SOMEDAY
July 2, 2006 on 9:57 am | In Humor | No CommentsThe longest day of my life won’t be a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, or even a Saturday or Sunday. It will be SOMEDAY. You know, someday, i’ll take care of this. Someday, i’ll actually get around to that. I’ll call you someday real soon. Blah, blah, blah, blah blah. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a “black belt” in procrastination, therefore I dread someday more than most.
Someday, I may form a ’support group” for others of my ilk. I have been contemplating it for a while, but typically, I can’t decide on a name for the group. I’m torn between Procrastinarors Anonymous and P.A.D.I.N. (People Against Doing It Now). A few more names for this proposed group may occur to me someday before I make the decision, so that will complicate things even more. I’ll get back to you someday in the near future when I finally decide. As the founder of this group, i’ll have to establish the Charter: When and where will we meet? Should there be dues, and if so, how much? Who will be allowed to join? The list goes on ad infinitum. Someday, after i’ve decided on the group name, i’ll make those decisions. I just hope that someday doesn’t come before I can get it done.
Should the dreaded someday ever arrive, I may just have to “call in sick”. I’ll be so busy trying to remember all of the things that I promised to do someday, that I won’t be able to accomplish anything. Therefore, i’ll have to postpone everything until I can find the time, SOMEDAY real soon!!
Life Day 21538: Sizzling in “Sin City”
July 1, 2006 on 5:45 pm | In On The Road | No CommentsOn Friday, the 23rd, I recieved and accepted a load which picked up in Matoon, IL and delivered in Sanger, TX. After delivering my current load at 0400, I departed Indianapolis for Matoon about 0815. I stopped in Brazil, IN for breakfast, then continued on to the Shipper arriving a little after noon. After being loaded, I drove to Sullivan, MO where I stopped for the night. I parked at Walmart instead of the Flying J for a change.
On Saturday, I left Sullivan at 0830, a far more reasonable hour than 0400. That is one of the drawbacks of running in the east. The 2 hour time difference (I run on Mountain Time) can make for some God awful early deliveries/pick-ups at times. It’s a little like “timed-release jet lag”. Call it “trucker lag” if you will. At any rate, I drove to Big Cabin, OK where I took a short break for the MMM. Checotah, Ok was my next stop. I fueled here because the Flying J here has one of the lowest fuel prices in the country right now. At 1630, I drove the rest of the way to Sanger, TX. This is a drop/hook customer, but they had no empties on which to hook, so it became a drop delivery. :>{ Being Saturday night, there was also no freight, so I drove the 10 miles to the TA truckstop in Denton, TX and called it a night.
On Sunday, I recieved and accepted a pair of “stacked PrePlans”. The first picked up in Hawkins, TX and delivered in Oklahoma City, OK at 2300. The second picked up in Jenks (Tulsa), OK and delivered in Buckeye, AZ. One of my “pet peeves” is Customers that use our empty trailers as storage for their pallets and/or damaged goods. This is the case here. Swift allows them to do this, but it sure makes it hard on we poor drivers who have to deal with not having an empty trailer for their next load. After accepting the PrePlans, I drove back to Sanger to try once again to find an empty trailer. It was beginning to look like another futile search until I finally found one in the area for “loaded” trailers. I don’t know how they let this one slip by them, but I hooked to it and left before they could fill it with pallets. When I left their facility, I saw this “boneheaded” accident.
I had made the same turn an hour earlier with no difficulty what so ever. Anyway, I drove on to Hawkins. I was promptly given a dock assignment and loaded. At 1715, I was finished and drove directly to the Consignee in Oklahoma City. I arrived with a scant 1/2 hour to spare. I was given a door assignment at my appointment time of 2300. The unload took 2 1/2 hours, which pretty much expended what remained of my 14-hour on-duty window for the day. I snuck over to our Terminal and went to bed.
Monday, I naturally got a late start after the greulling unload last night/early this AM. I left for Jenks at noon, arriving at 1345. This is a drop/hook facility, and I had no problems. The MMM even got to frolic untethered in a field.
