WEEK THIRTY SIX
Monday, September 1st through Sunday, September 7th


Well, it’s Monday and it’s Labor Day! And I’m sitting in the parking lot of a run down mall because there are no truckstops in the area. I had the good fortune of escaping from the Wal-Mart gig last night by running out of useful hours as far as they were concerned. I actually had 7hrs left, (and still do today). I had put in an MT call last night and asked that I be put back on the national board with the hopes of getting a load out sometime today, but I didn’t actually expect that to happen. I did however expect confirmation, or at least some kind of acknowledgement from dispatch that I was on the list to get a load. What I did get was complete silence.

I didn’t let it bother me too much; this seems to be the status quo lately during holidays and on weekends. I’m not going to put all of the blame on the people in the dispatch office though. I know that they are painfully understaffed and have more problems to deal with than they can handle, but a simple “working on it” would have gone a long ways towards alleviating some of my angst.

I did send in another message on this fine morning asking if a load would be available today or in the morning, but that too was ignored. I made it a point not to send in numerous repeat messages because I knew they were busy and it would do no good.

Realizing this day was a bust, I resigned myself to spending the day in a parking lot and did what I could to amuse myself. The mall, (whose parking lot I was currently residing in) was of the run down variety with a lot of no name stores in it, but it did have a theater with 4 screens in it. What the hay, I didn’t have anything else to do so I headed on over to check out one of the current releases. The choices were dismal to say the least and I opted for “Death Race”. I figured it would have a mindless plot and excessive amount of special effects and I was right. Basically a waste of money, but it helped me burn a couple of hours. The theater was a clear indication of the economy in this area. This was a first weekend release of this movie, on a major holiday weekend in the middle of the day and I was the only person in the theater. Not one other person to be seen.

Now that the movie was over I set out for a little walk to get some exercise and found a trail in the back of the lot that headed out into the woods. Curious as to where it went, I proceeded onward and found myself overlooking a pleasant little watershed pound after walking about a mile or so. It was a very secluded and quiet area and I thought it would be a fine spot to set up a little camp fire and pretend I wasn’t driving (sitting in a parking lot) a truck. I went back to the truck to get my folding chair and something to snack on and headed back to the pond and enjoyed an evening by a crackling fire.

One thing I did do before leaving the truck was make one final attempt at getting some kind of response from dispatch. Something to the effect of, “I’ve been here since last night, previous messages have been ignored, I know you’re busy, but could you please acknowledge this message. I have been released from Wal-Mart and don’t even know if I have been put back on the national board so that I’m in line for a load. THX”

This time around I finally received a response, “Sorry for the delay, it looks like you have not been placed back on national, please call ****** in the morning.” Just as I thought, left out to dry. As annoying as this was, it really wasn’t that big of a deal. I didn’t have many hours left anyways and this little layover (my third in two years, so I can’t really complain too much) made it possible to put in a reset. Last week was more or less a bust as far as mileage went, but with the $175/day pay at Wal-Mart plus some extra mileage pay for a good day there I still grossed $1161 on 2541 miles.

Tuesday eventually came around and I didn’t exactly have high hopes for what lay ahead. I wasn’t the only driver sitting around waiting on a load. There were no less than 10 CR England trucks in the lot and a handful of others. All, like me, had been sitting around for some time now. I had fully expected to spend another day in this parking lot. I couldn’t even start thinking about a load until sometime after 8am, that’s when the individual that I needed to talk to would be coming in. The problem with that, I’m sure I’m not the only driver in the fleet that needs to talk to him.

When the appointed hour finally came around I started with the phone calls, (voice mail of course) and sent off messages in three different directions and awaited some kind of response. Surprisingly enough it only took about 30 minutes to get my first QualComm message. This message acknowledged the fact that I had been sitting for an extended period of time and they would find a load for me, “just sit tight”. Not the perfect response, but at least I knew the ball was rolling. The difference between today and yesterday is that I am now a prisoner to the truck. Yesterday I knew there would not be a load offer, so I was free to wonder about and find some way of amusing myself. I now find myself forced to sit in the truck and await a load offer.

I also took this opportunity to call my Fleet Manager. I’ve been out too long this time around and this last week took the wind out of my sails. I’m ready to go home for some R&R. When asked, “When do you want to go home” I simply replied, “ASAP!”

And wait I did until shortly after noon. The QC finally chirped to life with a very respectable load offer. It was a preloaded trailer just outside of Philly going south of Atlanta (909mi) with a 5am delivery on Thursday. Well, I just went from “nothing to do” to “holy crap”, this is going to be a tight run. I was a bit miffed when I saw that the load had been ready since 8:30 this morning and I didn’t get the load offer until after noon. I guess dispatch was just that backed up and it took them awhile to get around to me.

Now I am left with a choice. I can sit in this lot for another 7hrs or so and then pickup the trailer, therefore forcing me to drive all night and sleeping during the days again. This option would make it possible to make my delivery with only one 10hr break along the way, but I would be on a night schedule. My other option would be to take off now and be on a very tight schedule because I would have to take two 10hrs breaks along the way to time the 5am delivery correctly. Well, I’ve been sitting around all I care for and pulled out to get the trailer. As I was driving towards Philly I started running the numbers and tried to determine my best course of action. I also realized this trip was going to be more than tight; it was going to be a squeaker. It sure would have been nice to get this load offer a few hours earlier.

I went through the paces and pointed the truck towards Atlanta. I had no time to spare so there were no extra stops along the way. I had a fuel stop sent to me, but I had enough fuel in the truck to finish the trip and I was able to by-pass that one, yup, I’m that short on time, can’t even waste 15mins. My biggest problem was the fact that there are no parking options in the Atlanta area. I was headed to McDonough and the choices are almost non existent. I actually had enough hours to get there and deliver the load early, but if I was turned away and told to return at my appointment time the following day I would have been screwed. If the customer had overnight parking I would be fine, but a call to the customer only got an automated system and there was no mention of it in the load info and I didn’t want to take any chances. Because of that I actually had to hold up 100 miles away at a TA north of Atlanta. Normally I would stop at our yard, but it was about 20 miles out of route, and that simple delay would have made me late for my delivery. Just one of those days I guess. This made for a rather short 400mi day, but I just didn’t have any other choice.

My Thursday started exactly 10hrs and 7½mins after I had shut down the previous night and I managed to pull into the customer’s lot 16mins before my appointment time. OK, that’s a little tight on a 900mi run. Into the receiving office I go only to find that this was a drop load. I also took this opportunity to ask if I would have been allowed to drop this trailer last night if I had pulled in at that time. “Sure” he says. Grrrr! Our drop deliveries are almost always denoted by a delivery window, i.e. 07:00 – 23:59 or something along those lines. When the delivery time says 05:00 it generally means a live unload. I got burned on this one; I could have dropped this last night, grabbed and empty and still would have had a few hours to get my next load. I’ll know better next time around.

