Life on the Road – Trucking News Blog

So I’m here in Laredo. At “our” terminal. It is hot and uncomfortable. Actually it’s just like being in an oven. It is busier than ever. Freight headed everywhere. Going inside the office, I encountered a bunch of “men-children.” Whiny, lazy, young and old, fat and extremely fat, unmotivated, very unprofessional truck drivers. I just wanted to leave. I’m so disappointed with these people. I’m sad for the company. Unfortunately, my load and paperwork were not ready to be taken over to the broker. I’m stuck here overnight. It’s dark and 102 degrees. Bummer.

What do you think of this? I’m in the rest room. One of the “men-children” comes in. He tries to open my stall and the one next to me. He almost takes the doors off. He yells “full house!” I thought he left. When I’m done I open the door and he almost runs me over, tells me to “get out already” and he slams the door. This goober is one of our million-milers! The decal on both sides of his truck says: “Ambassador.” Well, this “Ambassador” from hell must weigh over 400 lbs., clearly has trouble walking and you can smell him 10 feet away. The company just gave him a brand new International ProStar with a host of free options. He barely can get up and in the cab. This clown is an disgrace and I’m sure my company has no clue of this man-child’s piss poor attitude. You know the expression, what comes around goes around, well, I will not forget this little “incident.”

Then there was the driver who refused to take a load over to the broker less than fifteen minutes away because he claimed his 14 hours were up. The other driver who refused a load to North Dakota because he doesn’t want to go West because he wants to make sure he gets home two weeks from today. Another driver couldn’t figure out how to secure the load he was assigned. One driver was too tired to work anymore today. One guy doesn’t want to leave until tomorrow. I have never seen such stupidity. The operations staff here is the best in the business. They seem to let all this roll off their shoulders and just move on to the next available driver. A pathetic situation, clearly.

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Did you listen to the President’s “speech” tonight? I did. And I have mixed emotions. I opposed the invasion of Iraq after 9/11 and the subsequent ten year inglorious battle to provide uneducated barbarians, who despise our way of life, a taste of both freedom and democracy. If Iraq succeeds on its own, I will be amazed. I have similar feelings about Afghanistan. We are wasting our time there. I say stop the loss of any more American lives and pull out – now.

If we employ our advanced technology to learn of an Al Qaida or Taliban terrorist hideout, we can simply fly a drone there and drop a large bomb on their heads without “boots” on the ground. I think we all agree that the only good terrorist is a dead one. Afghanistan is a corrupt, horrible and disgraceful example of everything that’s wrong with the human race. They should be left alone to exist in their intolerant little world and a reminder that we still don’t have Bin Laden.

The President has been in office for 19 months. And I’m sorry for those people who believe that in that time, he has failed to make a world an economic panacea for you. Would the world have been a better place with John McCain and Sara Palin at the helm? I don’t know and any speculation about that, in my mind, is a waste of time. It didn’t happen, so move on. The President’s speech, according to the overpaid narcissistic talking heads, was boring and a failure. I remember the speeches of both Bushes, former President Clinton – even Ronald Reagan – and quite frankly they all left me, well, what’s a good word here – empty? Yes, the current President sounds a bit “down,” but who the hell wouldn’t be if they had to wake up every morning with the mess we’re in.

But, and this is a big BUT, I’m a truck driver and my worldview is different. Flatbed freight right now is the highest it’s been in two years. I am preplanned for another load 24-48 hours in advance of my being MT. We don’t have enough qualified drivers nor do we have the available trucks to handle the present available high freight volume. For a while, I sat MT and listened to the radio and never heard a carrier advertisement for drivers. I don’t sit anymore and there are dozens of carriers advertising for drivers for regional, dedicated, local-intermodal and OTR “opportunities.” I was asked to take less time home to assist in the demand.

