2/9/10

"I'm glad I got here before it started snowing." I recall thinking that as one of my colleagues rolled into the lot where I was parked last night. He went down to the end where the docks were and then tried to turn back around toward the area where I was parked. In the process of turning, he got stuck. It took some work for him to get moving again, but I was settled snugly into my space before all of the climate change began.

Then, this morning, I had the misfortune of being the first to get unloaded. The area where my colleague had experienced his difficulty was the same area where I would have to maneuver in order to get backed into the dock. Yeah, that didn't work out too swell. As long as I got a running start from the side and made a 90° swing without stepping on the brakes, I could roll back toward the building for the most part. The trouble was that I couldn't steer the trailer. The ass end of my truck went whichever way it felt like going. Through the course of my numerous attempts, my truck never seemed to feel like going the same way twice, so it was sort of like rolling a pair of dice and hoping for a twelve.

After around ten minutes of futility, I saw a guy come driving in with a tractor that was fitted with a scraper attachment. He gave the area in front of the docks a thorough scrubbing and then told me to try again. Unfortunately, his scraper hadn't removed all of the ice that was under the snow. Some of it was gone though and eventually I got back to the dock. Only problem - I wasn't anywhere near perpendicular. I couldn't see the lines on the ground, on account of their being buried by snow. (The tractor guy hadn't touched this part.) As I started to slide back into the dock, I thought that I was still somewhat squared away. I was wrong.

So I got to pull back forward into the icy area and give it another go. After getting stuck a few more times, I managed to get backed in well enough for the locking mechanism on the loading dock to engage my trailer. Good enough. I was unloaded quickly and sent on my way.

When I received my pre-planned assignment last night, it said that I would be picking up in Campbell, Kentucky. Of course, there is no Campbell, Kentucky. There's a Campbellsburg and a Campbellsville, but no Campbell. That's one of the groovy things about our state-of-the-art dispatching software. It allows for up to eight characters in the 'city' field. So, until I confirmed the actual assignment this morning, I wasn't sure exactly where I would be picking up next. Both cities are 900-something miles from Waco and neither is exactly as far as my paid mileage suggests, so I was relieved to see that I was picking up in Campbellsville today. Campbellsburg is further to the north and the thought of cruising through those hills in the snow was rather unappealing to me.

As I drove onto the main highway out of Nicholasville, I found that the roads weren't nearly as bad as the customer's parking lot had been. The temperature was in the mid 30's and the snow had been turned to mush by the light rain that was falling. All in all, not bad. After a break at the Wal Mart in Lebanon, I finished the run down to Campbellsville and checked in. The loaders were on their lunch break when I arrived but I was loaded and rolling before too long.

Which brings me to some absolutely startling news. This load is one of those drop/hook deals that can be delivered any time tomorrow. Normally, they would dispatch me to run balls out and make the drop as soon as legally possible, within my available hours of service. I don't know exactly what that legal delivery time would be, but likely somewhere around 2pm or so. When the actual dispatch came through, I had to do a double take. I'm due in Waco by... midnight... tomorrow night? Holy smokes. Giving me an opportunity to run whatever schedule works best for me, while still meeting the customer's needs? Eerie. Now I can rest whenever I need to rest and get there when I get there. Early, late, it doesn't matter. Just gotta deliver by midnight. Beauty. I'm not sure who or what brought this about, but good lookin' out, my brother.

Hey, guess who would have had time to get tires in West Memphis tomorrow. Heh. Screw those guys. I'm not making another phone call. If they have me flagged for Laredo or Joplin, then they can send me to Laredo or Joplin, by golly.

For the second day in a row, I found that road conditions improved as the day progressed. By the time I reached Tennessee, everything was clean and dry. I was feeling pretty tired and not much in the mood to drive through Memphis during rush hour though, so I've stopped for the night in Stanton, Tennessee. My fantastic Italian BMT with double meat certainly hit the spot but I'm still not feeling like a million bucks, so I guess I'll see if I can nod off early tonight. Probably not, but it's worth a try. Either I'll leave here early and take a few breaks along the way or I'll sleep late and make a long drive of it. Flexibility in scheduling is certainly a beautiful thing.