Lauren is the Branch Manager of our Ripley office. She’s very active and loves exercise, but her favourite is the walk from her desk to the kitchen. She’s slightly addicted to caffeine, made clear by the fact she’s proud to announce she can neck an energy drink in around 3.7seconds…

Lauren’s morning starts the night before. She rarely goes to bed later than 8 o’clock, so we can only assume that she’s either under curfew, or she’s a 75-year-old living in a 27-year-old’s body. Most people who go to bed at around 8pm would expect a nice long sleep and to be undisturbed. Well, at 5.05am she’s up and raring to go… To the normal person seeing this time on your clock in the morning symbolises two things, either a wicked night out, or your sleeping pattern is knackered. Lauren however, a “unique individual” sees this time every day. She’ll go downstairs, put the espresso machine on and make her first of 3 coffees for the morning. After slurping up all the final drops she’ll navigate her way into the living room and put the TV on. She’ll catch up with the news, any “correspondence” and will dabble in a few cheeky games of Candy Rain. Her and Momma P are in a heated competition at the moment (P is around 1000 points ahead). Potentially one of the reasons Lauren is waking up so early… Before she can leave for work she has to catch up with the group chats she’s in. Having gone to bed 3 hours earlier than everyone else, reading the 138 messages that were sent can be mentally challenging, so she’ll scan through and pick out anything worth knowing and set off to work.

Setting off to work sounds so simple but every morning Lauren must conquer her demons, including the reverse gear. To Lauren, driving a car backwards doesn’t make sense. Her argument is “You don’t see people planes doing a 3 point turn in the sky?” She has a fair point, but then again pilots aren’t pinging out their eyeballs on 3 espresso’s and an Ultra Violet Monster… Lauren likes to be the first person to arrive at the office for multiple reasons. She has bad spacial awareness, she can keep singing along to “It’s Raining Men” and finally so no one sees the 11 attempts it takes her to reverse into her space. After scraping a few alloys and denting the bumper once or twice she’ll get settled in the office and wait for the team to arrive. They’ll have their standard catch up about the On-Call phone, attend to any bookings that need filling and discuss what they want to achieve for the day! Today, for example, they got to write nice things about each other for Mental Health Week. According to her team, Lauren is always positive and smiley, you can be honest with her and she’s very caring. Jesus, let’s get the tissues out… But one thing they didn’t mention is that she can be bitter, especially when she’s 1000 points behind P on Candy Rain…

After exchanging notes and everyone feeling in high spirits, Lauren and Momma P have a big task ahead of them. Lauren has to teach Momma P an induction for one of their clients. It involves wearing a boiler suit, but seeing as Momma P is of a “seasoned age” she refers to it as a Teletubby suit… They had to carry out a presentation in front of numerous candidates and show them how to appropriately put on their work wear. They were there for the majority of the morning, both inducting candidates and trying to pry each other out of their suits… The journey back to the office is masked in secrecy. No one knows the route they’ll take, what they’ll talk about and most importantly the signature tune they keep referring to in the office. But one thing is certain, Lauren will pick up another Ultra Violet Monster – zero sugar, zero calories, 100% chemicals…

After arriving back to the office and informing them that P refused to take her suit off, the team discuss what their plans are for Lunch. Lauren is getting married in November so she’s stuck to a diet of leaves and seeds… It’s fair to say no one ever wakes up in the morning and says “I can’t wait to eat leaves for my lunch”… To be fair it’s all helping her for Tough Mudder this Saturday – if you haven’t donated already get cracking! In the afternoon the Ripley team are busy planning in their next induction, filling any last minute bookings and helping Lauren scrounge for an excuse to not do her “Day In The Life Of” meeting. They’ll have a final whip round, banter Lauren how all of them are going to the 5-year club trip to the races whilst she’s getting battered in the rain getting muddy and exercising… Tie up any loose ends and finally, Lauren will ask P whether she will be thinking of her, to which P responds, “No sorry I won’t have time to”.

Work comes to an end and Lauren can head home. Tonight she’ll be resting up as she doesn’t want to be tired for the big day tomorrow! This also means no wine either which is a tough pill to swallow… She’ll cook a nice hearty meal to prepare her for the next day (well Sainsbury’s prepared it, she just microwaved it) and even really push the boat out and set an alarm for 6 on a Saturday morning…