Saturday, December 8, 2007
12/8/07
Well, I think today was just what the doctor ordered. No traffic, no customers, no contact with CFI, no delays, no worries. My morning nap ran a little long, so I couldn't get a full eleven hours in before my fourteen ran out, but I covered almost 600 miles. In fact, it looks like I can get to Nogales a day early if I'm feeling ambitious. I should have enough hours available, but I'm prone to distraction and a severe lack of discipline. We'll see how tomorrow goes. I imagine I'll get rolling pretty early, but it won't really be necessary to take off right after midnight if I don't want to.
Friday, December 7, 2007
12/7/07
I had been running days for a while lately, so I started to forget just how much easier it is to run overnight. The only catch is that the first day after flipping the schedule can leave me a little tired. It wasn't bad, but I think by tomorrow I'll be on track for a few more days on the graveyard shift.
I tooled up to the brewery in Jacksonville to check in and drop my empty. Nope. Live load. My instructions said that it was a draft load, so I suspected it might be a live load, but the stop summary said drop/hook. No such luck. This was one of the customers who do their communicating by CB, so I threw them off a little. I find it hard to believe that I'm the only one out here without a CB, but whatever. I checked in with a guy at the dock and got a door. An hour or so later it was time to roll north.
Same old song and dance in Georgia - construction and cops. The overnight traffic was nice and light though, so I didn't really get slowed down. When I arrived at the beer distributor there were several trucks ahead of me. The difference between getting loaded last night and just picking up a pre-loaded trailer became a big one at that point. I probably could have beaten a few of them there if I were rolling before midnight. I sat, and sat, and sat, and sat. I arrived before 7am and I was empty at 12:45pm. Will I get paid for sitting there? I won't hold my breath.
Then it was a short jog over to the next shipper, but I made it a little longer by going the wrong way at first. This time I did have a drop/hook, so I was in and out quickly. Of course, by the time I moved down the road a bit, I got 14-houred. Oh well. I was a little tired and a lot hungry anyway, so that was as good a time as any to take ten hours off. By tonight I should be acclimated to the overnight routine. We'll see.
One drawback to sleeping by day and driving by night is the damn greenhouse effect. No, don't you Al Gore fans get started. I'm talking about the greenhouse effect in my truck. It's in the mid-60's today, but this thing heats up like a son of a bitch in the sun. So I'll be idling while I sleep. Of course, I don't have a pet so apparently my company doesn't care about my fuel mileage. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.
My usual one week summary will be a little misleading in terms of miles, since I just got 2,000 dispatched today. I'm sitting at 3,865 miles right now, but I won't drop this load in Arizona until the morning of the 11th. So, assuming I sleep the rest of the 11th, it will be around 350 a day for the first part of the month. As long as I get some decent miles from the 11th to the 15th, it won't be a bad pay period.
I tooled up to the brewery in Jacksonville to check in and drop my empty. Nope. Live load. My instructions said that it was a draft load, so I suspected it might be a live load, but the stop summary said drop/hook. No such luck. This was one of the customers who do their communicating by CB, so I threw them off a little. I find it hard to believe that I'm the only one out here without a CB, but whatever. I checked in with a guy at the dock and got a door. An hour or so later it was time to roll north.
Same old song and dance in Georgia - construction and cops. The overnight traffic was nice and light though, so I didn't really get slowed down. When I arrived at the beer distributor there were several trucks ahead of me. The difference between getting loaded last night and just picking up a pre-loaded trailer became a big one at that point. I probably could have beaten a few of them there if I were rolling before midnight. I sat, and sat, and sat, and sat. I arrived before 7am and I was empty at 12:45pm. Will I get paid for sitting there? I won't hold my breath.
Then it was a short jog over to the next shipper, but I made it a little longer by going the wrong way at first. This time I did have a drop/hook, so I was in and out quickly. Of course, by the time I moved down the road a bit, I got 14-houred. Oh well. I was a little tired and a lot hungry anyway, so that was as good a time as any to take ten hours off. By tonight I should be acclimated to the overnight routine. We'll see.
One drawback to sleeping by day and driving by night is the damn greenhouse effect. No, don't you Al Gore fans get started. I'm talking about the greenhouse effect in my truck. It's in the mid-60's today, but this thing heats up like a son of a bitch in the sun. So I'll be idling while I sleep. Of course, I don't have a pet so apparently my company doesn't care about my fuel mileage. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.
My usual one week summary will be a little misleading in terms of miles, since I just got 2,000 dispatched today. I'm sitting at 3,865 miles right now, but I won't drop this load in Arizona until the morning of the 11th. So, assuming I sleep the rest of the 11th, it will be around 350 a day for the first part of the month. As long as I get some decent miles from the 11th to the 15th, it won't be a bad pay period.
Thursday, December 6, 2007
12/6/07
It was a simple knock on the side of a truck, nothing more. There was no sinister motive, no apocalyptic underpinning. A simple knock. For the driver inside the truck, it might well have been the end of life as we know it. After tossing and turning through the night, as he is prone to do, he had just managed to reach that state where our most fanciful desires and our darkest fears intersect in the vivid landscape of our dreams. KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK. The sound tore through his eardrums and flung the driver back toward an awakened condition. To him, it was no less startling than an air raid coming to some remote village of some far-flung nation with which a superpower has achieved a quarrel.
