An Exciting Well Paid Day in the Life of a 3.5 Tonne Parcel Delivery Driver – Part 2

So, continue on from part 1 of “An Exciting Well Paid Day in my Life of a 3.5 Tonne Parcel Delivery Driver” here is part 2…

You might feel lonely being a parcel delivery driver. And yet you’ll meet people all the time.

Obviously delivering parcels to them but yet it will still feel lonely because you only get a fleeting moment with each person and never make any meaningful connections.

Which if you’re fine with, then great, it’s not a dating service after all, but I’ve spoken with a number of people who don’t like the coldness of the job, they always feel rushed, needing to get from one delivery to the next.

I’m fine with it myself, I’ve no desire to get to know the people I’m delivering to, but at the same time I am able to make meaningful conversation in the fleeting moments I meet them, maybe that’s just me, I can always find something to talk about, even if it’s for 30 seconds and we’ve never met.

But working for this particular company it is certainly a rushed feeling throughout the day. A great example of some deliveries I did the other day that shows this is this, read it in an ever increasing tempo……..

I delivered to a customer, they started talking to me about the last time I delivered something to them and how it wasn’t quite the right size or colour.

A voice in the back of my head reminding me that my next delivery was down that narrow road with no parking spaces that I’ll end up getting beeped out for simply stopping for 60 seconds to deliver a parcel to.

And when I get there it will turn out to be the house of the person who just beeped at me, who will then look at me sheepishly as if to say, well, if it wasn’t my house you’d delivered to I would’ve been in the right beeping my horn at you for stopping in the road for all of these amazingly long 60 seconds.

Just as the beeping stops, I turn around to see Tiddles being chased by Butch, who in turn is being chased by the old lady I delivered to last week who then asks in her most frantic voice if I could stop Butch from chasing her precious Tiddles before the poor thing has a heart attack.

Again all whilst the voice in the back of my head keeps saying that I’ve still got to deliver to that amazingly well thought out town centre with no parking for deliveries and park on double yellow lines whilst trying to dodge the parking attendant, yet again.

Then once I’ve dodged the parking attendant and finished delivering to the 5-6 shops before the local double decker bus arrives and starts beeping their horns at me as they can’t get past my van, I quickly jump back into the van and scrape my shin on the door and reopen the scratches that Butch lovingly gave me whilst trying to save Tiddles from him start to throbbingly bleed again.

I drive off whilst making eye contact with the parking attendant who has just come around the corner and realised I was parked on double yellow lines but they didn’t catch me and I smile to yourself and move on to the next delivery realising that any small victory is still a victory, oh and then I remember to breath.

Pah!

That was a funny few deliveries that day, frantic, hectic, stressful, frustrating, funny, hilarious, tiring and energising all rolled into one.

I drove off after all that and just said to myself, this job is fucking awesome.

I love it when it’s like that. It’s a real challenge and every day I overcome it and feel like I’ve accomplished something.

Until you’ve experienced it, reading about delivery driving doesn’t give it justice.

It can, of course, be simple and easy, almost boring at times if you like.

I get deliveries where it goes smoothly. No traffic or parking issues. No cats or dogs to catch/save. No people to listen to moan about the clothing they’ve ordered not fitting or the chair they ordered being the wrong colour.

Just an easy house to find, with a small parcel to deliver and get signed for, then move on to the next one and the next one.

That’s when you can really find out if you’re cut out to be a delivery driver. If you can tolerate doing the same thing day in day out, hour after hour.

Sure the traffic can be different, the people can be different, of course being British even the weather can be different.

But some days are just…. the same.

You deliver to the same houses, the same people, you don’t say anything apart from “Hello, I have a parcel for you”. “Sign here please” and “Thankyou”. Do that 100 times and then you’re back to the depo again.

Those are the days when you realise how much you actually enjoy the harder days.

The harder days when for no reason things go wrong in the depot and a 60-minute parcel sorting session turns into a 120 minute one.

The harder days when you have to really use your local knowledge of your route, some intuition and hope for some luck because it’s so busy with parcels that anyone else would take 12hrs to do what you’re about to attempt to do in 8hrs.

The harder days when you use your organisational skills to load your van evenly and safely so as to not overload one side or cause any damages to customer’s goods because they’ve wrapped something in tissue paper and also despite being delayed in the depo for an extra hour and knowing you have to be at the furthest point of your route away from the depot within the next 20 minutes.

The harder days when you rely for the 10th time on seemingly not so common courtesy and patience whilst stuck in a traffic jam knowing you’re the only one who has to be 1.5 miles away in 5 minutes and could nip down that road over there, but a few people have decided to ignore the yellow boxes on the road in front of it and that’s the main reason the for traffic jam on your side of the fucking road.