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For those that are interested in the fuel economy on a 2010 KW T660, I took this photo of how fast I generally run, at what RPM and what the truck computer is calculating the MPG’s at – with about a 45K load on the trailer. As you can see, it’s showing 8.3 MPG. That’s an average, of course. If it’s important, I drive exclusively with the cruise on. My last truck, a Freightliner with a small Detroit, I remember was getting, at best, about 6.4 MPG’s. I don’t know how that compares with what you’re driving and/or how you’re driving. A reminder that I have a Cummins 1997 ISX engine with a  Eaton ten speed. I have no clue what the “rears” are or the other “specs” truckers like to argue about, because quite frankly, none of that data would help me do my job any better. I received the truck with about 625 miles on it – it’s been less than a month and the odometer is now at about 12,000 miles. The odometer reading in the photo was from a few days ago.

This is another one of those posts that I’m going to jump all over the place, so as I usually say, please bear with me. The one item that keeps popping up in trucking concerns tolls and States allowing heavier weight trucks on their roads. I’ll discuss that in a second. But first, let me ask you this question – why isn’t there a decent truck stop in the Cleveland OH area? After I delivered in Bedford Heights, I received a preplan for a 5:30pm pick-up in Tallmadge, about 26 miles South. I didn’t want to get back on I-80. And the shipper has arrogant idiots working there and don’t allow ANY truck parking.

The QUALCOM said the stupid shipper “recommends” to go to the Knack Morgan Truck Plaza off I-76, exit 26 Eastbound, exit 25B, Westbound. The truck stop directory shows a Marathon in Akron, again off I-76, exit 26 WESTBOUND, 25B, EASTBOUND. The opposite of what was on the computer. Well, I didn’t see anything at either of those exits. If there was in fact a Morgan anything, it would sure be helpful if they managed to put up a damn sign or two. For all I know the QUALCOM message and the lousy directions were written years ago and NEVER updated.

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“On Sept. 11, the store, with 80 employees, was one of 250 Burlington outlets nationwide owned by the Milstein family. That morning, recalled Stephen Milstein, the company’s former general manager and vice president, the staff was in the basement when a piece of a plane plunged through the roof, either from American Airlines Flight 11 crashing into the north tower at 8:46am, or United Flight 175 crashing into the south tower at 9:03pm.” (The New York Times/Photo by Michael Appleton)

Tonight, I’m parked about 40 miles (59 degrees!) from my final in Bedford Heights OH. I have a home time request in for this coming Friday. I wish it were tomorrow. The traffic today was absolutely miserable from Iowa through Indiana on into Ohio. Every loon with a car, RV or U-Haul was out driving today. In many parts of the country, school starts tomorrow. And, as far as I’m concerned, it is overdue. School should be year round, like a job. America long ago stopped being an “agri” based economy, however, school schedules and our time – daylight savings, etc., are determined as if we all made our living growing fruits and vegetables. This being Sunday night, there is nothing to report on as far as trucking news. The cover of Transport Topics is as boring as ever. OOIDA’s server is as slow as molasses, and they have nothing pertinent to report, certainly nothing, as usual, that will put more money in your wallet.

I need to mention as a follow-up to yesterday’s post on the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, that there are 50,000 service personnel who, just like in Vietnam, will remain there and act in an “advisory” capacity. Remember we built an embassy there (in Bagdad) fifty times larger than Versailles. Someone has to stay over there to protect it. One service member – post withdrawal – was sadly killed today. I believe that makes the KIA (killed in action) count for our troops – 4401. And for what? So Muslims can build a mosque or entertainment center adjacent to the tragedy that started this whole Iraq/Afghanistan mess? Is our democracy safer now than before 9/11? Is the world more at peace since the overthrow of Saddam? Did invading Iraq provide us with a lifetime abundant supply of oil? Is Bin Laden behind bars down in GITMO? The Iraqi’s still have no coherent government, various factions sit in tents and want to blow each other up and nobody there is rushing to erect monuments to George W. Bush.

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There are a few times when I can’t get an internet connection and last night was one of them. I had to work on Windows Live Writer off-line, which is what I use to post to WordPress. Between Denver and Albuquerque, Verizon’s cell and data service is terrible. I don’t care how many red dots they show on a map, there wasn’t any service, but there should be. I can wait until cell towers becomes obsolete and service is offered via Earth orbiting satellites, like XM/Sirius radio.

