Well what a day that was. The start was re-arranged for 4am - not a problem. When I got there I was told I was going to Poole, not Chertsey - so bang goes all those pages from multi-map I printed out! Another driver was assigned to sort me out. He showed me the reams of paper work and explained it all to me. Then off to get the truck. Turns out is was an old Man truck with tail lift and refrigerated section. He checked I knew how to do that tail and gave me a couple of tips. Looking inside, he thought the load was a bit dodgy, so we got a couple of empty pallets to stop things moving around so much - and he noticed that there wasn’t a pallet truck on it! SO we got one of those sorted and I was off - leaving at 5am. I had 4 assigned drops, plus an additional plus a pick up on the way home.
I arrived at the first drop - a burger king. The driver had warned me that I would have to reverse down a dead-end along a narrow road with a sharp corner. However, I actually managed to get in the road without realising it was it!! There was no room to turn, so I had to back all the way out, turn around and then back in again. I got the first pallet off and then realised two things…1) There was no way a pallet was going to fit past the car parked at the loading entrance and 2) It was only an ordinary door, then a corridor to the kitchen. Therefore EVERYTHING would have to be hand-balled. So after two pallets, plus four dollys with bread I was knackered. It was then that I realised that they had a pallet of frozen as well. I had a look, and there was no way without unloading half the lorry that I would be able to lift the insulation barrier to get at the pallet, Therefore, the entire pallet had to be handballed from the side door - about 50 boxes, one at a time. I managed to persuade BK that I needed a hand so one of their guys helped - it would have taken another hour by myself.
As I was finishing, my TRansport office rang BK to find if I was there - i had left the mobile in the cab. “Do you know you are late?” “Err yes” “ETA on next drop?” “Dunno, how far is it?” I asked the BK man, and he said 10 mins if you know where it is. “30 minutes” I said.
In fact I got there in just over 10, another BK. I had to drive towards the drive-thru and then turn in the nearly empty car park (thank goodness) and then park up. Fortunately on this drop, i was able to drag pallets right to their back door and they then unloaded them. Even so, I had to re-arrange the truck to get at one of the frozen pallets. As I finished this drop, I was at 4.5 hours driving so had to take 30 mins (15 taken on the way down). Customer services were then on at me to re-arrange the order of the drops. I agreed as it wasn’t too far but pointed out I would have to go out of Poole and then find my way back in again.
I managed to find it, a small pub - but once again, everything was hand-balled. Time was slipping more and more. I then got to the 4th drop. Another pub and everything had to be carted thru some narrow corridors. The landlord offered me a sack truck - there hadn’t been one on the truck 
When I got to do dealing with his split pallet of frozen, I realised that his load for the ‘Red Lion’ was shared with another pub called ’ The red lion’!! Great. SO we had to check product codes and descriptions and check them against the invoice - so that too ages as well.
I finally arrived at my last drop, the landlady was spitting teeth - although not at me. I apologised straight off and was friendly. It turned out that the latest she had ever had a delivery before was 1:30pm…I arrived at 4:40pm!!! It was a small drop and everything on the truck was hers so no sorting out to do. I then headed towards the pickup. I then realised that I was running out of hours. I spoke to my agancy and he said head home 'cos your’e not gonna make it otherwise and he called my client. It took an age to get to the M27 and then there were signs of an accident on the M3. I called again and we decided that I wouldn’t make it. I was going to wait at Sutton Scotney for recovery - in the end I made it to Chievely and parked up.
I had to sit around waiting for a man in a van to arrive. When he did, we swapped and I drove the van back to base and he took the truck. I sorted out paperwork etc and clocked out of the building at…10pm - 18 hours after I arrived 
I got home at 11 and had a curry and went to bed. I turned down work for today cos I am shattered. I feel as though I have the flu as my body aches so much - I will not be working for that particular customer again as apparently it happens all the time. My agent said he drove for them once and one drop took 2 1/2 hours and the paperwork said he should have done another 3 drops!
I had checked my paper work, and the delivery slot for my last drop said 10am-11:15am and I got there just before 5pm!!! Now a more experience driver could have done most aspects of the job quicker - but not THAT much quicker.
Well, my TomTom arrived today, I tested it and it is FAB. Tomorrow I am out doing some duoble manned multi-drop - I hope it is better cos yesterday was miserable. However the driving was ace 
) tomorrow.
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