The harder days when someone decides to send a parcel to their friend on a quiet easy to park on road with over 150 houses on but forgets to put the house number on it. And when you take the parcel back to the depot because you weren’t you know, psychic. You find out that the parcel had to be delivered that day as it was a birthday present and the person now wants it delivered to their workplace the next day….. which turns out to be in the town centre you had hoped you weren’t going to tomorrow because it was a market stall day and the parking would be even more non-existent than on any other day of the month!

Those are the days I enjoy the most. Those are the days I get home, cream crackered, but happy that I’ve overcome another day. Another day I can learn from, gain experience from and ultimately get better at my job from and that’s surely what a job you enjoy is all about?

Anyway.

Once I’m done for the day, I head back to the depot and unload any parcels that I’ve collected from customers and/or give back any parcels I didn’t deliver that day.

Most evenings this process takes about 30 minutes, sometimes it takes an hour, it all depends on how many other drivers are back at the same time as me and on the volume of parcels we all have.

Either way, I’m generally back home before 6 pm now.

I know that it’s still an 11hr day most days, but I’m happy with those hours, I average around £15-£18 per hour and am set for around £30k for the year.

I’ve got to take out taxes from that, but being self-employed I can claim various expenses which will reduce that, so I’m more than happy with it.

Like I’ve said, for a parcel delivery driver, it’s very good money. Sure the hours are long, but then I get rewarded for it. Without a doubt, I don’t see myself working for this company for more than a few years at the most, simply because I want a life.

Once I’m home by 6 pm. I normally go and do a quick weightlifting/exercise session. Which for the last 2 months has literally been a few high rep sets of either pushups, chin ups or squats. All with a small amount of weight on or nothing at all.

I just haven’t had the motivation in me to lift anything heavy lately. But now that I’m really getting into the job it’s time to push on and get back to lifting some heavy shit again.

Anyway.

Rest of my evenings are spent preparing the next day’s food (e.g my breakfast) and my dinner and then relaxing/spending time at a friends etc for whatever time I have left before it’s time to hit the sack again.

I say that I want a life and by this, I mean that a normal week is 5 days, but the company wants us drivers to do as many weekends as possible. Because people still want parcels delivering at weekend after all!

Obviously, the drivers don’t want to work weekends if they can help it. It’s a long 5 day week anyway without adding on the 6th day.

I’ve been doing every other Saturday to begin with, mainly because I wanted the money but also because I wanted to get to know my route as quickly as possible.

But now that I’m 3 months into the job I’m going to start only offering to do one in 3 weekends because it’s just too much and I don’t have the time to enjoy things I want to outside of the job.

Since starting this job I’ve averaged 5.6 days a week and 10.8 hrs a day over that 3 month period and 60hr weeks are more than I already want to do, but I’ve kept doing them because of the money.

I’m hoping that by the end of the next 3 months I will have got that daily and hourly average down. Not because I’ll have been working less, but because I should have got to know my route that much better and also got better at the job.

Once the next 3 month period is over I’ll have a good idea what the job is really like and then I’ll make a decision based on that whether it’s something I could do for years on end.

I’m pretty sure I’ll stay for the manic Christmas period, if not just for the simple fact of the increased money earning, but also because I’m just really interested to know what it’s like in a courier company at the busiest time of the year.

I’m kind of scared to find out as I know that my route will most likely be back to what it was like at the beginning. That being 12-13hr days 6 days a week.

Hey ho. It is what it is. The good thing is that I always have a choice.

If I’m not enjoying it, I’ll find another job. There are plenty of other delivery driving jobs out there, and I know I could find one with fewer hours, I’d just have to accept the lesser wage

I’ve got my truck license to fall back on, but I’m reluctant to go into trucking as I found it hard finding a job with no experience that wasn’t nights away from home or stuck in truck stops for hours on end.

I know I have to gain experience somehow, but I don’t want it to be at the expense of home life, that’s always the first choice for me. Home life or more money with a certain job.

I’ll take the home life every time.

Although I am sacrificing home life now with this jobs hours. But at least I’m home every evening!

I really enjoy the hustle and bustle of parcel delivery driving, and think I’d be bored with truck driving for hours on end on motorways, stuck in truck stops for hours, or away from home overnight etc.

I’ve talked myself out of truck driving right there haven’t I? Pah!

Right, I’m done, that was an epic 2 parter.

Until next time…

WeeMike

An Exciting Well Paid Day in my Life of a 3.5 Tonne Parcel Delivery Driver – Part 1

I’ve decided to write a post about a day in the life of a delivery driver.

That delivery driver being me of course. And that delivery driving being in a 3.5-tonne long wheel base high top sprinter van.

