11/20/09

First we'll tie up one last thing from last night's post. Those peckerheads in Walton had my trailer ready 45 minutes late. Their status as my favorite Con-way Freight terminal has been placed on an indefinite suspension. I had a pretty tight timeline from there to West Memphis in the first place. Somehow our benevolent dispatching system determined that a delay of 45 minutes in getting my trailer would translate to a delay of 5 minutes in reaching West Memphis. Go figure. That point was largely moot though. Any extra time on the dispatch would be mere window dressing, given that I had to be off the road before 5:30am Central in any event. I started yesterday at 4:30pm Eastern, so add 14 hours... and there you have it. I made it to West Memphis with 15 minutes to spare, so good enough.

After I handed the paperwork to the overnight dispatcher, he took a look at the clock and noted that a ten hour break would carry me until some time between 3pm and 3:30pm, at which point I could get back on the board. I agreed, bade him adieu, and hit the sack. 6:30am (Godfather Standard Time) is a touch later than 5am, of course, but it's still better to go to bed at that hour than it is to wake at that hour. Alarm clocks suck. That's my policy.

I remembered to shut off my phone before I went to bed this morning. I don't, however, have the ability to shut off my damned satellite unit. After sleeping for a few hours, I heard the signature chirp. I ignored it and stayed in bed. Screw 'em. I was on my mandatory break. A couple more messages followed (also ignored by me). Then I got some peace and quiet for a while. When I had to get up and use the restroom a short time later, I took a look at the satellite unit and saw that I was lined up for a run this evening. It was another Con-way relay heading to Dallas, set to arrive in West Memphis shortly after I would be available for work again. Beauty. I replied to the plan summary, indicating that I could meet the timeline, but I left the actual load assignment alone. I was still on a mandatory break period, with zero hours available, and didn't care to try figuring out what kind of data to send.

Then a few more hours of sleep carried me to a fantastic dream involving a former politician and a Jell-O wrestling arena. Lots of fun, from what I recall. Time to be awakened by the damned satellite unit then, eh? Yep. A string of messages concerning my next run started streaming through. I got up and took a look. Stop location info, special instructions, stop summary, and so on. For the love of... oh, fine, I'm awake. I turned on my phone and found that I had a voicemail message from the morning dispatcher, asking me to speak with her "as soon as possible." I headed inside and told her that I had turned off my phone so that I could sleep, and that I would have no problem with this evening's assignment. She apologized for waking me with the satellite messages and explained that she just needed to make sure that the last leg of the relay (the one assigned to me) was all set to go. Then we shared a nice little hug to celebrate our camaraderie. Okay, I made up that last part, but she did apologize for waking me. That was good enough as far as I was concerned.

The only thing to do from that point forward was to wait. I still had to stay off duty until at least 3:15pm Central and my inbound relay was scheduled to arrive at 3:45pm. Time to let my computer burn a DVD while I caught a quick shower and did some reading. My loaded trailer showed up an hour and a half early... of course, since I couldn't go anywhere. If I had been able to do anything with it, the damned thing would have been an hour late. Once my ten hours were finished, I hooked to my trailer and topped off my fuel tanks.

I was walking around and checking out my tires while the fuel pumps ran when I noticed a potential problem. There had been a nail in the tread of one of my drive tires for a while, but it seemed to be in a thick spot where it wasn't going to be a problem. As long as I wasn't losing any air, I considered it to be a non-issue. The tires were about due to be replaced anyway, so I was just keeping an eye on it instead of wasting money to repair a tire near the end of its lifespan. Today I saw that the tread had worn a little more and that the nail had shifted in a way that potentially could end up busting a hole in the tire. I also saw that another nail had joined in the action. Damn.

I called the road service guys to fill them in on the situation. Since I knew that the question would arise, I had made sure to check out the tread depth before I called. I had 2/32" in the middles and 3/32" on the edges of both rear-axle drive tires. That's borderline at best. We determined that, on account of the nail situation, I should see if the tire shop at the Pilot in West Memphis could get me in quickly. If so, I still should have enough time to reach Dallas before 1am Central. If they couldn't get me in right away, I would just make the trip to Dallas and then find somewhere to deal with the tires after making my drop. After checking in at the Pilot in West Memphis, I was immediately assigned to a service bay and the work started shortly thereafter. Beauty.

The instructions from Mount Joplin were for the mechanic to replace the two rear tires and then rotate them, such that my existing front tires would go to the rear axle and the two new tires would go up front. The guy doing the work resembled, for lack of a better metaphor, a Martian fucking a football. I've only pulled a tire off the rim and then replaced it once in my life - on my Schwinn when I was ten years old. I've never done so with a car or truck tire. That being said, I'm pretty sure that I could have replaced and rotated those damned things in less than an hour and a half today. That dude was an unholy combination of lazy and incompetent. So, by the time I got back to the freeway, I was up against the clock... big time. Any further delays would most likely render me late for my scheduled delivery. Once I got out of the construction in West Memphis though, I was able to keep my foot to the floor for most of the trip. There was more construction forcing people off the freeway in Texarkana for a couple of miles, but that was it. Smooth sailing for 99% of the drive. I managed to squeeze in a quick potty break and still arrived in Dallas twenty minutes early.

After dropping my loaded trailer and getting my paperwork signed, I headed out to retrieve an empty... or maybe not. At least fifteen of our trailers at that place and none of them empty. That's bullshit. One of the loaded trailers sitting on the yard was the one that I pulled out of Kentucky last night. Good to see that we haul ass getting those loads delivered for a reason... or something. I sat around for a couple of hours until the yard dog swung around and brought me an empty trailer. Then, after a quick phone call to the dispatcher in Lancaster, I had my next dispatch to head down to the terminal.

I dropped my empty and went inside to tell the dispatcher that my 14 hour clock was nearly shot. She suggested that I get on the board anyway (at #23), since it would be "way more than ten hours" before I was moved again. Fair enough. Depending on how we interpret "way more," my pay week may be finished or there may be one more load to squeeze in before midnight. In any event, I'll probably have plenty of time to watch the football game here where my internet connection tends to be nice and fast.

Since we're still on the 5am bedtime routine and there is no reason to expect an assignment to interrupt my rest this morning, who wants to bet that there will be some dumbass satellite message in a few hours, telling us to drive safely or something equally vapid?