What Was Your Worst Day

[HomeDelivery]

1st night driving in a snow storm in feeders. I'm pretty sure I left grip marks on the steering wheel.

i thought you were going to type "...grip marks on the seat."

 

[ManInBrown]

There are no bad days. They come off one at a time, whether I have 140 or 200 that day. And the cash register is ringing all day long. A bad day is working at McDonald's for $7.00 an hour, trying to figure out how you are going to pay the bills that month. I got nothing to complain about.

 

[soberups]

33 years on road. Still the worst day I remember was 20 years ago when a $@&) feeder driver took my good tire chains out of my truck and stuck his worn ones in. Didn't know it, but by the time a 12 hour, snow up the butt day got done, my sup had made 3 trips out to my area bringing my every junky tire chain he could find in the building cause thy had no new ones around and I kept busting links till they wouldn't stay on. I still have nightmares about laying under that truck in thirty below wind chills chaining up time after time after )$&@" time!
And to think I was born in Arizona!

I keep a good set of chains stashed in my locker, just in case.

 

[soberups]

February 3rd, 1989. I was a rookie with less than a year of driving experience, sent out cold on a mountainous rural route with no area knowledge in a blown-out P-600 with wooden shelves. We got hit with the coldest temps in history that day along with a foot of snow. Most of the stops in my truck were snowed in so I couldn't get rid of them but management forced me to take them out of the building anyway and fight the load all day. I had never driven in the snow and no one had ever taught me how to install tire chains. This was back when we were on paper, and it was so cold that the ink in our pens would freeze before we could write down the shipper number, so we had to keep spare pens in our hats to keep them warm. It was about 10:00 at night, I was lost in the dark out in the middle of nowhere and I got stuck in the snow. My chain came off and got wrapped up between the duallies and frozen into a tangled ball of ice and steel. I was so frustrated that tears started coming out of my eyes and they would run down my cheeks and freeze. This was before cell phones or diad communication, so I was really on my own. It took me over an hour on my back under the truck to get that chain untangled and back on, I didn't get back to the building until after midnight. The normal driver on that route went out with 75 stops, they gave me 120 and I wound up bringing about 100 of them back. I almost quit that night.

 

[OPTION3]

February 3rd, 1989. I was a rookie with less than a year of driving experience, sent out cold on a mountainous rural route with no area knowledge in a blown-out P-600 with wooden shelves. We got hit with the coldest temps in history that day along with a foot of snow. Most of the stops in my truck were snowed in so I couldn't get rid of them but management forced me to take them out of the building anyway and fight the load all day. I had never driven in the snow and no one had ever taught me how to install tire chains. This was back when we were on paper, and it was so cold that the ink in our pens would freeze before we could write down the shipper number, so we had to keep spare pens in our hats to keep them warm. It was about 10:00 at night, I was lost in the dark out in the middle of nowhere and I got stuck in the snow. My chain came off and got wrapped up between the duallies and frozen into a tangled ball of ice and steel. I was so frustrated that tears started coming out of my eyes and they would run down my cheeks and freeze. This was before cell phones or diad communication, so I was really on my own. It took me over an hour on my back under the truck to get that chain untangled and back on, I didn't get back to the building until after midnight. The normal driver on that route went out with 75 stops, they gave me 120 and I wound up bringing about 100 of them back. I almost quit that night.

what would you do differently now?

 

[Packmule]

February 3rd, 1989. I was a rookie with less than a year of driving experience, sent out cold on a mountainous rural route with no area knowledge in a blown-out P-600 with wooden shelves. We got hit with the coldest temps in history that day along with a foot of snow. Most of the stops in my truck were snowed in so I couldn't get rid of them but management forced me to take them out of the building anyway and fight the load all day. I had never driven in the snow and no one had ever taught me how to install tire chains. This was back when we were on paper, and it was so cold that the ink in our pens would freeze before we could write down the shipper number, so we had to keep spare pens in our hats to keep them warm. It was about 10:00 at night, I was lost in the dark out in the middle of nowhere and I got stuck in the snow. My chain came off and got wrapped up between the duallies and frozen into a tangled ball of ice and steel. I was so frustrated that tears started coming out of my eyes and they would run down my cheeks and freeze. This was before cell phones or diad communication, so I was really on my own. It took me over an hour on my back under the truck to get that chain untangled and back on, I didn't get back to the building until after midnight. The normal driver on that route went out with 75 stops, they gave me 120 and I wound up bringing about 100 of them back. I almost quit that night.

Ah the old days! Forgot about all the frozen pens and feeling totally on your own! Thanks for bringing back all the nightmares! Lol

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

My worst day was my very first Christmas Eve. Finished my last stop just after midnight. Refueled but was never told to add dry gas when I did. Fuel line started to freeze up. Poured some dry gas in and limped back to center around 1:30 Christmas morning. The worst part was my father (not my Dad) was visiting and my (ex) wife had to entertain him while I was working.

