Oh another thing my boxes behind cab where messed up and maintenance said it was a safety issue with the chains falling out the bottom

 

Ahh, it's good to be back, I have had some pc problems, and up till the past couple days have been pretty busy. I just kept putting off posting thinking I will do it tomorrow, and wham, this is what happens.

That combined with me getting a blog set up and learning how to use it and all that, plus the holiday weekend didn't help all that much either, lol, but it was wonderful, just perfect, which is why I decided to start a blog so I could talk about everything thats going on instead of just the driving part.

Anyway, I only had a few minutes to write in and thought I would take advantage, but a better update will come tonight and I will let everyone know how it's been going. Anyway, got to run for now, I got a whopper of a load, a whole 75 miles, lol.(this after a huge 300 mile run) plus I am pulling curtainside and have to figure out how to secure the sides, wish me luck(by the way, I am in Fon du Lac, the south just keeps moving north).

 

I hope you're not at that OLD OLD truck stop in Fond du Lac but I bet you are cuz it's the Only one in Fond du Lac :P
Place was old when I started in '78 but the Food is Decent but the people who work in the Little Convenience store are a Bit Nuts :P

 

Nope Yoopr, I was at a customer's place delivering stone, but I think I know what place you are talking about though.

Like I wrote earlier, I will be starting a blog, so my little run that has got over 30k views will soon dwindle deeper and deeper into the archives, but it was a good run, and I will still update it, just not as often as in the past, plus I will make other posts when something interesting happens, I am not leaving the forum, but "My day" will slow way down over the next few weeks. Of course I will post a link so people can still follow me if they desire, but you will have to skip over the parts that don't pertain to driving if you aren't interested.

Anyway, last week was a busy week with decent miles, I got just over 3k miles and my check this week was 678, so needless to say I am happy, but this week hasn't been all that great, oh well, here we go with the good times come the bad times saga again.

So it turns out that I never got to choose between my loads, I was told to take the Marshfield load, but that didn't bother me any, miles are miles baby! So after I delivered the load I had, I deadheaded around 150 miles home, due to pick up a load in Ky Monday morning which gave me a decent little weekend, better than the normal 34 hours I am used to.

I grabbed the load and it was a drop and hook, needed to be tarped, but oh well, that's what flatbed drivers do. I took it to Marshfield and got there early again, hoping that my good luck streak with high mileage loads would continue. I was disappointed that I only got a 100 mile run, but it was no tarp, and delivered the same day, so no wasted time, that's cool, maybe the next will be better.

So was the next one better, well, it is the longest dispatched run I have ever got 1700 miles!!! whoo hoo!!!! I thought it might be a typo until I noticed it was going to Miami, cool, delivering early has paid off.

Well, I told them a while ago that I would need Memorial day weekend off, but since most everyone wanted off, I figured I would get screwed again. I needed it off because my families Decoration was on that weekend, and since I have missed the past few get togethers, I really wanted to make it to this one, so they were asked to make sure I had the whole day off on Sunday, I would give up all other days, but I really needed Sunday.

As I made my way to Miami, I kept checking in with dispatch to see if they were gonna get me home, and it wasn't looking good, so I was getting nervous. I got to Ellenwood and had to stop for fuel, and while I was there, I was pulled off the load to Miami since there isn't any freight coming OUT of Florida right now, and I would've had to wait maybe a few days to get something, plus I would be out of hours even if there was something to pull.

I still got almost a thousand miles out of it which is huge for me anyway, so I was still happy, plus it was awesome to see them work to get me home. I sat there for over 3 hours waiting for them to tell me where to go, and finally was sent deadhead to Talledaga to pick up a load of plywood, and it was a full tarp, and the way they stacked it made it difficult to cover to say the least, but I got it done and was on my way home.

I got home early Friday morning after a short easy day of driving and didn't have to leave until MONDAY!!! nice weekend with the family, ALL the family from different states, only person missing was my Grandfather, but he was there in spirit.

It was hard to get back into the truck on Monday morning, but after I was in the hot seat, I felt strangely at home again. I had to take the load that was so heavy I couldn't even fill the tanks all the way up to Grand Ledge Michigan. I got there a few hours early and picked up a load at the same place, to take to a Lowes store. It was a mixed load, I had a little bit of everything, plywood, stone, pvc, lattice, siding, brick borders and much much more.

It was only a 400 mile trip, and they had me due to deliver at 7pm the next night, and I could easily make it earlier than that, so after a argument on delivery time, I finally got them to move it up a few hours so I could make the most out of my day. I made the delivery and then deadheaded about 85 miles to Green Bay to pick up a load of steel.

All right, so the miles have had a certain amount of suckage to them, but again, with the good comes the bad, so I decided to grin and bear it, the miles will come, the miles will come, say it with me, the miles will come.

Well, the Green Bay load was due this morning and like every load since I was scalded by dispatch it was early. Ok, now the miles will pick up right? Wrong, my next load is a relay load to pick up and deliver in Kaukauna for a whopping trip total of about 75 miles. Now the low miles are starting to get to me, having to throw tarps for an hour and drive an hour is getting old, but I keep my cool, keep in mind, the miles will come.

Now, surely the low miles are over, but nope, I was told to pick up a curtainside(and a cut in pay for pulling it) with stone on it, and run it down to Fond du Lac and a huge 50 mile run, but no tarps are involved so I just go with it. I had to learn a few things since this was my first curtainside, but it wasn't too difficult.

