5/20/08

Well, this was a weird day.

I woke up and headed up to the consignee in Washington Court House, Ohio this morning. They assigned me to a dock right away. Then, once I got backed in and slid my tandems, a guy came out and told me to go to a different dock. So I did. The beauty about paper loads is that 45,000 pounds fit into eight rolls. Thus, I was unloaded very quickly and sent on my way.

There was room along the street going through the industrial park there, so I pulled off to the side and waited for what was next. I was #1 again when I got on the board and an hour later I had my assignment. It was a weird one. I had to deadhead up to the Toledo suburbs (157 miles) and then take a load to... Taylor, Michigan (51 miles). The load is going to Canada, but I don't go to Canada, so for me it went to Taylor. I guess they just needed a truck to get up there and make the pick up or something.

Along the way, I had quite the experience. That seems to be happening a little too often lately. So I'm rolling along on US-62, about to shoot over on OH-56 to I-71 northbound. OH-56 was closed for construction. There was a sign right there saying that there was a low bridge 13'5" ahead ten miles on US-62. So I was looking for another street that would get me off of US-62 and somewhere over toward I-71. The streets near the road closure were skinny residential ones with parked cars along the sides. Not a chance. I guess with some local knowledge one of those streets may have worked. They all looked awfully damn tight to me though. I had no desire to get myself stuck in a place from which I couldn't escape.

So I rolled along northward, thinking I would catch the next state highway to the east and just run up US-23 to the Columbus loop. I got to that road and saw a sign saying 13'3" on it. Well, that won't work. At that point I was getting pretty damn close to the ten mile mark. I was looking for a county road or an open lot or something, anything, that would let me turn around. Doubling back for a bunch of miles wouldn't have been too cool, but what else was there to do? Yeah, nowhere to turn. I was screwed. I seemed to have gotten myself stuck in a place from which I couldn't escape.

I pulled off to the shoulder and put my flashers on while I tried to think through my options. It really started to look like I was going to have to back down the highway for several miles. That sounded terribly unsafe, so I decided to roll up to the bridge and check it out. Letting a little air out of my tires and limping through was probably a much better bet than going backwards, assuming I was just an inch too tall. The bridge was well over a foot above my trailer before I got under it, so that was a good start. The trouble was that there was a hill on the other side that would be lifting me as my trailer passed under. I stopped every few feet, pissing off the trailing motorists no doubt, to check on the height of my trailer. The damn thing never came anywhere close to the bridge. I would say eight or nine inches at the closest. That was weird. So either my trailer was less than 13'6" or that bridge was a hell of a lot higher than 13'5". In any case, controversy solved. Moving along.

I got up to my exit on I-75 and got in another weird little pickle. I was about fifteen minutes ahead of my appointment time, and I needed to go south to the first gate on the right. Nice and easy. I turned south, or what I thought was south (actually east-ish more than anything). The sign about seventy yards down said "OH-65 North." Sweet. So we'll just find a place to turn around. Okay then, I guess we won't find a place to turn around. It was a pretty urban area and there was hardly even room to maneuver myself down the road in some spots. I had to take some other road up to some other road and across some other road, until eventually I snaked my way back to I-75 and headed back south. This time, I went the right way and everything was cool. I was about five minutes early for my appointment.

After I was loaded, the fella told me that I wouldn't be able to leave through the 'out' gate. That was weird. Apparently the CTL guy who left before me had a little meeting with the gate. We had to park and use a phone to notify the dispatch office that we were loaded so they could open the gate. It seems that my distinguished colleague got that part right, but forgot to set his parking brake. Ergo, broken gate. Bummer dude.

Back in Taylor I made my drop and got on the board. I was #1 so I hung around the yard. My mother called and I asked if she felt like getting some dinner. I let the dispatcher know that I would be heading out for a while, so she went ahead and told me that she had two loads from which to choose. One was going to Joplin and the other to Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. Here in my little world, we have a saying. "Anything but Joplin." So I'm going to Pennsylvania. The load is supposed to get here sometime tonight or tomorrow morning and it has to deliver at 6am Thursday. That means I can take a night off at home tonight and drive it down tomorrow. Beauty.

So the miles for today weren't great, but I got a break at home so we'll call it good enough. Tomorrow's run will be 468, so that's a pretty good day for me coming up.