 

[Wally]

The time Fonzie jumped the shark.

 

[sailfish]

Worst day was my first day on the road entirely by myself. It was over peak so it got dark by 5, and I had a really heavy stop count. But what made it so bad was that I was fresh on the road. I didn't have my efficiency up to par, and I didn't recognize all my stops just by looking at the addresses like I can now. I ended up calling an air recovery in an hour and a half before the air truck left because I really didn't know what I was doing. I missed a bunch of businesses along an entire length of road because it was after 4:30. It was dark and the route was still new to me so I had to creep along with a flashlight and walk off as many stops as I could at a time since I couldn't see the street numbers while driving. Never found any time to take a lunch all day. I was so stressed out and sick I wondered what the hell I ever got myself into and secretly hoped I DQ'ed. I didn't get home until after 9 and couldn't even eat before I threw up all the excess stomach acid. Haven't had a day like that since and it's all good now but talk about one hell of a learning curve.

 

[Indecisi0n]

The day I was hired.

 

[Re-Raise]

Feb 2nd 2011. The same snowstorm that dropped 20 inches of snow and shut down Lakeshore Dr. in Chicago hammered us.
It got so bad that I knew I couldn't stop and get going again even as I drove right by residential addresses I had stops for.

One of my favorite management quotes in my almost 30 years there happened when I got back to the center.

Another driver and I punched through the drifts to get to our lot at the same time. There was no way we could get into the building with almost 2 ft of snow in the lot. I walked in and asked the driver sup where we should park the package cars until they could get the lot plowed.

He said "They just plowed it this morning" ..... apparently oblivious to the fact it had snowed 2 ft that day.

 

[soberups]

what would you do differently now?

Today I know how to drive in the snow and how to properly install tire chains so they don't come off and wrap up between the duallies.

Today I have a cell phone that I can call customers with if I cant get up their driveway.

Today I am enough of a veteran that I wouldn't panic about not being able to get done; at 8:00 at night I head back to the building whether I am done or not and if management doesn't like it that's just too bad.

 

[pickup]

Worse day ? More like a week I won't forget. I was (and am) a feeder driver that was working days and very local for a while at the time. Job was cancelled and went on the spare list and ended up working nights. Shifted in the yard, went to lunch and then mystery time.. Where will they send me ? Railyard?, back in the yard?, or a trip to another hub? Well, it was , all week another hub. Some I have been to before, and some not.

One night I went to one that I had not been to before with very vague directions. I ended up getting off an exit of a route(not an interstate) that fed into a very insular residential neighborhood , 2 am in the morning. I end up going down a long road( at this point, I realized I got off at the wrong exit) that dead ended. I backed up my tractor/trailer combo(53 foot trailer) about a half a mile to the onramp. Sweating as I backed up around some curves. Fortunately no cars came up behind me on this narrow road.

Another night of the same week, poorly worded directions at a critical point, ended up going left when I should have gone right. Went 15 miles the wrong way( realized this 5 miles into the journey on this road( but needed 10 more miles to find a turn around)

Similar stuff during the rest of the week with some hubs I went to before(although a long time passed before making the trips again. I realized that , while the directions sucked in the above two cases, the other cases for the rest of the week, I should have done better and I realized that I was part of the problem. Needed to be totally prepared(mentally.attitudinally and other ways) before leaving the outbound gate and I will now find people to ask if I go to a funny upstate ny hub again that I haven't been to in a long time or at all . Yorktown indeed!!!

 

[Coca Cola Delivery Man87]

2 am in the morning. I end up going down a long road( at this point, I realized I got off at the wrong exit) that dead ended. I backed up my tractor/trailer combo(53 foot trailer) about a half a mile to the onramp. Sweating as I backed up around some curves.

I feel your pain! at least is was 02:00hrs and traffic was dead.

 

[pickup]

I feel your pain! at least is was 02:00hrs and traffic was dead.

True, that!

 

[superballs63]

March of '06. Was hired as a package handler.




It was the worst because I could have been a FT driver within 30 days, but my wife and I were getting married and buying a house within the next few months so I had to pass. Had to wait almost 3 years to then go FT. Longer progression time, and MANY people hired after me who went immediately FT, and are now in feeders and have had their choice of routes, I JUST got a chance to bid on a route this year.

 

[What'dyabringmetoday???]

Today I know how to drive in the snow and how to properly install tire chains so they don't come off and wrap up between the duallies.

Today I have a cell phone that I can call customers with if I cant get up their driveway.

Today I am enough of a veteran that I wouldn't panic about not being able to get done; at 8:00 at night I head back to the building whether I am done or not and if management doesn't like it that's just too bad.

 

[pickup]

The time Fonzie jumped the shark.

Just horrible!

 

[brownmonster]

I'm not good enough at typing to describe my worst day.

 

[jumpman23]

Too many of them to pinpoint 1, its a tossup between a lot of days and a lot of days lol.