Multiply 365 Day 222 - The grind

 

We have our first victim. I missed volleyball tonight because of work. Well technically it wasn't entirely because of work I did get home in time to go, though I would literally have had enough time to shower and change and then run right back out the door.

It all started relatively easily enough, I got into work and the first truck, Pepsi, was getting ready to unload as I got in the door. Even better was the fact they sent a palette truck as opposed to a side loader. The difference between the two is with a palette truck there is just one door in the back, and usually they have a motorized dolley inside, much like a forklift. This makes unloading much easier, as the order is pre sorted at the bottling plant and loaded onto palettes and each pallete can hold about 50 cases of product. When you are getting orders of 200+ cases, a palette is a nice thing to work with. A side loader has instead, a bunch of doors on the side and the driver has to open each bay and pull the required product, it is sorted on the truck by type, not by order. Worse, all the driver has is a hand dolley, so he is unloading at most ten cases at a time. Usually that is what they send us and it makes unloading a pain. But today was off to a good start, the order went pretty quickly and we actually got it put away in the basement in less than an hour.

I got a few coolers done when they had Sammy do a bank run for the Universal News. This is nothing new, they usually call him to get the change for that store because they are usually shorthanded early in the morning. Of course while he is away I get my second truck, Arizona Tea, but it is pretty small, so I am still doing quite well time wise. By 11am I have both trucks in house and checked in, the Pepsi order (213 cases) put away and I go to drop the Arizona invoice on my desk to be broken down later. Sammy has made it back from the bank and all is going swimmingly. I finish a fourth cooler and tell Sammy I am going to go put in the grocery order for Universal, but before I can I am handed a cigarette order for one of the people that orders through us. No problem, but I haven't even had time to connect my laptop yet, so I get it all hooked up, find the file for cigarette orders and type it in, then call the order in, gather my things and head to Universal, thinking at least I have four coolers done, if Sammy can get a couple done in my absence we will be in good shape.

But it doesn't work that way. Because of another fucking call off, Sammy gets pulled into working the deli, and from there the wheels just proceed to fall off the wagon. I get back, there is still a ton of stuff to do, and then Ed starts piling on the projects. Make sure the new deli signs get posted outside. Run to 7-11 and CVS and see what they are charging for 20 oz bottles of soda. Check the company email and see if our deliveries are scheduled to arrive. Find the number for the Pittsburgh Post Gazette circulation department. Wait, we are charging .10 less a bottle than 7-11 for soda? Change the prices on all of the 20 oz, Pepsi and Coke products we carry. Fix the Frito – Lay rack, it looks like a mess.

By the way, is that grocery order for us done yet?

I had finally gotten most of that stuff done as the clock was nearing 4pm, an hour after I should have been done, but still soon enough to probably sneak in a quick bite at home (I was working on two cups of coffee and three Reese Peanut Butter Chips Ahoy Cookies all day) and just as I was packing my things up in the office, the dreaded Pricemaster order Ed has been warning me about arrived. Now had this been a normal vendor I would have refused the delivery and told them to come back tomorrow, but since it wasn't I was fucked. I had to stay and at least catch that order as it came in as well. So by the time I got out of work and finally caught a bus home it was 5pm, till I got in the door it was a quarter after 5 and for me to get to volleyball on time and have some time to loosen up I would have had to leave my place no later than 6pm. It was just a little too much running around for my tastes, so I passed and opted instead to just stay in tonight and make something to eat. I will be so happy in three days, when I can finally have a day to just step away from all of this. It is really starting to wear on me now.