I was initially dispatched to Tucson AZ, but then was turned around to pick-up slinkies (coiled wire) today in Pueblo CO. The load is going to OH. I spent the night at a independent truck stop in the middle of nowhere – Springer NM – right off I-25. Nice place. Friendly staff. Big sign, however, at the Subway inside, saying their oven isn’t working. Sorry, I need my flatbread and sprinkle cheese toasted. So I walked into Russell’s Restaurant. And after forty days of watching every damn thing I put in my mouth, starving myself if there was nothing healthy available, I fell off the diet wagon. Not actually a fall, more like a high altitude swan dive into a deep Brazilian rain forest canyon.

I did try my best. I looked over the menu carefully. The Native American waitress sat down next to me to assist. Sorry gals, I’m a guy and when a waitress, especially a good looking one does that – sits down next to me – I have some trouble thinking. I made the mistake of asking her “What’s good?” She smelled like a desert flower after a September rain shower. OMG – did I just write that? “Green chili chicken or steak enchiladas.” I asked her name. “Nicole.” Well, Nicole (love that name) would you consider that healthy? What a moron I am. What kind of stupid question is that to ask. “Sure it is, it comes with lettuce and beans – that’s healthy, right?” I had been in the truck, on the job, in the heat, since 6 freak’n AM, off my “regular” time zone. I just kept looking in her eyes. And she stared back. I lost track of what happened next and what I ordered.

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OK, so here I am back on Mountain Time. Laptop time is 10:06pm. Log time is 9:06pm. Wife time is the same as laptop time. Today I drove the 641 miles from Carrollton TX to Albuquerque NM. Great trip. Wish I had a dedicated run between these two places. I would actually be OK with moving to Albuquerque, which I think is a pretty cool place. I’m parked right outside the consignee in an “upscale” industrial park. I have my window open and I’m not sweating. A nice change of pace from yesterday when I was tarping the load I’m under and it was 107 degrees. I finished at 9pm last night, drank an entire bottle of Gatorade and feel asleep. When I don’t post, there is always a damn good reason, like heat exhaustion.

I said before, there should be a law making tarping in 100 degree heat illegal. My delivery is for 0600 tomorrow. I met a Mercer driver the other day at the Red River Army Depot. We were talking about a bunch of stuff. I told him about how stupid late night early morning pick-ups and deliveries are. He agree. He told me to QUALCOM in my eta and tell them I’m not a dairy farmer and to make the appointment for 0800. Well, my company takes their JIT loads seriously and wants them delivered as promised. I sent in the message with the dairy farmer quote. I got a message back a little while later confirming the 0800 appointment. Thank you to that Mercer driver. To be honest with you, this driver could have talked me into buying my own truck and driving for Mercer. Thank goodness, when I left the Army Depot, I came to my senses.

Back to Carrollton TX. I really don’t like Dallas. Forget about every else there, the traffic for a truck driver is enough to make you mad as hell. The surrounding areas are no better. I’ve always felt the HUV lanes should be for trucks who are just “pass’n” through. I know I’m an old fart when I say this but, I first went to Dallas in the late ’70′s, when men were men and women were women. Dallas was magical back then. It is not now or will ever be again. On the outskirts, places like Carrollton are not better. So, why does the railroad decide to run a train though 5pm rush hour traffic under I35 NE for almost 45 minutes -backing up traffic for miles either EVERY direction?

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Good Sunday all. Are you home and off the road today? Did you attend a Church or Temple ( or Mosque) of your choice? You’ll feel better, trust me. What’s that? You’re hung over, stuck in a futon with someone named Wanda? And you have a tattoo? Well, to each his own. As far as I’m concerned, despite being in sweltering Texarkana TX, in the back of a Texaco station, I have the day off. It’s 34 hour shut-down time. I haven’t had to do that in a long while. It means flatbed freight is truly way up and I might be able to buy that Motorola Droid X soon. And a new GPS. And that new $189 Kindle. And send my mom some money. Holy smokes, I think I’ll go back to bed. But I’m starving and the Subway here is calling out to me. “Oh, Marshall, sweetie, this is your egg white ham and cheese flatbed sandwich calling you, dear heart, come to me – now.” Damn, I can’t resist that. I’ll be back in a few minutes.

