A: The place where promising weeks go to die.
Q: What is Joplin, Missouri?
Yep. I got up this morning and finished off my trip. The four pallets took only a few minutes to unload. From there I headed westward toward that medium Pilot truck stop near the freeway. I was hoping that enough people had left this morning to leave me a decent place to park. As I approached the freeway, my Qualcomm beeped at me. 'Planned deadhead.' If I hadn't given away the rest of the story in the opening of this post, the geography enthusiasts among you probably would have figured out that Joplin is only 75 miles from Springdale at this point. Shit.
So I pulled into the inspection bay in Joplin and the guys did their thing. The alternating looks of surprise and amusement were pretty funny to me. What was so surprising? Behold the end of an era...
By this time tomorrow, that door will say "Con-way Truckload." I can't say for sure, but I suspect that I may have been the Josey Wales of this little transition from CFI to Con-way. Everyone else surrendered to the new regime but I was the lone holdout. They started the rebranding toward the end of 2007 as trucks passed through Joplin. This is my first trip to Joplin since that time. Of course, there may be a bunch of other trucks out there with Contract Freighters on them. I really don't know. I just know that I haven't seen any of them in a long time. So I used the little Google feature up there in the corner and took a look. I've managed to steer clear of this place since August 13, 2007. Oh well. All good things must come to an end.So we already knew that I had some body work to be done after that fella in Atlanta did his bit on my fender. In addition, I was way overdue for an alignment. I had suspected as much, since my steering wheel had developed a bit of a wiggle at high speeds, but I'm not a mechanic. I just go with the flow. There is also a recall on my transmission something-or-other valve. And my tires were due for a rotation.
Our alignment bay is down for some sprucing up ahead of some important visitors, so I headed down the street to a local tire shop for that part. Back at the terminal, I checked in with the body shop. Pretty basic repair job there... for 99% of our drivers. My truck isn't red or white. For me, they'll have to get some black parts ready. I get to wait until tomorrow. Oh joy. I took care of the tires a little while ago and the tractor shop should get to me for the transmission work at some point today. Then tomorrow I'll get the new fender and bumper installed before getting myself back on the board. Then there will be fifty people ahead of me and I'll once again convince myself that the whole world is out to get me. Just another case of The Man tryin' to keep a brother down.
I still see plenty of red CFI rigs on I-25 in southern Colorado near New Mexico.
ReplyDeleteThey left the 'CFI' on the top and sides of the sleepers on the holdover trucks. They only switched the door logos to Con-way Truckload. I started looking about five months ago when one of my colleagues made a comment while we were next to each other at a loading dock. Haven't seen another one with the old door logo yet, but maybe there are still a handful out there. In any case, I'm part of the new corporate machine now.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog Joe! I'm no longer with CTL but I still enjoy reading about your exploits. Living vicariously! Did you manage to avoid the turn down to 65mph all this time?
ReplyDeleteNo, I only ducked them for a few months on that one. My old truck crapped out on me early last year and I got this one in Laredo. It was already cut to 65mph when I got it.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the feedback on the blog.
Good to see your still rolling along Joe Joe. Saw a few white Cascadia's last couple of weeks.When you gonna get one of those with the APU and all the new gadgets? Just a side-bar, moved the pool business to Las Vegas, Henderson actually. When your ready to get out of that truck and make some jack, look me up. Sun all year round, women of "questionable character" as you like to say, what more do you want?
ReplyDeleteSee, on a day like this, you would have to go and tempt me. I'm fairly unmotivated and not very productive though. Since your taxes will be going up before too long, wasting money on a guy like me might not be too prudent. I'll definitely have my Swedish buddy join you for a liquid sandwich though, if we're ever in the area.
ReplyDeleteThe guy in the body shop today said that they're trading the trucks in my general range at or around 500K miles. That's a little under a year away for this one.
Not that his opinion is official or anything, but that body shop guy does think that I was the last man standing with the Contract Freighters brand. Said he hasn't seen another one come through here in months.