Feeling grrrrrrreat !!! (some of the time)

I was sent to Manchester this week and found Tony the tiger hanging out at the Kellogg's factory.


Its right next to Trafford Park, where I was making a collection. I had driven past this place several times on many collections that day but I was told by the office to keep to the running order.


I then went over to Blackburn past the Blackburn rovers stadium , they were playing Chelsea that night and the tv crew were setting up.

It was a little bit flooded on some of the roads but I noticed the red cross were still on call to help if it all got to much for me.After Blackburn I had a simple collection at Liverpool Docks.
I have been her twice now and I have to say I haven't experienced the famous scouse charm yet.

I have been met by the most miserable woman in the world, smoking herself to death in a tiny portacabin with compulsory tiny drivers hatch to scowl through.

I present myself to her at the time requested and as usual she ignores my welcome and takes my notes from me.

She read the notes but then I noticed her nose turn up and she handed them back to me with disgust and said "no booking reference ", "no booking reference, no goods "Now, this place is like a salvage yard for wood, its a shit hole and she is sat there chain smoking at her place of work, spouting the rules to me.

I had to ring the boss and ask for the magic numbers.

Every other detail you could possibly imagine you would need was on my paperwork, except those four magic numbers.

The time, the place, the customer, the items, the weight, the height, the length, where they had been , where they were going, the time they had to be there , who was meant to be taking them there, (me) even my registration number and truck weight was on there!! but no Effing booking reference, no goods!

I produced the numbers and without even looking up she handed me a photocopy of what I had given her and told me to give it give to the forklift driver and he would pick my load for me! Unbelievable.

He was a jolly scouser, and after telling me it would probably take him two hours to find this lot and then looking puzzled when I started doing up my curtains and start to leave he played his trump card.

He loaded one item. The famous , your going nowhere now routine, load a part of the load and then take as long as you want to load the rest.

Not many drivers have succeeded in leaving the docks with only part of a 6 tonne load of timber on the truck or having it removed and be allowed to leave empty.

It was a classic move and he left me totally stranded and at his mercy.

I was eventually released and loaded after the a-fore mentioned 2 hours, and I set off for Civilisation ( I mean home)

This was the way home , past all these abandoned houses. street after street of them. Amazing to think all these houses are empty and boarded up.


I had a mad dash to get this valuable cargo of must have timber to its expectant customer and drove myself mad to get it there only to be met with the same disdain and loathing at the other end.

I had sweated blood and missed a very important appointment to get this load of crap to these idiots, and here they were, acting as if I had just decided to drop in as I was passing and try and leave a load of wood behind. Wankers.

Another day and another load of wood.

This time it was in Croydon and this machine was coming perilously close to the side of my brand new truck to get it off, in the pouring rain.


I was at Heathrow next,

and then I lost track of my week and found a picture on the camera for West Bromwich footbal club!

I must of been busy!







My favourite car of all time came along to cheer me up and then the pictures stop.

I don't get to take as many pictures these days because this job starts in the dark and finishes in the dark and the hours of light are very busy hours, so very few chances to take pictures.

I do still have story's though and this one is classic receptionist meets driver horror.

I was in a white van on Thursday while the ride had a six week service and was sent from one of our customers in the defence business to a company in Basildon.

This company make, among other things that go bang, a truck called the Mastif. Its famously used in Afghanistan for dealing with explosive devices.

Well I think they must of modelled it on the receptionist. both in size and in ferocity looks and personality, she was a horror of epic proportions (she was also epic IN proportions as well but I didn't hold that against her. I wouldn't hold anything against her, apart from a cattle prod maybe.

I found a few pictures of one I saw on the road in September and I have added them for dramatic effect.



I will set the scene for you and you decide if I was right to get upset.

I was sent to a nuclear company we work for to collect something to go to a certain defence company and the man loading me told me it was, Three very expensive and very fragile items to go straight down to Basildon and then to wait for a return load.

Now we do a lot with this particular company and I know that expensive means in excess of £100,000 each box.

I arrive at the company and because I had never done this regular (note the word regular)
drop before I present myself and my extensive paperwork at the security gate.

There are turnstiles and cameras and barbed wire fences and a system of security cards allowing access to everyone.

I am told I have to go to the goods in office on the left so off I go. Goods in on the left tell me it is the other goods in on the left , so off I go again.

Other goods in on the left tell me its other goods in on the right.

