5/17/10

After a peaceful night of sleep in a nearly deserted rest area (closed for the season), I fired up my truck this morning and found a pre-planned assignment waiting.  Beauty.  Until that point I had no idea what I would do for parking once I was done at the consignee.  Of course, I also needed to get a new tire for my trailer today.  I'm not sure exactly what was the cause, but the tread on one of them was pretty messed up.  The bracket for one of the mud flaps was bent, but it wasn't bent badly enough to rub against the tire.  Maybe it was rubbing whenever I went over bumps or something.  I don't know.  In any case, I needed a new tire.  Always when I have more work lined up, it seems.

I placed a call to the road service guys and they told me that their preferred tire shop was around ten miles away, in Bridgewater.  (It turned out to be fifteen miles, but close enough.)  Then I called my fleet manager and told him that I would have to head to the tire shop once I was empty.  As long as I wasn't delayed too long, everything would work out fine with respect to the next assignment.  Then I wanted to make sure that there wouldn't be a recurring issue with the mud flap bracket (in case that was indeed the cause of the damage).  I tried like hell to bend it out further away from the tire but I couldn't budge it.  I guess I'm not any stronger than whoever bent it in the first place.  One of the guys who was delivering equipment to the warehouse said that he had a chain we could use.  I attached one end to the bracket and he attached the other to a forklift.  Then he backed 'er up a little and voilà.  Good lookin' out, my brother.

I got over to the tire shop and, much to my relief, the mechanic told me to go ahead and back into the driveway.  He was ready to go right away.  The wheels of commerce grind a little more slowly here at Con-way Truckload, however.  The dude at the desk had to sit on hold for around twenty minutes before he could get the authorization number from our road service department.  Bureaucracy.  Gotta love it.  After a fairly quick tire replacement, it was time for another less than quick phone call to retrieve our Michelin national account number and print the final invoice.  The secretary chick was on hold for another fifteen minutes or so before I was finally sent on my way.  Good enough.

The next pickup was set for 1pm in Leominster, around 70 miles away.  I was on the road at 10:45am.  No worries at all.  I even had time to stop at the little truck stop in Leominster and grab an Italian BMT with double meat on the way to the shipper.  A quick in-and-out routine there had me loaded with four pallets and only 2,000 pounds, making me suddenly much less weary of this afternoon's trip down I-84.  That route is a bitch when you're heavy.    When the trailer is virtually empty it's not so bad.  Through Hartford before rush hour - beauty.

This load is a multi-stop deal so my next pickup is set for tomorrow morning in Newburgh, New York.  The only truck stop in Newburgh is a Pilot where I don't even like to stop for fuel.  The damned place always seems to be crowded.  I didn't have any better options though.  The only other place that would be close was a rest area on I-84.  After spending last night at a place with no facilities, a fella needs to spruce himself up a bit.  So the Pilot it is.  I got what shouldn't have been a terribly difficult parking space next to a dropped storage trailer and then somehow managed to make it difficult.  Some other drivers were inconvenienced while I took my time backing in, but all's well that ends well.

After getting my next batch of freight a few miles from here tomorrow morning, I'll be headed to Pennsylvania for another pickup and then to Illinois for a drop/hook delivery.  It's not a huge start to the week in terms of miles, but with the extra stop pay and quite a bit of northeast pay I'll be in pretty good shape.

Now it's time for my Tigers to deal with those thugs from Chicago.  Only a game and a half out of first going into tonight.  I, for one, am shocked.  Can we take the AL Central?  Probably not, but hey, at least the Miss USA crown goes to Michigan this year.  I'm not sure what the mullahs will have to say about her not wearing a burqa and all, but I'm a big fan.