3/3/09

Two conclusions can be drawn from today. First is that US-281 is a hell of a lot more hilly than I recalled from last time. The load that I dragged down today was 42,000 pounds. The one on my prior trip to Laredo must have been much lighter. The second conclusion is that I am not a popular man on the north end of town tonight.

I didn't fall asleep last night, but I did manage to doze off pretty soundly for a while this morning. As such, I got on the road a little after noon and managed to hit the Dallas area right in the middle of the afternoon rush. I'm not quite prepared to say that Texans are worse drivers than New Englanders, but it is getting to be a very close call. Why in the hell people don't just freaking GO remains one of life's mysteries.

I took a nice break in Round Mountain and then rolled on into Laredo late at night. I do very much prefer to get here after all of the day's traffic has subsided. The guy in the inspection bay told me that the broker was a 24/7 outfit so I would be able to make my drop tonight if I wanted to do so. I thought about going to bed and then dropping it in the morning, but that aforementioned traffic didn't sound like much fun.

I stopped at the dispatch window to get myself on the board and ask for directions to the broker, since the inspection guy never sent directions over the satellite. There was a sign hanging in the window, saying that the dispatcher was out doing a yard check. I called Joplin and had them put me on the board. #9, not bad. Now for the directions.

I turned on my computer and checked Mapquest to see if I could learn anything. The location seemed vaguely familiar to me, but I hadn't been there since I was driving with my trainer in July of '06. How hard could it be, right? So I headed over and checked it out. I got to the industrial park without any trouble. The broker was another story. It was one of those places with an address on one street and the location on another. After parking my truck and going for a rather lengthy walk, I found a locked gate. In my best estimation, this had to be the broker.

I called the terminal and spoke with the dispatcher, who had returned from his yard check by then. He sent directions confirming that the locked gate was my destination. The directions said to honk the horn if the gate was locked. I honked my horn. A guy who was sleeping in a truck across the street flipped his cabin lights on, looked out his window, and went back to bed. I imagine I'm not too popular with that guy. Nobody came to the gate though. So I called the contact number that the dispatcher sent to me with my directions. A groggy voice speaking broken English came across the other end. After a few minutes of unproductive back and forth during which neither of us could understand the other, I hung up the phone. A guy came walking toward the gate a couple of minutes later. Probably not too popular with that guy now either.

By the time I made my drop and got back to the yard I was up to #7. I saw a bazillion trailers on the lot, telling me that I could expect to be out of here relatively quickly. After maybe ten minutes I had an assignment. Not bad. I'll be pulling a trailer out of here after I sleep for a little while and heading to Edmond, Oklahoma. It's only a 10,000 pound load and I won't add many miles by going back up US-281 so I guess that's the plan. This one is a 10am delivery on Thursday, so I'll be empty with 1,830 miles down and three days left in the pay week. Setting aside the fact that the last two weeks were each looking good before something went wrong, I think I may actually make a few bucks this time around.