Time to put in my MT call and see what they have in store for me. The load offer was slow in coming, which surprised me a bit. This time of day usually results in a very quick response, but not today. About 20 minutes later I finally get the chirp and am a little disappointed. It’s going to NC (350mi) and it’s a live unload with a fair amount of unnecessary down time to it. I also note that it is a bit odd that I’m getting a load to NC, I never get loads going that way. Then it hits me, I put in for home time just two days ago and I realized that I failed to mention that I wanted to take it in Phoenix, not Wilmington, NC. That’s quite impressive, request home time and two days later I got it. Too bad it’s in the wrong direction. I guess I could always spend the week at the NC house, but I’m guessing the wife would be a little miffed about that one. We’ll be going back for a while to check up on things in October anyways.

With that realization I sent off a message to dispatch to inform them of the mix-up. I also let them know that I would run the load if they needed me too, but I would prefer something going in the direction of Phoenix so that I could take my home time there. Shortly thereafter I was pulled from the original load and sent a message that he was working on something for me. Oh goody!

Another 30mins passed and I was sent another load offer. This one picked up at 1pm here in town and was going to the Dallas area (813mi) 2 days from now at 6am. That was followed by a message “deliver this load and I’ll get you on a load to PHX from there”. Wow, that was easy, looks like I’m home bound.

There was a bit of excessive down time involved with these runs, but that’s not all that uncommon with loads that point you back towards the house. I was more than pleased with the rapid response to my home time request. A nice change of pace considering the lower freight levels these days.

My pickup was scheduled for 1pm. I figured it was on a preloaded trailer, but there was no urgency in picking it up right away. I had a scheduled delivery time in Dallas and it wouldn’t do me any good to show up early anyway. I waited until the prescribe hours arrived and went to get my load. Sure enough, it was ready to go and I headed on down the road and managed to make it to the middle of Alabama before my 14hrs expired with a whopping 350 miles for the day.

I actually got to sleep in Friday, all the way to 4:30 which was a nice change from my 2am starts of late. The rest of the day was just a pleasant stroll across I-20 with home getting closer with the passing of each mile.

I pulled into the customer’s gate first thing Saturday morning for my 6am appointment drop. Yup, another one of those receivers that is a drop, but they wont let you show up early. In this case I had to agree with them on their policy. This lot was packed to the gills and there wasn’t a spot to be had. I actually had to drop my trailer in the middle of their lot in front of a number of other trailers. What a mess. Now all I had to do was head on down to Waxahachie to get my load of insulation going to Phoenix.

The info in the QualCom stated that this load would be ready anytime after 6pm, but I had little doubt that it was already loaded and waiting for me. The 6pm thing was more of an “earliest pickup time to result in a productive load” kind of thing. Picking it up any earlier would result in extended downtime for the driver. But considering the fact that I was on my way to the house, ye ha!

As suspected, the trailer was waiting for me when I arrived and 16 minutes later I was westward bound. This load had a live unload scheduled for Tuesday morning, but I had every intention of pulling into our PHX terminal by Noon Sunday and after some solid driving that is just what I did. I love it when things work out like this.

What really made this a nice run was the fact that it was scheduled to deliver Tuesday morning. Thanks to the fact that I was able to pickup this load early and even though I was home before noon on Sunday, I was still under dispatch until the load delivered. That means that the remainder of Sunday and Monday did not count towards my home time. Tuesday is also not counted as a home day because I made the delivery on this day. So, outside of taking 2 hours out of my day on Tuesday morning to deliver my load less than ½ mile from the yard, I was able to spend an entire week out of the truck without ruffling any feathers. I really don’t think it would have been a problem even if I had Tcalled the load when I pulled into town, but this way I didn’t have to burden another driver with a shag load and I didn’t have to ask any special favors from my FM. I had been out for 7 weeks anyways and turned some great miles for the most part (I’m trying to put that Labor Day week out of my mind), I had the time coming and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Las Vegas, here I come.



WEEK THIRTY SIX
Monday, September 1st through Sunday, September 7th
Miles include deadhead

King of Prussia, PA to McDonough, GA...........................................909mi
Atlanta, GA to Garland, TX................................................ ............813mi
Waxahachie, TX to Phoenix, AZ................................................ ...1124mi



Total Paid Miles……………………………..2846 Miles

Not the greatest of weeks, but that will happen when one gets laid over on Labor Day and my two runs to get me home were not the most productive, but that is to be expected when you have a specific destination in mind. This is just about as bad as my weeks get and I was able to gross just under $1200.

Actual Miles.................................2869 Miles

2846 x .42 = $1195.32

 

WEEK THIRTY SEVEN
Monday, September 8th through Sunday, September 14th
Miles include deadhead

This will be short and sweet.

Home all week!

 

WEEK THIRTY EIGHT
Monday, September 15th through Sunday, September 21st


Well, my week of home time has come to an end and it’s time to be a truck driver again. My previous week on the road had been a little disappointing due to a slowdown in freight around the Labor Day holiday and I was ever hopeful of better days to come. I arrived at my truck at 7am and put in my ready call and crossed my fingers. Fortunately there were a couple of empty trailers in the yard, that’s one big hurdle. Next concern, after home time I never know if I will be dispatched on a hot load that has to go now and have me rushing around or if I will be dispatched on a load that doesn’t pickup until the afternoon, thereby leaving me sitting in the back of a truck instead of at the house. It would be nice if I could call in and find out what they have to offer and plan out my departure from home, but that never seems to work for me, especially on a Monday morning.

I didn’t have to wait very long to get my answer. A single load offer picking up anytime after noon in Nogales, AZ going to Ft. Smith, AR (1370mi). Not to bad at all, good miles, but it doesn’t deliver until 5pm Wednesday. That’s a little disappointing (OK, very disappointing) because I would be able to make it to my finial destination much earlier in the day. A delivery late in the day also greatly decreases my chances of getting a load out once empty, at least for the rest of the day. I guess I can always take a shot at delivering early.

I was also a bit annoyed once the load info came through. I had failed to notice that this was a two stop delivery. That explains the late delivery time. The first stop was scheduled for a few hours earlier. One good thing was that the two stops were in the same area, and the same customer, looks like two difference warehouses. That will improve my chance of getting unloaded a little earlier than originally planned.

I made it to the shipper by 11am and was assigned a door, but just because I arrived early didn’t mean they would start to load me early. The load assignment said anytime after noon, and that’s when they started loading me with no apparent urgency, I might add. Progress was slow, but I eventually headed on down the road with my 7000# load of electrical harness. I wasn’t pressed to get anywhere soon, so I decided to make a short day of it and held up in Alamogordo for the night.

Tuesday was another day with no real urgency to it and I putted my way on down the road. I had planned on spending the night in OK city so I could spend some time in good ol’ Bricktown. I still had a little time left on my log for the day, but due to my delayed delivery time I would be looking at about 15hrs of downtime before heading out in the morning and I didn’t really relish the idea of sitting in a service plaza on the OK turnpike for that long. If I’m going to be sitting still for that much time I would rather be somewhere that offers some form of entertainment. This way I could at least catch a movie or a good meal. Although after my week at home, I really didn’t need anymore heavy meals for awhile.

Wednesday was a late start. I had tried to call the consignee to inquire about an earlier delivery, but the number only got me an answering machine and I didn’t want to take the chance of showing up early and being forced to wait. That would take a big chunk out of my 14hrs clock. I decided to take off at 11am and hope that I would be able to get a load out tonight. We have a couple of drop/hook customers in the area and I might still be able to make a good day of this, although it would mean driving well into the night. Something that I haven’t had to do very much of lately.