Peering out his window, toward the south, the driver saw the horizon. It was a virtual rainbow of color, beginning with the deep dark orange and progressing through the various shades until it reached the equally deep indigo of the pre-dawn Florida sky. The driver wasn't sure just yet of where he was or what was happening. In his groggy state, he searched for more clues. His shoes were on the floor beside his bed. His blanket was half on the bed, half on the floor. A television rested on a shelf, high above his feet. The space around him, while not uncomfortable, was indeed small. He was in his truck. This tiny bit of familiarity brought a correspondingly tiny sense of reassurance. But where was his truck? He staggered toward the front of the cab, all the while trying to ascertain the nature of his predicament. Through the driver's side door, he saw yellow shipping containers. Through the right, he saw a tan stucco wall. The wall was plain and nondescript, save for a band of green running the length of the wall near the top. He was behind a store, or so it appeared. The surroundings were at the same time foreign and familiar. He had awoken behind numerous stores of a similar type, but still it was if this one was entirely new.
Just then, he spotted the shadowy figure of a man outside the driver's side of the truck. As the figure drew closer, he was able to see that it was a young man of fairly large build. The driver's eyes began to adjust to the surroundings. He noticed that the young man appeared to be of Cuban descent, although he might just as well have been Puerto Rican or Dominican or any of the ancestral lines beginning in Latin America. The young man had a neatly trimmed goatee, kept very thin. The thinness of the goatee was not lost on the driver. Perhaps it was a simple fashion choice, but he suspected that the man's youth was the more prominent factor. On a subconscious level, the driver surmised that the young man's whiskers had not yet reached the level of maturity and fullness that those of an older man may possess.
The young man was most certainly the source of the knocking, but what did he want? Sliding his feet into his shoes, the driver slowly assumed a position behind the wheel of his truck. As his right hand wiped the sleep from his eyes, the driver reached for the window knob with his left hand. Before he had the opportunity to roll the window completely down, the young man spoke. "What's up?" he queried. What's up? What's up? This was a useless statement in the driver's quest to identify his particular state of affairs.
About that time, things came suddenly into focus as the last vestiges of dreamlike mental wanderings were cast from the driver's mind. He noted the presence of bolt cutters in the hand of the young man. He noted the faint hint of light from around the edges of his trailer's rear doors. He noted the bills of lading sitting patiently on his dashboard, waiting for their chance to be put into use. The driver was at his delivery point and he needed to pull forward so that the mysterious young man could cut the seal from his trailer. The clock read 6:15am and it was time to go to work. He placed his left foot on the clutch pedal, his right on the brake. He pushed, firmly but in a controlled manner, against the buttons that would supply his brake lines with air pressure. He reached down and turned the key. His day had begun...
Sorry about all that. I think these damn audio books are getting to me. So yeah, I got going a little early at the first drop. Then it was about ninety miles to the second one. The tight backing that was mentioned in my directions wasn't so bad. The setup was the pain in the ass. I had to jack the trailer to the blind side in order to direct it toward the dock area, then jack it back to the left in order to hit the dock. No troubles.
I got a good news/bad news deal on the beer run. I am getting rid of it tomorrow, not Saturday, but I have to pick it up at midnight tonight. I might head over a little early, but it's a draft load so I don't imagine it will be ready much before 11pm. Then tomorrow morning I'll make the next pickup and head west.
So, where I thought today would be mostly wasted, it won't. I need to get some laundry done and clean up the truck a bit, then try to sleep for a while. Cheers.
Peering out his window, toward the south, the driver saw the horizon. It was a virtual rainbow of color, beginning with the deep dark orange and progressing through the various shades until it reached the equally deep indigo of the pre-dawn Florida sky. The driver wasn't sure just yet of where he was or what was happening. In his groggy state, he searched for more clues. His shoes were on the floor beside his bed. His blanket was half on the bed, half on the floor. A television rested on a shelf, high above his feet. The space around him, while not uncomfortable, was indeed small. He was in his truck. This tiny bit of familiarity brought a correspondingly tiny sense of reassurance. But where was his truck? He staggered toward the front of the cab, all the while trying to ascertain the nature of his predicament. Through the driver's side door, he saw yellow shipping containers. Through the right, he saw a tan stucco wall. The wall was plain and nondescript, save for a band of green running the length of the wall near the top. He was behind a store, or so it appeared. The surroundings were at the same time foreign and familiar. He had awoken behind numerous stores of a similar type, but still it was if this one was entirely new.
Just then, he spotted the shadowy figure of a man outside the driver's side of the truck. As the figure drew closer, he was able to see that it was a young man of fairly large build. The driver's eyes began to adjust to the surroundings. He noticed that the young man appeared to be of Cuban descent, although he might just as well have been Puerto Rican or Dominican or any of the ancestral lines beginning in Latin America. The young man had a neatly trimmed goatee, kept very thin. The thinness of the goatee was not lost on the driver. Perhaps it was a simple fashion choice, but he suspected that the man's youth was the more prominent factor. On a subconscious level, the driver surmised that the young man's whiskers had not yet reached the level of maturity and fullness that those of an older man may possess.
The young man was most certainly the source of the knocking, but what did he want? Sliding his feet into his shoes, the driver slowly assumed a position behind the wheel of his truck. As his right hand wiped the sleep from his eyes, the driver reached for the window knob with his left hand. Before he had the opportunity to roll the window completely down, the young man spoke. "What's up?" he queried. What's up? What's up? This was a useless statement in the driver's quest to identify his particular state of affairs.
