6:30PM and I’m back in the bosom of my home. Well, I say bosom, but it’s more like a butt cheek – (sigh).
As I wrote previously, I wasn’t looking forward to today’s work at all. I did however look on the bright side, as some of this company’s routes are alright. On top of this, Cozmic who does security for this particular company, I say security… I digress. Cozmic emailed to tell me he wasn’t working today and he’d been out of communication as his laptop decided to sit there and burst into flames!! Now, while I really don’t want to know what he was doing at the time this happened, I hope for his sake, he didn’t burn anything too precious.
So, I get to work and find that while I had been looking on the bright side of the possibilities that today could bring, I learned instantly it was all in vain! I was given one of the crappiest runs I think they have. Bideford, Barnstable and Ilfracombe in north Devon.
I promptly screwed up, by pulling out of Wellington and going northbound on the M5 Motorway instead of south! This is because (what I’m about to say here basically translates to; “it’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it”) I normally drive from a little place called Cullompton and nearly the whole world seems to exist north of the place and certainly coming from there I’d have indeed gone on the northbound.
After turning around at Taunton, I head back in the right direction and started my journey up the North Devon link-
road. I go past Tiverton and start heading on towards Bishops Nympton and South Molton. Now until I found out the WKD and her hubby were actually sheep farmers, I hadn’t really noticed sheep in the fields as the area is predominantly dairy herds, but as I passed Tiverton I started noticing fields and fields full of sheep! So I’m sat there dodging holidays makers thinking about why I had never noticed them before.
The trouble when you get into this pondering mood, is that you start to notice more things and starting thinking about these also. Like the fact a Bishop Nympton festival sign was still up, though the festival was last week and the fact that as I got close to South Molton, I noticed a sign for North Molton – I’ve been down this road a hundred times and it never occurred to me there might be a north one too. This of course lead to me wondering if indeed there is an east and west Molton.
A quick turn around at Bideford with very minimal conversation and on to Barnstable… I’ve only been to this store once, it’s a pig to get into and the lady who was there last time was nothing short of horrid!
I reversed in over a pavement and the remnants of a wall and was back out of there in 20 mins flat.
By now it was raining and I was already wet through to the skin. So now it was off to the part of the run I hate – Ilfracombe!
Ilfracombe is so small and tight, it is simply not conducive to trucks and certainly not 60 ft ones. However, the driving part is actually fun, none more so than when you see the look of shear terror on the faces of car drivers.
The reason I hate this ‘tip’ so much is that while it is a large store, it’s loading bay is actually a lay-by. In turn, this lay-by is not only on a tight road, but it’s also on a hill – and with heavy cages to deliver, it’s not good.
However, while it was hard work and rained throughout, I was cheered up no end by the store manager Roxanne. Roxanne hails by birth from the island of St. Kitts way over there in the Caribbean and now lives in Ilfracombe by way of 
High Wycombe.
So today, I can only thank Roxanne for cheering me up with a slightly sweet coffee and a good chat while the delivery was carried out.
I was still soaked to the skin and to make it worse – sweating. But a quick race back to the depot (while keeping weary eye out for fast moving red mini type road bourne projectiles) got be back for an official finish of 17:30 and the whole job done in 8 hrs flat.
Home, shower, finding of one huge T-Shirt and clean undies, coffee, large slice of Peanut Butter on toast, write this and now I’m ready to watch Top Gear.
Basic, straight forward and the day was a result…
Like this:
Be the first to like this post.
Last nights work was fairly quick, that said it didn’t turn out that quick as walking across the yard these days can take too long as I end up having to have a conversation with nearly everyone! The crazy thing about this is that for the most part, I can’t stand talking to people – I’m just not that sociable! There are a handful of folks I enjoy talking too, but either rarely see, or get the chance. Oddly though, last night I did see an old agency work colleague who I rarely see these days. As I have not thought up a name for him, I’ll refer to him as the ‘Bass Player’, the reason is simple, he looks like the stereo typical bass player with shiny head and beard. Living over at Lyme Regis and just around the corner from Ian Gillan of Deep Purple, it was good to see Bass Player again because I don’t think I’ve seen him for months, actually it could have been February when we were racing against each other in the early hours to Davidstow.
As a guy, I must admit a certain disdain for shopping… That is of course – unless it’s for tools.