Be aware this is a long fucking post, so I’ve got a double rum n coke and some jaffa cakes to keep me going, I’d suggest the same for you!

If you’re reading this and are a delivery driver, or know someone who is. You’ll probably know that any day as a parcel delivery driver isn’t, in fact, boring or even mundane, especially when you’re delivering parcels in timed slots throughout the day.

Also, the stereotypical delivery driver isn’t a deadbeat, can’t get a job anywhere else, doesn’t have people skills etc.

Some might be, but on the whole, we’re normal decent intelligent human beings. Honest.

I can also assure anyone thinking otherwise, that a proper parcel delivery driver is highly analytical, has great organisational skills, along with excellent people skills and they are generally very good drivers.

There are numerous other skills in the day to day life of a parcel delivery driver, but if you’re after an easy job that you can coast through without using your brain, this isn’t the one for you.

Or at least it shouldn’t be. Like any other job. If you’re not happy doing it, fuck off somewhere else and find one you are happy doing. There’s nothing worse than meeting people who hate their jobs. I can tell them from a mile off and not only does it look bad on the company obviously, it just makes them look like bad people, which often is the complete opposite, they’ve just allowed the wrong job to turn them into someone who they are not.

Right, enough of the deep shit.

Parcel delivery driving is fucking hard work, long hours and sometimes people can be complete and utter dicks and make you want to commit murder, but one thing it isn’t though is boring, mundane or low paid (for the right company). I’ll get into that later though.

The job I do requires me to keep my wits about me all day and I don’t get any rest during the day, once I leave the depo, it’s Thunderbirds a go, all fucking day, 10-12hrs of it and yes it’s fucking tiring, but I’d not have it any other way.

I could work in a 15-30 minute break somewhere I guess, but it means getting home 15-30 minutes later and when you’re doing 10-12hrs, it makes a difference.

Anyway.

Writing this, I wanted to see my current work life down in words and also in case anyone else was thinking of becoming a delivery driver and wanted to know about it.

I’m not going to name the company I work for, nor people’s names or exact money I earn, some might be able to guess who I work for, but I want to go into as much detail as I can without saying it exactly.

Here we go then.

It’s 6 am, the alarm goes off. Another day beckons. I’ve always been an easy riser. I enjoy waking up knowing that I have another day in front of me. It means I’ve done something right the day before. I’m alive, I’ve got a roof over my head, food in my belly and soon I’ll have clothes on my back too.

I’m winning and it’s fucking awesome.

If you don’t wake up like that at least once or twice a week, change fucking jobs. Life is short, you’re fucking awesome, so go find something that makes you feel that way too.

I fucking love Tony Robbins.

Anyway.

I’ve never got stuck in a job that I hated so much that I didn’t want to get up every day. If it ever got remotely close to that, I simply changed jobs.

And yes it is that easy. I’ve gotten myself into difficult situations before job wise. But there is always a way out, you just have to make the decision and cope with the consequences.

So, it’s 6 am. It’s not an early start by any means (compared to my last job getting up at 2 am) but it’s early enough that I have to be methodical in my evenings to make sure I get to bed around 10 pm every night to get 6-7+ hours of sleep.

Other people’s sleep habits are different, but I need 6-7hrs+ of good sleep to be fully functioning the next day. And seeing as though I have to be on the ball straight away when I get into work, then sleep is one of the most important aspects of my working life.

Anyway. (I like that word, anyway.)

I get dressed into my works clothing which is laid out the night before in our spare room. Mainly because I like to be organised, but also it saves times in the morning fumbling around whilst waking up bleary eyed.

I head downstairs and put the kettle on and make a cup of coffee. I used to drink tea, being British that’s probably a given. But then I found coffee and the rest is history as they say. Although I do generally stick to 1 or 2 cups a day only, I specifically only use it to wake me up in the mornings during the week and at the weekend for a mid morning drink.

I take my daily supplements, vitamins etc and then I get my lunch ready for the day. I’ve always prepared my own lunch as I’m a fussy eater and I can eat exactly what I like every day. Plus it saves a shit load of money.

I’ve prepared my breakfast the night before so I don’t wake my partner up. I like to have a raw milk protein shake with a banana in for breakfast every morning and it needs to be blended together so makes a lot of noise.

As a considerate person, it’s not something I should be doing at 6 am!

Once my day’s food is ready, I sit down on the sofa in the living room. Drink my coffee, take my daily supplements and then read some of the previous evening’s news. I generally don’t read every day worldly news, just sports and technology news. The rest I tend to look at every other day or let other people tell me about. I find most of it too fucking depressing or boring.

I leave for work around 6:45 am most days and from the moment I arrive I have to be on the ball, wide awake, ready for action straight away.

