JCB. For us Brits, it's not a brand name but a word. "JCB" means "digger". If you want a glimpse into the place they hold in the mind of the British Bloke, take a listen to the annoyingly catchy JCB song from a few years ago. They make all sorts of other really cool machinery besides diggers, but their diggers define them. If you are ever given the keys to a JCB then make sure you give it a try as the sheer destructive force you wield at the controls of such a machine can I'm slightly ashamed to say, be a bit of a rush.
I'm sitting at home on my sofa today because of a JCB. Same as yesterday. Someone's used one a little too enthusiastically and dug up the cable that keeps the office I work in connected to the world, so deprived of Internet and phones my colleagues and I are left at home.
I should be really pleased about this, but I'm not. I can dress as I like, keep the hours I choose and work as I want. And there's the problem. I've always disliked working from home because I find it much more difficult to stay on-message and get stuff done. The resulting guilt even when I have managed to achieve something, coupled with the lack of contact with other people, affects my mood and threatens to let in the girl fog.
Suddenly, I wish my job involved destroying something with a JCB. Digging holes. Or driving a JCB Fastrac like the one that dumped a great heap of manure in the field next to the office a week ago. Anything to get outdoors and away from a PC for a while!
And here we are. It's ten to nine, I'd better watch out or this will be distracting me from work.
I used to like driving the ship's crane; it was fun seeing how many different levers I could use at the same time. It's all hydraulics though, really
ReplyDeleteYep...totally relate!
ReplyDeleteCalie xxx
I'm now told the JCB didn't just rip out our line, it ripped out the great fat bundle of lines near the exchange. Several thousand bits of wire with an unfortunate BT engineer down a hole trying to figure out which one's which.
ReplyDeleteI seem to remember our clip-on backhoe didn't allow you to use more than one lever at once.
We call them "backhoes" here in the US.
ReplyDeleteBad luck! I had that once 10 years ago, you have to feel sorry for the engineer that has to go through the spaghetti don't you?
ReplyDeleteSounds like you want an Office Space moment with the digger :)
Stace
I'm more of a John Deere girl myself, but its a case of the tool for the job really :)
ReplyDelete@Jamie: I think JCB list them in their catalogue as "backhoe loaders", so I guess we do too, officially.
ReplyDelete@Stace: it could have a certain attraction, there have certainly been employers I could happily have fantasised about driving heavy plant through.
@Jess: If we're splitting into factions then I'm afraid that I regress to my first love and stand in the Ford Major camp. That dates me!