About that time, things came suddenly into focus as the last vestiges of dreamlike mental wanderings were cast from the driver's mind. He noted the presence of bolt cutters in the hand of the young man. He noted the faint hint of light from around the edges of his trailer's rear doors. He noted the bills of lading sitting patiently on his dashboard, waiting for their chance to be put into use. The driver was at his delivery point and he needed to pull forward so that the mysterious young man could cut the seal from his trailer. The clock read 6:15am and it was time to go to work. He placed his left foot on the clutch pedal, his right on the brake. He pushed, firmly but in a controlled manner, against the buttons that would supply his brake lines with air pressure. He reached down and turned the key. His day had begun...
Sorry about all that. I think these damn audio books are getting to me. So yeah, I got going a little early at the first drop. Then it was about ninety miles to the second one. The tight backing that was mentioned in my directions wasn't so bad. The setup was the pain in the ass. I had to jack the trailer to the blind side in order to direct it toward the dock area, then jack it back to the left in order to hit the dock. No troubles.
I got a good news/bad news deal on the beer run. I am getting rid of it tomorrow, not Saturday, but I have to pick it up at midnight tonight. I might head over a little early, but it's a draft load so I don't imagine it will be ready much before 11pm. Then tomorrow morning I'll make the next pickup and head west.
So, where I thought today would be mostly wasted, it won't. I need to get some laundry done and clean up the truck a bit, then try to sleep for a while. Cheers.
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
12/5/07
We're all behind our baseball team. Go get 'em Tigers. World Series bound and picking up steam. Go get 'em Tigers. There'll be joy in Tiger Town we'll sing you a song, when the Bengals bring the pennant home, where it belongs. We're all behind our baseball team. Go get 'em, Detroit Tigers. Go get 'em Tigers!
Today was a good day, regardless of how my job went. That's not to say my job was bad today, just that it wouldn't have mattered. Dave Dombrowski sacked up and did the job he's paid to do. What good is it to have a bunch of talented minor leaguers when they won't see the field any time soon? We needed a third baseman and we needed an established starter. We got both. Nice job! I almost feel guilty typing this from Florida, since the Marlins just got bent over. But anyway...
I fell alseep at some point early in the morning after watching 3:10 to Yuma. It was a good flick. Interesting characters, well-acted, cool story. But, in typical 21st century fashion, the conclusion was a real deus ex machina. I think screenwriters are just lazy.
I got rolling around 11am and headed into Georgia. This is the second time in a row that Georgia has been crawling with cops, so I suspect that budget troubles plague the old Peach State. I popped in at the T/A in Cartersville to get that light replaced, then headed south again. Traffic around Atlanta was, well, traffic around Atlanta. What are you gonna do?
The rest of the drive was pretty cool. I took a couple of breaks to make sure I showed up at the customer after they were closed and gone for the night. Pretty good move, as this parking lot is tight. Nothing says "oldest city in America" like a nice shiny new strip mall. As new as the place is, the loading docks seem to have been an afterthought. Pretty typical. I took a flyer and passed the building in order to approach the back from the north, guessing that the docks would face south. They do. Sweet. Coming around behind these stores, if you're facing the wrong way, can be a real bitch. There's not exactly room to turn around back here, so you have to circle back out and find a place in the parking lot between the light poles and grass islands and shopping cart corrals and abandoned cars and all the rest of it. My directions to the second drop say "real tight backing" so I also have that to look forward to, which is nice.
"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth," they say. If someone gives you a horse, don't check his teeth to see how old he is. Just be glad they gave you a horse. That's the lesson I have to keep in mind today. I had planned to highlight for home when I got to the last drop tomorrow morning. Go through my benefits information, get a few little things touched up on the truck, and prepare for a busy month of work while people come off the road for the holidays. Halfway through Georgia... I don't have to tell you. You know what happened. Preplan. I never get them when I want them. It's always when I have something else in mind. "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth."
The preplan that I got left quite a bit to be desired. I'll be empty in Lake Mary tomorrow morning and they sent a plan summary for a load leaving Jacksonville on Friday and delivering in Columbia, South Carolina on Saturday. That's not a lot of miles and those two cities mean beer, which is less than fun. The beer distributor in Columbia is no picnic when it comes to backing and parking and all the rest of it, so yeah. So, tomorrow will consist of the short trip down to Lake Mary and a pretty short deadhead back up to Jacksonville. Right about the time I started cursing the planners, one of them called my cell phone.
He said that they sent me a preplan. Yeah, no shit, I already replied to it. What's up? He then asked if I got the info for the load that was stacked behind it, because it wasn't showing that it went through on their end. I took another look. Nope, just Jacksonville to Columbia. He informed me that, after the beer load, I'll have a run going from South Carolina to Nogales. So, not heading home any time soon, but "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth," right? Miles are miles, so I ain't complaining.
The oil gauge hasn't stuck any more since a few days ago, and the steering seems okay. I think there might be an issue with the pump, but it felt right today so I'm just going to go with it. I'll likely highlight for home from Nogales, so I can have things in order before the holidays. That was the best time of year for me to make money last year, so I'm hoping for a repeat.
Today was a good day, regardless of how my job went. That's not to say my job was bad today, just that it wouldn't have mattered. Dave Dombrowski sacked up and did the job he's paid to do. What good is it to have a bunch of talented minor leaguers when they won't see the field any time soon? We needed a third baseman and we needed an established starter. We got both. Nice job! I almost feel guilty typing this from Florida, since the Marlins just got bent over. But anyway...
I fell alseep at some point early in the morning after watching 3:10 to Yuma. It was a good flick. Interesting characters, well-acted, cool story. But, in typical 21st century fashion, the conclusion was a real deus ex machina. I think screenwriters are just lazy.
