J.J. delivers calzones for D.P. Dough, usually 7 nights a week. That is, J.J. comes in between 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. and works until 3:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m. depending on the night.
J.J. also works construction 5 days a week. That is, J.J. leaves for work at 7:00 a.m. and gets home around 5:00 p.m.
I’m not going to do the math, but basically J.J. works all the goddamn time.
You’d think this would drive a man insane. You’d think that if a person works this much, they’d be a cranky asshole. You’d think, if your anything like me, that this isn’t a man at all, but some sort of machine from a geek’s wet dream, created to do all the world’s work so that humans can spend all their time doing whatever it is that humans would do if they didn’t have to work.
You’d be wrong.
The moment I met J.J. Tuesday night, I was excited. Despite his lack of sleep, he has an infectious half-dazed energy about him. His 6' construction worker's frame could be intimidating, but he's just too laid back to be taken as any sort of a threat.
I started the night with J.J. at about 10:00 p.m. Business had picked up suddenly as the football game let out, and J.J. grabbed a couple bags of calzones as we went out to his truck.
J.J.’s truck is nicknamed the “monster truck.” It’s a beat-up old pick-up with huge tires and I giant spider decal on the window. Inside, empty packs of Basic Lights and a sticker that says, “Ass, gas or grass. Nobody rides for free” cover the dash.
The "Monster Truck" - Photo by Rob Wofter
I instantly realized I was, at the least, an inconvenience. Without an open passenger seat, J.J. squeezed the calzones into the space between us, where they rested on the center console. Throughout the night, this would prove to be a pain in the ass. It seems delivery driving, or J.J.’s version anyway, resembles a Hollywood chase scene, and the boxes seemed to slide off the center console at every turn.
As I left for my first run with J.J., I quickly realized that not putting on my seat belt was a mistake. I gripped my seat as he shot out of D.P. Dough’s tight parking lot onto Richland Ave., all the while reading phone numbers from delivery tickets, typing them into his phone, smoking a cigarette, steering with his knee and elbow and looking everywhere but at the road. I’ll admit it. I was afraid.
After the first few runs, the fear passed. It became obvious that there was some strange, spastic grace in J.J.’s driving. He never appeared in control, but I couldn’t help but feel that he WAS in control as he broke speed limits, blew through red lights, hovered between lanes and almost rear-ended a car.
I asked J.J. about the cops. How in the hell wasn’t he in jail for driving like this?
J.J. has been pulled over a few times while on the job. “You’ll have a few that act like hard-ass mother fuckers, but most of the time they are cool,” J.J. said, noting that the APD is more lax than OUPD. “OU cops act like they’ve got something to prove.” Somehow, he has never received a ticket, only warnings. “The cops see that you are working and they don’t want to bother you, ya know?”
Not every driver is so lucky. J.J. told me that two drivers have been arrested since he’s been working at D.P. Dough, one for DUI and arrest warrants and another for a suspended license.
Cops aren’t delivery drivers’ only worry. I’ve read that delivery driving can be a
dangerous job. Apparently, it’s true.
“I had one dude try to sucker punch me through my window. I had just made a delivery on Court to this girl, and this guy just runs up and punches through my window. I wanted to jump out and stomp him right there, but, you know, I gotta keep my job.”
“Drunk girls aren’t bad,” J.J. explained. “But fuck drunk dudes.” I laughed, and said something about the customer always being right. “There’s nothing worse than a ‘right’ drunk dude, especially when he’s wrong,” J.J. replied.
“Most of the time, the customer isn’t right,” said Jay, J.J.’s boss, blowing away the old mantra that has pervaded most industries since it was made up by some guy in a suit and tie who had never actually worked with customers.
But, as J.J. said, drunk girls aren’t that bad. “This one time I walked up to a house and this girl had nothing on but a thong and bra,” J.J. laughed. “She’s like ‘Hey baby, blah, blah, blah…’” Despite the fact that this sounds like the beginning of a cheesy porn, nothing happened. “She was just trying to get free food.”
He also told me that people trying to buy calzones they didn’t order is common. “They’ll run up and be like ‘I’ll give you 20 bucks for it, man!”
J.J. is usually on the phone as he drives, trying to reach a customer to tell them to be ready. “It’s all about making time, man. It's a mad dash” That isn’t surprising. The more deliveries, the more tips he receives. The faster the deliveries, the bigger the tips are. It’s all about tips.
D.P. Dough drivers rely on tips more than most, because they only get paid “$5 something an hour” and D.P. Dough doesn’t charge a delivery fee, so drivers don’t get any extra pay to help with gas or wear and tear caused by Athens’ horrendous uptown roads. J.J.’s truck, he said, uses about 20 dollars in gas a night. The average tip is $1.25. J.J. has to make 18 deliveries just to break even. Not to mention the fact he has had to buy two sets of new front tires in the last 7 months.
J.J. told me that tips are random. Sometimes tips are good, and sometimes drivers get in a rut and tips suck all night. The best J.J. has ever done was $130 in one night, after taking out the cost of gas and cigarettes. On most nights he averages $12-$15 an hour, not bad for a job that isn't particularly strenuous.
As I said before, J.J. seemed incapable of staying negative. If he made a negative comment, it was followed by a positive one. If he got a bad tip, he shrugged it off. A rude customer? The good ones make up for it.
"I love this job. I meet some pretty awesome people, man," he said after telling me the sucker punch story. He explained that after doing it for awhile, you get to know people, and it's not uncommon for customers to offer to "bake you down."
Booze and pot are offered fairly regularly, according to J.J.
In fact, at the the recent "Oak-toberfest," J.J. claimed a partier shoved a bottle of liquor to his mouth, though he didn't acknowledge whether or not he took a drink.
Students, the predominant demographic in Athens, makes up most of D.P. Dough's business. While J.J. claimed there are a few townies who order regularly, he also said that D.P. Dough couldn't survive without the students.
J.J.'s job isn't just delivery. When he is back at the shop he has to make boxes, answer phones, and clean. My roommate, Mike Harmon,a D.P. Dough employee, claims that it's a running joke that J.J. has to smoke crack. "It's the only logical explanation," Mike laughed. He added that J.J. is the only driver who is always working when he is at the shop, instead of standing around. "The other driver's will pay him to do their cleaning at the end of the night. And really, he gets it done faster by himself than they get it done when they are all working on it," Mike said.
When asked why he works so much, J.J. said it comes down to bills. "I've got bills, credit card bills. I'm just trying to make it out of the hole," J.J. said, adding that he is also helping his girlfriend pay off her student loans.
Despite his insane schedule (I bitch and moan if I can't get 8 hours of sleep a night), J.J. is possibly the most laid-back, easy going person I have ever met. Over the course of about 3 hours that I spent riding with him, tips were terrible. And yet, he didn't let it get to him. As a server, a night of bad tips usually turns me into a self-pitying whine-ass. But not J.J. "There's always tomorrow, man."
Tomorrow. A day when I'll complain because I have to be up at 10:00 a.m. to make it to my Online Journalism class, while J.J. will be doing concrete work with, at most, 3 hours of sleep. While I can't say I envy his position, J.J's disposition is one that everyone could use in today's chaotic world.