I arrived an hour early and went about finding someone in charge of receiving. I also noticed at this time that there were two empty Crete trailers sitting in their yard. I was afraid of something like this. When I finally hunted down the person I need to talk to he told me to go ahead and drop the trailer in their yard and grab an empty. Oh, how I would have liked to do just that. But I had two PO’s on this load and I told him that I was to deliver the other half of the trailers contents up the street to their assembly plant, (I was currently at one of their satellite warehouses). He shrugged his shoulders and said “alright, put it in any door and we’ll get to you when we can”. That’s not something I ever want to hear. The wait wasn’t as long as I had suspected and I was soon on my way to the next stop. I would be arriving more than 2hrs early, but I assumed it wouldn’t be a problem.

What was a problem was finding the stupid place. Directions were less than accurate and after driving around for about 30mins I finally found it. It must have been almost a whole mile away from the first stop, to bad I had to drive over 10 miles to come to that conclusion. At least I was finally here and there were a large number of empty trailers sitting around which lead me to believe that I would be dropping this trailer. I went through the normal procedures with the guard and made my way to the shipping office.

The first question I get is, “why are you here with this product, it goes to the other warehouse?” I then go into the explanation that I had already been there and delivered half the load, now I was here with the rest of it, “see, here is the BOL with your address for the final drop.” “That doesn’t make any sense”, he says and picks up the phone. Ten minutes later and it is confirmed, the rest of the load has to go back to my original delivery point. Oh, I’m starting to get a headache!

Back to the first stop I go, this time it takes almost 2mins to get there and it looks like another search is in order. There is only one guy that deals with receiving and he seems to have perfected the hide and seek thing. After 20mins of wondering the dark corners of the place I finally found him having a cigarette break with a co-worker. I started to explain my situation to him and he cut me off with a “Yeah, I figured the whole load was suppose to deliver here, I probably should have said something the first time you were here.”

Oh my God! Where do these people come from?

He just tells me to head on back to the dock and they would unload me after they finished with the other truck. That truck took them a good 30mins and I once again backed up to the dock to finish the unload only to find myself once again waiting for someone to pull off the remaining 7 skids from my trailer. I was anxious to get going, and even though the unloading had yet to start I went ahead and put in my MT call and used one of the empty trailers on the lot as my new trailer. At least this way I could get the process going on my next load. If they insisted on putzing around too long in the warehouse I could simply leave my loaded trailer in the door and grab the empty trailer and be on my way, which is exactly what would have happened in the first place if I had known the whole load was going here. It’s just one of those days.

My next load offer came in rather quickly and as I had hoped, it was a preloaded trailer sitting here in town. It was to pickup anytime today and deliver anytime before noon tomorrow in Amarillo (438mi). Not the longest run in the world, but I would be able to run it out as fast as I wanted, plus it was getting late and the noon delivery window was already getting tight.

The unloading process started just as I was getting my new load info and by the time I was finished writing it all down the trailer was empty. Since I had used one of the empty trailers on their lot in my MT call I went ahead and dropped my current trailer and grabbed the other one to keep things straight in the computer system without bothering dispatch. It had been a rather frustrating afternoon, what could have be a 15min drop/hook had turned into 2½hrs, but it was now behind me and I headed on over to my next PU.

My fun for the day had not yet come to an end, however. This was suppose to be a quick drop and hook, but when I went in to get the paperwork I was informed that the BOL # that I had was for a load that wasn’t ready to go. They did let me know that they had a preloaded trailer going to Amarillo with a different BOL #. Well, I didn’t really care what the BOL#’s were as long as it was going to the same place, but I didn’t figure dispatch would have the same point of view so back to the truck I went to send a message explaining my situation.

Crete’s system works very well when every thing is clicking, but once you throw a wrench into the works, well, not so much. The day crew was still in control, however, and I held out hope that this could be resolve relatively quickly. It better, that noon delivery window is getting real tight, I really need to get my butt on the road within an hour or so. It took about 30mins, but I finally got a response. My initial dispatch was cancelled and a new load plan was sent out to me and I was told to go ahead and pull the load that was ready to go. Sounded simple enough, right! I went inside to get the appropriate paper work and headed out to their back lot to get my preloaded trailer. Of course, it was nowhere to be seen. There were 4 other Crete trailers back there, but none of them matched my paperwork. I started to drive back to the front of the building when I noticed a yard jockey coming from the back side. I didn’t think it could do any harm to check and drove in that direction. Sure enough, there sat my trailer in a dock door. I then looked in vain for a dock worker, no luck. The green light was flashing which usually signifies that it is OK to pull the trailer out, but some places get down right pissy about who can pull a trailer out of a door and I sure didn’t want to rustle any feathers over such a thing. It’s actually a rather sever safety issue in many plants.

So back to the shipper’s office I go realizing that my delivery window is getting insanely tight. I know it wouldn’t be a problem if I told dispatch the load would be a little late, but I would rather get it to where it needed to be without involving anyone else. Especially since it appears that I am just hauling back a load of specialized pallets that they use to transport material on. I have little doubt that this will simply be a drop/hook delivery once I get to where I’m going with no particular urgency to the actual delivery time. But it’s in the Crete system to be there by noon and I would like to be able to do that.

After returning to the shipping office for the 4th time today, I confirmed that my trailer was ready to go and made sure I was allowed to pull it out. He says, “Sure, go ahead, I saw you walking around the trailer and making sure everything was safe. I figured you would have pulled it by now.” I love the way everyone around here seems to communicate after the fact.

I finally found myself driving down the road. This was a relatively heavy load and felt that I needed to stop to scale it out and I would also have to get some fuel at the Pilot on my way through OK city (always a frustrating fuel stop). A quick check of my GPS and a mental calculation, “I might be able to pull into the customer’s lot by 11:45 for my noon deadline.

I was trying to decide if I really needed to stop to scale out. This load was at 42,000# and I felt that I had the tandems in a good spot and really needed to save time. I was also not very likely to come across any open scales. Oklahoma wasn’t likely to be open this time of night and Texas doesn’t have any permanent scales along the way that I have to worry about.

After lamenting between my need to save time and desire to avoid the possibility of an overweight ticket I decided to pull into a truck stop in Roland, OK. I had a choice of two, the Shell or the Pilot. My truckstop book showed that they both had a scale and I opted for the Shell station knowing that scaling in a small Pilot is a pain in the backside. It’s always such a hassle to deal with the traffic in a Pilot, especially the smaller ones when you are in a hurry. My choice of the Shell turned out to be a poor one. As I was pulling onto the rather dilapidated scale I notice a very thin yellow rope across the exit side. Apparently it was out of order and it didn’t occur to them to put the rope up on the entrance to the scale. So I backed up, parked and ran inside for a quick McDonalds fix. I wasn’t going to have time to stop for anything better and I was getting a bit hungry.