I got rolling around 11am and headed into Georgia. This is the second time in a row that Georgia has been crawling with cops, so I suspect that budget troubles plague the old Peach State. I popped in at the T/A in Cartersville to get that light replaced, then headed south again. Traffic around Atlanta was, well, traffic around Atlanta. What are you gonna do?
The rest of the drive was pretty cool. I took a couple of breaks to make sure I showed up at the customer after they were closed and gone for the night. Pretty good move, as this parking lot is tight. Nothing says "oldest city in America" like a nice shiny new strip mall. As new as the place is, the loading docks seem to have been an afterthought. Pretty typical. I took a flyer and passed the building in order to approach the back from the north, guessing that the docks would face south. They do. Sweet. Coming around behind these stores, if you're facing the wrong way, can be a real bitch. There's not exactly room to turn around back here, so you have to circle back out and find a place in the parking lot between the light poles and grass islands and shopping cart corrals and abandoned cars and all the rest of it. My directions to the second drop say "real tight backing" so I also have that to look forward to, which is nice.
"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth," they say. If someone gives you a horse, don't check his teeth to see how old he is. Just be glad they gave you a horse. That's the lesson I have to keep in mind today. I had planned to highlight for home when I got to the last drop tomorrow morning. Go through my benefits information, get a few little things touched up on the truck, and prepare for a busy month of work while people come off the road for the holidays. Halfway through Georgia... I don't have to tell you. You know what happened. Preplan. I never get them when I want them. It's always when I have something else in mind. "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth."
The preplan that I got left quite a bit to be desired. I'll be empty in Lake Mary tomorrow morning and they sent a plan summary for a load leaving Jacksonville on Friday and delivering in Columbia, South Carolina on Saturday. That's not a lot of miles and those two cities mean beer, which is less than fun. The beer distributor in Columbia is no picnic when it comes to backing and parking and all the rest of it, so yeah. So, tomorrow will consist of the short trip down to Lake Mary and a pretty short deadhead back up to Jacksonville. Right about the time I started cursing the planners, one of them called my cell phone.
He said that they sent me a preplan. Yeah, no shit, I already replied to it. What's up? He then asked if I got the info for the load that was stacked behind it, because it wasn't showing that it went through on their end. I took another look. Nope, just Jacksonville to Columbia. He informed me that, after the beer load, I'll have a run going from South Carolina to Nogales. So, not heading home any time soon, but "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth," right? Miles are miles, so I ain't complaining.
The oil gauge hasn't stuck any more since a few days ago, and the steering seems okay. I think there might be an issue with the pump, but it felt right today so I'm just going to go with it. I'll likely highlight for home from Nogales, so I can have things in order before the holidays. That was the best time of year for me to make money last year, so I'm hoping for a repeat.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
12/4/07
You know, I started this blog a while back in order to give the best and most real answer I could to the ever-present question - "What's it really like out there?" You can't really answer in a sentence or two, so I started typing each day, day after day, week after week - this is what today was like out here. I get feedback from quite a few people, either through the feedback form or the comment function. I enjoy the conversation and support from everyone, but I honestly could use a day where I have nothing to say to you guys. Something along the lines of "I went from there to here, logged a few hundred miles, that's all" would do me some good right now. I don't mind the typing, and I always have plenty of spare time, but I just need a day where nothing actually happens... I guess there's always tomorrow.
My customer this morning was about a mile from where I slept at the Flying J. I took my ten hour break there, got my act together, and headed over. The directions were nice and simple - take a left on Enterprise and a right on Purity Drive. 6am appointment, it's 5:30am, we're good to go.
The left on Enterprise was clearly marked, which is always nice before the sun comes up. No worries there. Then rolling along slowly, holding up traffic (as if I give a shit), I started looking for Purity Drive. All the way through the industrial park and back down by the Flying J - no Purity Drive. So I doubled back. It was dark, so maybe I missed it. Back through again. Nope, no Purity drive. By this time it was 5:50am, so I had ten minutes. No big deal, I'll call the customer and see what they have to say. I got some canned message saying to e-mail for assistance. Okay, I guess I'll call CFI and get another number. They gave me the same number I had already called. Honestly, why would I expect anything different? So I headed back through again. There was a street going west, roughly where I would expect to find Purity Drive. It was called Mt. Zion, but maybe they just changed the name or something. It had a couple of businesses with loading docks so I gave it a shot. Neither business was my customer and both had closed gates, so I needed to find a place to turn around. 90 degree turn, and another, then an 's' curve, then another 90. This ain't good. Hopefully I can at least catch a connecting street and get back out to the main drag. Nope. The street wound around for a half mile, then turned into a one lane dirt road with a 4 ton weight limit. Nice.
So as I sat there, preparing to back out of the jam I was in, the clock struck 6am. The scenarios started going through my head - I'm going to clip a mirror on a pole coming around one of these blindside corners and get a preventable accident. Or maybe my fleet manager is going to give me shit about being late and I'll threaten to kick his ass. Then I'll lose my job. Or maybe the customer will kick me to the back of the line for missing my appointment. Then I'll have to sit all morning and wait to get loaded. Lots of scenarios, none of them good.
On a positive note, whatever backing issues I had yesterday seem to have worked themselves out. Blindside, sightside, 90 degrees, 45 degrees, 'S' curves, I did a pretty nice job backing out of there this morning. It only took about ten minutes to get out. That seems pretty solid to me, considering it was a half mile around five or six turns.
