first time I'd used this particular filling station, and I was unaware that, just beyond the place chosen by the lorry-driver to leave his vehicle, there was a row of parking spaces, one of which had been occupied by the BMW.
Only days later, I left home early in the morning and was forced to use my horn out of hours when a car reversed out of a gate in front of me as I drove down the next street. It's time to return to a theme I first voiced soon after I began this blog - Reverse Parking. I suppose it's partly due to the speed of life these days that probably 4 out of 5 motorists drive straight into a parking space, get out of their vehicle - hopefully locking it - and dash off to execute the business for which they parked. There's also an element of selfishness, too, for few if any of these folks will have considered the effect that their behaviour will later have on the convenience or safety of other people - or their own, come to that!
The design of the motor vehicle is not readily compatible with the act of driving out of a parking space, once the driver has driven forwards into it - especially as this is often done without making any adjustment to either the position of the vehicle or the angle of the driving wheels once the end of the bonnet has reached the far end of the space. The fact that the steering bit is at the front means that the process of reversing out is hampered by not being able to manoeuvre the vehicle until it's almost entirely out of the space.
Usually a degree of shunting is necessary to get either into or out of a parking space so, I ask, why not carry this out in the most favourable and most beneficial way? Earlier this year, while on holiday, I saw someone go round and out of a car park because there wasn't room to drive forwards into the only empty space; I followed him, and reversed my larger saloon into the space at the first attempt.
Apart from the matter of steering, the benefits of reverse parking are many. Take first the question of safety. When you approach the parking space, you are already aware of the surrounding traffic situation: you know which other vehicles are moving, and where they're going. Advantage can be taken of this information in order to reverse safely into a space. If you drive straight in, your later attempt to leave will necessarily make you more vulnerable. It will be conducted when you have to assess the behaviour of other vehicles either before you get into the car, by which time the situation may well have changed; or from a driving position where your vision is restricted by adjacent cars, and where the possibility of eye-contact with other drivers is almost non-existent.
There's also the matter of fuel economy - an all-important consideration when prices are constantly increasing! Manoeuvres carried out with a warm engine will use less fuel than the same tasks carried out with a cold one.
Planners don't help in coping with this dilemma. At the filling station where I encountered the BMW the spaces are laid out at an angle - so-called 'echelon parking', which is necessary where there is less space between a wall or pavement and the flow of passing traffic - but the usual direction of this angle means that you have to park in the direction of travel, and reverse out into the flow of traffic. The same system was adopted when the centre of my home town was re-designed a short while ago. As a van driver, I find these spaces virtually unusable for, in addition to the foregoing considerations, my rear vision is severely restricted, and the only way to emerge is simply to 'hope and go', relying on the alertness, consideration and generosity of other drivers - which is by no means a universal commodity!
For the reasons I have outlined, it would have been better if the echelon parking had been laid out in the opposite direction, so that drivers reverse in and drive out, but planners are hardly going to consider safety and fuel economy when the majority of the driving population are set in their habits of 'drive in, stop and run away', and give no thought to the essential aftermath.
I was heartened, the day after the second of the two events with which I began this post, to make a delivery at an establishment where the car park was plastered with notices saying "This is a reverse parking only car park". The car park was almost full, and not a single boot could be seen, only radiator grilles. IT CAN BE DONE!
A friend of mine watched me parking recently and commented, "That's something I've never been able to do!" To him, and any readers who feel the same, I would say, "Just practise!" Borrow some traffic cones, stick a post into an old plastic bucket, or bribe some friends who can jump and shout. Find a deserted space, believe that you can do it, and just practise. See just which bit of your car you have to get lined up with the corner of the adjacent vehicle, or of the parking space, and practise!
Only days later, I left home early in the morning and was forced to use my horn out of hours when a car reversed out of a gate in front of me as I drove down the next street. It's time to return to a theme I first voiced soon after I began this blog - Reverse Parking. I suppose it's partly due to the speed of life these days that probably 4 out of 5 motorists drive straight into a parking space, get out of their vehicle - hopefully locking it - and dash off to execute the business for which they parked. There's also an element of selfishness, too, for few if any of these folks will have considered the effect that their behaviour will later have on the convenience or safety of other people - or their own, come to that!