I had decided to take my chances by not scaling out with this load. I felt fairly confident that I was legal on all axels and even more confident that I wouldn’t be crossing any open scales. I did, for a very short moment, consider crossing the 4 lanes of traffic to scale out at the Pilot, but a plumb of black smoke billowing up from what appeared to be the fuel islands made that decision for me. I’ve seen that kind of smoke before. It could only mean one thing. TRUCK FIRE! On a fuel island to top it off. The smoke was thick, but it was obvious that it was just getting started. I was thanking my lucky stars that I pulled into the Shell instead of the Pilot. I could only imagine the cluster F that was going on over there. I had barley been able to see any smoke as I pulled out onto the road, by the time I made it onto the Interstate the flames were clearly visible and the smoke was intense.

My only regret was that I wasn’t able to snap a few pictures of the event. I was able to Google up a video of it that another driver posted on Youtube and pulled a couple of screen captures from it. I’ve included a link to the video if you want to check it out. The guy even caught a tire blowing out.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spyom7tGGTE


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I was amazed, even with all this going on and my warning that I was offering up on the CB, trucks were still pulling into the parking lot, completely oblivious to the inferno on the other side of the Pilot. I guess they assumed a funnel of black smoke going hundreds of feet into the air was a daily occurrence and nothing to be concerned about.

Thankfully, I had avoided getting caught up in that mess and I was once again on my way down the road. My stop at the Pilot in Oklahoma City was a hassle just as I figured it would be. Too many trucks and not enough pumps and it ended up taking me 25mins to get in and out. I was now on an extremely tight schedule without a minute to spare. I drove out the rest of my hours and put in for the night with 15mins left on my 14hrs. I had pushed my luck a little tonight. I was lucky to find a place to park at this time of night. It was after midnight and I kind of had to make a parking spot.

I started my Thursday 10hrs later. I had 72 miles to go and 75 minutes to do it. About 15mins after I started driving the Qualcom beeped with a message. I didn’t have time to stop and read it, but I already knew what it said. Someone in the main office was shooting out a message asking if I was going to be on time. I managed to pull into the customers drive just before the noon deadline and contacted receiving on the CB. I wasn’t surprise when they told me to sit tight. I had no doubt that this wasn’t exactly a priority load before I arrived and sure enough, they were in no hurry to get it through the gate, but as long as I was able to show an on time delivery I was content.

I had also received a pleasant surprise that was out of the norm. Yesterday I had been sent a preplan to pickup a preloaded trailer from this customer once I had dropped this load. It’s nice not having to worry about getting a load offer after being empty for a change. I let the customer know that I was dropping a load of pallets and picking up a load, but they wanted the pickup number for my next load. Well, I don’t get that until I put in an empty call. I’m sure glad I was here on time! It took another 20 minutes before I was able to get the pertinent information and I was once again told to wait. This customer had a small lot and only allows 3 trucks in at a time and if those three trucks take their time, well I wait. I finally made my way through the gate about an hour after arriving and did a quick drop and hook and was on my way to Portland, ME (2035mi). In the words of Eric Cartman, “Sweeeeeeet”.

This was the perfect load that would finish out an awesome week for me. As I was driving down the road I started planning out my days. If I put in 3 solid days of driving and didn’t waist any time along the way I would be able to put in for a 34hr reset somewhere in the Connecticut or Massachusetts. The only problem is that it was an incredibly optimistic goal. So close as a matter of fact that I had to pull out the calculator and go through it a number a few times. Taking PTIs into consideration, along with the Pennsylvania and New York mountains that I would be pulling this 45,000# load over I was looking at three 11hr days with absolutely no stopping outside of fuel, and they would have to be quick ones. I might be able to fit in a 2-3 min stop each day at the most. If I failed to stay within these time constrains or hit a traffic backup along the way I would still be able to make my delivery on time without concern, but without the reset I would find myself unloaded in Maine with about 2hrs left on my 70. This would leave me stranded for another day before I could pickup another load, so off to the races it was. Runs like this really make me miss the lightning speed 65mph trucks of yesterday. That extra 3mph would have given me the extra hour that I sorely needed at this point. Anyone that says 3mph doesn’t make a difference is wrong.

My next three days were on the verge of being ridiculous. Outside of my 10hr and 8min breaks for the night I drove 1900 after picking up my load with two 10min stops for fuel and a grand total of two additional stops of 2mins each. I usually drink a large amount of water and soda during any giving day, but I found that severely limiting my liquid intake made the extended periods between stops much more tolerable and I prepared meals during my breaks so that I wouldn’t have to stop to eat. I could just reach into the cooler and feed myself on the fly. So went my Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

A little scenery from the trip.


I managed to pull into the Pilot in Sturbridge, Ma by the early evening of Saturday with just enough time to put in my reset. Mission accomplished! I don’t mind pushing, but that was a little more pressure than I care to deal with.

Now that I was settled in for the weekend I finally found myself with all the time in the world. After being pinned up in the truck for the last three days I took the opportunity to get a little exercise and walked into town. It was about 4 miles away and made for a pleasant evening. The walk back that night was a little intense though, wow it gets dark on these backwoods roads without moonlight. It’s the time of year up here when the weather is just about perfect and once I got away from the truckstop I found it to be a rather tranquil area. A little nature walk if you will.



Where’s Froggy?




WEEK THIRTY EIGHT
Monday, September 15th through Sunday, September 21st
Miles include deadhead

Nogales, AZ to Fort Smith, AR........................................1370mi
Fort Smith, AR to Amarillo, TX..........................................438mi
Amarillo, TX to Sturbridge, MA........................................1893mi

Total Paid Miles............................................. .................3701 Miles

I still had the hours and ability to put in another 180 miles on Sunday and spend the night at the customer, but if I had done so I would not have been able to put in a 34hr reset and would have been force to sit for an extra day after my delivery before gaining back hours at midnight. With the reset in place I would be in a great position to run some great miles again next week!

Actual Miles............................................. .....................3760 Miles

3701 x .43 = $1591.43 plus $30 Drop pay

 

WEEK THIRTY NINE
Monday, September 22nd through Sunday, September 28th


My reset has come to a close and I’m well rested. Last week was great and I have a fresh 70hr clock and I’m looking forward to another productive one.

Last week I had put in some very long days so that I would be able to put in a reset. I managed to make it to Sturbridge, MA which was about 160 miles from my final destination. I would be able to make my 7am appointment, but only by the skin of my teeth. I took off as soon as my log book would allow and managed to pull into the customer’s parking lot in Portland, ME with a short 15mins to spare. Wow, that’s cutting it close. What I found when I arrived didn’t surprise me in the least, however. I had pushed very hard to get here on time and just as I had suspected all along, this wasn’t exactly a JIT (just in time) load. It took me a good 20mins to find someone in the warehouse and when I did he was on the phone. I then stood there for over 30mins waiting for him to finish his conversation.