At that point, my only choice was to start going building to building. Something had to give sooner or later. First driveway - nope. Second - nope. Third, fourth, fifth - nope, nope, nope. At some point I found a driveway that went around the side of a building and further back. Purity Drive. It didn't have a sign, but the building at the end had an address on it. So, twenty minutes late, I checked in. I wasn't being loaded. I wasn't late. I didn't have a 6am appointment. It was a drop/hook to be made any time between 6am and 3pm. The stress, anxiety, and uncertainty of the morning were caused by my company's policy that drivers can't be trusted with complete information since a few of them might not use their time wisely. In light of a recent message board conversation, this is either completely hilarious or utterly disgusting. I haven't decided yet.
If I knew it was a 6am-3pm drop/hook, I would have rolled out of bed around 8am instead of hearing the alarm at 5:15am. I would have been more rested than I was. The sun would have been up. Perhaps, as I drove past Purity Drive the first time, I may have seen the sign for my customer about a hundred yards down. Perhaps I wouldn't have. Either way, I wouldn't have felt rushed for time and grasped for straws. I most likely wouldn't have ended up at the end of a road from which, quite frankly, half of our drivers probably couldn't have backed out. Instead, I got what I got. And that's just the way it is.
Things did get better from there. The load is 20,000 pounds. It's light enough not to drag me too bad on the hills but heavy enough to make for a smooth ride. The traffic around Indianapolis was light and quick. I caught a nice nap just outside Kentucky. The traffic through Louisville was light and quick. The weather was clear and dry, getting progressively warmer as I got further south. The traffic through Nashville was light and quick. I actually saw a big truck that had rear-ended someone and it didn't burn to the ground. That eased my mind a little bit, in light of the last few that I've seen.
Just past the scales on the way to Chattanooga, I ducked into the parking area and called it a day. I'm not all that tired, but sometimes I need to learn when to say when. (A friend of mine is a shrink and that's what she says. She claims that it's an Irish thing. I don't know. But anyhow...) I'll have about nine hours of driving tomorrow, then a Thursday morning drop. The customer is a store, so I'm parking in their lot whether they like it or not. That means I don't have to worry about setting an alarm. I'll just get there when I get there. I need to get a marker light on my truck replaced along the way, but that shouldn't take too long.
For the second day in a row, the only radio station that would come in for more than ten minutes was NPR. I got the extreme pleasure of listening to their assessment of the worldwide terrorism threat (or lack thereof) and what they think should be going on in America. You know how some people think in movie quotes? I'm one of those people.
My customer this morning was about a mile from where I slept at the Flying J. I took my ten hour break there, got my act together, and headed over. The directions were nice and simple - take a left on Enterprise and a right on Purity Drive. 6am appointment, it's 5:30am, we're good to go.
The left on Enterprise was clearly marked, which is always nice before the sun comes up. No worries there. Then rolling along slowly, holding up traffic (as if I give a shit), I started looking for Purity Drive. All the way through the industrial park and back down by the Flying J - no Purity Drive. So I doubled back. It was dark, so maybe I missed it. Back through again. Nope, no Purity drive. By this time it was 5:50am, so I had ten minutes. No big deal, I'll call the customer and see what they have to say. I got some canned message saying to e-mail for assistance. Okay, I guess I'll call CFI and get another number. They gave me the same number I had already called. Honestly, why would I expect anything different? So I headed back through again. There was a street going west, roughly where I would expect to find Purity Drive. It was called Mt. Zion, but maybe they just changed the name or something. It had a couple of businesses with loading docks so I gave it a shot. Neither business was my customer and both had closed gates, so I needed to find a place to turn around. 90 degree turn, and another, then an 's' curve, then another 90. This ain't good. Hopefully I can at least catch a connecting street and get back out to the main drag. Nope. The street wound around for a half mile, then turned into a one lane dirt road with a 4 ton weight limit. Nice.
So as I sat there, preparing to back out of the jam I was in, the clock struck 6am. The scenarios started going through my head - I'm going to clip a mirror on a pole coming around one of these blindside corners and get a preventable accident. Or maybe my fleet manager is going to give me shit about being late and I'll threaten to kick his ass. Then I'll lose my job. Or maybe the customer will kick me to the back of the line for missing my appointment. Then I'll have to sit all morning and wait to get loaded. Lots of scenarios, none of them good.
On a positive note, whatever backing issues I had yesterday seem to have worked themselves out. Blindside, sightside, 90 degrees, 45 degrees, 'S' curves, I did a pretty nice job backing out of there this morning. It only took about ten minutes to get out. That seems pretty solid to me, considering it was a half mile around five or six turns.
At that point, my only choice was to start going building to building. Something had to give sooner or later. First driveway - nope. Second - nope. Third, fourth, fifth - nope, nope, nope. At some point I found a driveway that went around the side of a building and further back. Purity Drive. It didn't have a sign, but the building at the end had an address on it. So, twenty minutes late, I checked in. I wasn't being loaded. I wasn't late. I didn't have a 6am appointment. It was a drop/hook to be made any time between 6am and 3pm. The stress, anxiety, and uncertainty of the morning were caused by my company's policy that drivers can't be trusted with complete information since a few of them might not use their time wisely. In light of a recent message board conversation, this is either completely hilarious or utterly disgusting. I haven't decided yet.
If I knew it was a 6am-3pm drop/hook, I would have rolled out of bed around 8am instead of hearing the alarm at 5:15am. I would have been more rested than I was. The sun would have been up. Perhaps, as I drove past Purity Drive the first time, I may have seen the sign for my customer about a hundred yards down. Perhaps I wouldn't have. Either way, I wouldn't have felt rushed for time and grasped for straws. I most likely wouldn't have ended up at the end of a road from which, quite frankly, half of our drivers probably couldn't have backed out. Instead, I got what I got. And that's just the way it is.
