I did some calculation before I checked out of my motel room and found that, if I could make good time, my available nine hours might be enough to get me to my final destination after all. It would depend on traffic and the like, but at least I had a shot.
Once I got out to the freeway, I found that it had been plowed and salted. There were some spots where the road was too rough for the plows to work effectively and the ice was still problematic, but overall it wasn't too bad. Those few slow spots and the general caution being displayed by everyone on the road were still enough to make my pace a little slower than it would have been in good weather though.
Pursuant to yesterday's phone conversation with our road service department, I pulled into the Pilot in West Memphis and told the guy behind the desk that I needed two new drive tires. He was kind enough to inform me that he only had one super single in stock. Well, shit.
I went back out to my truck and dialed the road service department to see what they wanted me to do. As I sat waiting on hold, I pulled out my truck stop directory and looked to see what would lie ahead on I-40. Every time I have had a tire issue in the past, they have told me that I need to go somewhere that is a Michelin dealer so that they get the proper account pricing. I saw that the Love's in Jackson, Tennessee was a Michelin dealer and filed that information away in the memory bank.
After sitting on hold for fifteen minutes and still having a job to do, I headed back to the road. For the second time in as many opportunities, they waited until I was down the road and across the bridge to the next state before someone picked up the phone. You'll now get a rare glimpse inside the mind of a truck driver as he loses all patience but tries to maintain as professional a tone as possible. Let the frustration begin...
Road Service Guy: Road service, this is {...}, can I help you?
Me: Yeah, this is Joe on truck {...}. I just stopped at the Pilot in West Memphis for new drive tires but they only had one in stock. I need to know what would be my next option along I-40.
RSG: If you're in West Memphis, you need to go to McGriff's. That's a shop that we use.
Me: I'm not in West Memphis anymore. I've been on hold for 25 minutes. I've already crossed into Tennessee now.
RSG: Right, you need to go back to West Memphis
Unspoken Inner Monologue: I swear these guys act like I just pulled out of Grandma's driveway and forgot the cookies. I can't just throw it in reverse.
Me: I don't have enough hours to be driving in circles today. My customer is 450 miles away and I'm already below eight hours.
RSG: Well... {silence}
Unspoken Inner Monologue: He has no idea what I'm talking about.
Me: What else is there along I-40 to the east? I see that the Love's in Jackson is a Michelin dealer.
RSG: We try to do these things in Joplin so we can replace them for like half the price.
Me: I'm not headed in that direction.
RSG: That's why you need to go to McGriff's.
Unspoken Inner Monologue: I might as well be discussing organic chemistry with my two-year-old nephew right now.
Me: Assuming that's not an option, what's the next place?
RSG: You're saying that's not an option. I'm trying to help you here and you don't want me to help you. You just want to go wherever you want to go.
Unspoken Inner Monologue: I'll get tires in fucking Zimbabwe if you want me to, bubba. I don't give a shit. It's not my truck.
Me: I'm not sure you understand how the 70 hour rule works. I can't afford to burn an extra hour circling back right now.
RSG: But that's the closest place.
Me: You're not hearing what I'm saying. I'm already in Tennessee. By the time I find somewhere to turn around, get past the accident on the bridge, and find the shop in West Memphis, that's a half hour gone. By the time I get back to the freeway, make it across the bridge, and get back to where I am now, that's at least another twenty minutes. It doesn't matter how far the place is. It's in the wrong direction and I'm running low on hours.
RSG: Well, you should have called before you went to the Pilot in the first place. Then you would have known.
Unspoken Inner Monologue: I fucking called and I was told to go to the fucking Pilot. If you guys had enough people to answer your fucking phones in less than 25 minutes, I would be at your silly little shop right now and not having this fucking conversation with you.
Me: No, no, no. I did call. The guy yesterday said that the Pilot was my best option.
RSG: That's because McGriff's was closed last night. You didn't call last night when you got to the Pilot and found out they were out of stock, did you?
Unspoken Inner Monologue: Don't tell him what I'm really thinking right now. Just stay cool.
Me: I didn't have enough hours to get to West Memphis yesterday. I told the guy on the phone that I would be stopping this morning and he said that the Pilot was fine. I stopped at the Pilot this morning. They were out of stock. Then I called you and I was on hold for 25 minutes.
RSG: Well... {Silence}
Unspoken Inner Monologue: I had better find a way out of this before I blow my top and get myself fired. I'm not doubling back to West Memphis and forcing myself to run out of hours. I'm not falsifying my log book to make the delivery on time. There has to be a way out of this asinine conversation. Think... think.
Me: Can you just flag my truck for repairs in Joplin then?
RSG: {Sarcastic snicker}... Joplin is a lot further than West Memphis.
Unspoken Inner Monologue: This fucking Einstein still thinks we're arguing about the distance between Memphis and West Memphis.