Unlike most people in this part of the country, he was an incredibly rude and nasty person. Most of my experiences with the folks from Maine have been quite pleasant, this wasn’t one of them. I didn’t take it personal and just dismissed his behavior. I was getting some great miles and was in a pretty good mood, I wasn’t going to let this miserable human being bother me. He had ordered me to back into one of the open bay doors (there were none available, although he was very adamant that there was) and after an oddly confrontational exchange (strange man) I was able to convince him of the reality of our situation and he told me to wait in the truck until someone pulled out. This also was a point of contention since all the doors had trailers in them, but none where attached to a truck. I felt that further debate with the fine gentleman wasn’t going to get me anywhere so off to the truck I went. One hour later one of their yard jockeys finally showed up and pulled out a trailer. I did a challenging blind side back to squeeze into the spot and waited. Another 30mins and the unloading began. Thank god I wasn’t late, eh!

Fortunately the guy that did the unloading was a very pleasant man (although he never stopped badmouthing my new found friend, the Forman) and had me unloaded in short order. My MT call goes in and I await my next destination.

I’m pleased to get a two load offer and go with the slightly shorter one because it has an attractive delivery time. The load I went with was going to Shelby, IA (1509mi). It picks up in Sanford, ME anytime today (looks like a possible drop/hook) and delivers to IA anytime on Thursday, or before. It’s the perfect trip with great miles and no wasted time. It also gets me within 40 miles of my grandmother’s house and I might just be able to swing by and put in a short visit.

I arrived at the shipper to find that this was a live load and not a drop/hook as I had hoped. I was also very disappointed to learn that they had an equipment malfunction earlier in the day and their production line was behind schedule. As a result I was told to make myself comfortable and check back in 3-4hrs. I don’t know what it is about Mondays, but it’s living up to its reputation today. I was dead in the water with nowhere to go so I pulled out the skillet and made myself a fine meal of hamburger helper. Only the best for this driver.

Once the 3hrs were up I headed back inside to check on their progress and was told to back into a door that was occupied by a Swift truck once he pulled out, “should be done with him in 45mins or so”, I’m told. Well, at least there is finally a light at the end of the tunnel. True to their word, 45mins later he pulled out and I backed in for my turn.

While sitting there I had a nice conversation with a Millis driver sitting next to me (they had just started loading him) who had been there longer than me. We of course started comparing notes and he was none to happy with Millis. He had been with the company for 5 years and his miles have been really bad for the last six months. I seem to be having a lot of these conversations lately.

The day continued to crawl by and I was finally loaded and headed down the road a mere 5hrs after arriving. At least I would pickup $30 for detention pay. Not much, but it’s better than nothing I guess. The day was almost shot and I simply ran out the rest of my 14hrs, managing to make it back to the same Pilot I had taken my 34hr reset at in Sturbridge, MA. It will by my third night in a row and this place is starting to feel like home. That makes a whopping 350 miles for a 14hr day, but I was able to put in enough miles to be able to make my destination with two full days of driving. I would be able to make it there by Wednesday evening but would have no drive time left once empty. I wouldn’t be able to pickup another load that day, but I would be one of the first on the list for a Thursday morning load.

Tuesday and Wednesday went by without incident and I was able to put in some solid miles and arrived at my final destination early in the afternoon of Wednesday. I dropped my trailer and only had 15mins left of my driving hours, so I just headed across the street to a small truckstop and put in for the night. My hopes of visiting my grandmother were also shot. I didn’t have enough hours left to go the extra 40 miles and there were no rental cars available in the area, maybe next time.

My next load offer came early in the morning and was headed to the feared freight waist lands of Pennsylvania (1109mi). Good miles, but it was scheduled to pickup between the hours of 1pm and Midnight with an open delivery for Saturday. If I run the load as scheduled I would be looking at less than desirable miles, but the pickup was a General Mills and I assumed it was a drop/hook (most open pickup windows at GM plants are) and the delivery was going to another GM plant. I’m confident that my trailer will be ready to go when I get there and I anticipate no problems with an early delivery and set out to do just that.

After a 100mi deadhead I arrived at the shipper about 4hrs early. The preloaded trailer I had anticipated was nowhere to be seen and I quickly realized that this would be a live load. My hopes of getting an early start were now a distant memory and my 14hr clock was ticking. I then proceeded to wait my turn and was able to back to a door a little early, but only by 30mins. Once loaded I headed on down the road to put as many miles behind me as possible before running out my 14hr clock. Along the way I stopped off at our Ottawa, IL shop to pick up some oil and antifreeze and top off the tanks with fuel. I realized I wasn’t in any real hurry and had plenty of time to make my delivery so I also opted to take two lane roads across Indiana and most of Ohio. It would cost me a little time, but that would also allow me to bypass the turnpike. It’s not my favorite route, but it saves the company a little bit of money on tolls. Plus my pocket was getting a little light on cash and I didn’t feel like stopping along the way to take a cash advance to pay the Ohio tolls (our EZ pass now works in IN). Since I had stopped to fuel up at a company terminal instead of the planed truckstop, I would have to pay a few bucks for the cash advance (a free service when getting fuel). My night ended in a dirt parking lot of a defunct truckstop just across the boarder in Ohio after a respectable 600 miles.

Friday morning started out at the reasonable hour of 7:30. I was only about 500 miles from my destination and would be able to have it there by late afternoon. I had until tomorrow to get it there, but with the way PA freight has been lately I wanted no part of delivering a load on a Saturday with the hopes of getting out of there on a weekend. Other than a hang up with traffic going through Chicago (left lane was still closed due to water on the road from last weeks rain storm) and some slow progress over the PA hills I had no real problems to deal with. I had planned on stopping at our New Kingstown terminal for fuel on my way by, but it was about 20 miles out of route and the 5 o’clock rush hour was getting to close for comfort. I was almost on empty because I had passed up my fuel stop (a horribly overcrowded Pilot) upstate earlier in the day. I figured I had enough fuel to get to the customer and back to the terminal if I had a load going in that direction. If not there was a Pilot close to my delivery that they could fuel me at when I got my next load.

I pulled into the General Mills a day early and was greeted by two lines of trucks stacked 5 deep trying to get in. Thirty minutes later it was finally my turn. I was given the location of the empty trailer that I was to pull out of a door and told to drop my loaded trailer where ever I could find a spot. They were packed to the gills and it took a couple of trips around the place before I was able to spot a hole off in the corner that appeared to be big enough to squeeze into. And squeeze I did. It took a number of pull ups but I finally got it in and then realized there wasn’t enough room to get in between the trailers to lower the landing gear. Not a big problem, I just had to pull it out far enough to drop the gear and then put it back into its spot.

The place was a mad house with at least 9 or 10 drivers wondering around looking for any little crevice they could find to drop a trailer. I spent an amazing amount of time just waiting for other drivers who were blocking the drive trying to make their own spots. The line getting out was just as prolonged and what can usually be a 20min drop and hook was stretched out to 1¾ hrs. Talk about a little tension buildup by the time I got out of that place. The only saving grace is that during that delay I was actually give a load offer and it was in a preloaded trailer and ready to go. Very good news indeed, I had fully well expected the infamous “no freight available” message.

Instead of that, I got a load going to Elk Rapids, MI (846mi). This was Friday and it didn’t deliver until 7am Monday morning. Like so many of our weekend loads, but when I’m getting squeaky tight on hours it makes for the perfect load. Well almost perfect. Due to my extended stay at General Mills I was looking at another extremely tight schedule. Like last week, the delivery time wasn’t a concern. I could have it there no problem. But if I could sneak in a 34hr reset I would be ready to burn up the miles again next week. If I can’t make the reset work I would be looking at having virtually no hours available after making my Monday morning delivery and be forced to sit around all day waiting to regain some hours. That wasn’t a particularly pleasing thought, so I set out to make the reset happen.