Multiply 365 Day 221 - Adrenaline anti-rush

 

I think I am finally starting to lose my momentum a little bit. I still have three days left out of 20 in a row at work and while I did get a boost with the removal of Curtis this past weekend, I am thinking the buzz is starting to wear off a bit. Not that we have been shorthanded, at least my crew hasn't been. Last Friday Ed had hired Sammy's son, Shane, and put him on my crew. He has been training with Sammy and I for most of his first week and has been doing a better job than I would initially have expected. Not that anything we do is all that complicated, well some of the stuff I do may be a little more complicated, but the stuff that my crew is asked to do isn't all that mind challenging of work, more labor intensive than anything else. And Shane seems like a good worker in that regard.

Tomorrow will be the big test, we have a Pepsi truck coming in, the first one Shane has ever experienced. 236 cases on it, a baby order for Sammy and I, and with three people it will be even easier, but still to the untrained it will seem and feel like a lot of work. I guess technically it is, I just don't dwell on it that much. Once you get used to catching a couple hundred cases every week, you almost become numb to the process.

As long as my crew remains reliable and doesn't shy away from work, I am sitting in the cat bird seat. Again today there was at least one call off upstairs, and as I was leaving around 3:30, one of the 3pm crew still hadn't arrived yet. I am not sure how Ed tolerates it at this point. I would be all kinds of “off with their heads” and just bringing in new people. I know it would leave us short handed in the short term, but if they aren't there, then we are short handed anyway, so there is no benefit to keeping a name on the schedule when there is no better than a coin's flip of a chance that they will actually show up. Sorry, you just can't run a business that way. Not that any of us have the greatest jobs on the planet, but if you dislike it that much, then leave.

I did get to talk to Dee today. She is still in Florida, doing some work for Ed on the how to's behind setting up a pawn shop from one of his business contacts down there. I guess she is just doing an eyes and ears sort of thing, watching what the guy does, asking the relevant questions, etc. But she was talking to Ed today and Ed's hearing being what it was, he put me on the phone to get the relevant information (she needed another copy of a pawn broker's license printed up) and then I handed the phone to Ed. No harm, no foul, right? Ed starts talking to Dee again and the next thing I hear, Ed is saying “Dee says she misses you Matt”. Now I am not reading anything into this at all, I have firmly established that that avenue leads nowhere, but it still twisted the dagger just a tad. Unintentionally I am sure, so I shot back, “Yeah, I have that effect on women.” Then I said I miss her too and went back to my work, which I think at the time was finding grocery wholesalers for Ed to buy more stuff from. I swear the man shops like a woman some times. I already know that we are expecting a very large order from Pricemaster, another wholesaler he deals with. By the way he has been talking about it, it is going to be a very large order, and all of it is going to be unmarked, so I can see just hours of rearranging the stock room to make room for this order, followed by hours of hand tagging each item in the order itself.

Well I am off to get some sleep. 17 days down and only three to go, but one of which I double up with volleyball tomorrow night. On the plus side I am celebrating the end of this run (and the demise of Curtis) with a breakfast sundae at Deluca's Saturday morning. A banana split on a Belgian waffle sounds really good right now.

Multiply 365 Day 220 - Pandorarama

 

“On A Carousel” The Hollies

Yes Pandora is on again, and I am listening. The station is always in need of some tweaking and given my choice this evening is either blog or write a prison letter, Pandora can be on for either. And given you are reading this, obviously it isn't the prison letter. Then again, knowing some of the company I keep, it may be the last thing they read before a visit to the pokey.

Why do they call it the pokey anyway? I mean, sure, if you bend over you may get a pokey in there, but where the hell did that name come from anyway?

“Immigrant Song” Led Zeppelin (skip) – Sorry, my station plays too much LZ for my tastes. Besides, I can find about three different local radio stations that will play that.

The latest installment in the Batman movie series has been filming here for a while now. Last week they were in my section of town, filming over by the Cathedral of Learning then on Saturday they were filming at Heinz Field. Now they are downtown shooting for at least this week and maybe into next (I have a schedule on my desk at work but haven't really read it) and by the looks of things we will be unaffected. Plenty of street closings, but not for us at Smithfield News. Not that we would close anyway, we were open for the G20 summit after all, when nobody could even park downtown lest they be presumed to be a terrorist. But we will be open regardless.