Things did get better from there. The load is 20,000 pounds. It's light enough not to drag me too bad on the hills but heavy enough to make for a smooth ride. The traffic around Indianapolis was light and quick. I caught a nice nap just outside Kentucky. The traffic through Louisville was light and quick. The weather was clear and dry, getting progressively warmer as I got further south. The traffic through Nashville was light and quick. I actually saw a big truck that had rear-ended someone and it didn't burn to the ground. That eased my mind a little bit, in light of the last few that I've seen.
Just past the scales on the way to Chattanooga, I ducked into the parking area and called it a day. I'm not all that tired, but sometimes I need to learn when to say when. (A friend of mine is a shrink and that's what she says. She claims that it's an Irish thing. I don't know. But anyhow...) I'll have about nine hours of driving tomorrow, then a Thursday morning drop. The customer is a store, so I'm parking in their lot whether they like it or not. That means I don't have to worry about setting an alarm. I'll just get there when I get there. I need to get a marker light on my truck replaced along the way, but that shouldn't take too long.
For the second day in a row, the only radio station that would come in for more than ten minutes was NPR. I got the extreme pleasure of listening to their assessment of the worldwide terrorism threat (or lack thereof) and what they think should be going on in America. You know how some people think in movie quotes? I'm one of those people.
Monday, December 3, 2007
12/3/07
There's a lot of chatter around about whether LTL and local drivers have it better than OTR drivers, and vice versa. To me it's like asking whether a blonde with big boobs is better than a redhead with no gag reflex - different strokes for different folks. Anyhow, one thing I can say for certain is that the typical OTR day is a hell of a lot less like work. Today wasn't backbreaking or anything, but I only made three pickups and a drop. Those guys making a bunch of stops every day - let's just say I'd have to make a lot of money. According to the LTL companies with whom I've spoken, the part about those guys making more money than us is utter bullshit. But anyway...
The first stop was in what looked like a fairly modern industrial area. So of course it had almost no room to maneuver a truck. I got in and snaked through the driveway without taking out any trees, then checked in. I had a 9am appointment, according to CFI. I was scheduled to pick up any time after 10am, according to the customer. Don't even get me started on the communication thing today. So I hung out for a while, then backed into the dock. There was room on my right, which was good since there was hardly any room in front of the dock. I had to come in at a pretty shallow angle and twist the hell out of it, but I got the trailer settled in. Two pallets and 400 pounds later, I was ready to wind my way back out of there.
Then a nice little stretch down to Lafayette, IN. The traffic leaving the Grand Rapids area was a bitch. Then it settled in for a bit. Then that stretch of Indiana where everyone thinks Chicago is going to disappear if they don't get there last week. Then I-65 settled in for a bit. Then, when I made it to Lafayette, I had another wicked tight entrance and dock area to navigate. A guy carried a pallet and set it in the trailer. Yes, he carried it. It was a total of 50 pounds, including the pallet.
Then leaving Lafayette and getting back to I-65, a stretch of maybe three miles, took forever. I ran down to Frankfort, where I got to back into another pain in the ass dock. This one wasn't as tight as the first two, but it was still a day cab job. Four pallets and 1,000 pounds. Do the math if you want to. It seems like a waste of a 53 foot trailer behind a sleeper cab, but I don't pay the bills.
The route from Frankfort to Anderson, where I would deliver, was IN-38 over to IN-32 over to Anderson. It was dispatched at 54 miles. I took the most direct route, so I don't imagine it could have been much longer than the dispatch. It took a little over two hours. IN-38 is on my version of the 'do not call' list from now on. It's a 55mph state highway, but there's a stretch that totally sucks balls. The lanes were so skinny that I had tires on the white line and yellow line, at the same time. There are a bunch of 10mph curves that require the use of the oncoming lanes. That's well enough, but a few of them were in wooded areas. I couldn't see through the trees, so I had to ease into the oncoming lanes just to see if there was anybody coming at me... in the oncoming lanes. See a problem there? Then the towns along the way had more crazy tight turns. I can handle them, but man. After a while it seemed way too much like work.
The guy at the Peterbilt place is pretty cool. It was the same guy from the time I ran down there last month. He started working and I sent in my empty call so I could I check the directions to my next pickup (I did get the Florida run). After a while, I didn't feel any bouncing so I went inside. He was nowhere to be found, but there were still the two pallets from the first place in the trailer. So I went back outside and caught up my e-mails. Still no bouncing, so I headed back in. He was there this time. "Your bills are over there." Uh, sir, do you want those other two pallets? "Oh yeah, that would be good." So he unloaded the last two and I took off.
The route to Lebanon, where I pick up tomorrow morning, would be straight back across on IN-32. Yeah, maybe another time. I had my fill of that shit today. Here's a serious question: If you were driving along and saw this big-ass red truck pulling this big-ass white trailer, blocking your travel lane as it came around a corner, why in the hell would you continue driving right into its path? There's always a dumbass here or there, but this must have happened ten times today. One lady (I think the town was Edgewood) just sat right in front of me and refused to back up. The people behind me stopped. The people behind her backed up. She just sat there and waved her arms at me. Well I hope you packed a lunch sweetheart, because there's only one way I can go from here. The light changed. She sat through a green facing her direction. Man, did that piss her off! Whew! Then it changed back to green for me. We had quite a few spectators lined up along both roads by the time she backed it up. Then, she would back up a foot, I would go forward a foot. She would roll her eyes and back up another foot. I would yell out the window at her and go forward another foot. And so on and so forth, until I got around the corner. Dumb bitch. Anyway, what was I saying?