As I drove to my pickup I began to realize just how tight my schedule was. VERY! I had also made a huge mistake in choosing a route to the pickup point. The shortest route was across Hwy 422 which would result in a 42 miles trip. My other option was to run up to the Interstate, but this would have made it a 60+ mile trip. Ever conscious of my out-of-route miles I went with Hwy 422. I was late enough that I didn’t think traffic would be a big problem and I would probably arrive at about the same time regardless of the chosen route. What a miscalculation that turned out to be. I finally pulled into the customer’s lot 1½ hrs later. Anyone interested in saving time might want to stay off of that very scenic route. Not that I wouldn’t want to try it again some day with a car while doing some sight seeing.

The one good thing I had going for me on this trip was that I had been to this customer before. I knew exactly were they wanted the empty dropped and I knew where the loaded trailers were and was already aware that the BOL was on the floor of the trailer. I was in and out in 9 minutes and on my way to the terminal. I had just enough time to make it there by the skin of my teeth before my 14 was up. But even that goal ended up being just out of reach. I did make it to within 8 miles and had to stop in a Kmart that I knew would let me park in the back. It was one of those situations where it was 6 minutes past 9:30. That meant that if I stopped at that moment I could log it as 9:30. If I continued to our terminal just down the road I would have been forced to log until 9:45. This would have been within my 14hrs but would have added 15mins to my log. This run was going to be so tight that I couldn’t even give up that much time. The following Saturday morning I started right at 7:30 and headed over to the terminal. That way I was close enough to include the drive time in my PTI and Fuel while on line four. This 100% compliant thing can be a real pain in the butt at times.

Now all I had to do was drive to somewhere in upper Michigan and find a place to park to do my reset. There were a few obstacles to contend with first, however. My routing has me running across PA on Hwy 322. This route is actually a little longer than taking the turnpike, but I guess it saves enough money to justify it, on paper at least. My problem is that I am certain, without a doubt, that if I go that way I will never make my delivery on time with a reset intact. I had mulled over it for some time the night before and even pulled up the PA DOT website to lookup the cost of the turnpike. It was more than I thought, somewhere in the area of $40+, but I really had no choice from my point of view and I went with the turnpike. If they back charged for taking that route I would go ahead and eat the cost of the toll. In the long run it would put more money in my pocket. I was hoping that my effort to avoid tolls last week would help my case if it came down to it. I would worry about that when the time came. For now, today is what concerns me. Fueling wasn’t a concern because I had just topped the tanks here in our PA yard and I had enough to make the trip and get back out if need be. The other pressing matter is that I would have to drive for the remainder of the day without a single stop, maybe 2 minutes if I was lucky.

10`1/2 hrs later I found myself in the fine community of Grayling, MI. OK, not the actual community, more like a barren truck stop next to a Super 8. I considered holding up in the motel for a couple of nights, but the stupid place was asking $65 a night. In the middle of nowhere on top of it and the parking lot was almost empty all weekend. There’s some smart business man for ya. Now that my truck has an APU it’s not quite as frustrating to spend time in the truck and I’ve been trying to cut back on unnecessary cash expenditures lately anyway so I settled in for the weekend.

For the second week in a row I had to push hard to squeeze in my reset, but once again I was able to make it work. I had a 7am delivery Monday morning and as it worked out I only had about 60 miles to go and would have 75mins to do it once my reset was complete.

This reset was a bit boring but as usual I was able to amuse myself. The annual changing of colors in the leaves was in full effect up here. This was in a heavily wooded area, as most of northern Michigan is and I wondered off on a little nature hike and set up an impromptu campsite complete with a campfire. I really shouldn’t say complete, after all, I only had a collapsible chair and a campfire, but I was content.



WEEK THIRTY NINE
Monday, September 22nd through Sunday, September 28th
Miles include deadhead

Sturbridge, MA to Portland, ME (final leg).................................156mi
Sanford, ME to Shelby, IA................................................ .....1509mi
Carlisle, IA to Palmyra, PA................................................ ....1104mi
Blandon, PA to Grayling, MI (first leg)......................................790mi

Total Paid Miles........................................3559 Miles

Actual Miles............................................. 3591 Miles

3701 x .43 = $1530.37 plus $30 detention pay

 

have you had the pleasure of pulling one of the new "advertising" trailers?

 

Month Behind! Where's the Evertrucker... Everyready Energizer Bunny?

Happy Spook Day ....

 

I'm on strike until you start your new thread, "Another day in the Life of Headborg"

Not really, I've actually just been a little to lazy to keep up, but I'm working on it. If the miles keep hitting the skids like they have been for the last couple of weeks I should be caught up in a few days. Uck!

 

WEEK FOURTY
Monday, September 29th through Sunday, October 5th


Well, another reset is in the books and as I hit the 34th hour I find myself in the drivers’ seat waiting for the clock to give me the green light. I had arrived in Greyling with just enough time to squeeze in my reset and be on my way. I have a little under 60 miles to go and 75mins to do it after logging my PTI. If it was a straight run on an interstate I would be fine, but the remainder of the trip is on two lane roads through the north country of Michigan with the fine community of Elk Rapids as my final destination. It’s a quiet little town situated on a bay off of Lake Michigan in the far northwest part of the state. I have a load of empty cans going to a food plant of some type. I had assumed I was headed to a fishery (based on the odor in the area), but it turned out to be a fruit cannery. I had the good fortune of sitting next to a large pit where all the refuge fruit was dumped and it appeared that it had been fermenting for some time. A rather rancid smell to say the least that I had to contend with for a number of hours.

My first adventure of the week came around rather quickly. I had started my day at 04:30 and it was still quite dark at that hour. I had been driving for about 20mins when I noticed a big truck and a four wheeler were pulled off onto the shoulder on the eastbound lanes. I was a bit displeased with the truck because he had his brights on and due to the slight angle of his cab, they where shining directly into my eyes as I approached and it made it very difficult to see the faded lines on the somewhat narrow road. I squinted as best I could and made my way by. Shortly after that I saw the shadowy silhouetted outline of two people walking along the side of the road (apparently the drivers from the two vehicles I had just passed).

As I was making an attempt to process all that was going on and trying to readjust my eyes (still half blind from the high beams of the truck) on this very dark, moonless morning I found myself looking at a very large and recently dead dear smack dab in the middle of my lane. There was no real time to react other than to center myself on the obstacle and hope that the truck was high enough to clear it without knocking off a chunk of my Freightliner’s plastic bumper. Fortunately it didn’t have a large rack on it to do any damage and I made it by unscathed. OK, I’m awake now. Better to run over a dead deer than hit one that is standing on all four. Much less damage that way. I’m sure which ever one of the two guys walk back this way that hit this deer would agree.

