STRAYCAT’S DOGGONE BLOG

Life Day 22521: Obsequious in Otay Mesa, CA

March 10, 2009 on 8:05 pm | In On The Road |

Not much new to add since my last post from Lathrop. In case you were inclined to doubt my veracity about the onset of Spring about which I mused in my last post, I proffer the following photographic evidence.

There are blossoms on the trees, and the normally brown hills are getting greener.

If you are still not convinced maybe you’ll believe “San Joaquin Sam” (Punxsutawney Phil’s distant cousin). He says: “That moron, Punx, always gets it wrong”.
Enough levity; I’ll get on with the chronicles now.

Sunday, March 8th: After “leaping forward” all of my clocks (it was an arduous task), I decided to stay in Ripon for the night.   I drove to Stockton this morning and picked up my load to Otay Mesa (San Diego), arriving at about 1030. It was a drop/hook pick-up so it went well. I caught up my ubiquitous paperwork, and departed Stockton at about noon. As you can see above, I wasn’t in too big a hurry. I stopped a couple of times between Stockton and Coalinga to take the pictures above. I stopped again in Coalinga and had a late lunch at Harris Ranch. I naturally had the Chicken Fried Steak. I then took these pictures as even further evidence of Spring, although their grounds are always impeccable anyway.



I love the wide variety of flowers they maintain on their grounds.
I left here at 1700 and drove to Wheeler Ridge. I took a short break here for the MMM, then finished my drive to Otay Mesa, arriving right at midnight.

Monday:  What a boring day. It started off well enough. I delivered my load ahead of time. It was a ‘live unload’, but it took only about ½ an hour. I then drove to the new Pilot truck stop here. It is a real God send. There was nothing here before it was built and no place to park while you were waiting for your next load. After waiting for most of the day, I received a PrePlan which picked up in San Diego and delivered in Chino, CA. Not much of a load (only a little over 100 miles), but I accepted it anyway. It was scheduled to pick up at 2100 and deliver at 0930 this morning. A tight schedule because I would have to take a 10 hour break after arriving in Chino before delivering, but doable if everything went smoothly. Naturally, it didn’t. I arrived 15 minutes early, only to be told that I would have to wait for a loading dock. About an hour after my appointment time, I finally backed into my door. I then waited 3 more hours to be loaded. By this time, there was no way I was going to be able to make the 0930 delivery in Chino on time (legally). I still had to weigh the load to make sure it was legal before I could proceed. There are no scales in San Diego that are open at this time of night, so I had to drive back to Otay Mesa and weigh the load there. After I weighed and was legal, I went to bed. The Planner decided to T-call the load there, and have a local driver deliver it.

Today, Tuesday:  The local driver woke me up at 0500 to get the trailer, and went on his way. I went back to bed. I awoke again about 1000. I re-set my PTA for the current time, and have been waiting for a load ever since. It seems like I’m going backward. Yesterday, I was empty here in Otay Mesa with an empty trailer. Now, I’m empty here with no trailer.