“White Room” Cream (skip) – No, just no. This isn't the 60s and I am not a fucking hippie.

“Wild Horses” The Sundays – Much, much better. A better song, sung by a woman who I still say I would marry just for her voice alone.

Not that I am all kind of excited for the filming, I mean I am glad they are shooting here, maybe the city will make a shekel or two despite itself, but I am not one of those celebrity stalker type people. If I saw Christian Bale, I would be just as inclined to ask him if he beat his girlfriend recently as opposed to wanting to strike up any sort of legitimate conversation.

“Criminal” Fiona Apple – Maybe I should be working on the prison letter.

Yeah, things are weird like that. I am still in a good mood. Curtis's demise has brought just the right infusion of motivation and glee to my work that getting through the last week of this three week marathon isn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. I really expected to be dragging at this point and just dreading going into work, but it hasn't been that bad. I did get busted for forgetting to order a couple of things at work for Monday, but it happens, I owned it and it kept me from getting yelled at. Just simply owning the mistake and moving on. Fighting over it isn't going to make it any better, so might as well just admit the faux paus and continue on my merry way. I just hope I didn't forget anything today, but given I was being pulled in a few different directions while I was trying to do the order, it is possible an item or three slipped through the cracks again.

“Sunny Road” Emily Torrini – (skip) WTF? Is this like a coffeehouse or something? That is just suck and more suck right there.

“Everlong” Foo Fighters - Thank god, I thought I was going to be stuck in a chick loop there for a second.

This just in, the Pittsburgh Pirates still suck. Well, I guess I shouldn't be too harsh, they were in first place as late as July year, but after a winless homestand (0-8, the worst homestand in the franchise's 120+ year history) they now find themselves 5 games under .500 and there exists the very real possibility they will extend their consecutive losing season streak to 19 straight years. On the plus side, they did make a couple of moves at the trade deadline, moves that may help the franchise in the future but even if they don't the team didn't mortgage their future by making them. No high level prospects were traded away in an effort to win at all costs right now.

“Lil Devil” The Cult – Not my favorite Cult song, and had I not had to waste skips on songs like “Sunny Road” I might have skipped this but I am a cheap ass Pandora user, so I have to use some descretion in handing out my limited number of skips per hour. I will sit through this before listening to Emily get in touch with her feelings.

Friday starts football season, at least here in Pittsburgh with the Steelers first preseason game. My season starts on Sunday with the first of three fantasy football drafts this year.

“Sea of Sorrow” Alice in Chains – Nothing witty here, sorry.

My first draft will be with some people I met on Facebook while playing the Madden Superstars app. A bunch of us that are in a group to help each other with the game (gifts, hints, tips, etc) are doing a league on NFL.com. The second will be Jade's league here on Multiply and my last one will be the one people familiar with my fantasy football postings are all too used to, that being my bar league. I need to rebound after last year's third place finish but honestly I haven't done any homework yet. I don't even know who drafted whom and am only vaguely aware of the bigger name players that shifted teams during the off season. So I have my work cut out for me starting this weekend in getting myself all caught up on things fantasy football related.

“Crackerman” Stone Temple Pilots (skip) – Okay, enough of the mediocre songs by bands that I can tolerate. I went above and beyond Spiderman on Family Guy (everybody gets one) by letting two slip through, not a third. Sorry.

“Clocks” Coldplay – Serviceable enough.

I just got a crack out of my neck. That is a good thing. It means I am relaxing. Usually if I move my neck to the right and then to the left, if after the move to the left I get at least one pop then my back and neck are loosening up somewhat. Then again, I am not at work, I am just sitting here typing with my cigarettes and my Mountain Dew both right beside me, so this is about as low key as it gets around these parts. I am not even all that worried about what I write on the page this evening. There was once again no plan, which is why I am posting my Pandora songs as they come up. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. Can't be any worse than yesterday's blog, which I though was witty and informative and was met with an almost collective yawn.