But let me reverse for a second. From the moment I step into my van, I need to be alert, responsive and responsible.

I can’t state those three words highly enough.

Alert. Responsive. Responsible.

I see far far too many drivers early in the morning who are still half a fucking sleep.

I know of far too many people who literally get into their cars/vans/trucks to drive to work within 5-10 minutes of getting out of bed.

It’s fucking irresponsible and down right disrespectful to your fellow human beings. Stop it!

I’ve seen accidents first thing in the mornings, which I don’t doubt for a second have been caused by someone’s lack of responsiveness and alertness, most likely due to not being awake enough.

So. If you’re a delivery driver for a living, don’t fucking do it. We have more responsibility as drivers than everyone else does, so we need to be setting the standard. Simple.

And even if you don’t drive for a living, don’t drive half a sleep for fuck sake. Be a responsible person and respect other people by driving fully awake and alert.

Anyway.

So I’m in my van at6:45 am every morning. I get out my daily record sheet to record my starting mileage etc. I do my daily checks on the van, lights, fluids, fuel etc. Then I head off to my depo.

As a delivery driver you should have daily checks on the vehicle you’re driving, regardless of size and that should include checking you have enough fuel for the day.

I’ve known of several drivers who have run out of fuel in the middle of a run, delivery drop etc and they’re fucking dicks. It causes huge issues for everyone, not just you. Just five minutes a day checking your vehicle and you’re sorted.

Bosh.

Now, whilst I’m technically self employed, like most other carrier companies who don’t directly employ drivers, it’s a sham and a load of bollocks.

I’m not really self employed. I work for one company. I don’t get a choice of the days when I work. I don’t get paid sick pay or holiday pay either.

It is what it is, and is something I’m not going to get into on this post. I knew what I was signing up to when I joined this company, and I’m happy enough with it.

If you’re someone who likes to take a week or two of holidays a year, you have kids and need a day off here and there, then this most likely isn’t the job for you.

Sure you can take the time off if you want. But it will be unpaid and most likely you’ll be out of pocket as you’ll still be paying for your van and insurance policies etc.

I’m fully intending to see this year out without any holiday myself and then see how I feel next year and I might stay or move on. I’m earning more money than I have ever before, doing a job a love and that’s enough for me right now.

Anyway. So I arrive at the depo for around 7am.

From the moment I step out of the van it’s Thunderbirds are go again.

I collect my parcel scanner, look at my route information for the day and off I go starting to scan my parcels.

Once I’ve scanned each parcel, I lay them out around my van, roughly in the order I’m going to deliver them in.

This initial scanning process can take anywhere from 60-90 minutes, every, single, fucking morning.

And I say it like that because when people order and send things they don’t check the addresses they are using properly.

On a daily basis I’d say I can have up to 25% of my parcels with incomplete or weird addresses on them.

That doesn’t sound a big thing, but when it’s someone’s name, with just the road name or village/town name and nothing else, it can take a while to sort it out. Sometimes I can’t sort it out whilst at the depo, so I have to do it whilst out on the road, which I’ll get to later.

Once all the parcels are scanned on my scanner, I then have to route my day’s work.

To begin with, this is by far the hardest part of the job. If you’re new to a route and don’t know the area, you have no chance. I was regularly doing 13-14hr days for my first few weeks as I just didn’t know my area.

The scanner the company uses does have satellite navigation on and it can organise your route into a postcode sequence, but for anyone who knows’s postcodes here in the UK, that isn’t always helpful, to say the least!

Anyway, once you get to know the route, you can then organise it the way you want to based on your knowledge of the area.

For me, this has gone from 90 minutes work in the mornings to around 20 minutes, and even though I’ve been delivering to the same route for the last 3 months, I still have issues finding some addresses.

It’s how you cope with the parcels with the weird address that will define how your day goes and if you can make it long term as a delivery driver too.

The reason I say this is that not a single day has gone by that I haven’t had at least a few parcels with weird addresses on and they often crop up during a period of the day when you have already been delayed due to traffic, parking issues, customers etc.

If you can resolve address issues before you leave your depo, then great, it will save you double the time out on the road.

I know several people who used to be delivery drivers long before satellite navigation and the internet was available to search addresses on etc and to say they have encyclopaedic brains is an understatement.

Compared to 20 years ago, delivery driving is a breeze nowadays.

Anyway.

So I route my parcels into an order that I think is best for the day.

No day yet has been the same route wise. And that is mainly due to the company I work for offering a particular level of service that other delivery companies don’t.

We offer customers specific timed delivery slots and because of this, it can mean I am in different areas of my route at different times of the day, every, single, day.

Everyone morning I will have a certain amount of parcels that have to be in certain areas of my route at specific times of the day. Either because the person ordering has requested it or because the company sending it has requested it.