The design of the motor vehicle is not readily compatible with the act of driving out of a parking space, once the driver has driven forwards into it - especially as this is often done without making any adjustment to either the position of the vehicle or the angle of the driving wheels once the end of the bonnet has reached the far end of the space. The fact that the steering bit is at the front means that the process of reversing out is hampered by not being able to manoeuvre the vehicle until it's almost entirely out of the space.
Usually a degree of shunting is necessary to get either into or out of a parking space so, I ask, why not carry this out in the most favourable and most beneficial way? Earlier this year, while on holiday, I saw someone go round and out of a car park because there wasn't room to drive forwards into the only empty space; I followed him, and reversed my larger saloon into the space at the first attempt.
Apart from the matter of steering, the benefits of reverse parking are many. Take first the question of safety. When you approach the parking space, you are already aware of the surrounding traffic situation: you know which other vehicles are moving, and where they're going. Advantage can be taken of this information in order to reverse safely into a space. If you drive straight in, your later attempt to leave will necessarily make you more vulnerable. It will be conducted when you have to assess the behaviour of other vehicles either before you get into the car, by which time the situation may well have changed; or from a driving position where your vision is restricted by adjacent cars, and where the possibility of eye-contact with other drivers is almost non-existent.
There's also the matter of fuel economy - an all-important consideration when prices are constantly increasing! Manoeuvres carried out with a warm engine will use less fuel than the same tasks carried out with a cold one.
Planners don't help in coping with this dilemma. At the filling station where I encountered the BMW the spaces are laid out at an angle - so-called 'echelon parking', which is necessary where there is less space between a wall or pavement and the flow of passing traffic - but the usual direction of this angle means that you have to park in the direction of travel, and reverse out into the flow of traffic. The same system was adopted when the centre of my home town was re-designed a short while ago. As a van driver, I find these spaces virtually unusable for, in addition to the foregoing considerations, my rear vision is severely restricted, and the only way to emerge is simply to 'hope and go', relying on the alertness, consideration and generosity of other drivers - which is by no means a universal commodity!
For the reasons I have outlined, it would have been better if the echelon parking had been laid out in the opposite direction, so that drivers reverse in and drive out, but planners are hardly going to consider safety and fuel economy when the majority of the driving population are set in their habits of 'drive in, stop and run away', and give no thought to the essential aftermath.
I was heartened, the day after the second of the two events with which I began this post, to make a delivery at an establishment where the car park was plastered with notices saying "This is a reverse parking only car park". The car park was almost full, and not a single boot could be seen, only radiator grilles. IT CAN BE DONE!
A friend of mine watched me parking recently and commented, "That's something I've never been able to do!" To him, and any readers who feel the same, I would say, "Just practise!" Borrow some traffic cones, stick a post into an old plastic bucket, or bribe some friends who can jump and shout. Find a deserted space, believe that you can do it, and just practise. See just which bit of your car you have to get lined up with the corner of the adjacent vehicle, or of the parking space, and practise!
Saturday, 5 October 2013
So, What is Normal?
After the much-trumpeted sequence of three day weeks, life got back to (sort of) normal with a bump when, on Monday morning, the phone rang at about 10.0. "Are you OK to do a 'screamer' to the QEII?" QEII is shorthand for the Queen Elizabeth II hospital at nearby Welwyn Garden City; as to 'screamer' ... the next sentence informed me that someone was undergoing an operation there as we spoke. I left all on my desk just as it was and departed, to collect whatever was in the red box I was given by our customer - as he too emphasised the urgency - and then to lose no time in getting to the hospital. As I commented to a friend later, I hadn't realised that my van would actually do 97mph! Needless to say, the return journey was far slower!
Courier life, I reflected on Tuesday evening, is a strange mixture of similarities and contrasts. My second job on Monday was for the same customer, this time to a conference centre in the middle of Birmingham. There was a degree of being passed from one gate to another, and from one person to another, in order to establish whether they wanted these goods ... and, if so, whereabouts. Finally, I learned that they weren't actually needed until Friday, and I was asked to put them for now into a shed that was already almost full - presumably the other stuff there had also arrived early for the same event. My final task on Tuesday evening, which prompted these thoughts, was a delivery at a salad firm in rural Hampshire, and the idea of travelling to a food company, along country roads in the dark, called to mind the job I did a couple of weeks ago to Scotland, which fitted the same description, albeit at the other end of the country.
