The Horrors of Kwiksave: A Prelude to the Best Job in the Land

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(Edited)

The Horrors of Kwiksave’ is a candid recollection of my memories working at Kwiksave (the now-defunct discount supermarket chain) as a 'Stock Lad'.

I wasted over FOUR years of my life in this maggot-infested hellhole and still occasionally wake up drenched in sweat after enduring a nightmare in which I am working there still.

Some of the names have been slightly changed simply to save my arse in case anyone takes offence at some of the details regarding my facts or opinions.

Many of the people mentioned are now dead as this happened so long ago, but their siblings are not.

This is the 'HIVE Special Edition' of a multi-part autobiographical story (with a little over-embellishment on some of the details) I posted on STEEM over 2 years ago.

It contains a LOT more detail and content than the original and will fill in many gaps that were missed the first time around.

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Chapter One: A Prelude to the Best Job in the Land

...'December 1980'...

'WARNING: BAD LANGUAGE BELOW'

I couldn’t wait to leave school. To have some money in my pocket was all I could think about. I did very badly and left with a single Maths ‘O’ level and that was a CSE Grade 1, apparently equivalent to a GCE Grade ‘C’ or so they told me.

College; that was for those stuck up twats who were cleverer than me. I was not under any illusions of being one of those ‘grammer grobs’ but I could have been, and things might have turned out differently.


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...'Fearns is still listed as an 'Inadequate' school looking at the Ofsted ratings. I am quite amazed that I even have the skills to talk, never mind write after attending several years there'...

Having missed passing the eleven plus exam by a fraction, I ended up at one of the worst secondary modern schools in the country, Fearns County Secondary School.

College was more school to me and if there was one thing I despised it was school, the bullies, the teachers who were bullied by the pupils, and the flawed institution. I hated every minute of it.

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...'I mean come on, would you work at the shiny new supermarket or in the wreck of a place!'...

In 1979 there were two ‘career options’ for the uneducated; the factory or the supermarket.

The factories I deemed to be ‘shitholes’ and a continuation of the bullying I was often at the end of within school, so I chose the latter and started working at the emerging supermarket chain Asda as a shelf filler.

Asda was not such a terrible place to work for and sleeping in the middle of a pallet of bog rolls on the top floor of the warehouse was a common pastime for several of us ‘hard-workers.

However, this story is not about my Asda memories, and so other than this chapter there will be little in the terms of content matter regarding this, other than to inform you that I was fired for eating a Dairy Milk chocolate bar while skiving off in the warehouse.

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Yes, it was stolen chocolate, and I was supposed to be working, not eating their chocolate while being paid to do so.

Sleeping was OK but eating was not. I had failed to read the employees manual and there would be dire consequences for prospective chocolate fans that had little control.

Some of my colleagues had warned me about the slap-headed store detective 'TunaFish' who had been watching me.

Eric Tunafish, was a portly ageing ex-cop and on a mission to get me sacked, that's fired to you Americans.

He was strictly old-school and was as two-faced a cunt as you would ever meet. In the corridors he would nod and pass you exhibiting a sickly smile, somehow using only one side of his mouth.

I once caught the fucker red-handed crouching down like an oversized melon on a stairwell watching me.


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...'TunaFish tried hard to gain your trust using smiles and falsehoods, but under that guise he really was a two-faced twat'...

He kind of muttered something under his breath and slinked away, the disappointment evident on his frowning mush.

I should have grabbed his bad fitting wig and thrown it down into the depths of the warehouse, but better still I should have realised this wanker had it in for me at that moment.

They decided to make an example out of me and I found myself in the local nick, jobless, having my prints taken plus gaining a criminal record to add to my floundering career and self-esteem.

I could see ‘TunaFish’ knew some of the local plod and still remember that satisfied look he held when hoisting me to the local pig station using unnecessary physical force.

…’If he’s not a cop does that not constitute assault?’…

I was just a kid and didn’t know any better, and the plod would have simply laughed. This was 1980, and you had no rights then.

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...'the cops have no guns here, but they went over the top with a body search which revealed nothing other than an empty choc wrapper'...

Busting me was not enough and Asda decided to press charges (I’m quite sure on ‘TunaFishes’ insistence). I was summoned to court and fined £75. I still remember it all and have subsequently not had any brushes with the law since.

It wasn't really the best start for me. I had failed at school and was now a dirty 'chocolate bar criminal' trying to get a job.

My parents were ashamed, especially my father who had pushed me to do well in my education, but gave up once I started going to that 'shitty school.'

I couldn't face going into that Asda for several years, and even then 'TunaFish' seemed to appear out of thin air giving me that knowing smirk of his. Motherfucker!


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To be continued...


Cover Picture is a combination of free sources from here and here, combined and edited with Luminar 4. Shopping card icon is a FREE Pixabay image

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15 comments
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What a bastard!! That seems so over the top taking it to court and the subsequent nonsense. It is funny thinking back to then. The world was a different place and you literally had few rights when cornered by the plod. I knew an ex copper in my ncp days who worked for their security and oh what a bastard. Fancy that, must be coincidence. Lol

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They were quite right to give me the sack, but the rest of it was just spite and I sure instigated by TunaFish. That damn chocolate, I can't eat the stuff anymore!

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Aye, sacking is standard for that kind of thing but the rest, Sheesh!!

It's not the best chocolate anyway, you ain't missing much :0D

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It's not the best chocolate anyway, you ain't missing much :0D

It's not, I quickly lost interest in that brand after all this caper.

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That's a very sad experience, poor school and poor employment conditions. I remember the bullying in supermarkets, it was rife among the shopfloor staff. I wonder how many youngsters are still on the receiving end of this nowadays?

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I had a pretty dismal teenage life, the current headmistress just resigned that school after 3 years of it being 'Inadequate'. I guess she gave up trying to pull it out of the doldrums. I have never been back to it since leaving at 16, such was my despise for it.

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I recognise an educative tale of teenage delinquency when I see one. A good moral it has: Never trust fishy people and don't eat chocolate, avoid people who makes an example of you and this was 1980, and you had no rights then.

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Never trust fishy people

Haha.. had me laughing. He was never part of the original series and would now be around 95 years old, so likely dead! Can't say I will miss him... bastard!

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(Edited)

This reminds me of a steak house here in the U.S. I worked at for a couple of months as a teenager. It was nasty and dirty. Employees had sex in the food storage locker, cooks came in drunk wanting to fight while working with knives and other dangerous items, managers would disappear for hours, food would be recycled for days before it was all gone and all kinds of other terrible working conditions.

One day I finally walked out because a customer was giving me the business because more than half the Buffett bar was empty. I finally lost it and told her something to the effect of "if you want the trays to be refilled then go in the kitchen, bang on the refrigerator door, and tell the assistant manager to stop boning the waitress and unlock the door so our servers can get to the food." I then walked out and never went there again.

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We all had some shitty jobs when leaving school, the older we are the worse they were! Seems you have a story to tell.

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Dang, you are killing it. I look forward to reliving these tales :) They were very well written. The fact that you are giving us bonus content is even better!

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Flattery will get you everywhere mate, I could hardly post these again without giving them a hefty content boost, and a lot more colour. I was a little new to STEEM at the conception and was more afraid of using all that profanity!

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