Hullo All,
Just looking back through and I found this thread. I retired officially back in 2003, I then did a bit longer with the Company that I was Sub Contracting for another year to be exact. I was in the Office one day collecting my delivery notes, when a young upstart waiting behind me started giving me a lot of old lip. “Come on you old ■■■■ get a move on, you’ve got the best job in the world you have, it’s not any wonder we can’t get the good jobs because you always get them”. That did it, I turned round and said to him, OK son do you wan’t my job, because if you do you can have it. He was a bit taken aback by this and said I don’t have a Motor to do it with. No problem there son, just hold on a moment. I got on the phone immediately to a bloke that I knew because he had been pestering me for some time to sell him my Motor. Do you still want to buy my Motor I asked, well he said I would like it but I have no work at the moment for it. No problem, I have Driver here with me now, he wants my job, I’m here in the Office and can arrange that this Motor stays on this job. It pays well five days a week and every night at home. OK he said I’ll come round tonight and do the deal. So this bloke got the Motor, the kid got my job, I got a few bob in my pocket and started my retirement.
My Wife had died the year previously and I was living on my own, so I thought I know what I’ll do, I’ll go off anywhere to have a good holiday. Then another young man that had been doing the same job as me but for another firm, rang me up one day and said, have you decided where you’re going on your travels. No I said, why do you want to come with me ? No but my Mother said if you like she will. Well I went down to see his Mother, actually her first Husband had been a mate of mine a long time ago, an ex Middle East man in fact it was him that introduced me to Whittles. Anyway we made some travel plans and off we went, I had an open top 350SL Mercedes at that time, so we decided to tour Spain and Portugal, it was the first time that I’d ever been to Portugal and I loved it it was just beautiful. We came back home, we had about nine months together but it was getting boring so I decided that I needed to be off again. I had all the time we were back at home been working again, this time for a local Haulage Company running frozen foods from Malton to Maltby, a good easy little job with good money, so I still was’nt touching my pension money. Well having decided to go off again on a trip I bought a second hand Hymer Motorhome from Germany, chucked some bedding in it and off I went. First stop Portugal, fantastic. I found a very good Campsite near to Estoril/Cascais and parked up. It was such a nice place that I never Moved for four and a half months. During this time I went to a Camping Exibition in Lisbon and saw some really beautiful prefab Bungalows for sale, so talking to the Salesman I said I would like one but that I did’nt like their inside layout. OK that’s not a problem he said, you give us a plan of what you want and we will build it. So I did, I then spoke to the Management of the Campsite and they gave me a site which turned out to be the very best position of any on the site. I lived in this wonderful place for six month each year for two years. The other six months of each year I was still working for the Haulage Company in Malton. On my third year there and on one of my trips into the city of Lisbon, I met up with a lovely little lady from São Paulo in Brasil. We started to see each other, then we used to call each other by phone when she went back to Brasil. She came over to England, I went over to Brasil, it was great and we decided we would spend a lot our time just travelling. I was still working at weekends for the old Haulage Company when we were in England. Then they had Money Troubles, not of their own doing but because their biggest customer left Malton to go to the West Riding, and there other big customer went with a Haulage Company from York. So they sold their Yard and Workshop in Malton and moved up to Middlesbrough and bought a Yard and Wharehouse there. We had decided that on this year we would go to China, Australia, New Zealand, Chile and Brasil. So off we went and we had a really fantastic time on our trip, especially Australia and New Zealand. When we got back and I went into work, I just could’nt believe it, where before there had only been one Brother in the Office and one Brother in the Garage, there was now one Brother in his own little Office and a big Office with nine men In it. Then one Brother in the corner of the Wharehouse, with an assistant doing the Garage work. Well I now really understood how much the job has changed. Nine richardheads in an Office, none of them had a clue trying to run the Haulage, between them they lost the work at Asda and the work at Tesco’s and were left with only the Container work from Teesport. I fell right out with a ■■■■ called Nattress and then I also fell out with his either Wife of Daughter another ■■■■■ So that’s when I said to myself enough is enough. I still have my license, but I may not renew it again this next time when I get home. I’m seventy four now. This last time away we have been to Thailand, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina, Paraguay and Brasil. When we come back to England for this Summer we are we decided going by Ship, from Santos to Buzios, and Salvador do Bahia in Brasil, then to Madeira, Malaga, Palermo, Malta and Venice, then fly to London.
I am thoroughly enjoying my retirement years, if only I had known it was as good as this I’d have done it years ago. Long may it last.
Cheers, Archie.
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