As to the remainder of the week, there was little worthy of remark, either for location or circumstance; however, two details do linger in my mind. On Thursday morning, I was sent to a remote destination in the Fens, between Spalding and Boston, to a food company with a Japanese name I'd never heard of. Although the sign by the gate was made of cast-iron and announced the name "Blacketts Farm", as if it had stepped forward from the 1950s, what lay beyond the gate was an immaculate modern factory building with a separate office suite that looked for all the world like a residential bungalow of c. 2005. As I approached the door, it was opened for me and a courteous, middle-aged receptionist greeted me with a broad smile that boasted both efficiency and welcome.
Fast-forward, then, to the last job of the week, which was sufficiently normal for late on Friday afternoon: a drinks delivery to a public house. This one was to a tavern in an inauspicious area of Peterborough, just outside the city centre. Mine hostess seemed to be in sole command, and was entertaining a trio of regulars, all of whom were surprised at my arrival with three kegs of ale and some assorted spirits. With the welcome assistance of one of the drinkers, these were ushered through the front door and, far quicker than I had anticipated, I was on my way. As I neared the end of the road, my gaze fastened upon the house at the junction.
It was built of the same grey-white bricks that characterise the area, but stood apart from the terraces on either side. With its tall bay, stretching from pavement to eaves and embracing both upper and lower lace-clad windows, and its neat black-painted woodwork, it seemed to live up to its name 'May Villa'. This appeared above the date '1896' on a stone tablet on the wall, and was echoed on a glass plate suspended by two chains above the front door. It brought to mind a street in a seaside town, and I wouldn't have been surprised to see a 'Vacancies' sign in the downstairs window. For a few minutes, in the fading evening sun, my thoughts drifted from the KFC meal I was about to enjoy in the (noisy) service station just off the motorway, to the pleasant seaside holidays of my early teens.
Today was, for many reasons, my first free Saturday for some while, and this morning I paid an overdue visit to my local tyre specialist, where I was greeted by the shock news that my van was in need of a new set of tyres. To my amazement, the ones now replaced have seen me through 49,274 miles since early February, and for this deserve my grateful praise! This afternoon I tracked down one of the FA Trophy Preliminary Round ties, and watched a fast-moving, but none-to-friendly conflict between Royston Town and Three Bridges. I left early, put off as much as anything by the anti-referee shouting from the crowd, with the home team losing by three goals to one.
Courier life, I reflected on Tuesday evening, is a strange mixture of similarities and contrasts. My second job on Monday was for the same customer, this time to a conference centre in the middle of Birmingham. There was a degree of being passed from one gate to another, and from one person to another, in order to establish whether they wanted these goods ... and, if so, whereabouts. Finally, I learned that they weren't actually needed until Friday, and I was asked to put them for now into a shed that was already almost full - presumably the other stuff there had also arrived early for the same event. My final task on Tuesday evening, which prompted these thoughts, was a delivery at a salad firm in rural Hampshire, and the idea of travelling to a food company, along country roads in the dark, called to mind the job I did a couple of weeks ago to Scotland, which fitted the same description, albeit at the other end of the country.
As to the remainder of the week, there was little worthy of remark, either for location or circumstance; however, two details do linger in my mind. On Thursday morning, I was sent to a remote destination in the Fens, between Spalding and Boston, to a food company with a Japanese name I'd never heard of. Although the sign by the gate was made of cast-iron and announced the name "Blacketts Farm", as if it had stepped forward from the 1950s, what lay beyond the gate was an immaculate modern factory building with a separate office suite that looked for all the world like a residential bungalow of c. 2005. As I approached the door, it was opened for me and a courteous, middle-aged receptionist greeted me with a broad smile that boasted both efficiency and welcome.
Fast-forward, then, to the last job of the week, which was sufficiently normal for late on Friday afternoon: a drinks delivery to a public house. This one was to a tavern in an inauspicious area of Peterborough, just outside the city centre. Mine hostess seemed to be in sole command, and was entertaining a trio of regulars, all of whom were surprised at my arrival with three kegs of ale and some assorted spirits. With the welcome assistance of one of the drinkers, these were ushered through the front door and, far quicker than I had anticipated, I was on my way. As I neared the end of the road, my gaze fastened upon the house at the junction.
