The Pennsylvania Trap or Dr. Zebra is a Produce Bitch

Something about Pennsylvania this week.  I can't stay out of here.  In fact, this weekend, I can't GET out of here.

Just a couple of pictures of splattered bugs set against the backdrop of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

So after delivering the HazMat goop in Winchester, VA, I pull some dead chickens overnight to Vineland, NJ.  Thinking I was clever and positioning myself better to get to my next load, I drove out to Carney's Point and awaited my next dispatch.  "Get Thine Ass Back To Vineland," sez the Qualcomm.

It's a load of produce bound for Bedford, PA and Washington Court House, OH.  Made those deliveries and got ANOTHER produce load from Springfield, OH to Pottsville, PA and delivered it this morning.  That load paid $2.48/mile.  Great!

The problem is that this IS Pennsylvania, and it IS Saturday.  Nobody ships on the weekends in the northeast, and even more so since Prime is in negotiations with shippers working on getting better rates.

Got my next load assignment, and it appears that I wont' be leaving the state for a while yet.  Joy!

Meeting New Friends, or Fun With HazMat

Yesterday was a fun day.  I delivered the last of my tomatoes in Taunton, Massachusetts and get caught up on a little sleep.  "BZZZZZ!" goes the noisy Qualcomm, several times over as my next assignment comes in.

Pick up a load in Nashua, New Hampshire.  Ok.  Pick up the rest of the load in Wilmington, Massachusetts, a whopping 26 miles away.  Ok.  Deliver it to Winchester, Virginia.  Ok.  It's HazMat.  Uh, ok.  I guess that's why it paid $1.48/mile to the truck even though it originated in an area notorious for crappy freight rates.

I accomplish the pickups with little fanfare (though the locals there sure do swear a lot.  not because they're mad at me, but because it's punctuation to them) and zip off to the great unknown.

After I get onto the Mass Pike, I start feeling insanely hungry.  No problem, I've got a fuel stop in Sturbridge, I'll just eat there.  At that moment, I see the Westborough Service Plaza ahead and they have a d'Angelo's, and a Philly cheese steak is sounding mighty good.

I pull off and park (who is the dumb shit that designed the truck parking here??  do they have any clue as to what size a truck actually is?) , run inside, and get my grub.  While going back to my truck, I notice another Prime truck parked out front that looked like I should know it somehow.  So I sneak up on it and grab the number (69035) and note that it is REALLY familiar and I have a hunch as to who it belongs to.

I go back to my truck, fire up the ol' laptop and aircard and confirm my suspicions.  It belongs to TNet and DrJoe, newly annointed Prime drivers from the Pumpkin world.  I forget my food, run over to their truck lest they drive away and squandor this historic moment, and start banging on their door.  Hmmm... the only answer is this dog inside barking and generally trying (failing) to be threatening.  I decide to wait it out.

Sure enough, a guy comes out of the plaza with the "What the hell are you doing around my truck" demeanor and I stop him dead in his tracks asking if he is Joe.  I introduce myself and it's just a party from there on.

Very, very nice people.  And it was fun to be a stalker, if only for a little while.

Oh, and I delivered the nasty HazMat this morning, too.

A Post Without A Point...

Why yes, folks, that is really a picture of the George Washington Bridge going into New York City, taken by me today.  Amazingly enough, NYC was easy to get through.  You see a little backup in the picture because the Port Authority Fire Department was doing something that required the right hand lane to be blocked off.  What it was, I have no idea.  It looked like they were just standing around talking to me.

The good news is that I didn't actually deliver in New York City.  In fact, I never deliver there.  And I never will.  Not my cup of tea.  But I had to endure the drive through to get to Massachusetts for the last two stops of this load.

There was actually going to be a point to this post, but I'm too tired to remember it and can't be bothered to care.  So here's a picture of a Wyoming sunrise that I took a couple of months ago:

The Respect That Truckers "Deserve"

It's another day and another time for me to rip the trucking world a new asshole.  Well, I guess that's what I'm doing.  I don't think I am, but that's how everyone is going to take it, so who the hell am I to argue?

"Respect" is a word that is increasingly bandied about by truckers.  Mostly when they bitch about not getting any of it.  I guess everyone's a Rodney Dangerfield these days.  It's really getting irritating because nobody seems to understand what it actually means, or why they should or shouldn't be getting it.

My question to you, my select group of truckers who don't get no respect, is this: what are you doing to earn respect?  Do you think you deserve respect just because you're a trucker or even just because you're alive?  La-de-fucking-da, guys.  I'm a trucker too, and I'm also alive.  But I don't whine about not getting respect.  I don't demand that everyone kisses my ass simply because I haul consumer commodities. 