I'm getting a bit sick of this now but he insists that "the other fella always takes it there mate" So I load it all back into the van again and look for the other goods in on the right.

I see the "other goods in on the right" and he looks at the paperwork and tells me I need the other site , its 400 yards up the road mate !!.

I go out of the fortress and up to the other site and look for a delivery entrance or a security gate.

I cant find one so I make my way into the main reception area.

Automatic doors doors open and I am in a massive foyer where men and women in suits with key cards, swipe past me through barriers and onto elevators that take them up into the bowls of the defence industry elite.

I stuck out like a sore thumb , amongst the suits and the glass and the camouflage exhibits that crowded the hall like trophy's.

Here I am dressed in driver fleece and safety boots , three days growth and bed hair caused by waking up at 4 am 5 days a week and never looking in a mirror (I told you there was a lot of glass in this hall)

The receptionist was behind her desk.
She wasn't looking at me and hadn't acknowledged me yet , she was speaking so I stood at the desk and waited for her to finish.

She seemed to be getting more and more agitated and was going on about a plant.

I waited and eventually she looked straight at me and shouted "You think I'm telepathic or something" put it over by the plant for gods sake.

I thought she had been talking to someone on her headset but she had been talking to me the whole time.

I tried to show her my paperwork and she ignored me and said again , "for gods sake put it behind the plants near the main doors".

Goods in on the right had phoned her and told her why I was there but no one had told me that .

I didn't fancy leaving £300,000 of nuclear equipment by her potted rubber plants in Basildon and then waiting around for a return load so I tried to explain to her what I had and who it was for and that I needed to take something back with me.

She then spoke to me very slowly like I was thick , deaf and foreign . "PUT IT OVER THERE.
THAT'S WERE IT GOES I HAVENT BEEN TOLD ABOUT ANYTHING GOING BACK."

I explained I didn't want to take it out the van and leave it by the plants in case it was needed somewhere else and ive have to load it all again and that would be the forth time, and when would the person in charge be available?

I had just committed the worst sin possible , I had questioned a receptionist's authority.

Her epic proportion was in danger of moving off the epic chair it was positioned on so I went to the van to get the paperwork I had for them.

It was stil at the other site at goods in on the right so I set off back to get it.

When I returned she had reinforcements with her in the form of a male security guard.
She had a look of total contempt on her face and a very wry smile on her face as I trudged up the steps and behind the plant with my three expensive box's and the two empty ones for the returns.

I asked her if anyone was looking for the person I needed and she totally lost it.

"I am the one you want , don't you get it, I am the one telling you put it near the plant and go way , there is nothing here for you to take."

Now bear in mind I hadn't even spoken to this woman before I had merely walked into the foyer of the company she works for , she had been told of my arrival by her colleague and had decided to treat me with contempt from the start.

I decide to calmly explain what I thought of her treatment of me and why I was asking what she deemed "stupid questions "

I explained I was told I had expensive items to deliver for my company and I was obliged to take care of them and deliver them safely .

I explained I had been to every door of the main site and now this one and was simply looking for some guidance as to where to deliver my goods. and collect my return load.

"I know why your here" she said "I am telling you where to put the stuff but I am getting sick of explaining to you, the people you need are not here, you can wait all day if you like but they wont come."

She then refused to sign for the goods and said with a stupid grin , "get the person giving you your return load to sign it when they show up."

Now while I had been bringing these boxes up the steps in the rain I noticed two jaguars pull up and two very well dressed men got out and went up to the Mastif,.

"Oh hello sir , and how can I help you, please sit down and make yourselves comfortable someone will be down in a minute to see you , anything I can get you?"

I told her that I found her the most unhelpful, rude and downright hateful person I had ever had the misfortune of meeting that day, and that If I was in a suit I would of probably been treated like a human being by her at least.

I rang work and explained that I was being told to leave the delivery behind a plant and that nothing was listed as being returned.

They rang back and said to get signed up and come back empty.

"Oh nothing going back she said , are you sure you don't want to wait ? are you sure its ok If I sign for you? "

The look on her face, the joy at my discomfort was sickening to see , she was in her element and I was left wondering what she gets out being that horrible to people that are only trying to do their job.

I am glad I got that off my chest, I didn't want to devote any more of my time to that woman and her hateful soul.

Lets see what Monday brings. More pictures , less words I hope.