Cold As Ice

Oh yea, that whole truck driving blog thing.  How could I forget?  Easy.  I didn't.  There is a fine line between forgetting and lack of motivaion.  At the end of each day I justified it as "oh, nothing new happened today".  Fact of the matter is, thats how the first week on reefer went.

I lost count of how many trips between eastern PA and central to northern WI I made since this tour started.  The 800 +/- mile stretch of I-80/90 that I used to dread in my road trips is now the highlight of a run.  Its the only time I can set the cruise at 60 and just sit back in the zone for 3 hours at a time and never have to worry about shifting for hills no matter how much I've got behind me.  Maximum wage ftw.

It's gotten to the point where I go by what anybody else would see as one of dozens indistinct crumbling barns or silos and think "Oh hey, I'm this far already!"  Also, every travel plaza has free shower suites for truck drivers, facilities which put Gary to shame, despite the lack of free towels.  Free shower every 40 miles?  I'm okay with this :)

So the week was a long slew of tight schedules taking a certain product of WI to the east coast and bringing back a whole lot of stuff I mix with vodka.  Its not a dedicated fleet per say but I certainly don't feel like such a mercenary anymore.  I don't mind consistency in this job, I really don't.  If things had been just running like they had on dry van for the rest of my time here I would still be feeling like every day was a transitional period from not knowing what I was doing to getting stuff down right the first time.  Its like every day feeling like the first again.  That SUCKS.

Just because the routine was coming together doesn't mean it was all good.  You know how when stuff is going so smooth, your kicking ass with 550+ mile days and you're like "damn, somethings GOT to mess this up"?

Yea Tuesday was one of those.  I was assigned to run couple of multi stops to distro centers in OH and IN, each with appointment times of either 3am, 4pm or 9pm respectfully.  How do you juggle the clusterF of  live unloads with inconsistent timing and procedures while maintaining your 14hr day rule?

Not easily.  Think too hard and you get more tired, think too little and you get your head stuck in some mud.  And by head I mean wheels.  Yea that was todays episode.  At least there was no damage to anything, but I still wonder why I'm kept on board here when my slip ups so far have costed the company about the same amount I already owe them for my training.  Not sure what I want for Christmas this year now, a tank or a CMV tow truck.