So obviously when I am routeing my parcels, it is the most efficient way that when I’m in an area for a specific time slot, that I deliver other parcels in that area around that time too.

Which also means that I can’t have a set route every day and make sure a certain amount of parcels are with customers before they go to work or go off on the school run etc.

This has it’s downside and also it’s upsides, but it all means that I have to know my route very well to work out how I’m going to get all my parcels delivered successfully within a decent time frame. E.g less than 12hrs as I really don’t want to be working 12hrs every day if I can help it.

I mean, if I was happy doing 14hr days, I have no doubt I could deliver every single parcel I have, every single day of the week because I’d be delivering later in the day, when most people would be home.

Anyway.

Once I’ve routed all my parcels for the day, I then number each parcel. Not all drivers do this, but I do as I feel it makes my day easier.

Some drivers can put all their parcels on their van and go off and deliver them, no issues finding a parcel in the back at all. Some don’t number them and put them on their vans and have issues finding a parcel whilst out on the road.

Me, I number my parcels and I put them on my van in an order that makes it easy to find once I’m out on the road.

Anything I can do to minimise any delays whilst out delivering, I’ll do it!

Once all the parcels have been numbered and loaded on to my van, I’m ready to hit the road.

For me, this is normally anywhere between 9-9:30 am. And it is that specific.

If I’m not out of the depot before 9:30 am, then firstly something has gone wrong in the depo to delay me and most likely other drivers, but also it means that I’m going to be out delivering until gone 7pm, which isn’t great.

It is fine from a customer point of view, as generally after 5:30pm, a lot of people are home and that means I can get a successful parcel delivery, but for me anything after 5:30pm means I’m into a 10.5hr day and that’s just shit!

Don’t get me wrong. If I was to do 12hr days every day, the job would still be paying very good money. But if I can keep each day to around 10.5hrs, then it becomes really very good money and I’m even more happier!

Anyway.

So I leave the depo around 9:30 am and for the next 7-8hrs I’m out delivering parcels.

This is the easiest but also hardest part of the day.

Driving around, listening to music, seeing the world. Delivering parcels to people who are generally happy to receive them, is fucking awesome.

And I’m not understating that. People are generally pretty happy to receive a parcel from you and unless you’re a psycho or a complete wanker, you’ll be happy delivering the parcel to them too.

If you don’t derive some kind of happiness from delivering a parcel, you’re in the wrong job, simple.

The hardest:

Driving around on your own. It’s a lonely job sometimes and this is something some people don’t cope very well with.

I’m led to believe that humans are a social animal (I’m not and love time alone!) and this is at odds with most delivery driving jobs.

Sure, out on the road, especially in the UK, you’re surrounded by other cars and people, but it still feels lonely at times.

Especially with the particular company I work for.

Due to the time slots we offer to customers for delivery of their parcels, you are constantly watching the clock.

If you stop and talk to someone, that is time you could be spending driving to and delivering another parcel.

Yes, it literally is that time sensitive.

Once I leave the depo every single customer who has a parcel being delivered that day receives a notification of some kind that I have a parcel for them.

Most importantly, they receive in that notification a time slot of when I will be delivering.

Easy peasy.

Not so much…

When you get stuck in traffic. Have issues finding a parking space in a packed town centre, or narrow village road with impatient traffic behind you or in front of you.

Or you have an overly chatty customer you’ve just delivered to, who wants to tell you about the funny lump on Tiddles the cats fucking leg!

Or a parcel with a weird address on that you didn’t sort out before leaving the depot.

Etc. etc.

All these things add up throughout the day and I cannot overstate how much I am clock watching. Every. Single. Minute.

That does make it sound pretty stressful. And I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t.

But if you’re the right person, then you find a way of coping with it and making it not stressful, but enjoyable.

If you don’t have the attitude of wanting to do the job, then it will become stressful.

But if you hit everything head on, attack any issues calmly and promptly, then the day runs fine and you shouldn’t get stressed.

And with that, I’ll stop for part 1. Man I can’t believe how much I’ve warbled on pmsl, oh well, it’s been interesting writing all this.

If you want to read part 2, the link is at the bottom below.

Until next time…

WeeMike

An Exciting Well Paid Day in the Life of a 3.5 Tonne Parcel Delivery Driver – Part 2

 

Bad habits creep up.

When I signed up for this new delivery driving job, I said to myself that I’d be happy doing 10-12 hr days, as long as it meant I was earning good money.

Whilst I was learning the job during the first month and then getting used to it the 2nd month I wasn’t worried about my earnings. Now that the 3rd month is over and despite earning some very good money, I’m unsure as to whether I want to continue in the role.

