the day that would not end

Remember how I was all wistful about R5. Yeah, well, that was when I thought I wouldn’t be doing it for a while.

So, I was working R5 today and it was an exercise in frustration. One of the regular carriers was gaming the matrix [that’s the system which determines who works what route using seniority and route assignment preferences] so he could get an extra day off on Saturday. The result of his shenanigans is that Doug (who I sub for) agreed to work Saturday and so I’m relegated to routes 8 and 9, which means a much shorter day, and therefore a lot less pay, for me. Plus, Jim Regular’s new sub did the route on Saturday and left me five feet of mail to case, that’s what I saw when I got in this morning. Then there were the flats. Lots of flats. I took over 30 feet of mail (not counting parcels) to the street. Not a record on R5, but having to case almost 30 of those feet in one morning might be.

Out on the route, it seemed I went slower with each passing hour. I can usually deliver R5 in about 3 hours plus a few minutes (on a Monday). It took my almost 4 hours today. I think two of those hours were spent on the last 50 boxes. No, that’s an exaggeration, it just felt that way.

Even so, the day that would not end eventually did. Now I get to do it all again on Tuesday (Jim Regular called me today and said he has “stuff to do” tomorrow). File this under “be careful what you pray for.”

 

P.S. — one good thing about today. The schedule for next week and the week after was posted, and there’s a whole row of x’s next to my name for the second week, meaning that my vacation (at least the first half of it) has now been publicly displayed. Still no signed leave slip, but this is almost as good.