The Work Situation

The last few months I have felt as though I was engaged in an epic battle against a life of indentured servitude to the man. For 11.5 years now I have grunted, and sweated my life away to move all of your packages in a never-ending game of Tetris. I never really minded it for most of that time. It really isn't a bad job. It could be much worse anyway. For reasons that are too complex to explain any more, I was always content to stay in my safe position. It seemed like the right thing to do. And I always felt I could escape at any time I wished. No one told me that the Recession was coming.

So then, when I found myself feeling less content with my station in life, I found that there was nowhere else to go. Nobody has been promoted within the giant corporation I work for in quite some time. As people start to retire, or leave the company, those positions are not filled. Cut backs have been the buzz word around town. Nevertheless, I was determined to squeeze my way up the ladder, and this is how it has progressed:

Last fall, the Human Resources manager informed me that they had lost the paperwork documenting my qualification to be a driver. Therefore, I would have to take the class again. Why not? I queried. It's forty hours of paid training to sit in a room and do nothing but watch videos. Sounds perfectly reasonable to me. I do get bored quite easily, but I will never say no to getting paid to be bored. So I did it.

Once I became re-certified to be a driver, I was returned to my regular job of playing extreme tetris, for a guaranteed 17.5 hours a week. I continued to harass the human resources personnel to make sure my paperwork was not lost again. I also continued to harass the Wasatch management about whether or not they were going to need utility drivers for the christmas season. They kept on telling me that it would happen soon.

Meanwhile, I applied for 2 full-time openings that appeared on the communal bulletin boards.

Sometime right after Thanksgiving, I received a call from the Wasatch Center informing me that I was to be immediately trained on the road. It would seem, to use old man Rob's terminology, that I was about to be given my very own starship. I was elated, and equally terrified. Everyone started coming out of the woodwork to tell me that it had been nice knowing me, and that they thought I was very stupid, but it was my funeral.

Let me digress to explain something about the attitude of UPS "hub rats". Although UPS drivers get paid substantially more than employees of the hub, and get to work during the daytime, and get to see the sunlight, and get to talk to real people, and don't have several supervisors literally breathing down their neck every moment of working time, and get treated generally with respect, It is the belief of most hub rats that being a driver is so completely horrifying that it is better to work double shifts in the black of night for half the pay. The hub is filled with horror stories of what will happen to you if you dare to leave behind your rusty cage and strive for something better. It is noble to stay down there at the bottom where you have no real responsibility.

So I was apprehensive about it. I had been listening to this propaganda for more than 11 years. Nevertheless, I could not stand the thought of another year down in that cesspool of humanity.

By the time I started training to drive I got a call from Human Resources informing me that I had won the bid for a full-time hub job. I told the Wasatch management and they said they would convince the hub to let me stay on as a utility driver until Christmas so that they wouldn't have to start training someone else.

For two of the most grueling days of my life I was trained in Park City. I don't want to talk about that. But then I was put on what would be my utility route for the remainder of the peak season: Cottonwood Heights. The first couple of days of that did not go smoothly, but my mind was working on solutions to my hundreds of daily problems. The next day I would do things a little differently, a little faster. Pretty soon I knew exactly where I needed to be all the time, and I was getting done early. And just as it was getting really good, they assigned me a driver helper. Pretty soon, I was letting him do all the grunt work, while I was spending my time organizing and figuring out how to get everything done even faster. It was beautiful.

I would come back to the hub with my empty truck, long before I needed to be there. The management would scratch their heads and wonder why I could figure it out so easily, and the other utility drivers could not. I got my ass severely kissed on several occasions. It seems that if you do your job as a driver, people like you for it. In the hub, a person who does their job is merely given another job to do on top of the first one. Those who do not do their jobs, on the other hand, are given an easier job.

Alas, Christmas arrived, my loyal helper Jake and I said our tearful farewells after all that we had seen, and it was back to the hub for me. The Wasatch people begged me to stay on Utility. I told them I could not do that because Utility gets no work after New Year's. And although I hated the hub more than ever, after my 4 week escape, I need the guaranteed 40 hours that my new full-time job would afford me.

The bitter hub rats were immediately all over me to tell me how stupid I was once again. They informed me that if I took the full-time gig I wouldn't be able to go driving for a year, and I would screw myself all around. I should just be smart and stay part-time yet again, like a good hub rat. I was vexed. I consulted the union people. They told me the same thing. Now I was very vexed, but I tend to distrust the union, so I initiated a nearly two week, epic struggle to get answers from the human resources. The human resources people are slow to tell you anything, but they never lie. Eventually I found out from them that everyone else was full of bull, and if I officially accepted the full-time position I could still become a driver the very next day if a position became available.

Let me digress again to explain something about unions. They are completely retarded, and will constantly tell you that they are there for you, even while they beat you over the head with a club, steal all your money, and your clothes. Then they will leave you to die on the side of the road, and when you manage to survive they will come back and tell you that it's the management that screwed you over in the first place, and ask you to give them more money. I have always been treated fairly by UPS. I can't say the same about the union. They have never done anything for me as far as I can tell. The signature at the bottom of my paycheck is not Jimmy Hoffa Jr.

So I became full-time. Thus began an epic game of musical jobs. The first day I was told I was doing the same job I always did: pink belt loader. A couple of days later I was told I was the pink belt irreg sweep. Then I became the west wall irreg sweep. Then I became a blue belt loader. Then I became the west wall sweep. Then I became the purple belt sweep. Then I became the irreg belt sweep. Then I became officially a member of the irreg belt, but spent most nights sweeping the west wall anyway. Some days I was told I didn't really have a job, and I should just "look busy", which is not as easy as you might think. I spent some good time playing solitaire on my phone in the restroom on a couple of nights. Then they certified me to pull the irreg trains, and that pretty much brings us up to the current situation.

Being a full-time hub rat is the worst job I have ever experienced. That's the short version of the story. I hate it every minute. I pass the time by thinking evil thoughts, and conspiring in the shadows with other dark minions. Every day I feel I become weaker, and more mean-spirited. The full-time jobs are known as "combo" jobs, but are often referred to in the hub as "combo douches". The irreg people are often known as "irreg douches". Therefore, I find myself slowly becoming an "Irreg Combo Double Douche". That is my title. I survive it only because I know it is temporary. Eventually I will escape to become a driver for good. I am not afraid because I have been there and seen the truth. Being a driver is awesome. Being a hub rat is merely willing yourself to a minimal standard of living. I should have figured that out 11 years ago. But in any case, I'm ready to go now. I now resume my constant harassment of the management on a whole new level to make sure they do not forget that I am waiting. My vampire days are over. There is a cure.

As the good doctor said, "At the top of the mountain, we are all Snow Leopards".