3/1/09

When the blog is called 'Tales from the Road,' its nature is essentially predetermined. I bounce around the country and tell you guys about the things that go on. Occasionally I have something on my mind so I throw that into the mix while I'm typing. People draw their conclusions and then tomorrow we do it all again. Easy enough. Sometimes though, the story that didn't take place would have been far more interesting.

For example, I spent last night parked behind a Citgo. The story may have been fairly intriguing if I had done business with some guy when he offered to sell me drugs. I've heard plenty of entertaining tales involving drug use over the years. I had no interest though, so there really isn't much of a story. I may be the only graduate in the history of Lincoln Park High School never to have used recreational drugs. I may have partaken in performance enhancers far below the Barry Bonds level of sophistication once or twice in my sporting life, but my only form of recreational intoxication has always been alcohol.

The story may have been a little less mundane had I followed my instincts vis a vis the cashier at the Citgo. She was a bit older than I, but one would be prone to the impression that she could have been the prom queen of a local high school maybe twenty years ago. The look in her eye suggested that her sly comments toward me were more than idle chatter. I could have made a move and had either a fun evening with the lass or an embarrassing tale of rejection. Either way, the story may have been entertaining. I dismissed her and her comments out of hand before considering that an opportunity may have been squandered. I spent the night alone in my truck. Not much of a story there either.

Oh well. Another day in the life, I guess. I hung around the Citgo all day today and then headed the last 45 miles to my consignee. They got me into a dock and told me to check in with the lumpers. I know that I've been to that consignee before and I know that there were no lumpers. I asked about it and was told that they just started using a lumper service. Sweet. Skipping over the boring details about Comchek numbers and scheduled breaks for the workers and such, we get to the point that I left three hours later. The two other CTL guys who arrived after me were done well before I was. The whole situation was one big fiasco. Oh well, what are you gonna do?

And now I find myself on the board at #3, most likely behind the two drivers who got unloaded before I did. Yep. The whole world is still out to get me. One of the other CTL guys mentioned that he was heading over to a frontage road in town near an abandoned truck stop. He made the same trip as I did out of Texas this weekend and arrived in town on Friday night, then hung out here for two days. Since I had no better parking options in mind, I headed down to the same place to put my feet up for the night.

Since we've clearly got another case of The Man tryin' to keep a brother down, I fully expect my next dispatch to take me to snowy New England.