It was built of the same grey-white bricks that characterise the area, but stood apart from the terraces on either side. With its tall bay, stretching from pavement to eaves and embracing both upper and lower lace-clad windows, and its neat black-painted woodwork, it seemed to live up to its name 'May Villa'. This appeared above the date '1896' on a stone tablet on the wall, and was echoed on a glass plate suspended by two chains above the front door. It brought to mind a street in a seaside town, and I wouldn't have been surprised to see a 'Vacancies' sign in the downstairs window. For a few minutes, in the fading evening sun, my thoughts drifted from the KFC meal I was about to enjoy in the (noisy) service station just off the motorway, to the pleasant seaside holidays of my early teens.
Today was, for many reasons, my first free Saturday for some while, and this morning I paid an overdue visit to my local tyre specialist, where I was greeted by the shock news that my van was in need of a new set of tyres. To my amazement, the ones now replaced have seen me through 49,274 miles since early February, and for this deserve my grateful praise! This afternoon I tracked down one of the FA Trophy Preliminary Round ties, and watched a fast-moving, but none-to-friendly conflict between Royston Town and Three Bridges. I left early, put off as much as anything by the anti-referee shouting from the crowd, with the home team losing by three goals to one.
Sunday, 29 September 2013
The Downhill Days
With the end of the three consecutive 'three-day-weeks' that I spoke of last week, I'm reminded of an incident some 30 or more years ago, when a throwaway remark caught my father at the wrong moment. It was about this time of year when I said, "Well, it's all downhill to Christmas, now!" Dad looked me straight in the face and with no hint of smile retorted sharply, "Christmas! - that'll come soon enough; you don't want to go wishing your time away, boy!" He was obviously feeling his age just then.
Nevertheless, the events of these last few weeks have marked the end of a good summer, and with only a few exceptions, there are no more 'highlights' to look forward to until the great Feast. Talking of feasting, this week has had more than its share of that! Monday started as usual with the 6.30 prayer-breakfast at the church, and then I set off for East Anglia. The first stop was the record office in Bury St Edmunds, where I spent some while trying to resolve a few troublesome questions, both for myself and for a friend who lives just too far away for a comfortable research visit to Bury.
After scoring some success here, I moved on to the village of Wattisfield, where my great-grandparents were married at the Independent Chapel (now United Reformed Church), in November 1876. Although I've driven through the village many times (it's on the main road, after all!), I'd never before explored it on foot, and the sunshine made it an ideal time to take some pictures.
On then to the annual school reunion. The former pupils of many schools hold these events on the school premises; this is denied us, because ours was demolished in the 1980s to make way for a housing estate. All that now remains of the school is the clock that once adorned the Edwardian façade, and which for over seventy years told many a pupil that he/she would earn a red mark in the register for being late. This has now been lovingly restored and presented to the town's museum, and this year's reunion featured the presentation of a suitable dedicatory plaque to the curator (who happens to be an old boy of the school as well!)
Three fairly full days of work formed a run-of-the-mill interval to this concerto of a week, and were followed by a leisurely Friday, catching up with admin, e-mails, and the like before packing and departing for a church 'weekend away'. This was first mooted almost two years ago, and seemed at first a far-away, rather elaborate excursion. Gradually it has acquired an aura of increasing reality until eventually all the planning came together and about 70 of us, ranging in age from one to eighty-one (and perhaps beyond!) retreated in ones, twos and complete car-loads for a two-day event in rural Norfolk. We stayed at Letton Hall, a Christian conference centre founded as such in 1979. The building itself is probably Georgian, and lives up well to its description in Kelly's 1865 directory of Norfolk as 'a neat edifice'.
I think I can say that we all enjoyed our time there, for a variety of different reasons. It wasn't all serious: Saturday morning included outside activities like archery and go-karting, for example, and one of the teaching sessions ended with the diversion of teams making up a song or a story from three random words ... just for fun! As well as encouraging us to think 'outside the box' about our parish and the people who live in it, the weekend was also a chance for us to get to know each other a bit better, and to do something that was outside our 'comfort zone'. For me, this included the experience of driving a go-kart, and finding out just how different that is from my trusty Combo van!