That was good. Yummy and healthy. Remember, no chips – go with the yogurt. And NO cookies! The interesting thing is that inside this dump is a “classy” cigar store. It’s closed today, but it looks like it has a good size walk-in humidor. I have no clue what it’s doing here inside a gas station. There are no signs for it outside that I can see, and looking at the “patrons” who fuel here, who go inside for a wiz or to order a sub, well, they don’t like the type to indulge in a fine cee-gar. I used to love a Cuban or two, but I’m sure if I lite up anything near me, I would explode, that being with all the meds I’m using. LOL. So, no cigars for me. There is an awesome black high tech really cool looking travel humidor that would hold 4 Cubans for $19.95. Maybe some other time.

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Happy Friday 13th LOTR followers. For those drivers that are fortunate enough to get home this weekend, have fun. For the rest of us, America’s freight rolls on. There was a 1 vehicle “accident” on I-40 westbound east of Nashville this afternoon. Traffic was backed up 5+ miles to the West and 8+ miles to the East. The TN State Police did their usual miserable job of managing the situation and what in other states, on other roads would be nothing, this “event” lasted hours longer than it should have.

Speaking of TN, I truly resent that the 55/65 and 55/70 mph speed limit “split” is still in effect there. When OODIA stops wasting their time with barbeques and giving out awards nobody cares about, maybe they’ll get down to business and get the speed limits safe for truckers in TN. Split speeds anywhere are totally unsafe. And, back to the 1 car accident, there was no reason for any backup in either direction, but it was the worst case of “Oh, let’s stop and take a look at what’s happening.” These folks are as dumb as bowling pins and the truckers trying to “control” traffic are no better. Shame on all of you.

As I was trying to make time down to Texarkana, I got a call from dispatch telling me there is a HOT load that will be at our Dallas yard tomorrow night. So forget Texarkana, head straight to Dallas, drop the trailer and wait for the other load that needs to be delivered to Wausau WI next Thursday. Next Thursday? The rationale behind all this is “we” don’t have enough drivers to “handle” this load. Well, isn’t that special. Problem is, I’m low on hours. I will have 8.5 left on my 70 tomorrow afternoon and need to shut down for 36 on Sunday. I’m about 600 miles from Dallas. Long story short, turns out someone else will handle it and I will proceed on schedule. That’s the photo I took of the 1 car accident. The driver was air lifted out hours earlier. I don’t know what his/her condition is.

Moving on, my hatred of Facebook continues. I have 57 e-mails from people who are asking to be friends. I have no idea who the heck they are. I would love to comply, but Facebook has me on “hold” from adding friends because I’m abusive and annoying. This constantly happens to me. I can’t wait to meet someone who works for Facebook. I intend to shove their head in a bucket of ice water. Facebook along with Twitter are no better than the bowling pin morons who sit on the interstate waiting to see a 1 car accident. I find the fact that Facebook allows the use of profanity, repugnant. There is some intelligent “conversation” occurring, but the rest of the nonsense is no better than childish CB chatter. I’m now hearing of some influential and popular media folks pulling out of Facebook and concentrating on building their web sites and chat rooms. The photo to the left is just after I “cleared” the 1 car accident heading west – look at the other side standing still – OMG.

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Imagine you are the middle school daughter of a truck driving mother. Now imagine your mother pulling you and your brother out of public school and enrolling you in a school on wheels – homeschooling in the sleeper of her 18-wheeler.

That is exactly what happened to Kerry Anderson and her brother. Their mother supplemented their curriculum (they mailed in assignments) with activities based on life on the road. She had them calculate fuel efficiencies and arrival times. She had them assist with route planning. Kerry and her brother were involved in many of the aspects of the job of full time truck driving.

