10/6/07

When the alarm went off at 2am, I reached over and hit the snooze button. Or so I thought. Apparently I shut the alarm off. I woke up at 3:15 and had to piss, thinking it was three or four minutes later. Yeah, not exactly. Anyhow, I gave the truck and trailer the once-over and got on the road. I had about 45 minutes to spare when I got to the customer, so I guess that extra hour of sleep did me some good. I know I didn't fall asleep in the first place until some time after midnight.

The ride was much easier than expected this morning. As I came up to the Beltway, I needed to go from I-66 (due west) to US-50 (due east). It was basically the same distance if I chose to go across the top or across the bottom of the loop. Truckmiles.com said to take the top, but the bottom looked like a straighter route to me. So... I took the bottom. I don't think I've ever gone all the way around there before. Usually it's a matter of going from a north/south freeway to an east/west one. I did run from south to north on I-95 one time, but that just runs up the east side on I-495. Anyhow, the lower half of the loop is much better than the upper half, as far as I'm concerned. Less merging and exiting, fewer tight curves, fewer cities and towns, not too bad at all.

Once I got across Chesapeake Bay, the fog turned into that pea soup stuff you always hear about. There were actually people driving in that shit with their high beams on. The year 2007 and we still haven't learned about light and reflection? Idiots. Anyhow, the ride along US-301 to Maryland 300 and straight across was uncongested and smooth.

I got to the assigned section of the drop lot at the DC and set up to back my trailer in. Normally people favor the left side of a parking spot. That's pretty natural as we can't see our right side so we hug the left to be safe. So, as a result, one guys stays left, the next guy stays left, etc. And thus you end up with evenly spaced trailers. Not today, my friends. There was one, exactly one, empty space in my section. There was a JB Hunt trailer parked right on the line to my left and a Swift trailer parked right on the line to my right. I don't care who you are, that's funny right there. I couldn't help but picture the two drivers looking at each other and saying, "We'll show those guys to keep making fun of our trucks." Anyhow, what it meant for me was a wicked tight parking job. I usually do a pretty half-assed job of setting up to park, and today was no different. Most people say a good setup is a key, but I find that this only holds true until you start moving back. Then, a fuck up is a fuck up and your perfect setup just went out the window. So I did the usual and angled out a little until I thought it looked good enough. Back, back, back... Ever seen Ace Ventura, Pet Detective? That was me on this fine morning - "Like a glove!" Right on the money with one shot. Of course squeezing my ass in there to lower the landing gear was a bitch, but I got it down.

Then on to find a parking place. No truck stops anywhere near there. The one I thought was in Delaware was actually in Maryland and it was a long way from Smyrna. My atlas didn't really show any nearby rest areas either, so I just decided to take US-13 north and see what I could see. One mile north - rest area. Beauty. I hung out for an hour or so and then got my next assignment. Deadhead 222 miles to Suffolk and then leave tomorrow afternoon with a relay to Knoxville.

I was in the mood to kick back and watch football, so my route will actually be about 290 miles. I drove over to I-95 to get to a truck stop with Idleaire so I can get the satellite TV channels. From here I'll probably try to take the shortest legal route to Suffolk since I'm empty and I have plenty of time. I'll make up for the extra fuel I burned by not having to idle all day in the 80 degree heat, so nobody should mind. Of course, I'll mind eight days from now when I am short the extra two hours I wasted, but that's okay.

Notre Dame (+22) @ UCLA. That's just depressing. I didn't think I'd ever see a +22 point spread, but I guess it's just one of those years for the lads to take their lumps. The last time I stayed at an Idleaire location, I got San Francisco channels in Denver. Therefore I assumed they just used the west coast feed everywhere. Wrong. I have local Virginia channels here, so there's about a 99% chance I'm not seeing the Irish tonight, unless a new streamer shows up. The guys who put the games on SopCast are all on the east coast, so they can't help tonight. I guess it just isn't meant to be.