“Marching On” The Alarm (skip) – I like some of their stuff, this isn't one of them though. I'll pass.

“Let Go” Frou Frou (skip) – More coffeehouse crap. You may like this, you may even be able to purchase this at Starbucks while buying your Venti sized Double Honey Nut Mocha Suck, but I will settle for my corner store coffee for $1.25 without the added female whininess in the background, thank you very much.

“Every Day Is Like Sunday” The Pretenders – An okay cover, not great but not bad.

I think I will quit blogging when I run out of skips. Not that I will throw songs away just to get done faster but it would seem to be an almost natural stopping point this evening. If I am gong to make Pandora a focal point of this blog then it would only be appropriate that I stop blogging when I stop listening. Not that it is always the case, usually just the opposite actually, I stop listening after I finish blogging and not vice versa.

“Joy” The Sundays – More Harriet Wheeler goodness. She could come up behind me and whisper in my ear “Matt, you are a disgusting pig” and her voice would still be super sexy.

I should call my mom at some point, I don't think I have called home in about a month or so, the last time was the week before the family reunion, which I didn't attend. Nor did I get much feedback on how it went. I hope it went well, but if not I am not sure I want to know that either. Ignorance is indeed bliss. And as I titled a blog entry before, non ignorance is non bliss. The only thing I missed out on was that those of us that get together for Christmas were supposed to exchange names, and I wasn't there for it. I asked for my name to be put in and just have someone draw for me, but I still don't know if that even took place or if it did whose name I got.

“What I Am” Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians – Not bad. I have heard worse this evening.

But by not skipping this song that means I have to come up with more shit to say. Damn it. Where is that “Get out of blogging free” card when I need it? I could be in my kitchen making a cajun chicken sandwich right now, instead I am forced to type even more. And the longer this goes there exists a chance that I could end up earning more skips by listening too long. And I could really use a good cajun chicken sandwich right now, because the last two I had both kinda sucked, in that they weren't cajun at all. Yeah, that can be a problem.

“Breathe In” Frou Frou (skip) – Apparently they didn't learn from the last one I disliked, they went to the suck well a second time.

And it was my last skip. So I guess I am done, but I can't stop in mid saga like that. So I guess I will finish with my last two cajun chicken sandwiches and then call it a night. The first of the two was last Saturday at the Squirrel Cage. I had stopped in after a 6 hour tour at work and caught the right bus to go there. I had made a little deal with myself at the bus stop, if the next bus was a 61 (A, B, C or D) I would go to the Cage, if it was a 71 (A, B, C) or 500 then I would just go home. It was a 61A, so I went to the Cage and ordered my cajun chicken and fries with iced tea. Instead I got a breaded chicken sandwich with lettuce, tomato and mayo. I gave them a pass though, because it isn't often they screw up my order, the iced was delish and the fries are just to die for. Plus I like the older lady that bartends and waits tables there on Saturday afternoon. I don't go there too often, maybe 8-10 times a year and she always knows to have the iced tea at the ready (I do switch the sandwich order from time to time). So it's all good.

The second was last night when I sat down to blog, I placed an order with the South Aiken Bar and Grill online and waited for my food to arrive. Unlike the Cage, even if I wanted to send this back, it would have been a huge hassle to have the driver come back, pick up my incorrect sandwich (it was a plain chick breast , not my cajun chicken, on white bread that looked like bad store bought bread) take it back, bring a new one and now I am into a two hour wait just to get the dinner I ordered. And this isn't the first time they have fucked up an order of mine, so they get no more chances. I will take my business elsewhere than that establishment.

There, cajun chicken story done unless of course I order another some place and they too fuck it up. But for now I think I will go make my own. I am hungry after all. And there are no skips on dinner at my place.