After graduating from homeschool high school, Kerry attended Valencia Community College and just prior to graduation was surprised to receive an invitation to study at Harvard University, expenses paid. She graduated from Harvard this year, and is headed for law school.

Kerry remarked in an interview about just how unusual she was on the Harvard campus. To be a transfer from a community college was enough to have her stand out in the crowd, then add to that her truck cab homeschooling, and you have the ingredients for a real shock for both students and faculty.

She missed life on the road and rejoined her mother for a week of trucking right after graduation. She said she missed the trucking culture, meeting different kinds of people and hearing their stories. It’s an education you just cannot obtain while sitting in a classroom.

Kerry may be a graduate of Harvard, but she will always remain the proud daughter of her truck driving mother.

Now when I heard about Kerry’s homeschooled education in the cab, it got me wondering about age limits of passengers of truckers. I mean could that still happen today? Surely somebody has passed a law since then that would make it illegal to bring your middle school kids with you in the truck?

I am a homeschooling parent myself and plan to take our homeschooling family on the road for a cross country trip as part of my children’s education. I know of several homeschool families who have done this. But I have never met a homeschool family that has done that while maintaining full time truck driving.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128674314

I was parked at the Shell/Subway right off I-96 in Portland MI. Last night, it was comforting to shut down at about 9:30pm and pull into a rest area where there was plenty of parking. What a concept! As you know, that would have never happened in North Carolina or anywhere in the horrid Northeast. It so happens it was the same rest area that many years ago I found out, in the dead of winter, that TRISM had shut down operations – Arrow style. I did make my delivery the next morning and due to the support of many drivers along the way, made it back home to Florida on fumes. I eventually returned the truck to Jacksonville and tried to get on with my life, broke. Right now, FYI, I’m on I-80 in Indiana headed to lovely CT with another load of tarped pipe.

I have tried several times to “register” for another Flying J fuel bonus card, but their website seems completely screwed up. The Pilot & J “programs” will be merged next year, but for now, since I told you I can now fuel at FJ due to their accepting Comdata, I might as well have a card. FJ just never seems to get it right, which is probably why Pilot has swallowed them as part of their “hey, let’s ignore the truck drivers since the dumb manager is never here and this dive is really a social club for all of us that can’t get into cosmetology school.” Wonderful.

The other merger, T/A and Petro, has produced a new version of their old boring “rag.” It’s the flip over two in one kind of “thing” that is annoying as hell to read. One side is the old Road King magazine, the other opposite side is something called the Driver’s Seat. Hey, Tom O’Brian – president of, I guess, the two merged entities aka – the guy who can’t seem to fix his parking lots, but had enough money to acquire Petro. the new “mag” is a stupid idea. I just do what the ten or so other drivers that read it do, rip it in half and then clip it together so it “handles” like a real magazine. I like Tim Brady, but I get cramps when I read about a woman owner-operator who “wants to expand and diversify her business” by getting “certified” as a minority owned company and as a “woman-owned” and “disadvantaged” business. What kind of nonsense is that?

So, I flip over the cover to the “other” magazine – the T/A side and I say holy smokes, looking at the photo. There’s a picture of driver-trainer Christine Stratton and her former submissive, I mean, trainee, one Randy Pease. Now I’m sure, maybe, that Ms. Stratton is a wonderful woman with many fine qualities. But, she scares me. Look at that smirk. I think if I touched her, I would ignite in flames. She has that cougar – I’m going to bite you hard look. I would never, ever get in a truck with her. And oh, did I mention, that I abhor as in despise any, every and all driver trainers? Well, I do. There is a photo of former student Pease hugging trainer Christine. It makes me want to barf. Doesn’t he just look like a leee-tle angel? Oh, he must have just been the perfect submissive, I mean trainee, for Ms. Stratton to share her two seconds in the spotlight with him. I’m just surprised the photo doesn’t show him with a studded dog collar with the leash in his trainers hands.

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