A footnote on yesterday's post.

In yesterday's post I made reference to bus drivers' belief that passengers don't read destination blinds or timetables. Not just the drivers, there are controllers and managers that I know who also have this belief. Well to today there was a little incident which suggest that drivers also don't read things that they should.

I was working a rest day, which I do from time to time to help out when we are busy and I signed on at 8:40. The bus I caught to work arrived at 8:37 and it is a 3 minute walk up the hill to the depot, you can run it in 2 minutes I'm told but I'm not going to try that. Any way I arrived at 8:40 signed on and checked which bus and running board I would be using. Bus was there but not the running board. The running board or duty card as they are some times called tells you such things as where to go and at what time to have your break and most importantly what time to go home. So I told the controller that the running board wasn't in the box where it should be. He told me to look in all the other boxes but it wasn't in any of them. "What's the duty number?" he asked. "3581." Said I.
"I've got that." said an other driver. "It's my duty." He led me over to the main notice board where all the duties are posted and said , "Look, that's me." I had a look and sure enough there was his name with the correct line number next to it but what he hadn't noticed was the "A/L" after his name.

A/L means annual leave. He was on holiday and hadn't noticed. Now this isn't the only way drivers can find out when their holidays are. There is a folder in the Pay In room with 2006/2007 Holidays printed on it in thick felt tip pen. It usually appears in December (our holiday year runs April to March) and when it does I check it instantaniously and write the dates down in my diary so I wont forget. As if.