STRAYCAT’S DOGGONE BLOG

Life Day 21313: Kansas City Karma

November 18, 2005 on 10:57 am | In On The Road |

Today, i’m waiting in Kansas City for my load to be ready. It’s a “round trip” WalMart load, meaning that I pick up the load, deliver it to a store (Cedar Rapids, IA in this case) then return to WalMart. I am then planned on a load which goes to Plainview, TX. From there, I will get a load heading west.
Since my last posting, i’ve been pretty busy. After taking enough time off in Fort Pierce, FL to re-start my 70-hour clock, on the 13th, I left at 0900. I drove to Jacksonville, FL After a 1.5 hour break, I drove to Columbia, SC where I stopped for the night. 513 miles in 8.5 hours.
On the 14th, I left Columbia at 0730. I drove to Fort Chiswell, VA where I fueled both my truck and myself. From there, I drove to Winchester VA, did the drop/hook delivery, then went to bed. Along the way, between the North Carolina state line and Ft. Chiswell, I saw a post-cardesque view of a valley with a small town, rolling hills, and farmland all resplendent with Fall Colors. Alas, I could not stop for a photograph. There was nowhere to stop. Those pesky “Emergency Parking Only” signs. I don’t think that a Virginia State Policeman would share my view that stopping along the shoulder in heavy traffic to take a photograph for my BLOG would constitute an “Emergency”.
On the 15th, I accepted a load which picked up in Aspers, PA and delivered in Morehead, KY (94 miles empty and 457 miles loaded). I left Winchester at 0600 and drove to Aspers. This was a drop/hook customer, so all went quickly. I left Aspers at 0900 and drove to Jane Lew, WV for a break. At 1430, I departed and drove to Morehead, KY. I drove directly to the Consignee and went to bed.
What a difference a day makes: When I went to bed last night, the temperature was in the low 60’s and the Morehead area was under Tornado watch until after midnight. Before I was finished with the day, I had encountered ice, snow, and temperatures that would send a Polar Bear into hibernation. On the 16th, I made the drop/hook delivery at 0630. I accepted a load which picked up in Hebron, KY and delivered in Northlake, IL (109 miles empty and 299 miles loaded). As you might suspect from the name, Northlake is in the greater Chicago environs. The Planner also gave me a load which picked up in Elk Grove Village, IL (also greater Chicago) and delivered in El Paso, TX, but it was scheduled for T-Call at our terminal in Edwardsville, KS (14 miles empty and 512 miles loaded). I accepted it as well. Theoretically, I was to deliver the Northlake load then pick-up the Elk Grove Village load and drive toward Edwardsville until I had utilized all of my hours. In practice, it turned out quite differently. The Northlake load had a delivery window between 1800 and 2300, indicating a drop delivery. However, upon arrival, I found out differently. I arrived at 1745 and was told I would have to wait until 1900, then be “live unloaded”. Still not a problem, I could still at least make the Elk Grove Village pick-up and get out of Chicago before retiring for the night. Again things did not work out according to plan. It turned out to be a “cattle call” type delivery . All the drivers are ‘herded’ into the recieving office to check in, and then assigned doors according to some seemingly arbitrary selection process. Additionally, you were forced to stay in the immediate area, because if they called you and you weren’t there, you were moved back to the bottom of the list. All they had for us to sit on was a wooden bench. I was there for 4 1/2 hours before I was finally unloaded. This, of course meant that I was already far in excess of my 14-hour window for driving. Needless to say, Dominicks Grocery Warehouse will NEVER be graced with my presence again. Ever hopeful, I drove to the shipper in Elk Grove Village to see if I could still ’salvage’ my day by at least picking up my 2nd load. Alas, the shipping department was closed when I arrived. I parked in their employee parking lot and went to bed after calling ‘Dispatch’ with the bad news.
On the 17th, I was loaded and left Elk Grove Village at 0900. This load was 3 rolls of steel each weighing 13,000lbs+. I had to use the WAG method to figure out where to have the loader place each roll in my trailer. When I weighed the load, I found that I had guessed right, but just barely (hey, I don’t do these type of loads everyday). I could have had him place the back (3rd) roll about a foot farther back in the trailer to even out the weight distribution. I had 11,780 on my steer axle, 33,600 on my drive axle, but only 29,100 on my tandems. Legal, but sloppy. Anyway, I drove to Walcott, IA and took a break for breakfast. With the 1 day delay in being loaded, I asked if the T-Call was still in effect. The load was supposed to be delivered in El Paso tomorrow at 1000, but there is no way to make that now, even with a ‘team’ on it. It will have to be re-scheduled, therefore, I could make the delivery myself and be set up nicely for my approach to Northern California and the Thanksgiving holiday. Before I left Walcott, no decision had yet been made. Between there and Des Moines, I recieved about 10 QualCom messages; yes, no, yes, no, etc, etc, but the bottomline was that I was still to T-Call the load in Edwardsville because there was a ‘team’ from El Paso waiting for the load so that they could get home themselves. I arrived at 2030, and was beseiged by the waiting team immediately upon my arrival. I dropped the trailer in the driveway just past the entrance, and took the paperwork into Dispatch for processing. I then re-set my PTA to 0800 went to bed.