Me: That's fine.
RSG: Okay then, it's in there that you need to be brought to Joplin or Laredo for a tire inspection.
Unspoken Inner Monologue: This was so fucking stupid. I swear it would almost be worth it to run over a pile of nails and make them send a roadside repair truck with new tires.
Me: Okay, thank you.
RSG: Okay.
_________________________________________
The sad part about the whole thing is that the guy probably still has absolutely no clue why I couldn't just swing back to West Memphis. I'm sure he hung up the phone and had a funny little story to tell about the asshole driver who just called. In my restaurants, I would see the same general thing going on. The waitresses knew nothing about the cooks, other than how to bitch about them. The cooks knew nothing about the waitresses, other than how to bitch about them. Nobody knew anything about the dish washers, unless and until we were out of clean glasses. Then everyone knew how to bitch about that too. I don't know why I should think that a trucking company would be any different. I guess I just fall into the trap of thinking that, since the drivers have federal regulations to follow and everything (dispatch, road service, etc.) has to fit within those regulations, then people should have some kind of clue as to what is going on outside their own cubicles.
Anyhow, whatever. I'm flagged for a "tire inspection" now. Good enough. I'm not below 2/32" yet, so hopefully they'll get me in within a few days.
The roads dried out once I got further into Tennessee and I was able to keep my foot down for most of the day. As I came across the Bluegrass Parkway, I started making a few quick mental calculations to see if I would indeed be able to reach my consignee tonight. That was the whole point of the exercise in futility detailed above, after all. If the bad weather comes in overnight as expected, then I would be far safer sitting in a customer's parking lot than I would be driving through the hills at 4am or 5am, before the sun comes up and before the roads are plowed. Not that my little buddy in road service would give a shit one way or the other, but maybe the people who send the damned "Be safe" messages every morning would understand why my remaining hours were important.
If I couldn't make it tonight, then the last truck stop would be the little one at Exit 42 on the parkway. I determined (correctly) that I should be able to reach my consignee before my hours ran out. I also determined (incorrectly) that dropping down from Exit 68 and catching KY-169 over to Nicholasville would be a good idea. Whoa Nellie, was that road ever a skinny one. It wasn't listed as restricted in my atlas though and I never saw any signs saying that I was out of line, so good enough. I didn't crash into anything, nobody crashed into me, and I got to my consignee with ten minutes to spare.
I received a pre-planned assignment for tomorrow as I was cruising up I-65 earlier in the afternoon. It's going from somewhere in Kentucky to Waco, Texas, so maybe the "or Laredo" part of the conversation with my little road service buddy will come into play. Better Laredo than Joplin, as far as I'm concerned. Plus I've been talking with some friends lately and it sounds like it's about time to head home for a few days. If I can get to Laredo before requesting home time, then I can make a few bucks on the way back up. One thing's for sure either way - I'm not requesting home time until I've gone to one of those two terminals and gotten new tires. This situation needs to be put behind me. I just had an inspection, I'll have relatively fresh tires all around, and the routine maintenance stuff is arranged electronically without a phone call. I hope that it's a good long time until I have to dial those people again.
Looks like fun in the morning...
Dude, that was just to funny. Ain't it the truth how people never seem to see it from the other side of the conversation.
ReplyDeleteGood to hear you still have a job, and thanks for the entertaining post.
J.T.
Glamorous life... or something.
ReplyDeleteAfter that conversation are you sure its not purely incompetence? Definitely a funny read.
ReplyDeleteOh, there's no doubt that this guy wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, but it hasn't been my experience that there's a systemic issue with road service. The guy with whom I spoke on the previous day was fine and I've found those guys to be pretty helpful more often than not. Even in the Nebraska episode last month, the guy who took my call on the day that I actually got the inspection had his act together.
ReplyDeleteThe load assigning stuff (namely sitting half the day and then getting a pre-loaded trailer) is too consistently weird for me to think it's just a matter of someone being stupid though. Month after month after month, it's the same exact thing. The company gets paid by the mile just like we do. I don't know. Maybe nobody from the top of the company to the bottom knows what's going on, but I'm inclined to think that there has to be more to it.
Being that i'm in a new cascadia I haven't had to deal with RS so much, but the one time I did wasn't a pleasant experience. I'll have to take your word for it and pray for the best next time!
ReplyDeleteOk, I had to do a double take. Did you shave between comments? First pic has you with a goatee. The second has a cleaner younger looking Joe.
ReplyDeleteJ.T.
Well, I think they've cut staffing levels as one of those "cost control measures" that Wall Street loves so much, so maybe praying for the best will be all that we have left from now on. We'll see.
ReplyDeleteAnd J.T., a friend of mine gets on my case if one picture stays there too long, so I have to snap a new one every now and then to shut her up. Until you said that, I hadn't realized that the old pictures stayed with the old comments. That's pretty cool.