With that little bit of excitement behind me I found myself within ¼ mile of the customer much sooner than I had expected; at least according to my directions. I was supposed to turn right on Hwy31 and look for the entrance ¼ mile on the right. A mile later and absolutely no sign of a business of any type I pulled out the phone and called the customer for directions. According to them I was still 15miles away. With my new directions in hand, I continued on down the road and pulled into their gate at 05:50 for my 06:00 appointment.

It’s obviously a Monday, because it is starting to resemble last week’s debacle. Once again I have pushed the limits of my log to make an on time appointment only to once again find that no one but me was overly concerned about when this load arrived. For the second week in a row I found myself wondering around a seemingly abandoned warehouse for 20mins before coming across someone. When I inform the gentleman that I am here with a delivery scheduled for 6:00am, I’m told that receiving guys weren’t up and running yet and tells me to back to the dock and make myself comfortable in my truck. Sure, why not, I don’t have anything else to do.

I had actually expected this very thing and didn’t let it get under my skin. I was fairly confident that this was going to be an extended stay anyway because when I initially received my load information on this haul it went into great detail with regards to detention procedures. Such things as making sure I arrive on time, properly document arrival, unload start and finish times and specifically, “You must get a signature on the detention form to receive payment” That line in itself let me know that I was in for a long morning.

Sure enough, the wait was extensive. I was under the impression that they would unload me and send me on my way. The fact of the matter was that they were using my truck as a can warehouse and would pull one pallet off at a time. They would then take that pallet to the canning line and load it into the machinery. When that pallet of cans had been filled with product they would return for another pallet. And so it went for the next 5 hours. That’s just what I wanted to do after a 34hr reset.

As if 5hrs wasn’t enough, I actually had a preplanned back haul on this load. Once I was empty, I was to pickup a load of specialized pallets that this company uses and return to the very place I had come from. Oh crap, that’s PA! Considering the fact that in the recent past I had only had two, maybe three loads into PA in the last 6 months; now I can’t seem to stay out of the bloody state.

So, after my 5hr unload I was instructed to head on over to the other side of the plant to be loaded with empty pallets. I do so and spend another hour waiting for that process to be completed which was fine because it took about that long to hunt down someone that would sign my detention form. By noon I was finally loaded up and ready to head on back to my favorite state, Pennsylvania. Thanks to another Monday filled with delays I once again failed to reach the 400 mile mark within my 14hrs, but was able to get another $30 bucks in detention pay. Whoo Hoo!

Tuesday was looking like a pretty good day. I had around 500 miles to run to make my delivery and should I be faced with the seemingly standard in PA, “no freight available at this time” message, I would still have a reasonable day of driving behind me. But in an effort to up my chances of a load once empty I started out at 3am so that I would arrive at a early enough hour to improve my chances of getting a load before this day came to a close.

Even though I had been routed over the Ohio turnpike I avoided it for as long as I could and stuck to Hwy 20 in order to make amends for my unauthorized trip across the PA turnpike last week. It was still very early in the morning and traffic was not a problem, so I didn’t really lose too much time in the process and was able to arrive at the consignee by 2:30 with the grand hopes of getting another load yet today.

Not only did I get a load out, they offered my two different ones and I didn’t even have to wait. One load was going to TN and the other was into SC. Mileage wise, they were very similar, but the SC had a much more attractive delivery time. My one big concern was that being empty in SC would greatly increase the likely hood of getting another load into PA, but I went against my better judgment and took the SC in the interest of saving time on the delivery end of things.

This next load was also a nice drop and hook pickup and I was able to get in and out in a little over 15mins and made my way to our terminal in New Kingstown. That way I could top off the fuel tanks and drop my trailer in the yard, thus making it easy to bobtail around town in the search of a place to eat and also made it possible to find a quite hiding place in the back of a shopping center so I would not have to listing to idling trucks all night long. That made for a nice 600 mile day.

Wednesday was another 3am start so that I could get to the customer as soon as possible. It had an open delivery window, but as usual, an early delivery always bodes well when one is looking for another load before the day is complete. I knocked out the remaining 500 miles and made it to my delivery point shortly after noon. I didn’t arrive quite soon enough however because there was another truck just backing into their only dock as I arrived, so I had to sit while he was being unloaded before I could take my turn. The wait wasn’t so bad, but the fact that it was another Crete truck was the kicker in this scenario. Because he was there first, he was unloaded first, therefore he got the first choice of the loads being offered out that afternoon.

The other driver was given a choice of two loads, both out of Maxton, NC (Campbell’s soup), but one was going to a good place, can’t remember where, and the other was going to a suburb of Philly. Guess which one I ended up getting.

I had a funny feeling that my decision to take the SC load would land me back in PA and that’s just what happened. If only I had made it there before the other Crete driver. I should have because this driver was definitely working at a slower pace. He had actually pulled out to pickup his load as I was backing to the dock. I left that customer about 30 minuets later and ended up missing my turn on the way to Maxton which led me on a scenic tour of the SC countryside (had a hell of a time finding a place to turn around) and cost me a good 20mins of wasted time. When I finally pulled into Campbell’s the other driver was sitting there hooked to his new trailer when I arrived and still there when I left with my trailer. Sure do wish I had his load, oh well, off to Philly I go. My hours were all but up for the day so I shut down in a dirt lot next to Hardee’s after another good day of 600mi.

Thursday was definitely a no hurry day. I only had about 550 miles to go and this load didn’t deliver until the early morning hours on Friday. If the customer had on site parking I could have just buzzed on over, but the likely hood of that was slim and I was headed to a Kmart DC, so an early delivery was also not an option. Even though there was no pressing need to get to where I was going today I did have to take parking into consideration. Options are limited in the area and if I tried pulling into the area at night I would be hard pressed to find a spot, so with that knowledge in hand I pulled out at 3am and found myself in the Newark service plaza by Noon. I had planned on pulling in and making a final decision on where I would park for the night, but realized I was probably in as good a spot as any and shut her down. This way I would have a short 80 miles to finish off in the morning and would be doing it when there was no traffic on the road.

I managed to make it through Philly just as the morning traffic was getting revved up and was able to avoid the traditional nightmare that unfolds there every day. I arrived at the Kmart one hour early and received my instructions. A nice little set up actually. All I had to do was drop my trailer in an open lot and their yard jockey took it from there. I had anticipated a reasonable unload of 90mins or so, but since I had dropped my trailer and watched it disappear around the corner I was not in a position to know what was going on. At least when you are hooked to a trailer you can feel it bounce around and know when the unloading begins and ends. Instead I was sitting in a parking lot with no clue as to how things were progressing and as the 3hr mark rolled around I was getting very antsy. I was antagonized further by the fact that two other trucks that had arrived at about the same time as me where already finished and gone.

I try to be patient in these circumstances, but it got to the point where I couldn’t hold out any longer. I had to know what was going on and headed out on a quest to find some answers. It was a bit of a challenge, but I finally track down someone that knew what was happening and was simply informed that my load had an extensive breakdown and they were still working on it. Not the answer I wanted to hear, but it did help alleviate my fear that an empty Crete trailer was sitting, lost and forgotten, somewhere in the bowels of this place.

