Posted by admin on Feb 7, 2009 in
Where Am I? I actually can’t say if Schenectady is a drain or not… but I just love saying the name! 🙂
Dropped my load of miscellaneous Nestle` products at the WalMart DC in Johnstown, NY yesterday morning. Did have any loads in the area so my travel agent (a.k.a. Dispatcher) asked if I would do a favor… drop my trailer at a near-by business, and grab a dead trailer there, take it into Albany, NY to the local refer repair shop. So I rolled over to Rotterdam, NY where I dropped my trailer and picked up one that the refer wouldn’t stay running on it. Drove that the 30 minutes or so over to Albany and dropped it at a repair shop, then bobtailed back to my trailer. Which had been promptly stolen (well, actually used by the business there for another load). So I had to grab a different trailer, no big deal. It’s all paid miles and hauling deadhead I get GREAT fuel mileage! LOL
So I finally got a load… but it doesn’t pick up until tomorrow at 1500 in Delhi, NY about an hour West of here (Rotterdam). Sooo, I’ve bedded down in a small truck stop off I88 x25 in Rotterdam for last night, and basically have today “off”!
So I got to sleep in this morning… made me a decent pot of coffee (Of course I have a coffee maker on the truck! Duh!) and am just chillin’… literally, it’s frickin’ freezing here this morning! LOL
Anyways that’s about it for me… today is going to be “house” cleaning day and will probably enjoy a movie or two now that I have a 19″ monitor on the truck… so I don’t have to keep the laptop in my laptop to watch. I also bought an iPod FM transmitter so I can tune the trucks 6 speakers into the station it broadcasts and listen to whatever is on my laptop! Just like surround sound! Whoo Hooo! I’m thinking either Star Trek (the 1st one) or start the Star Wars series over… not sure yet! Maybe both! ROFL
Posted by admin on Feb 5, 2009 in
Where Am I? Was home all weekend getting the truck setup and spending some wonderful time with my sweetie.
Picked up a load out of Biddeford on the way out… thought it was going to be Maple products by the name of the company… NOPE 32 pallets of chunky salsa, medium! Dragged that down (again through the snow!) to Dayton, NJ. Really really neat driving down I95 on Long Island, NY at 3 in the morning! Crossed over the George Washington Bridge into “Joursey” on the Turnpike… then suddenly could NOT for the life of me get the damn “Sopranos” theme song out of me head! Kept waiting to see a Cadillac Escalade go by with a fat Italian guy smoking a stogey!! ROFLMAO Wait… that WAS every car going by!
Got unloaded there this morning, then took that MTY to Jersey City and the Tropicana plant there… had to Bobtail from there to Headen, NJ to pick up a damaged trailer going to the Pittston yard.
When I say “damaged”… I mean busted-ass broken down!! The front trailer tandem had no wheels or tires… the axle was LITERALLY hanging by a chain from the frame and it had no mechanical or air brakes on it what-so-ever!
Don’t know what happened to it, but the tandems were FRIGGED UP
EDITORIAL NOTE: I had posted this (and more last night), but for some reason the connection got screwed up and didn’t actually post, so I’m going to resume the saved draft this morning 0940hrs)
So I bunked down in our Pittston, PA terminal after dropping that shit trailer… of course because it had no brakes, I had to find a decent spot in the DIRT back lot for trailers… you know all the snow and ice we’ve had the last week or two? Yeah, well the entire back lot was a sheet of ice… no sooner had I lowered the landing gear on the trailer, lifting it high enough so I could pull out from under it without pulling the free-wheeling trailer… I GOT STUCK! All eight drive wheels just spinning their merry little way… FORWARD OR REVERSE!! <sigh>
Raise the landing gear… drop the trailer back onto the fifth wheel to get enough weight on the drives so I can pull forward some… lower the landing gear / lift the trailer again… fortunately I was able to drive out from under it the second time!
Oh yeah… going back… that trailer full of Ortega Thick N Chunky salsa? Yeah, the receiver rejected two cases… one jar in each of the cases had been broken (by the shipper I’d say as they were stuck to the dried out carboard “box” they sat it)… had to call our claims department.. yada yada yada.
Bottom line… claims said “dispose of them”… um… OK!!
So now I have one case (minus a jar, 11 jars) of Ortega Thick N Chunky medium salsa, and one case (minus a jar, 11 jars) of Ortega Thick N Chunky Garden Variety Medium salsa!! Whooo Hoooo!!
Now… where did I put those damn Tostitos?!?!
I got to meet my Fleet Manager (FM) / Dispatcher this morning…real nice guy… he should be getting me a load sometime this morning to roll out! It’s like a lottery… will I go south where it’s “warmer” (yeah… 40’s in Florida!) or go North? Com’on Arizona!!!
Posted by admin on Jan 28, 2009 in
Where Am I? My first VERY close call… was traveling along on I71 in Kentucky today… you know where they had the really, REALLY bad ice storm? The one that’s dumping all the snow shit on your guys?
So I’m traveling along in the slow lane… doing about 50 because the lane is fairly clear. I have a truck coming up on me fairly quick… know he’s gonna go out around me… when I see some clown in a grey Jeep Cherokee coming up the get-on ramp, we’re matching speed when he looks over at me and I look at him.
So what does the rocket surgerist do?
Yup… he punches it to get on the highway ahead of me!!
He’s got a good long ramp and he gets ahead of me… except the moron didn’t think about the foot high pile of snow at the end of the ramp from the highway where the plow guys had just pushed it aside.
He hits that… goes slide ways… and does a donut RIGHT in front of me
Comes to a stop passenger’s side to me… blocking both lanes
I have JUST enough time to hit the four ways to let the guy behind me know… and swerve to the hammer lane
Just as I’m about to hit this asshole, he gets enough of his senses to punch the gas and I can hear the cherokee smoking the tires as he’s heading back up the get-on ramp, out of my way JUST in the nick of time for my trailer to go through the space his vehicle occupied a split second before
I saw him turn aournd and get back on the highway… but he never got above about 40 when I left him in my dust
All because he didn’t want to get stuck behind a big truck
If I had hit him… I probably would have killed him… certainly seriously injured him
I sooo wanted to stop and ask him what the fuck he was thinking
I didn’t dare hit the brakes… I had already started to wander towards the hammer lane and my truck tires were in shit… knew if I hit them I’d start skidding
so… hit the four ways, turn wheel and hope like hell
I will give him credit that he stomped on that V8 and gave it all it had to get out of the way in time
It must have been pretty scary to him to0… I mean I had literally less than a car length away when he mashed the gas, all he could have seen was this GINORMOUS Frieghtliner grill bearing down on him in a hurry!
Of course by that time I was already having to swerve back to the right so I didn’t go into the median and with the trailer tracking slower (called off-tracking – the difference between where your rig tires go and where the trailer follows)… it would have run him right over!!
I say again people… especially in bad weather… if a big rig doesn’t move over to let you on… SLOW THE FUCK DOWN!! Wait YOUR turn to get on the highway, don’t “force” your way in, or try to “slide” in ahead of (or RIGHT behind) a big truck! Fully loaded we’re carrying upwards of 20 TONS.. it is literally like a freight train hitting your puny little car… even if you drive an SUV… I WILL crush, maim and probably kill you just TRYING to slow down, never mind actually stopping.
Okay… lecture over… for now.
Sitting in the rest area just East of Columbus, OH for the night.. roads are getting too shitty and I’m tired… I still have 744 miles to go before Friday at 0800 when this load delivers so tomorrow’s gonna be a long day!
PS… Shout-out to my sweetie for letting me use part of our IM chat tonight so I didn’t have to retype all this! 🙂