I get respect because I give respect.  I don't go screaming at the poor clerks in the shipping or receiving office because the loaders/unloaders aren't working according to my schedule.  I take the time to understand that the world is larger than my and my piddling little needs.  I don't regard customers as enemies.  I do my damnedest not to inconvenience or endanger people.  I bathe regularly.  I don't get mouthy on the CB.

You want respect?  Then tell me this: what are you doing to help make the lives of the people you interact with today a little easier?

Old Friends...

On Tuesday, I had a great opportunity.  I passed through Charlotte, NC on my way to Pennsylvania and had a lot of time on the load.  That meant that I could stop and see an old friend from college that I hadn't seen in 13 years.  Holy crap, that is a long damned time.

Got to hang out for a couple of hours and shoot the breeze, catch up on events passed.  Tommy, if you ever read this, it was good seein' ya!  Hope we can do it again sometime.

Now to dig up some other friends I haven't seen lately.

Oh, Jessica, if you read this, don't get offended because I came through North Carolina and didn't see you,  sis.  I just saw you a couple of months ago.  Get over yourself.  (My family is such a loving bunch)

Another Departure, Another Fustercluck

Seems like every time I leave the house, I get saddled with some crap that another driver couldn't be bothered to get fixed.  I was dispatched to pick up some dead cows today, which is a nice and easy drop and hook at the dead cow factory.

I inspect the loaded trailer.  Hey, not one, but TWO flat tires.  Whee!   And the only shop in the area is 20 miles in the wrong direction.  Seriously, one of the tires didn't even have the bead seated.  What the hell is wrong with people?

Home again!

I deadheaded home from Ogden, UT on Saturday.  After taking a brief detour to ditch my trailer in Greeley, it ended up being just over 500 miles.

Normally I don't like deadheading home, but I have stuff that I have to get done here this week and my options for getting here were limited due to a weekend delivery.  I could have taken a load from Salt Lake City to Sparks, NV for a Monday morning delivery, but that wasn't acceptable.  I also could have waited until Monday for a load heading home, but again, I needed to be home.

Such is the fun of being a trucker, and more so being an independent contractor.  I'll end up being $300 or so in the hole this week.  Oh well.

Once a reefer driver, always a reefer driver

Oh hell.  I forgot to update my situation in my last post.  I guess I got too excited in my rant or something.

I'm back in the saddle as a reefer driver, with a brand new 2008 Freightshaker Century.  The flatbed gig was ok, but through the training I just had a horrible feeling that I would regret it if I did it.  Whenever I go against my gut feelings, I lose. 

Here's a picture of the new truck:

A Trucking Strike?

Seems that some people are calling for a trucker's strike to protest high fuel prices and/or pressure government to intervene in the hopes of providing relief.

I'm going to be blunt. These people are morons.

"Wait, wait, wait", you say, "that's not really fair to say. These people are just trying to earn a living!"

I repeat. These people are morons. The reason that any driver or company is going under in these economic times is the unwillingness to adapt to the current marketplace. See, we have a free market economy here, and as such, it's a consumer driven economy. That means that if your business is going into the shitter, THEN YOUR BUSINESS IS NOT IN DEMAND.

As a business owner, your function in life is to satisfy your customers in a profitable manner. You do not render services to customers for less than cost, and you do not keep offering services that are not in demand. You're trying to make money here.

"But what about the unscrupulous brokers? If I don't take their crap freight with no fuel surcharge, someone else will!"

So what? Let that someone else haul that freight and lose money on it.

For that matter, owner/operators and independent contractors need to learn to cut their expenditures, especially in fuel. Slow your ass down and quit idling so much. At $4.00/gallon at 1 gallon/hour of idle time for 10 hours, you're spending $40/night to idle that truck. How much pain are you willing to endure before you learn that lesson? Driving slower is even more of an impact. Saving 8 cents per mile over the course of 120,000 miles (about 1 year of driving) gives you an instant $10,000/year pay raise, with zero increase in revenue!!

Strike, my ass! How about I just come out and slap the stupid out of you? Or even better, keep putting forward that myth that speed = money, run yourself the fuck out of business, and leave more freight for the smart and business savvy drivers to haul.

You're not entitled to a profit in this country, and if you won't effectively manage your business, you don't deserve to earn a profit. Quit asking the government to reward your shortcomings as a businessperson.

