6/16/10

It's uncanny.  I don't feel motivated enough to do the digging and provide you with links to all of the old posts tonight, but it's uncanny.  Whenever I tell you fine people that I'm ready to head home and have a few beers, the high-paying pre-plans seem to come out of the woodwork before I get a chance to send in my home time request.  Some of you have been reading this blog for quite some time, so you already know that this has happened numerous times.  For those of you who are less familiar with the historical tendencies, you'll just have to take my word for it.

I got rolling around 10am this morning.  10am, incidentally, is the correct time to get rolling in the morning.  So one might say that the day was off to a good start.  I was due in Matthews, North Carolina by 5pm but I was going to try my luck at getting rid of the load a little early.  3pm was my targeted time - not ridiculously early such that I would be sent away from the consignee, but still early enough to beat the afternoon traffic around Charlotte.  If I were able to get rid of the load early as I hoped, then I would be able to send in my request for home time and possibly catch another assignment today.

Having encountered no traffic at all during the first half of the drive, I was running way ahead of schedule.  I saw a sign for a truck stop on I-77 in Columbia so I decided to duck off and take a lunch break.  Cue the telltale double chirp of the satellite unit.  At first I was kinda glad to see that I had a pre-plan.  I wasn't going to have much luck in finding parking once I was empty, so this way I would at least have somewhere to go.  And requesting home time today wasn't an absolute imperative.  I needed to get back and renew my medical card by June 24th, so taking one more run and sending the request in a day or two wouldn't kill me.  From anywhere in that part of the country, I'm only a couple of days from home.

Once I got backed into a parking space at the truck stop, I took a look at the new assignment.  In light of yesterday's remark about getting home to a fridge full of beer and a comfy couch, sometimes you just gotta chuckle...

Oh well, it's kinda hard to complain about squeezing in an extra $800 before heading home for a couple of weeks. Between this extra trip and my upcoming safety bonus, there should be plenty of cash to keep the fridge stocked.

My delivery in Matthews turned out to be a drop/hook, so that was a nice surprise. The folks at the distribution center were polite and friendly as well. This was an even bigger surprise. After making a quick and easy swap of my loaded trailer for an empty one, it was time to retrace my steps down toward Columbia.

My next pickup was at the tire place in Lexington. I had been there once before. On that previous trip, there had been a paperwork issue that made for one big hassle. On today's trip, everything went smoothly. I made another quick and easy drop/hook, sent in my loaded call, and hit the road.

My original plan summary (pictured above) said that the load would deliver in Nogales at 8am on Saturday.  That's just crazy talk though.  The paperwork says that the load must deliver no later than 8am on Monday.  In all likelihood, we would be looking at something in the middle.  Depending on the broker's hours of operation, I was expecting to deliver either on Sunday afternoon (if they were open) or on Monday morning.  As I merged back onto I-20, the dispatch came over the satellite.  Assholes.

I'm due in Nogales by noon (3pm in the civilized world) on Saturday.  2009 miles in less than 72 hours is a pretty shitty deal in my book.  After I drive my balls off for the next few days, that damned broker had better not be closed for the weekend.  These jokers have pulled that shit on me once or twice before.  I wasn't amused.

My own personal distaste for 600+ mile driving shifts is not the only issue with my schedule for the next few days.  Now it's not entirely clear to me where or when I'll be able to renew my medical card.  I'm probably not making it back to Michigan by the 24th, so it'll have to be handled somewhere on the road.  When I first saw this assignment, I thought that I would be able to stop at our terminal in Lancaster, Texas and go to a clinic somewhere around there.  With this kind of balls to the wall dispatch though, I can't really fool around.  Lancaster will fall somewhere in the middle of Friday's drive.  I won't have time to stop there and then resume the trip after getting my physical done.  I guess I'll just have to get to Nogales and then take it from there.  I'll have five days left on my current card at that point.  I'm sure we'll come up with something.

I got through South Carolina and Georgia tonight before parking at a little truck stop in Heflin, Alabama.  I think this leaves me somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,700 miles from Nogales, depending on whether or not I cut the corner on one of those "not recommended" state highways.  This load is a shade under 30,000 pounds, so it might behoove me to stick with the freeways and go through Tucson.  In any case, I'll have to get cracking bright and early tomorrow.  Lots of ground to cover.