I also had a brief taste of life in a busy kitchen. The whole event was organised on a self-catering basis, starting - thanks to the devotion of one dedicated individual - with a mammoth Tesco home-delivery on Friday afternoon. Many of us took a turn in the rota to help with the preparation and distribution of the meals, and I'm pleased to say that assisting at this morning's breakfast wasn't nearly as traumatic as I'd persuaded myself it was going to be!
Nevertheless, the events of these last few weeks have marked the end of a good summer, and with only a few exceptions, there are no more 'highlights' to look forward to until the great Feast. Talking of feasting, this week has had more than its share of that! Monday started as usual with the 6.30 prayer-breakfast at the church, and then I set off for East Anglia. The first stop was the record office in Bury St Edmunds, where I spent some while trying to resolve a few troublesome questions, both for myself and for a friend who lives just too far away for a comfortable research visit to Bury.
 |
| Wattisfield - the former Independent Chapel, now a private dwelling, with a new church to the rear. |
On then to the annual school reunion. The former pupils of many schools hold these events on the school premises; this is denied us, because ours was demolished in the 1980s to make way for a housing estate. All that now remains of the school is the clock that once adorned the Edwardian façade, and which for over seventy years told many a pupil that he/she would earn a red mark in the register for being late. This has now been lovingly restored and presented to the town's museum, and this year's reunion featured the presentation of a suitable dedicatory plaque to the curator (who happens to be an old boy of the school as well!)
 |
| Letton Hall - 'a neat edifice' |
I think I can say that we all enjoyed our time there, for a variety of different reasons. It wasn't all serious: Saturday morning included outside activities like archery and go-karting, for example, and one of the teaching sessions ended with the diversion of teams making up a song or a story from three random words ... just for fun! As well as encouraging us to think 'outside the box' about our parish and the people who live in it, the weekend was also a chance for us to get to know each other a bit better, and to do something that was outside our 'comfort zone'. For me, this included the experience of driving a go-kart, and finding out just how different that is from my trusty Combo van!
I also had a brief taste of life in a busy kitchen. The whole event was organised on a self-catering basis, starting - thanks to the devotion of one dedicated individual - with a mammoth Tesco home-delivery on Friday afternoon. Many of us took a turn in the rota to help with the preparation and distribution of the meals, and I'm pleased to say that assisting at this morning's breakfast wasn't nearly as traumatic as I'd persuaded myself it was going to be!
 |
| The morning sunshine from my window |
Sunday, 22 September 2013
Three-day Week(s)
There is much to commend the idea of working only three days a week: less pressure, more opportunity for other interests in life, personal affairs, etc. The downside is a dramatic reduction in earnings. Someone said that, while money might not be the most important thing in life, it does make almost everything else go more smoothly. So, when the notion of a second holiday was first mooted, I was rather sceptical. As the thought took root, however, it became more attractive. I realised that, with just a little flexibility, I could take two days from one week and two from the next and enjoy, in effect, a (very) long weekend that was only one day short of a week!
Last weekend, therefore, I was braving the wind and rain in the vast green expanse of
Wollaton Park in Nottingham, part of a grand tour of some of the stately homes and other attractions of the east Midlands. My thoughts were far from the challenge of writing a blog!
After returning home on Tuesday evening, however, life came down to earth with a bump. I quickly discovered how little I'd earned the previous week, in three none-too-productive days. Wednesday did little to lift my gloom, with a visit to Rochester and then a local job being the only activity, apart from collecting five containers to be delivered in Newbury the following morning. By contrast, this was to be the beginning of a much better day. The Newbury delivery was interesting, for a start: the building was tucked away behind a church that was undergoing repair; the doorbell didn't work, so phone calls to the office, to our customer and to the consignee were necessary to gain access; and then - despite a very polite welcome - the lady there explained that these cases weren't supposed to go to her anyway, so would need to be collected later and taken the next day to the other side of the country!
Immediately after getting back from Berkshire, I was sent off on a local delivery, but by the time I'd collected this, another job had come in that was in the same general direction, so I was given that as well. Some three hours later, as I was negotiating some road-works for the second time on my return journey, the controller rang to ask whether I'd be able to take something 'to somewhere in Scotland' that evening. My curious mind needed no further bidding, and I accepted the challenge immediately. Another driver would pick this job up for me, and in return I was to collect a parcel for him to take to south London on my way back to Letchworth.