Pop Quiz for Oklahoma City Residents

You're on an onramp merging into another onramp that will merge onto an interstate highway.  At the end of your ramp, there is a "yield" sign.  There is no traffic coming up that will interfere with your merge.  Do you:

1. Come to a complete stop at the end of the ramp
2. Double check for traffic, maybe only slowing a little as you do so, and then GET YOUR ASS MOVING

Oklahoma City drivers kept choosing option 1 and failing the test this afternoon, at rush hour.  Let me explain this once.  A yield sign means to let traffic already on the road go ahead of you.  But if there IS no traffic, you keep going.  You'd think that this is a simple concept, but I guess not...

Still Truckin'!

I'm still around, folks.  It's been busy, busy, busy.  There are some developments since my last installment.

• Another driver and I founded Primedrivers.net, a forum for Prime drivers and possible future Prime drivers.  Trolls and exclusive naysayers need not bother registering.
• MY LEASE IS ALMOST DONE!!
• After my lease is up, I'm going to try my hand at flatbedding.
• I'm a Trucker Buddy

Heartwarming, ain't it?

Holy hell! You're still here?

Ok, I know I haven't updated in a long time... again. But I've been BUSY!! By shutdown time, I've been too exhausted to even think about putting together coherent sentences.

Anyway, I was going through my comments and came across one from "anonymous" back in August asking for a retrospective since I've been doing this for over a year now. Here goes:

It's been a LOT of learning, a LOT of mistakes, and a LOT of growing. Not so much my body. I think I've gained a little weight, but I'm not needing new clothes yet so I think I'm ok for now.

The biggest thing to understand is that when you're getting started, the money isn't there. It is very discouraging at time. VERY discouraging. It takes time, patience, stubbornness, and an OPEN MIND to get this job. An open mind is the most important thing because if you're not willing to change anything, you're going to keep screwing up and keep flushing the dollars down the toilet. The day we stop learning is the day that we die.

Advice to newbies: watch everything. Watch how truckers conduct themselves in all situations. Listen to the CB chatter. Listen to them talk. Watch how they back in to docks or parking spaces. You will learn much by doing this.

For the talk, you have to understand that 99% of everything that truckers say is pure BULLSHIT. The important thing is to learn to not only recognize the bullshit, but to understand WHY it is bullshit. They brag and boast but the reality is that they're not doing any better than you are, and quite likely worse.

For general conduct, you will learn what to do and what not do to. Don't piss and moan at your shippers and receivers. I don't care what they tell you to do. Just smile, say "ok", go back to your truck and scream there. I have plenty of shippers and receivers that I despise, but THEY will never know that. Also watch for general etiquette and PLEASE remember to avoid getting in people's way whenever possible. Fuel islands, parking lots, docks, etc. Don't block stuff unecessarily.

For parking and driving, watching the veterans and beginners is a very good habit to get into. You'll learn little tricks to try (and some to NOT try!). Even watching newbs back in is good because you can watch them make the same mistakes that you make and see why they're mistakes.

Anyway, that's enough posting for one night. Hope everyone had a good Turkey Day!

Massive Stupidity in Louisville...

This has got to be by far the stupidest thing that's ever happened to me at a shipper or receiver. Actually, in this case, this consignee just happened to be my next shipper. Zero deadhead miles. Woot.

So I got this load on Saturday to pick up at our contracted drop lot in Bensalem, PA. Delivers Monday at 0200 in Louisville, KY. No problem. I pick it up and drive down to the TA in Elkton, MD to call it an early day on account of laundry.

No sooner did I get my clothes in the wash than dispatch called me asking how soon I could get the load to Louisville, preferably in the morning. Uh, no. Still 650 miles to go, clothes in the wash. Try 1700-1800. Reason he was asking was that the consignee has a load ready to go (pick up no later than 1200) bound for Romulus, MI and it would be good to get the load squeezed in and get another one in after that before payday cutoff. He tells me that 1700-1800 will work ok, and that it will be a drop and hook. Well, it would have been ok, but...

Next day, I haul ass to the consignee. Get there at 1730. There is ONE person working the entire building and the full crew isn't due to arrive until midnight. They can't unload me until 0200, the appointment time.

Me: "But I was told it was going to be a drop and hook!"

He: "Uh, we don't do drop and hooks any more. All unloads are live. And I'm not showing a load to Romulus as being ready yet."

Fine. As I was heading back to my truck, I noticed a flammable placarded Prime trailer sitting in one of the ready pads. I walked around it and saw that it was all sealed and everything. Nothing unusual, but I just had "that feeling" that my destiny would be intertwined with this trailer somehow later on.

