Autism and Employment (another PennSilverTaco thread)!

The kid owned the troublesome Maxima put in his two weeks, left on good terms, and went to work at a different dealership; His friend who carpooled with him ended up getting fired due to a combination of his lackluster performance and the fact that he regularly came in late. He ended up joining the Army a short time later, and actually used the general manager who’d fired him as a reference when he enlisted; My boss, an Army vet himself, said that joining the Army was probably the best thing the kid could have done, and from what I’ve heard he’s doing great!

 

My boss told me I was not a bad detailer by any stretch of the imagination, but I knew I was far from being the best; On weekdays, I could get three or four vehicles done, and on Saturdays it was anywhere from five to seven depending on a number of conditions. I worked at the detail shop from early September 2018 until June 29th, 2019; Keep in mind that I continued to work at Puck until it closed its doors indefinitely in January 2019, and I also started doing Uber Eats in November or December 2018. The money I made at the detail shop was not my only income, but if I had been getting paid by the hour instead of by the vehicle and didn't work on my days off, I would have made $240 a week (before taxes, etc) working at the detail shop. Sometimes due to a lull in car sales and not having many jobs as a result, or other circumstances beyond my control, I made less than that. Thankfully, this was rarely the case; If I got a particularly lucrative job (like a large SUV or any vehicle in which the customer had opted for the paint and fabric sealant), it was easy to make considerably more than I would have if got paid hourly. This was the only upside to getting paid by the job (piece work) instead of by the hour; If I didn't get a lucrative job, my slowness compared to the other detailers caught up with me. I found myself working on my days off in order to boost my pay, which only succeeded in burning me out, and in turn led to anxiety and depression. If I got lucky, I could manage around $500 in a week before taxes, but this was very rare.

I'm not going to lie; I started to feel a bit of anger and jealousy because most of my friends did not have work weekends at all. Those that did were paid by the hour and one of them was (still is) a union custodian at a public school. I have two friends who drive 18-wheelers for a living (one of whom also has Aspergers), and they work weekends A LOT, but they also get paid a hell of lot more than I did and spent most of their times in an air-conditioned truck!

 

When someone joins the military, they do so knowing full well that it is not easy, and that at best they will not have many weekends and/or holidays off in the near future. At worst, they make the ultimate sacrifice and either come home in a box or not all.



Police officers, firefighters, paramedics, doctors, and nurses, among others, also sign up to do what they do knowing full well that it won't be easy and at times won't be fun. When I worked as a barback at Puck, I worked long hours and got paid considerably less per hour than what I get paid per hour at NAVMAR; The key detail there is that I got paid hourly at Puck regardless of what I was doing (even if it was a slow night with little or no customers) and I not only got all the soda I could possibly drink for free (plus anything on the menu for free as my lunch or dinner), but also got a cut of the tips on really busy nights. Also, lets face it; Working at a bar is fun!

Detailing cars can be fun and downright therapeutic at times, but it is obviously not in the same category as military, law enforcement, and other emergency services; Hell, I can even understand mechanics being considered vital to society, especially since the dealer where I worked serviced a lot of ambulances and police vehicles. However, the mechanics get paid a hell of a lot more than the detailers, and (at least at that dealer) were treated a lot better too!

 

I probably would have quit before Christmas 2018 if it weren't for one issue; My boss at Puck took me aside one afternoon in October 2018 and told me that serious structural and electrical issues had recently been discovered in the building where the bar was located. As a result, the bar would remain open until the end of January 2019 before closing indefinitely for repairs; The owners had also decided to undertake major renovations, and as a result nobody knew when the place would reopen...

Looking back on it, I still should have quit detailing cars and taken a job at UPS as a driver helper to give me that extra financial kick in the ass I needed to get through the holidays, and then weighing my options in January. In December, I signed up for Uber Eats and added a nice side hustle to my monthly income.

The money I made at the detail shop wasn't great, but it wasn't bad, so I decided to stick it out for a bit longer; One thing that influenced my decision to tough it out was my 60-day review. My boss took me into office and read me his report, saying that while I was merely average in terms of my ability to detail cars (which was normal for inexperienced newbies according to him), he had observed that I got along particularly good with my coworkers and had gotten a lot better about arriving at work in a timely manner on Saturdays. He specifically mentioned that he had written in his review to HR that he thought I was a great guy and really hoped I stuck around.