It must have been one nasty product breakdown, because I spent a grand total of 5hrs in the place before I finally had an empty trailer attached to my truck. As annoying as that little delay was, I was calmed by the chirping of the Qcomm with a load offer. I was sure that I would be stuck here for the rest of the day because of the length of time I had sat here. Instead, I had a load offer immediately after sending in my MT call and it was getting me out of this awful corner of the world, but only after driving into Elizabeth, NJ first. There is always a price to pay, isn’t there.

I was to pickup a load of beer from the Bud Whse and run it up to Michigan. Although this load got me out of the Northeast, it was far from perfect. First I would have to drive into Jersey, but I had been to this place a few times and knew the ropes. Go to one drop yard to check in, then take the empty trailer to a different drop yard and return to the original drop yard to get the loaded trailer, and don’t go to the office that the Qualcomm tells us to go to. It helps to know these little things at times. So, other than the traffic, which at that time of day wasn’t all that horrible, it was a fairly painless drop and hook and I was on my way down the road.

Now for problem two. It was now Friday, 1pm. This load was to deliver anytime after 10pm Sunday night, but was only 650mi away. Long story short, I could be there Saturday morning. This would actually afford me enough time to put in a reset had I been so inclined to do so, but I would still have around 15hrs available upon my arrival and didn’t really care to do so at that time. I would be much more content if I could run some more hours off.

The delivery time on this load was a bit odd. Any time after 10pm on a Sunday. It was obviously headed to a small local distributorship and these places tend to operate on a M-F, part of Saturday kind of schedule. I assumed that the late Sunday delivery time probably coincided with when the shift started for loading their outbound trucks for Monday morning deliveries. There was also a phone number listed with the load info that showed business hours. What caught my eye was that they were open until noon on Saturday. After running the numbers through my head a couple of times I realized that I could make it there by roughly 10am. Here we go again, off to the races with no stops along the way other than for fuel and my required 10hr break. This is getting to be a habit.

I drove out the rest of my hours for the rest of the day without stopping to help improve my chances of arriving in Michigan in a timely manner and shut down for the night on the west side of PA.

Saturday started with me being in a very good position to make it to the Bud distributor before noon. I actually had more than enough time to make that dead line, but I also realized that if they shut the doors at noon, and I arrived at that time or slightly earlier, I would have, in all likelihood been told “tough luck, see ya Sunday night” I figured I was already taking a chance in showing up on Saturday, but these smaller places are generally very flexible when it comes to receiving deliveries, so I was feeling very confident that I could get unloaded if I showed up at a reasonable hour.

Not wanting to arrive too close to closing time, other than a quick fueling, I started at 3:30am and did the no stop thing, managing to show up in their lot at 10:45am. A little tight for comfort, but I might just be able to pull this off. I was absolutely elated to see another Crete truck backed up to one of their doors. Looks like I’m not the only one that had this idea.

When I walked into the office I got two responses. From the nice girl working in the office, “Good morning, how are you doing today” and from the warehouse guy, “Oh, Jesus Christ, another one!” The pleasant office girl told me, “Don’t worry about him, he has tickets to the game and seems to think he can leave early”. Apparently, this guy was looking forward to meeting up with some local buds to watch the Michigan game down in Ann Arbor against Illinois. I can joyfully inform you that they lost that game 20-45. Go Iowa Hawkeyes! Although Michigan State beat the Hawkeyes on that same day.

Well, I can tell you one thing. When these guys set their mind to it, they can have your trailer unloaded in the blink of an eye. I was given a door assignment and before I made it to my truck the warehouse guy had the door open and was standing there waiting for me to back in. Once I did so, I walked to the warehouse entrance, which was about 10 dock doors away. By the time I made it to my dock from the inside of the building the guy already had six pallets off and he didn’t give a damn where he put them. I’ve never seen a guy drive a forklift so fast or recklessly. He was on a mission and nothing was going to stop him. He was shoving pallets of beer in every little cranny he could find that involve the shortest possible distance of travel and my truck was empty in 7 minutes flat. Holy Cow! I knew these guys were keeping this ability a secret.

What a perfect day, I’m now empty and its not even noon yet. Sure beats sitting around until 10pm tomorrow night. I put in my MT call and waited to see what was available for freight in the area.

While I was waiting I had the chance to talk to the other Crete driver that had unloaded just before me. He was a little distressed because he had been driving all night to make this delivery and had actually run over his 11hrs due to a wrong turn close by trying to find this place. He had only been with the company for two months and was upset that he was going to get a log violation. According to him, had been driving in circles for about 30 mins past his 11hrs. He also said that he was never more than a few miles away, he actually drove past it a couple of times without realizing it. I simple suggested he log the adventure as “on duty” and he would be fine. If he took my advice, he would fine. I hope he did so.

When I returned to the truck I found a load offer waiting for me. Want to guess where it was heading, yup, PA.

And just to rub salt in the wound, it was a load that was scheduled to pickup at 1am in Battle Creek. That’s less than 100 miles away and its only Saturday noon. The trip it self is actually perfect for my time frame. I am once again getting tight on hours and this will work out perfect, but only if I can pickup the load now. If I can do that, I will be able to arrive in PA with about 2hrs left on my 70 and be the perfect position to do a reset just across the street from the delivery point. Due to the timing of things, however, if I have to wait until the scheduled pickup time I would still be able to make my delivery, but without the reset, thus forcing me to sit dormant for a total of two days waiting to gain hours back.

There seems to be a theme to my resets lately, if I do this, and it works out like that, and I get lucky here, I might just be able too, and so on.

Well, if that’s what I have to do it’s fine with me. Even though this load has a 1am pickup time, I know for a fact that it is a 100% drop and hook customer. I just hope that it is loaded and ready to go. I arrived at the gate and let the guard know that I was about 12 hrs early, but if the trailer was ready to go I would be ready to take it. After a little paper shuffling I was given the green light and a trailer number. Lucky me, still going my way.

I drove out the rest of my hours for the day and got a very early start on Sunday morning which made it possible to pull into my favorite PA destination, Breinigsville, in the mid morning, thus making it possible to put in my reset and be ready to burn up the miles once I dropped my trailer just across the road. Very annoying customer by the way, even though it’s a drop/hook delivery, they won’t let you into the gate any more than 2hrs early (may actually be 1hr these days). Not that it makes any difference to me on this particular day; I’m out of hours anyway.



WEEK FOURTY
Monday, September 29th through Sunday, October 5th
Miles include deadhead

Grayling, MI to Elk Rapids, MI (final leg)......................................56mi
Elk Rapids, MI to Blandon, PA................................................ ...789mi
Columbia, PA to Lancaster, SC................................................ .604mi
Maxton, NC to Fairless Hills, PA................................................ .636mi
Elizabeth, NJ to Howell, MI................................................ ........708mi
Battle Creek, MI to Breinigsville, PA..........................................713mi

Total Paid Miles............................................. .......3506 Miles

Actual Miles.............................3600 Miles

3506 x .43 = $1507.58

 

I still say that Tonn should have all of the Crete trucks/trailers painted the same color. That way those Shaffer boys wouldnt have to listen to all of the crap on their CB when they are pulling a red trailer down the road and taking a load away from a red truck driver.......

 

ET you are about a month and half behind on your posts. Thanks!