9/30/09

Eleven hours is a long time as far as I'm concerned. To the numerous cowboy truckers of the world it's just a day's work. For me though, it's a little too much... usually. You can imagine my surprise then when I found myself desperately in need of a place to park before I had gone past my eleven hours today. That doesn't happen very often.

I had planned to hang around the truck stop in Youngstown until my pickup appointment drew near this morning. When I woke though, all of my neighbors had left the gravel lot where I was parked and I saw that there was actually a series of 'No Parking' signs along the eastern edge. Probably better not hang out too long then. I grabbed some breakfast and then fired up the truck. My satellite unit powered on and chirped at me with a new message. Great, what now? Good news this time, actually. It was a note saying that my load was ready to roll and giving me the number of the trailer that I needed to get. The original assignment hadn't mentioned any drop/hook business, so this was a decent surprise for me.

The drive down to Panama City wasn't bad at all, but the process at the shipper was a bit tedious. After going through the security check-in, I had to stop at another little shack for my trailer inspection. Then after sliding the axles back and dropping the empty, it was a whole lot of fun trying to get my loaded trailer out of there. Fortunately for me, I don't yet qualify as full-on 'trucker fat.' I'm just 'regular dude fat' at this point in time. Another inch or two on the old waistline and I don't think I could have pulled it off. The crank handle for my trailer had to scrape against the adjacent trailer in order for me to raise the landing gear. I don't know exactly how wide the horizontal portion of that handle is, but I can assure you that my ass had no business squeezing into such a space. Anyhow, yeah, it took a while to get the damned thing cranked up and pulled out of there.

Then it was back to the inspection shack place for my paperwork and then back to the security shack to check out of the facility. Okay, now we drive...

I played a hunch and took some two-lane roads out of Florida and into Alabama. I was guessing that they wouldn't be much slower than US-231 but hopefully might have less traffic. Good call on that one, I think. Until I caught back up with US-231 in Troy, there really wasn't anything to slow me down at all. Only a few towns along the way as well. Beauty. From Troy through Montgomery and Birmingham, well, you can't win 'em all I suppose. That part was a bit of a battle in the middle of the afternoon.

Then it was time to turn westward. It's truly amazing to see all of the development that has been spawned by the Appalachian Development Highway System. (Yes, in case it doesn't translate into the written word, that was sarcasm.) I think I saw one sign saying that there was an industrial park somewhere in Northwestern Alabama, but that was about it. Kickass freeways built out in the middle of nowhere may not carry much traffic but at least they come in handy for us truckin' folk. That ride up US-78 into Memphis is a pretty mellow one.

The ballgame was in full swing by the time I got through Mississippi and, after a rocky start, the Tigers had their boots on the collective throat of the Twins. Since I had plenty of time to kill and things were going fairly well, I decided to try a change of pace. I went up to US-64 to cross the eastern part of Arkansas instead of staying on I-40 this time around. That part seems to have been a pretty good idea too, at least up to this point. The only catch was the aforementioned eleven hour situation. Once I got on US-64 and started westward from I-55, I realized that my hours were going to run out in about 45 minutes. My truck stop directory showed one place with a small parking lot in Wynne, roughly 40 miles away. Better say a quick prayer and hope for the best then.

For the second night in a row, the truck stop was apparently full but there was an adjoining gravel lot with plenty of room. This lot seems to be an adjunct of the truck stop though and there were already a couple of trucks back here, so I think it's all good. Since I did in fact drive a full eleven hours today, I'll only have to cover around 300 miles tomorrow in order to reach Muskogee, Oklahoma for my delivery. I'm due to arrive there by 6pm Central so I do believe we're looking at a morning with no alarm clock. Ahh, I always like a morning with no alarm clock.