Now the story starts getting good.

So I come back at 0-dark-thirty as instructed. Check in, assigned door, open trailer, back into door. Unloading commences. Unloading finishes. Check out, ask for next load, and HEY!! It was loaded all the time on that trailer that I noticed earlier and rather bluntly foreshadowed for you.

That's not the good part. Here is the good part.

In order to hook up to the loaded trailer, I had to drop my empty one. Drop and hook, which the consignee doesn't do for incoming loads for some reason. So when I backed to the door, I had to disconnect from the original trailer while being unloaded (safety reasons), wait to get unloaded, hook back up, move the now empty trailer to another spot in the yard, drop it, and hook up to the new loaded trailer.

You mean to tell me that I couldn't have just left the loaded trailer in the door, hooked up to the new load and been on my way? They had yard goats, for crying out load! Basically, I was sitting around waiting to move an empty trailer for them.

Ugh. Needless to say, ontime delivery in Romulus, MI was no longer possible, and had to be rescheduled for tomorrow because they can't take loads after 1200.

This is not a job for hotheaded people, that's for damn sure. Ugh.

Getting fingered in Slowhio... (coarse language!)

The following is a letter to an asshole:

To A Gentleman in a Grey Pickup Truck Who Passed Me Near Cincinnati This Morning:

I was in the passing lane doing 63 (in a big rig, that's speeding in Ohio!) going around traffic that was moving just a little bit slower so it took a little while. Should have been pretty easy to understand. After I overtook the vehicles, I moved over to the right lane and watched traffic pass me. You were second in line, and you flipped me off as you drove past.

There really is no delicate way to put this, so I'll be blunt: WHAT THE FUCK, DUDE?? If you're pissed off because I was holding you up by only going 63 even though my truck will certainly exceed that speed, might I remind you that your beef is with your idiot Ohio lawmakers who mandated that the speed limit for trucks be set at 10mph below the rest of the traffic. That is, 55mph when everyone else gets to go 65mph. I was doing 63mph, which was pushing it. Given Slowhio's reputation for harassing truckers, I wasn't going to risk a speeding ticket just for your convenience. I was also not about to sit behind traffic moving slower than me.

In addition to this, was that two or three minutes really that important to you? Were you that late to be somewhere? If that was the case, I have no sympathy for you. I did not cause you to leave home without ample time to get to your destination. If you were running late, the fault lies entirely with you. So again, don't pin your idiocy on me.

I'm a professional driver, and I do my best to be a courteous driver. You could certainly help out my cause by being a little more patient and willing to share the road. Instead, you chose to be an asshole. For that, I pity your parents. Fuck you.

Love,

Rodger

Delivering in Delaware...

Here I sit, waiting for this Wal-Mart distribution center to finish unloading my trailer. The drive through Maine yesterday was quite pleasant and relaxing, and everyone at the shipper sounded like comedian Bob Marley. I'm not kidding there.

Of course, things turned crappy once I got back to Massachusetts and got worse in Connecticut. Friggin' Northeasterners need to learn how to drive. They don't seem to understand a few basic concepts such as:

• Every lane change contributes to backed up traffic. Multiple lane changes by the same care compounds the problem.
• When entering the highway, you're supposed to be a freeway speed BEFORE you get to the end of the ramp.
  
• Traffic already on the highway has the right of way. These bastards push their way in like you wouldn't believe. Again, adding the backup.

Things deteriorated really quickly as I approached New York. Apparently, a tree decided to fall on the highway and this caused a nine mile backup to the last service plaza in Connecticut. Joy.

I took my break in New York's retarded, evil brother, New Jersey. Actually, New Jersey wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the people living there, but that's a whole other essay (or rant). In any case, I stayed at the Vince Lombardi service plaza. If I had more time, I would have taken a shuttle into NYC to poke around a bit because there's a LOT of truck parking there and I've never really seen NYC in any meaningful way. Just I95 and JFK airport. Some other time, though.

I'm preplanned to go to Chicago next. While I'm no fan of Chicago traffic, it beats the crap out of what I've been dealing with this week. This load also is another piss-poor payer, not even $1.00/mile. But there are two things that are making up for it:

• My expenses are already paid this week (and then some!), so all the profit goes directly to my bank account
• I'm getting the HELL out of the northeast!!

The bad news is that unless my fuel optimizer has a better solution, I have to go brave Washington, DC. Ugh.

Maine...