By the time I'd swapped loads, and been home to collect a few necessaries, it was probably 4.0pm before I set off for a destination about three-quarters of the way from Glasgow to the Ayrshire coast. I made the Carlisle truck-stop my 'base', and stopped there both for a meal on my way, and then for a few hours' sleep and breakfast on the return journey. Not surprisingly, I recall very little of the adventure, and saw none of its beauty since it was dark when I went and dark when I came back. I don't know how long the engineer had been standing there, but he was waiting outside the security gate when I arrived. We negotiated the delivery from vehicle to vehicle on the deserted car park, and by the time I'd planned my homeward journey, he'd driven into the works with the goods in the boot of his car.
I was home about 3.30 on Friday afternoon, and set my weekend off to an early start. The business week wasn't over, though. Fuel apart, one of the biggest expenses of being a courier is the van's insurance, and yesterday's post brought the annual 'bombshell', the renewal paperwork. To my amazement, this year the premium has actually gone down by £50 ... and despite the fact that the brokers have increased their fee by a staggering 50% (!) the total sum due is still more than 2.5% lower than last year.
Now comes the third three-day week in a row, for tomorrow I'm off for some family history research followed by a school reunion, and next weekend begins a day early in order to take part in a church retreat in rural Norfolk. Life may not be in the realm of super-profits, but it's certainly not dull!
Last weekend, therefore, I was braving the wind and rain in the vast green expanse of
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| Wollaton Hall, Nottingham |
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| Peak Rail - arrival at Matlock station |
After returning home on Tuesday evening, however, life came down to earth with a bump. I quickly discovered how little I'd earned the previous week, in three none-too-productive days. Wednesday did little to lift my gloom, with a visit to Rochester and then a local job being the only activity, apart from collecting five containers to be delivered in Newbury the following morning. By contrast, this was to be the beginning of a much better day. The Newbury delivery was interesting, for a start: the building was tucked away behind a church that was undergoing repair; the doorbell didn't work, so phone calls to the office, to our customer and to the consignee were necessary to gain access; and then - despite a very polite welcome - the lady there explained that these cases weren't supposed to go to her anyway, so would need to be collected later and taken the next day to the other side of the country!
Immediately after getting back from Berkshire, I was sent off on a local delivery, but by the time I'd collected this, another job had come in that was in the same general direction, so I was given that as well. Some three hours later, as I was negotiating some road-works for the second time on my return journey, the controller rang to ask whether I'd be able to take something 'to somewhere in Scotland' that evening. My curious mind needed no further bidding, and I accepted the challenge immediately. Another driver would pick this job up for me, and in return I was to collect a parcel for him to take to south London on my way back to Letchworth.
By the time I'd swapped loads, and been home to collect a few necessaries, it was probably 4.0pm before I set off for a destination about three-quarters of the way from Glasgow to the Ayrshire coast. I made the Carlisle truck-stop my 'base', and stopped there both for a meal on my way, and then for a few hours' sleep and breakfast on the return journey. Not surprisingly, I recall very little of the adventure, and saw none of its beauty since it was dark when I went and dark when I came back. I don't know how long the engineer had been standing there, but he was waiting outside the security gate when I arrived. We negotiated the delivery from vehicle to vehicle on the deserted car park, and by the time I'd planned my homeward journey, he'd driven into the works with the goods in the boot of his car.
I was home about 3.30 on Friday afternoon, and set my weekend off to an early start. The business week wasn't over, though. Fuel apart, one of the biggest expenses of being a courier is the van's insurance, and yesterday's post brought the annual 'bombshell', the renewal paperwork. To my amazement, this year the premium has actually gone down by £50 ... and despite the fact that the brokers have increased their fee by a staggering 50% (!) the total sum due is still more than 2.5% lower than last year.
Now comes the third three-day week in a row, for tomorrow I'm off for some family history research followed by a school reunion, and next weekend begins a day early in order to take part in a church retreat in rural Norfolk. Life may not be in the realm of super-profits, but it's certainly not dull!
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| Bolsover Castle - the terrace that's visible from the M1 |
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