TRANSLATION: He knew I was not particularly enjoying working there and was considering quitting, and had observed that while I was far from being the greatest detailer ever, I had integrity and generally did what I was supposed to. I started working at the detail shop in September 2018, and before I'd been there a month one guy abruptly gave his two weeks notice and left; One guy (Tyler, who was mentioned earlier) left without any warning, and two more ended up getting fired before the year was over. We were understaffed, and since the detail shop tended to hire more people in the warmer months, he knew that they would really take a hit if an average but generally competent detailer like myself left right before winter. I was moved by his glowing review of my performance and decided to stick it out.

 

During the winter and early spring, I didn't particularly mind working Saturdays because there wasn't much else to do; I even got the okay to take a Saturday off in March so I could spend the weekend at a friend's house in the Poconos for my 30th birthday.

But then the days started getting longer, the temperatures started getting warmer, and I realized that I was going to have to pick and choose what car shows I went to; I also going to have to miss some altogether!

At the same time, my family had a puppy that was dying of a rare congenital kidney disease and my hours at the detail shop were taking away from the time I should have been spending with the puppy during the last few months of her life. We adopted Mandy in September 2018 (after I'd started working there), she was diagnosed with Congenital Renal Dysplasia in October 2018, and we put her to sleep just two days after my final day at the detail shop) on July 1st, 2019. My boss had stated that he would give me a week off for a family reunion that ended up not happening, but the prospect of working at that damned detail shop for the entire summer only succeeded in stressing me out even more than I already was. I took the first Saturday in June 2019 for a car show in York, got a room in a hotel, and spent the entire weekend there doing some very intense thinking. Two weeks later, I put in my notice and was gone before July.

 

I initially did Uber Eats, but realized in a matter of days that it wasn't going to work out as a sole source of income. I started doing DoorDash, and the income from that allowed me to have something resembling a summer vacation without dipping into my savings; I was offered the job at NAVMAR by my dad's boss in August 2019 and that's where I still work today...

 

Conshohocken, Pennsylvania...

 

Newer townhomes in Conshohocken; They all had two A/C units (one for the 1st floor and one for the 2nd floor); The inner houses all had this unique setup...

 

All of the end units had them located on the side (this is not a very good install in my opinion)...

 

@CaptAmerica
@shakerhood

Saw a RARE 2WD Ramcharger in a parking lot while doing DoorDash today...

 

Also saw a fairly rare 2-door Crown Vic in the parking lot of the Plymouth Meeting PetSmart...

 

Yes, people can now use DoorDash to have pet food and supplies delivered to their home!

 

That is wild that it is 2wd.

 

This is at the apartment building that the PetSmart order went to; The apartment buildings were OLD and there was one (likely original) pre-1987 Trane Weathertron heat pump still in use (couldn’t get a good pic of it)...

 

Same units as above from a different angle (circa 1987-2002 Trane XE-series); I have never lived in a house with a heat pump, but I know how to properly maintain one installed in the snowy Northeast! In order for a heat pump to run efficiently, it is necessary to go outside and clear snow around the outdoor unit, which has clearly not been done here...



One of these Tranes was running, so that’s how I knew it was a heat pump!

 

Was driving to the next customer’s house, which was located less than half a mile from the apartment, and I happened to notice that this heat pump at a building in a park was defrosting...

 

@ColoradoTJ
@shakerhood
@Taco critter

I actually test drove a used Prius today while I was waiting for my truck to get the oil changed; Considering buying one to use for DoorDash...

 

This one has almost 170K miles (thought I got a shot of the odometer but didn’t ), but it’s in really good shape; After chatting with sales people, it looks like I’m gonna have to settle for a higher mileage example if I don’t want to finance...

 

The Dealer gave me one as a loaner one day and it felt a little weird to drive, kind of a disconnected feeling. Something like that should do good for delivery as it would save a few bucks on gas.