Delivered my load in Lewiston, Maine tonight. Created myself a parking spot at a nearby truck stop, and hopefully they won't bother me about it while I'm sleeping. I'm past my 14 hours for the day and I'm exhausted. I really don't need to be hunting up another spot in the middle of the night.

Anyway, I'm preplanned to pick up a load of nonrefrigerated goods in Wilton, ME for delivery in Delaware on Saturday. The pay sucks for this load, but that's the freight in Maine for you. You get paid well coming in, crap on the way out.

By the way, I still hate driving in New England. What's the deal with all those toll roads? What are they doing with all the money they collect on those? I know what they're NOT doing - paving the roads. Or even modernizing the cash boxes so that they don't create traffic jams. Open road tolling a la Chicago would be a really nice way to use some of that money.

New England...

Driving in New England sucks. I don't know how people do it day in and day out. I'd refuse loads in an out of there, but they pay too well. I wish freight rates would switch for the northwest and the northeast, because driving out there is far preferable. Oh, and you haven't seen traffic jams until you've gone to Pennsylvania, New York, or New Jersey. Traffic jams of breathtaking scope. And lots of road construction. Just resurfacing. They're not doing anything useful like widening the roads like everyone else is doing. Basically, they're just making sure that you crawl along slowly on somewhat smoother roads.

That's my rant for the day.

I start today in Zanesville, OH after a murderous run on little two-lane state highways through southern Ohio. Get to Pittsburgh, PA, where I faithfully follow Prime's fuel optimizer and take PA28 up to I80. It was fine until it went down to two lanes, and then it degenerated into another twisty turny hilly mess. Like Slowhio, but more road construction. Finally, I make it to I80 and crawl through its various traffic jams. I got fuel at the Sapp Bros. in Clearfield where I was surprised to find that they were having a barbecue for truckers. For trucker appreciation week, apparently. Whatever they're calling it, it was free grub. Much appreciated, y'all.

Tomorrow, I get to blast through New York (thankfully not the city this time!), Connecticut, and a couple of other states on my way to Maine.

Posting Again!

Yeah, yeah. Once again, I've become lazy and haven't kept this thing up to date. Still going strong with Prime.

Started out in York, NE this morning and got a "check engine" light and the engine started running crappy in the middle of Omaha. Nice. Got it to the TA in Council Bluffs and found that my fuel filter is clogged and I'm getting EGR codes from the engine. The fuel filter got changed, and now the engine is running better. I'll have the EGR fixed later when I have time.

This fiasco put me about 2 hours behind, so I rolled up to my consignee in Valparaiso, IN about 1.5 hours late (had the appointment changed, so no service fail!). Was a long and rough day, and I'm done. Should get a load home tomorrow.

Fun With Reefers

I finished my hometime this morning and drove out to the Budweiser plant in Fort Collins to pick up an empty trailer. After a while, I found the trailer, and it was certainly empty. Of fuel. And battery charge. I call my dispatcher who sends me to road repair who tells me that my dispatcher needs to decide whether to have me get the trailer fixed now or go find another one. This is the fun part. For over an hour, I send messages over the Qualcomm asking for a solution. I also called a lot, but got an automated message saying that my dispatcher is "away from their [sic] desk".

AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHH!

I finally call the Prime "all purpose" number and get transferred to the supervisor who discovers that I'm being dispatched from Salt Lake City today (my normal dispatchers get days off?!) but the phones aren't transferring properly.

After all this is straightened out, it is decided that I am to go get this trailer fixed. First, I go to Johnson's Corner in Loveland since it is close and not far out of route. I get the trailer fueled and find that the shop doesn't open for another hour and decide that instead of waiting, I'll just drive down to another shop that's near my pickup. Great idea, huh?

Fast forward to the Tomahawk Truck Stop in Brush, Colorado. One guy is working the shop. Needless to say, this takes a while.

So after waking up at 4 am to get a trailer and get my load, I finally roll into Fort Morgan and grab the load at 3PM. Great start, huh?

Headin' HOME!!

Finally, I'm on my way home. I've earned it, having been out for over a month now.

Anyway, things have been going well at Prime so far. The last week wasn't so productive because your options get VERY limited once you have to go in a particular direction. But that's ok.

I spent the last week driving around New England, delivering frozen vegetables and picking up and delivering ice cream. Had a four-stop load of ice cream treats to Ohio to supply the ice cream trucks. Man, talk about some messed up backing situations at those places.

I talked to my ex-codriver tonight. He had found a new codriver, but that arrangement lasted only about a week before he got fed up with the guy. Since then, he's been back at the Ford account as a utility driver and is starting Monday morning at Knight Transportation. Good luck, dude.