Which is weird because I’m now earning the highest wage I have ever earned in my life. I’m nearing my 40th birthday in a few weeks and these earnings aren’t to be sniffed at. A lot of other people would love to be on what I’m on. Especially other delivery drivers.

I know that this level of earnings is helping pay off my debt quicker than I ever have before. And that within a few years I will be debt free for one of the very few times since I turned 18 and applied for my first credit card.

I know that I’ve got myself into a debt situation that I need to knuckle down and get rid of asap, so that I can have a lifestyle not dictated by what day job I have.

I’ve gotten to know my delivery route pretty well now. I feel confident that I can solve any issues that crop up whilst delivering parcels. And that the more I continue, the easier the job will get and the money will seem even better still.

And yet I still question whether I really want to be in this job.

Ever since I started working on the land 13+ years ago, I realised pretty quickly that it was my calling. That regardless of what it was I was doing, no matter the weather or who I was working with. I loved working outside and on the land.

Ten years came and went and I loved every minute of it.

But then I changed jobs and it took me a while to come to terms with having got myself into a level of debt that meant I could no longer afford to work on the land.

But come to terms with it I did.

Now that the warmer weather is here, I miss it again.

I miss working up a good sweat digging holes and planting things. I miss the aching muscles at the end of every day. I miss the satisfaction of looking at a days work out in the fields.

For sure I enjoy driving around all day in my new job. It makes me feel like I’m doing something different every day, even though it’s the same route day in day out.

I enjoy being in the sunshine all day and the fact that my route is pretty rural and I get to deliver to various farms and farm houses.

But every time I do, I just look at the fields with envy. Wishing I could be out there working on them.

I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to see out this year in this current job. And at least make a very big dent in the size of my debt.

I don’t see myself in this role after this year though. It’s just too all consuming. Two 6 day weeks a month and every day being a 10-12hr day is just too much.

Regardless of what amount of debt I have, I’m pretty sure I’m going to find something else after the year is up.

These last few weeks has been the hardest for some reason, despite me feeling more confident in the role than I ever have.

I’ve allowed myself to become lazy and started making regular excuses to myself as to why I can’t exercise more than once a week or eat healthy the majority of the time.

My diet has gotten pretty bad. Especially the last month or so. I’ve never drunk more coca-cola than in the last month. I’ve never eaten more crisps or chocolate bars than in the last month.

Normally I allow myself the odd chocolate bar, crisps or something junk foody during the week but save up a little binge for the weekend. It’s worked for me for 15+ years but for some reason I’ve stopped it since starting my new job.

It’s come to a head this weekend. Me being ill has helped, so it’s been a perfect time for self pity and wallowing. I’ve consumed about a weeks worth of junk food in 2 days pmsl.

Hey ho, I’m man enough to admit when things aren’t going well and these last few weeks have been pretty bad for me.

At least I’m aware of it. Have now faced it and it’s now time to move on.

It’s time to embrace the long days. Make sure I plan things. I need to do one thing every day weight lifting wise. Get back to eating healthy 80%+ of the time and stop drinking so much coca-cola and start drinking more water again.

Easy really.

Until next time…

WeeMike

 

Weightlifting at last!

Finally managed to finish work early enough to be home for 5pm and I got some weightlifting in, finally! 

Was really excited for some reason lol. Felt like it was Christmas.

Until I got under the bar. 

I decided to start with some 5 rep sets of squats.

I’ll stick with 2.5kg over bodyweight to start with I thought. So I plonked 72.5kg on the bar and holy moly did it feel heavy.

5th rep I was straining, I could feel the veins in my head bulging lol. 

2nd set was strangely easier and 3rd set felt pretty good too.

Guess I just needed to greese the cogs as it were. 

I wanted to do more but thought better of it, we’ll see how my body feels over the next few days lol.

Also did some bent over rows, as I don’t feel I can do any deadlifting until I’m properly back into it. And I stuck with 46.5kg on the bar for 3 sets of 8 for those.

Then I did a 10 rep set of chin ups and finished off with some side raises, because I could lol. 

I’m going to work on a plan this week for the coming few months. And this time I think I’ll put down 15 exercises that I want to do through the week and then when I get home from delivery driving, I can pick a few exercises from the list, according to how tired I am. 

That’s the plan anyway, it working is another thing, we’ll see how my body reacts this week.

Until next time, 

WeeMike

A month goes by, all work no play. No weightlifting either! :(

Blimey, this last month has whizzed by. It’s been great earning a lot more money in my new job, but man it’s been tiring.

I worked 12 days straight during this month and it really whacked me, seeing as though most of the days were 12hr days too.