Oh yeah, over to Lebanon. After the way this afternoon went, I just took I-69 to the loop and back up I-65. Nice and easy. I rolled through the Flying J parking lot, expecting to find it full. I got a spot. It was pretty tight and I can't back worth a shit today, but I'm there. That saved me from having to scout the industrial park for one of my hiding places. Beauty.
Early start tomorrow, then it's southward and away from the cold for a few days. I may, depending on how the next couple of days go, actually end up highlighting for home when I get down there. Something about my steering seems a little off today. I'll give it the trip to Florida and see if it's actually the truck or if it's just me. Plus, my oil temperature gauge sometimes sticks at 300+ degrees. I know that's not right, but the gauge is supposed to work. If those things are still going on, I'll head back to Michigan and take a day or two at home while it's in the shop. I guess I could even have them take care of that fuel tank while it was there. This is actually starting to sound like I probably should highlight. (My apologies for the rambling in this last paragraph. Sometimes you folks get to join me as I figure things out for myself, or at least try to.)
The first stop was in what looked like a fairly modern industrial area. So of course it had almost no room to maneuver a truck. I got in and snaked through the driveway without taking out any trees, then checked in. I had a 9am appointment, according to CFI. I was scheduled to pick up any time after 10am, according to the customer. Don't even get me started on the communication thing today. So I hung out for a while, then backed into the dock. There was room on my right, which was good since there was hardly any room in front of the dock. I had to come in at a pretty shallow angle and twist the hell out of it, but I got the trailer settled in. Two pallets and 400 pounds later, I was ready to wind my way back out of there.
Then a nice little stretch down to Lafayette, IN. The traffic leaving the Grand Rapids area was a bitch. Then it settled in for a bit. Then that stretch of Indiana where everyone thinks Chicago is going to disappear if they don't get there last week. Then I-65 settled in for a bit. Then, when I made it to Lafayette, I had another wicked tight entrance and dock area to navigate. A guy carried a pallet and set it in the trailer. Yes, he carried it. It was a total of 50 pounds, including the pallet.
Then leaving Lafayette and getting back to I-65, a stretch of maybe three miles, took forever. I ran down to Frankfort, where I got to back into another pain in the ass dock. This one wasn't as tight as the first two, but it was still a day cab job. Four pallets and 1,000 pounds. Do the math if you want to. It seems like a waste of a 53 foot trailer behind a sleeper cab, but I don't pay the bills.
The route from Frankfort to Anderson, where I would deliver, was IN-38 over to IN-32 over to Anderson. It was dispatched at 54 miles. I took the most direct route, so I don't imagine it could have been much longer than the dispatch. It took a little over two hours. IN-38 is on my version of the 'do not call' list from now on. It's a 55mph state highway, but there's a stretch that totally sucks balls. The lanes were so skinny that I had tires on the white line and yellow line, at the same time. There are a bunch of 10mph curves that require the use of the oncoming lanes. That's well enough, but a few of them were in wooded areas. I couldn't see through the trees, so I had to ease into the oncoming lanes just to see if there was anybody coming at me... in the oncoming lanes. See a problem there? Then the towns along the way had more crazy tight turns. I can handle them, but man. After a while it seemed way too much like work.
The guy at the Peterbilt place is pretty cool. It was the same guy from the time I ran down there last month. He started working and I sent in my empty call so I could I check the directions to my next pickup (I did get the Florida run). After a while, I didn't feel any bouncing so I went inside. He was nowhere to be found, but there were still the two pallets from the first place in the trailer. So I went back outside and caught up my e-mails. Still no bouncing, so I headed back in. He was there this time. "Your bills are over there." Uh, sir, do you want those other two pallets? "Oh yeah, that would be good." So he unloaded the last two and I took off.
The route to Lebanon, where I pick up tomorrow morning, would be straight back across on IN-32. Yeah, maybe another time. I had my fill of that shit today. Here's a serious question: If you were driving along and saw this big-ass red truck pulling this big-ass white trailer, blocking your travel lane as it came around a corner, why in the hell would you continue driving right into its path? There's always a dumbass here or there, but this must have happened ten times today. One lady (I think the town was Edgewood) just sat right in front of me and refused to back up. The people behind me stopped. The people behind her backed up. She just sat there and waved her arms at me. Well I hope you packed a lunch sweetheart, because there's only one way I can go from here. The light changed. She sat through a green facing her direction. Man, did that piss her off! Whew! Then it changed back to green for me. We had quite a few spectators lined up along both roads by the time she backed it up. Then, she would back up a foot, I would go forward a foot. She would roll her eyes and back up another foot. I would yell out the window at her and go forward another foot. And so on and so forth, until I got around the corner. Dumb bitch. Anyway, what was I saying?
Oh yeah, over to Lebanon. After the way this afternoon went, I just took I-69 to the loop and back up I-65. Nice and easy. I rolled through the Flying J parking lot, expecting to find it full. I got a spot. It was pretty tight and I can't back worth a shit today, but I'm there. That saved me from having to scout the industrial park for one of my hiding places. Beauty.
Early start tomorrow, then it's southward and away from the cold for a few days. I may, depending on how the next couple of days go, actually end up highlighting for home when I get down there. Something about my steering seems a little off today. I'll give it the trip to Florida and see if it's actually the truck or if it's just me. Plus, my oil temperature gauge sometimes sticks at 300+ degrees. I know that's not right, but the gauge is supposed to work. If those things are still going on, I'll head back to Michigan and take a day or two at home while it's in the shop. I guess I could even have them take care of that fuel tank while it was there. This is actually starting to sound like I probably should highlight. (My apologies for the rambling in this last paragraph. Sometimes you folks get to join me as I figure things out for myself, or at least try to.)
