The Idler

Petrol Pomp

Whilst completing a Master’s degree at Lancaster University (see crap towns) the year before last, I was simultaneously engaged in tackling the world of work. Having applied for countless tedious jobs, I ended up being taken on by a 24 hour petrol station, doing Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights from 11 till 7 in the morning.

Working at a petrol station is a deeply unsatisfying endeavour. When someone picks up a pump a beeper goes off and you press a button. That’s it. Crap.

Working nights at a petrol station is a vision of hell.

At night you’re locked in. There’s no escape. Made to feel like a terminally bored zoo exhibit, you share your evening with the hum of fluorescent lights, the smell of petrol and the customers.

Dear God, the customers.

After 11 o’clock nobody wants petrol except taxi drivers. After 11 o’clock the fun starts. You probably recognise the following scenario. You’ve probably been in it. You’ve probably been the person who wants to know what sandwiches I’ve got. I don’t have any fucking sandwiches but nonetheless I’ll go check what’s in the shop. After making my way round the counter and shouting out all fourteen varieties of chicken sandwich, you have probably replied that you no longer require a sandwich and would rather have some AA batteries instead.

Bastards.

I hated you. Not as much as the customers who threatened to come and twat me when the doors were opened, but I still hated you. Even hairy, hairy Jesus would have lost his patience had he been forced to hunt down snack foods and dairy products all through the night.

Of course there was more to the job. I had to contend with dodgy scallies trying out their new stolen credit cards, doing runners after filling up, and flinging bottles and bags of coal around the forecourt. There were also the nightly thrills of the two hour stock-take and floor mopping.

After a few months of enduring this tedium I got fired for inaction. Some pissed-up knuckle-scraper pulled the cover off one of the pumps, leaving bits of it all over the forecourt and obviously rendering it inactive. Apparently, I should have reported this incident to the police. I didn’t though and thankfully they alleviated me of my duties.

That was a crap job alright.

John McCaffrey