But now that I’m out the other side as it were, I can look back at a great month for money earning and for learning. I’ve learnt so much about my new job during this last month that I’m really starting to get to grips with it.

I thought that delivery driving was pretty easy, but when there are numerous finding address issues, oversized and overweight parcels, traffic issues, parking issues, customers not being in when they say, customers saying they haven’t received parcels when they have, on top of all the internal procedures I have to follow due to the high value of some of the parcels I deliver and it all adds up to a hell of a lot to learn.

So much more than I thought there would be that’s for sure.

But to make it all that little bit easier, I know that I’m earning nearly 100% more than I was in my previous job. Which is what I’ve been telling myself every day for the last month.

I don’t know for real yet what my actual month to month wage will be because I’ve been on a training wage for this last month, which means my wages have been topped up by the company.

This is one of the reasons why I joined this particular delivery company. Simply because no other delivery company offered this, nor the potential wage earnings either.

I can see that as long as I do my job, I will be able to earn what I’ve been told. But it might mean doing 12hr days five days a week one week, then six days the next week.

If that’s the case then in a few months time, I’ll be re-evaluating whether I want to stay here, as I know that elsewhere I can work much fewer hours for only a little less pay being a HGV driver.

I’ve decided to give this job a good three full months, or until my 40th birthday in July. And then I’ll make a definite decision after that.

I don’t mind doing 10hr days fives days a week, but when it creeps up to 12hrs every day, it starts getting a bit too much, even with the added income.

We’ll see how it goes.

Aside from work, I’ve not had the time nor energy to do much else. Until this weekend that is.

This weekend has been amazing in that I’ve had 3 days off for the first time in months, and have finally been able to get into the garden and do some tinkering with stuff, which has been good.

I’ve played video games, watched plenty of football and generally just lazed around the house and I’m feeling pretty refreshed for all this lazing around, which is great!

One thing I’m not really happy with since starting my new job is not doing any weight lifting what so ever.

Lifting 100-200 parcels of varying weights from 1kg to 35kg every single day really does tire you out more than you think.

Most evenings for the last month, I’ve got home feeling drained and physically exhausted.

I did a tiny amount of exercise for a few days over the first few weeks, but since then I’ve been so whacked physically every evening, I’ve just not felt like lifting anything other than my fork to shove food in my mouth!

One bonus of being so active in my new job is that my belly fat from Christmas has well and truly gone now, which reminds me, I need to take some measurements tomorrow morning.

Due to the lack of weight lifting, my lovely muscles have shrunk too, most noticeably in my back and chest.

Anyway, I’m not too worried, I know I can put the muscle back on soon enough, I just need to start lifting a little every other night and my body will soon adjust and I’ll be back working out properly a few times a week soon enough.

I do need to eat more food though to gain any muscle, as I think I’ve found the balance of what I’ve been eating to what I’ve been doing physically each day. But now that I want to start lifting weights again, I’ll need to add in some more food somewhere in the day.

I don’t feel hungry first thing in the mornings, so I’m still having my protein raw milkshakes, and then when I’m out driving, I take a small lunch with me as I don’t feel hungry whilst out delivering either.

So I need to come home, do some form of weight lifting and then shove a load of food in my face as I definitely feel hungry in the evenings. Well, as long as I’m home before 8 pm that is.

I start at 7 am and have been getting home mostly around 6-7pm. But some nights I get home gone 8 pm and just don’t feel hungry at all. I look back on the day and think to myself, I’ve literally had fuck all to eat, how am I not hungry?

Then I look in the mirror and at my physique and understand why. My body has been feeding on the excess body fat I’ve had, as well as the muscle.

So I need to sort out the weight lifting and the eating now that I’ve gotten used to the job physically.

Oh man. There was me thinking I’d gotten through the tiring days. The next month is going to be a right bitch.

Oh well, suck it butter cup!

Until next time…

WeeMike

New job, new beginnings and all that.

Not posted a diary entry for a whole month. Not felt the desire to write anything down, it’s been a productive month though, I’ve finally got a new job, whoop!

Ironically it’s not a HGV driving job, but it is a local delivery driving job, Well, I say local. The company is local, but the delivering isn’t, but that’s fine. As long as I can get to work within 10 minutes then I’m well happy.

I actually applied for the driving role before I got my HGV license, but then forgot about it as I was informed that they weren’t recruiting any more drivers at the moment.

Then out of the blue in the middle of Feb I received a phone call asking if I wanted to come in for a chat and then within two weeks I was accepted for the role and I’ve just finished two weeks of my five weeks of training.

I won’t name the company I’m working for, but anyone who has been or is a delivery driver in the UK will probably know who it is, or will realise who it is most likely in future posts.