Now, I have had it with crap runs, I am up north, which I don't mind, pulling curtainside which I don't mind, but those added to the fact that I am getting no miles shows that I am willing to bend over backwards and I have reached my bending limit, so I call dispatch and tell them to get me the miles I am tired of waiting(I had been talking with dispatch about the mileage situation earlier) so they reward me with a 50 mile deadhead down to New London to pick up a load to deliver in Rome, ahhhhhh finally some miles, around 883, but this won't help my paycheck out this week, I won't even break 2k for the week and that includes one over 800 mile trip.

If they jerk me around like this next week for that many loads, I don't know what I will do, but I won't put up with that mileage for long, I am hoping it was just a small glitch or something since the miles were so good last week. Now I am on my way home, but since it is over 100 miles more than Roehl wants you to log in a day(even though you could go further IF everything goes perfect which it hardly ever does, but it COULD) so I will be stuck about 100 miles from home, I hate when that happens, but oh well, at least I have some miles.

Sorry for the story being so choppy, I didn't mention when my days ended, and all that, but I will start again soon, I just have to find the time. So lets make a left at the guitar and head on home!

 

Nothing really jaw dropping to add today, but I did manage to put 600 miles in my pocket, and considering that I had a wreck that held things up just south of Chicago, and the traffic in Chicago and Indianapolis was really heavy(I came through Chicago during EVERYONE'S lunch break).

I made it as far as I thought I would, about 2 hours from home, I am on the Ky, Tn state line, and even though I had a lot more driving time left in me, I had to stop for the night since my 11 was up.

On a side note, there is talk of the yearly dot crackdown happening next week, I think the 6,7,8th and I was wondering if anyone else heard about it. I have only been through the whole deal one time, and that was with the nursery, so I was light and never got the red light, didn't seem like that big a deal, but this year pulling for Roehl, I worry that the chances are greater of getting the red light since I am heavier and run for a huge company.

Needless to say that I am keeping everything squeaky clean, but I still get nervous, are there any horror stories from other drivers on the boards that got nailed during the magic 72 hours(or however long it is). I am thinking that it is more exaggeration than anything, or maybe last year was a easier year than others, oh well, only time will tell.

 

One thing I forgot to mention is that I had to brake at 100% today, which is only the second time I had to do it since I started driving. I was coming through Chicago, and a 4 wheeler cut me off and slammed on the brakes for no reason, there was nothing around for many car lengths.

My only guess is that she thought that was her exit and then realized that it wasn't. If people only knew how many times their lives have been in danger for doing something stupid like that in front of a truck, maybe they would be a bit more careful.

I had to get on the brakes all the way, and when something like that happens, I usually get on the air horn all the way, screw the city horn. Of course she still had the nerve to flip me off, I was boiling there for a few.

And if all that isn't bad enough, there was a roadway truck behind me, and my international almost got bred by a freightliner. Thank goodness he was keeping a safe following distance, new drivers pay attention, DO NOT FOLLOW TO CLOSE, PAY ATTENTION DON'T LET YOUR GUARD DOWN!! cause at the very least you will get a big fat preventable, and the worst is too terrible to mention(everything in between is bad as well).

Oh and just one more thing, she wasn't even a Chicago local, get this, she was from Nashville which is only 70 miles from where I live!

 

Sorry bout that Nova. That stuff happens everywhere anymore. Had 2 trucks here burn to the ground after they ran into one another due to a 4 wheeler cutting the one off. Cops are not happy and are still looking for the 4 wheeler. 2 trucks were beside one another on I-95 which was 3 lanes at that spot. Car came out of the left lane and would have caught the truck in the center lanes bumper. Truck jogged right towards the right lane to keep from wrecking the reckless car. Ended up smashing into the truck next him in the right lane. Both trucks caught fire, one was hauling furniture and the other was hauling trichloride in his tanker. Since the tanker truck had chemicals that react with water, the firefighters had to let that one burn to the ground and the one with furniture took a while to put out as they had to move it from the tanker in case of a leak.

 

Where do you live Novacane? I only live about 70 miles or so from nashville myself.

 

That doesn't surprise me MrFord95, and the funny thing is that if the public were more educated about us, I am pretty sure it would get better, of course there will always be bad drivers though.

Before I started driving, I got mad at truck drivers all the time for holding me up, I always wondered why in the world they would run side by side(didn't know they were governed) or swing into the turning lane and make me back up, I thought to myself many times "they think they own the roads because they are bigger than everyone" but now that I have been a driver it has affected my 4 wheeler driving as well as my whole families.

It was a lack of understanding, and instead of running all the ads about how you can sue truck drivers, they should have a commercial about how hard it is to stop one of these trucks and why they do some of the things they do, if people had a reason as to why we swing so far or whatever the case may be, I think it would help us out, but that wouldn't make any money for all the lawyers, so it will never happen.

I just make sure that my eyes are on the road, mirrors, and guages at all times, you can't afford not to pay 100% attention, if there was ever anything I could pass on to new drivers looking for tips, this is number one, don't get "comfortable" behind the wheel, wait for the 10 hour break to relax, and even then you have to watch for other drivers hitting parked trucks, cause I have seen almost as many wrecks in the parking lots of truckstops as I have on the roads.

I really feel for all the truck drivers who have had accidents caused by 4 wheelers, and even though it's not the drivers fault they are the ones that pay most of the time.

Jagerbomber, I live in Cookeville Tn, about 70 miles east of Nashville, exit 286 to be exact.

 

I just found this thread.. I must say it is SO great to read how a trucker's day goes, especially for a noob like myself that is planning to become a professional driver. The only thing that beats this is actually being out on the road experiencing it for yourself - not to mention it's much better than reading through all of the beginner forums; reading other peoples questions get answered and such.

I think if anyone wants to know what it's like for a person to live as a truck driver, they should read this entire thread.

You have some awesome tips here too, thanks for that.


Ant ~