5/29/09

It's official now. No rain at all today. It feels good to get that behind us. The official definitions should be ironed out before the issue arises again.

My alarm was set for 7:30am and nobody woke me until 7:20am, so that was a pretty good start to the day. Once I was empty I headed over to the Flying J on I-71 to wait and see what would come next.

You've heard me whine about my Qualcomm unit's power saver mode plenty of times. Usually it doesn't affect things and my complaints are in the 'what if' context. Today the 'what if' came to bear. I got a call from the folks in Joplin while I was trying to decide which news was better - the fact that Pravda (for crying out loud) is stunned by how quickly we're adopting Marxism in this country or the fact that each American household is on the hook for an additional $55,000 in debt this year alone. Pravda had some banner ads with hot chicks on them, so I think they were in the lead when the phone call came. They had sent me a load assignment but the message hadn't come through yet. As nearly as I can tell, the Qualcomm turns itself on and checks for messages once every half hour or so. In this case the message must have been waiting to be delivered for the full half hour. I was needed in Lordstown for a ConWay run in exactly three hours. The distance from the Flying J to the ConWay yard was right around 160 miles. That's a pretty tight timeline in a 55mph state. Away we go then...

Due to some lingering uncertainty regarding my legal status in Ohio, I'm pretty diligent about observing the double nickel. I don't know for sure that they have an issue with me but I also don't know for sure that they don't. Better safe than sorry. Today I had to let my Swedish buddy Sjoe take the wheel for a few hours. ConWay loads are absolutely required to pick up on time and I'm one of those guys who is never late. He went ahead and fell in line with the usual flow of trucks moving a little more quickly than 55mph. The speed limit is slated to go up sometime in the near future, but as of today Sjoe and the boys were still bending the rules a little. The cops were out in full force on I-71 but they didn't seem too concerned with us.

I got to the ConWay yard with plenty of time to spare and checked in with the dispatcher. And... my load was ready an hour after my scheduled pickup time. Typical. I made a quick four-hour hop over to New Columbia, Pennsylvania and got rid of that load without incident. The nice and easy 17,000 pound payload took most of the frustration out of I-80 along the way. Also along the way, I got a pre-planned assignment to pick up tomorrow morning. Beauty. As we've covered in previous posts, I wasn't too optimistic about making any money this weekend. Gotta give the planners some props this time around.

I headed eastward on I-80 toward Levittown without any concrete plans regarding parking. I have to pick up early in the morning and there isn't a whole lot of available parking in the vicinity. My last decent bet was probably the service plaza on I-476 outside Allentown. Parking there and fighting the traffic toward Philly tomorrow morning sounded like a shitty idea though. Oh hell, it must be about time for a good old roll of the dice. I got to the shipper a little while ago and found an open gate. Charmed life, I tell you. There's a chain with a lock hanging from the gate but apparently someone forgot to close up shop tonight. As that preacher on the radio in Iowa once told me - "You're never lucky. You're blessed." Two other CTL guys showed up after I did tonight. I'm pretty sure that this makes me an official trailblazer or something.

I'm picking up a load headed to Illinois for a Monday morning delivery. Since I don't pay cash tolls, I'll spend a little extra time crossing Ohio on US-30, but I still will have plenty of time to hang out and watch some hockey over the weekend. Then I'll be set up nicely for something back toward Detroit. Usually lots of freight originating from Illinois. Beauty.