Quick update…

I GOT MY EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE WORKING!!!!

Whooo HOOOOOO!!!!

It was just the plug… so I’m sucking off a few movies for future enjoyment! WHEW!! What a relief THAT thing still works and it’s just the inverter plug in the truck!

What an awesome drive! – 1036hrs

Well, the instructor drove for a few hours this morning and got us about half-way here. I took over around lunch-time and finished up the last couple hundred miles. Still grinding some gears… BUT there WAS a definite improvement over the last couple of days. We drove through this wicked nice, winding, highway (I75 through Tennessee) that was simply awesome!
It was a slow, four-lane highway with the speed limit at 55 and 50 for trucks. It was truly a beautiful ride through the very hilly Tennessee wilderness with a few very sharp turns (40 for trucks at times) and down through the valley’s we would go and then back up and around and over and twice THROUGH…

Made for a very pleasant day of driving! So we arrived in Gaffney, SC and dropped our pizza trailer and picked up an empty and headed up to the local Pilot truck-stop a couple of miles away where we’re bedding down for the night!

I even managed to get to talk to my sweetie for a while tonight via chat so it was one pretty great day! Right now we don’t have a load scheduled for tomorrow so we’re just puttering around here. I shuffled my bunk around some trying to make some more room… again, one person can live in these trucks without much of a problem, but two grown men make for some cramped quarters! Oh well, soon enough I’ll have my own truck and can have all the room to myself! 🙂

I’m hoping we can get a load headed out west somewhere (if not the Northeast, but I know my instructor doesn’t like to run up there much)… but with Ike just having passed through…there’s not much freight to be had through the mid-south so we may end up heading north again!

Oh, one last thing… my instructor had me doing more 90 degree backing practice tonight both at the receiver (called our 90) and here at the truck-stop. Both times I did a “passing” job at putting it in the hole from a 90 degree approach. That maneuver is one that I’ll be tested on to get my CDL so I’m pretty happy that I’m able to do it… not to mention pretty damn impressed I’m ABLE to get this monster swung around in such a tight corner!

All ’round the mulberry bush – 0009hrs

Wow…what a day! We started in Olney, IL early this morning with an empty trailer and no game plan… got our load while we were bedded down last night… Pick-up in Schaumberg, IL just outside of Chicago. So we boot-scooted up there to drop our trailer (after our first truck and trailer wash (inside AND out!)… a mere $86 and change, but the inside of the trailer needed to be done for the next load.

We arrived in Schaumberg, IL and the shipper had a black-light to inspect the inside for any blood or contaminants. Once that trailer was cleared, we could drop it in their yard and pick up our pre-loaded one. 22,000 pounds of frozen pizza going to Gaffney, SC!

I drove since noon (central time) and we’re just now bedding down at a rest area just outside of Cincinnati, OH… one BIG-ASS circle via different highways! We ran into a bitch of a storm around Chicago… to the point that one exit ramp we had to go around took us through about 6″ of water! I’ve seen at least three rain-related wrecks today on the highway… people going too fast when it’s raining too hard…and sure enough, around they go into oncoming traffic and the wall!

So the big news of the day? My instructor and I finally figured out what the hell my damn problem was with my shifting… and at about the same time too… something so stupid simple we laughed… I had to slide the seat BACK by one notch so that I wasn’t “up on” the clutch so much!!! I was pressing the clutch in WAAAY too far, hence causing me to grind gears like and SOB and miss them altogether. Once I slid the seat back a bit…holy shit what a difference!! Now I hardly grind at all and usually slid the gear right in with maybe only a slight growl!

WHOOO HOOOOOO!!!!!

There’s hope for me yet!!

Okay.. almost 500 miles I drove today.. another 400 some odd miles to go tomorrow…but the load’s not due until 0300 Monday so there’s plenty o’ time to get it there (it’s another drop and hook) and move on from there.

It’s late, I’m tired… I’m off to bed! One more time… WHOOO HOOOOO!!! Here’s to no more grinding gears (crossing fingers!)