I’m still training. And whilst I’m training it’s difficult to fully evaluate the role as my wage is subsidised by the company. But from what other drivers who get on with the job have told me, it is a very good wage, you just have to be a hard worker and get on with it.

I’ve just completed two weeks of classroom training, learning about the company, it’s procedures and it’s future aims etc. Plus I had a few days out with a driver to watch how it’s all done, then I had 3 days out delivering some parcels myself.

It’s been a steep learning curve, but a good one and now I’m eager to get going on my own route so I can get to know the area’s and then quicken up my delivery times so I can deliver more and hopefully get paid more!

I’ve read some negative comments about the company online and from what I’ve experienced so far, a lot of it is from ex-drivers who don’t want to put the effort into the role.

Sure it’s hard work, but any delivery driving role will normally be a 10-12hr day, five days a week, sometimes a sixth or seventh day too, but the difference with this one is that you get paid very well for it.

They don’t expect the drivers to work seven days, but they do expect you to do some six day weeks, which is fine by me. I want a job that I can earn enough to pay off my debt. Once that’s done I’ll go from there.

Until that time, I want the work and I’m happy to work six 10-12hr days a week for it.

At the end of the day, there are a lot of people who work longer hours and for less pay than I should be getting. I say should, because I don’t know I can definitely earn what I want yet, I might be shit at my job and have to find another one pmsl.

Enough of that, lets see how my first week out on my own route goes next week!

The last month has been great sleep and health wise. It’s amazing how great I feel energy wise and mentally too.

Getting regular 6+ hrs of sleep, during the night, in one stint has enabled me to start feeling healthy again. I’ve been eating proper meals, not snacking on crap and overall I can feel my body and mind thanking me for it every day now.

I’ve not got back into a regular fitness routine yet, but I’ve made sure to keep pretty active and do something bodyweight wise every day.

Yesterday was the first time this year that I’ve touched a weight. And I just did a simple lightweight ten rep set of 50kg squats, along with some chin ups and some push ups and I felt great doing it.

I’m going to gradually increase what I do weight wise whilst I’m learning my new delivery route over the next 3 weeks and by then I should be back to some decent weights and workouts and really start to feel like my old self again.

If only I’d changed jobs sooner!

Until next time…

WeeMike

Wednesday musings

I made the decision to wake up an hour after my partner this morning.

She got up at 6 am to go for a run on the treadmill. And I decided that even though I don’t have a job, I should start waking up at the time I probably will once I do.

Create a routine an all.

So I was awake at 7 am and up and ready for the day by 8 am. Which was the earliest for a few weeks.

I decided to hit some household choirs head on as I’d been putting the off for a week.

The main choir being cleaning the oven.

That took me most of the morning. We use it a lot as we like to cook proper foods and we rarely eat ready meals.

We both need to get into the habit of giving it a more regular wipe down.

Then I did the hoovering and felt some weird sense of accomplishment at the house having a clean floor.

Had some lunch and then arranged another job interview for tomorrow. This time with a local delivery company, so fingers crossed that turns out positive as I’d prefer to work locally.

Now I’m spending a few hours this afternoon reading. One thing I read that stuck out for me was this… 2 Mental Shifts.

I’ve always worked for the business I work at and not just for myself. From memory, I’ve always been one of the first people to take on more work when needed. To stay later/work extra days if needed or even help others with their tasks when not asked if I can see they’re running late or could just do with a hand.

Not because I enjoy being praised, but because I know that everything that everyone does or doesn’t do, effects the company. And ultimately as an employee it’s in my interest that everyone in the company and the actual company it self, does well.

Without a doubt looking at a lot of people that are unhappy in their job, one of the main reasons is that they don’t go that extra mile for the company or their fellow worker. They do it for praise and/or a promotion/raise.

I couldn’t care less about gaining promotions or praise. Sure I like to be told every now and again that I’ve done a good job. But I’m an adult, I know I’ve done a good job when the job has been completed as required and because I’ve done it.

If I’ve been asked to do a job, I’ll do it as best I can, as quick as time allows and I’ll go the extra mile if needed without being asked. Because I like to do a good job. Not because I want to please my bosses, I’ve generally worked in customer facing roles so the only people that need pleasing are customers.

From experience, I know this gives me browny points with bosses or puts me in their good books and sure I’ve used this in the past too and been able to get days off at short notice or more favourable jobs rather than a mundane task.

But that is never the reason I do a good job. I do a good job because I enjoy doing a good job and want a customer to have a good experience of the company they are dealing with. Why bother doing something if you’re not going to do it to the best of your abilities?

Huh. Wednesday musings turned into something else. That’s enough of that.

Time for some more activity me thinks, bodyweight only, 3 rounds of push ups, squats and chin ups is good enough right now.

Until next time…

WeeMike