Sunday, December 2, 2007
12/2/07
First things first - if you're one of the sickly or old CFI/ConWay employees who will be spending my insurance premiums next year, you're welcome in advance. The roll of the dice came up snake eyes and I won't be heading east. Maybe I'll get to my benefit information before the deadline, maybe not. Given that we're on the road for a living, couldn't they do this stuff by e-mail? I'm not saying, I'm just saying...
I also didn't have to sit at that customer and wait for Monday morning to get a trailer, although it wouldn't have made a huge difference in terms of miles. They bobtailed me up to Howard City to grab an empty, then dispatched me to pick up a load outside Grand Rapids tomorrow morning. It's another one of those Peterbilt P&D runs like the one I had the last time I went back to work. Three pickups and a dropoff. Also like last time, they planned me on another load behind it. Why are the people in Taylor so much better at their jobs (at least in the planning arena) than the people in Joplin? Almost every time they've given me something short out of Michigan, they've tacked a longer run on behind it. Is it just the smaller number of trucks involved or maybe the smaller territory? Wouldn't that simply suggest that they need to staff more people, or better people, in Joplin then? I don't know. Anyhow, after my drop in Indiana it looks like I'm set to make a pickup nearby and then two drops in Florida. Given recent events, I won't count my chickens before they hatch but hopefully that will work out. In December, I find the south to be quite tolerable.
Ever tried to slide tandems on a solid sheet of ice? I hadn't before today, but it's not quite as fun as you might think. On a good note, I did find a use for my tire chains. Chain up? Hell no. I don't even know how to get them out of the bag. But that fifty pound bag does make for one hell of a wheel chock. Mission accomplished.
I did a lot of driving today for 56 dispatched miles. I had to go quite a bit out of the way to get some fuel before I could set up shop for the day. I still have that issue with the engine only pulling fuel from the left tank so I have to fill up almost every day. For reasons I won't go into, I couldn't make a fuel stop along the way last night. By the time I got to Cedar Springs, the needle was buried on 'E.' So, in my own clever way, I parked horizontally across their loading docks and went to sleep. That tilted my truck to the left and, by the time I woke up, some fuel had migrated over and pushed the needle to around 1/8 full. Of course, that meant I had 1/16 since the fuel in the right tank is useless, but that would be sufficient to get me to my trailer and to a fuel stop.
After that, I headed back west toward tomorrow's first pickup. I thought about heading straight to the customer and parking, but decided on the nearest truck stop instead. I have had my fill of parking lots covered in ice and snow. Hopefully they'll get their plows over there and salt everything down before the work week starts tomorrow. It's raining right now so, if it gets cold enough tonight... nah, let's not think about that just yet. Also, getting done early in the afternoon usually means it's a good idea to have a store and restrooms nearby.
Bring on the Sopranos. Nine more episodes and I'll be caught up with the rest of America. Better late than never. Cheers.
I also didn't have to sit at that customer and wait for Monday morning to get a trailer, although it wouldn't have made a huge difference in terms of miles. They bobtailed me up to Howard City to grab an empty, then dispatched me to pick up a load outside Grand Rapids tomorrow morning. It's another one of those Peterbilt P&D runs like the one I had the last time I went back to work. Three pickups and a dropoff. Also like last time, they planned me on another load behind it. Why are the people in Taylor so much better at their jobs (at least in the planning arena) than the people in Joplin? Almost every time they've given me something short out of Michigan, they've tacked a longer run on behind it. Is it just the smaller number of trucks involved or maybe the smaller territory? Wouldn't that simply suggest that they need to staff more people, or better people, in Joplin then? I don't know. Anyhow, after my drop in Indiana it looks like I'm set to make a pickup nearby and then two drops in Florida. Given recent events, I won't count my chickens before they hatch but hopefully that will work out. In December, I find the south to be quite tolerable.
Ever tried to slide tandems on a solid sheet of ice? I hadn't before today, but it's not quite as fun as you might think. On a good note, I did find a use for my tire chains. Chain up? Hell no. I don't even know how to get them out of the bag. But that fifty pound bag does make for one hell of a wheel chock. Mission accomplished.
I did a lot of driving today for 56 dispatched miles. I had to go quite a bit out of the way to get some fuel before I could set up shop for the day. I still have that issue with the engine only pulling fuel from the left tank so I have to fill up almost every day. For reasons I won't go into, I couldn't make a fuel stop along the way last night. By the time I got to Cedar Springs, the needle was buried on 'E.' So, in my own clever way, I parked horizontally across their loading docks and went to sleep. That tilted my truck to the left and, by the time I woke up, some fuel had migrated over and pushed the needle to around 1/8 full. Of course, that meant I had 1/16 since the fuel in the right tank is useless, but that would be sufficient to get me to my trailer and to a fuel stop.
After that, I headed back west toward tomorrow's first pickup. I thought about heading straight to the customer and parking, but decided on the nearest truck stop instead. I have had my fill of parking lots covered in ice and snow. Hopefully they'll get their plows over there and salt everything down before the work week starts tomorrow. It's raining right now so, if it gets cold enough tonight... nah, let's not think about that just yet. Also, getting done early in the afternoon usually means it's a good idea to have a store and restrooms nearby.
Bring on the Sopranos. Nine more episodes and I'll be caught up with the rest of America. Better late than never. Cheers.
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