At 1515, I drove back to OKC. I fueled at the Flying J because their fuel was .03 cents per gallon less than at our Terminal. This equates to $3.00 per hundred gallons, so I saved about $5.00 on my total. Hey, that’s almost a sandwich in a truckstop. Anyway, from here, I drove to Amarillo, TX where I called it a day. I still had over 3 hours remaining on my 11 and 14, but I was just too pooped to progress any further.
On Tuesday, the 27th, I left Amarillo at 1000. I drove to Albuquerque. I had lunch and walked the MMM. Then it was off to Flagstaff, AZ. I took a quick break here and discovered I had 1.25 hours remaining on my 11, so I decided to proceed. I drove to Cordes Junction, AZ where I stopped for the night. I think this was the first time I’ve driven my full 11-hours since I left las Vegas on this outing.
Wednesday, I left Cordes Junction at 0945. I stopped at the Sunset Point Rest Area about 10 miles away because I spilled my Pepsi and had to clean it up. While there, I took a walk around and took these pictures.
Fortunately, I saw no poisonous vermin. I then continued on the Buckeye. I did the drop/hook, then settled in to wait. About 3 hours later, I finally recieved a PrePlan which picked up in Phoenix and delivered in Santa Fe Springs, CA. I drove to the Shipper arriving at 1400. I spotted my trailer. In 45 minutes, I was ready to roll again. The load was heavy, so I drove to our terminal and weighed the load.It was OK. I drove to Cabazon, CA where stopped for the night because I ran out of hours for the day (14-hour rule).
Thursday was torture. I left Cabazon at 0830, the earliest I could legally drive. My appointment was for 1015. If all went well, I had time to make it on time. Of course, nothing went right. At the junction of CA-60 and I-215 traffic clogged up. It was heavy all the way to I-605 where I had to go south to Santa Fe Springs. Then, I couldn’t find the exit. The directions said to take the Florence Avenue exit, except there is no such exit on I-605, at least I saw no signs for that exit. On my 3rd time around, I happened to be in the right lane and saw a tiny sign on the shoulder which read Florence Avenue second right. The problem is that the second exit was I-5. It turned out that the Florence Ave. exit is actually on the off ramp to I-5 south: A little fact that would have been handy to know. I then followed the directions again only to find that they were even wronger (is that a word?). They had me turn left onto Norwalk Blvd when I actually should have turned right. Once I figured that out, got turned around, and finally found the correct street, I discovered that the Consignee was not, and never had been at that address. I called my DM, and she found the correct directions. I finally arrived at the Consignee a mere 3 hours late. They unloaded me anyway. It took 1.25 hours. In the interum, I recieved and accepted a PrePlan which picked up in Garden Grove and delivered in Las Vegas, NV. After being unloaded, I drove to Garden Grove. Amazingly, the directions were accurate. At 1600, I left the shipper and drove to Primm, NV where I stopped for the night (14-hour rule). Traffic was of course heavy until I got to Victorville.
On Friday, I left Primm at 0915 and drove to Las Vegas. I fueled at the TA. At 1700, I drove to the Consignee. I was immediately unloaded. On the way to the WWW, I stopped for some Chinese food at Palace Station.
It was good as usual. Then off to the WWW for a few days off. The daytime temperatures are predicted to be well over 100 degrees for the entire weekend. Can you hear me sizzling??
WHAT THE ????
July 1, 2006 on 4:05 pm | In Miscellany | No CommentsThis accident ocurred in the parking lot of the Wild Wild West about 0930 this AM. Looking at the 2 pictures below, can you tell what actually happened?
At first glance, it seems that the black Jaguar tried to occupy an already occupied parking spot for some reason. NAY, NAY. The driver of the mini-van, an elderly man (who needed a motorized chair to get around when not behind the wheel???) lost control, for some reason yet undetermined, while making a turn from Tropicana Ave onto Procyon St. He jumped the curb and sidewalk, sideswiped the other black car, and shoved the Jaguar, that was parked next to it, head on into it’s current position. Time to more closely scrutinize the issuance of drivers licenses to the elderly?? YEAH, YEAH!!
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