I met Jono late on the Thursday night. He dropped down out of the lorry, with a Cheshire cat grin, spread all over his face. Three months ago I had the same face, but this time it was him going on holiday and me having to work for the best part of two weeks. Ah well knuckle down and get on with it I told myself.
The highlight of the first week was the strike by the Dover dockers. These people, normally on the French side, really do my head in. They have no consideration for any of us drivers who are just trying to get a job done. You manage to keep all your cards looking good and hey presto the dockers have downed tools again and everything comes to a standstill. Now its going to be a month of dodging french coppers, waiting for the tacho to overwrite, because the produce always has to be there regardless of hours. It should be just a point of parking up when the times up, but the boss never agrees.
After having 24 hours off in Ramsgate, the brain dead mission began. "Tom please meet Kevin and take 1 box of flowers to Rotterdam" he said. Now far be it for me to criticise the boss, but a 44 ton truck and 1 BOX of flowers. I can't fathom it. It must be paying a fortune! (but I don't think so.) It had to be there for 8 o'clock in the morning and I arrived 2 o'clock. Can Tom sleep for 9 hours? (I don't think so) Five hours later I'm up and walking the two miles to the delivery with the flowers on my shoulder. An hour later I'm back at the lorry and the Van Dongen jobsworth is on my case for parking in the wrong spot and now I HAVE to move the truck. I told him politely to go away!
Then for the purpose of the police Jono drove to Anterpen, because there is a deadline to be at the Banana place. Has the boss planed well? Has he bo***cks! If the police caught me, would he back me? I don't think so! Is he grateful? I don't think so! All this done for one box of flowers! If he learnt to count, it would be a start. When I got down to to Paris, I went straight around to the delivery point, and was told to come back on Sunday. They can't even tell me when the delivery day is. Just a bit of information would have saved me an hour of waiting and the argument with the French man, when I told him my gaffers would of let me know if it was Sunday and that he should just get on with it. The joys of Logifrance!
The weekend run went nice, apart from the added Worcester and Cheltenham, which meant we had to change over down there. This meant Jono getting up at 2 o'clock and me fighting with the traffic to get home, but who cares I've got four days off which I'm really looking forward to.
