only in new york.......

now, don't get me wrong....i love new york.....as i've told you before, i'm one of the extremely few truckdrivers who still get excited everytime i cross the george washington.....or staten island.......but i gotta tell ya, there is a reason that new yorkers have the reputation they have.......case in point......a couple of weeks ago we headed over into brooklyn by way of the verrazano bridge to pickup a load at the old navy docks.....after getting off of i-287 and making our way almost to the docks on typical, overcrowded, narrow, paralell-parking-on-both-sides-of-the-street surface streets, we were one left turn away from our destination when we can to a sudden stop.......a roadway driver in a 10-wheel straight truck.....what???,about half the length of our truck???? rammed in to side of a small compact car driven by a young man who was attempting to pull out of a parallel parking spot on the right....thus tying up traffic on the street while both parties exchanged blame and other choice words and then got on their respective cell phones to contact a. police, and b. insurance agents and c. at least one good buddy each who they surprised with the words "dude, you're not gonna believe what just happened"........we sat at a stop right behind the roadway truck because we needed to make a left hand turn just past that building on the left in the top picture.......cars from behind us started coming around us, which literally made the oncoming traffic have to come to stop, except for a few adventuresome souls who sucked in their breath till they'd fit and created a lane where there was none........all of this was accompanied by the usual honking and hand gestures that make new york new york......and then the epitome of new york thinking kicked in in the form of the roadway driver coming back and telling brad to go around him.......brad told him that he had to make the left turn and that there wasn't room to get snaked around him and clear the intersection......and his reply???? "whatdayamean( yes, that's all spoken as one word!) ya can't make the turn??? wheredidya (also condensed to one word) learn how to drive????"

ummmmmm.....dude, excuse me, but we're not the one's sittin in the street with a four-wheeler attached to our bumper.........

another mouth to feed........

one of the perks of being a team of company drivers is that we get a brand new truck every year......we put around 250,000 to 300,000 miles on a truck and then trade it in and start all over.....for about 3 years now, we've been burning ultra-low sulfur fuel in the trucks ....a design effort to reduce emissions and comply with epa standards, especially california epa standards.....at first it was a hassle as not all truckstops were carrying the ultra-low sulphur fuel and we were constantly having to track down a place that had it, but then as there became more and more demand for it (all trucks with engines 2007 and newer require it), more and more places carried it........



about the same time we started using the ultra-low sulphur fuel, we also got a handy little feature on our engines called "regeneration"........this meant that while going down the road, our truck would occasionally go thru the "regen" process where internal temperatures could reach as much as 1500 degrees and would burn off any carbon buildup......occasionally you would also have to "regen" manually if you had been idling for long periods of time....when you have to manually "regen" you have to make sure you're not sitting on grass and/or near any paper or combustible materials........i've gotta tell ya, it took quite awhile to get over feelin anxious every time we were in "regen" mode......with all the little silly things we've had mechanics miss on our trucks over the years, it's a little hard to trust that truck builders always do everything right to keep you safe from those kind of temperatures under your butt........



last month we got our 2011 freightliner cascadia.....it has a detroit motor in it.......detroit, in their infinite wisdom, designed an engine that not only has all the features i've already mentioned, but it also has this handy little receptacle that you have to keep filled, in addition to the fuel tanks........ this extra tank holds a product called d.e.f......which stands for diesel exhaust fluid....an additive that makes the "regen" process burn cleaner and supposedly more effectively.....

you have the above pictured gauge(the row of green lights) on your dash to let you know when you need to add def.....and you're warned to keep a close eye on this gauge as running out of def will shut your motor down............we've been told that eventually most truck stops will also have a pump on the fuel islands for def, but so far, in three trips from coast to coast, we've only found one truckstop in washington state with it and they only had one pump on one fuel island for it.......the truckstops who do carry def stock it in the packaging you see below......2 and a half gallon plastic jugs with foot long nozzles that come packaged in cardboard cartons.........it causes me some concern that the same people who came up with this wonderful idea, are the same people who couldn't figure that the packaging should include a vent in the plastic jug so that the fluid would actually go into the tank with out you having to pull out your trusty pocket knife and punch a hole in the jug.............it also causes me concern that even tho i'm not picking up the tab on the def, it's $14 for one of these jugs and we have yet to determine how many jugs it actually takes to fill the tank up......ours was on half full and we put in 6 jugs and think we could have easily added two more.......let's see....that's $84 and two days later we had to fill it again.......i'm all for saving the planet, i just want to be able to afford to live on it while i'm keeping it green........

so now we leave this nice mess on the fuel islands.........

and this mess down the side of our truck, because the way the tank opening is situated and the way the jug nozzle is made, it's impossible to keep it from dripping......

not to mention that on the stops where you have to add the def, it adds at least another 15 minutes to an already tight schedule.........but hey!.....who gives a rat's derriere if we're overloading the landfills with plastic and cardboard as long as we're keeping the air cleaner in california?????

my little black bag

i'm not much for carrying a purse on the truck......for one thing, life in the truck is hard on them....they get kicked around on the floor, rub up against stuff and ruin the leather as we roll down the road....about the only time i feel the need for one is if we are taking time off somewhere other than home and i know i'll be going out shopping or to dinner....or when we stop at walmart.........back in my solo-driver days i had the whole dash to hold all my "essentials" while i was driving......but in the years since i became a team driver, it seems like either the dash is getting smaller and smaller, they're putting more and more space-sucking gadgets on the dash or else brad is just getting more and more stuff of his own, because it doesn't seem like i can find a place for my stuff up there anymore!.....but a couple of months ago while in walmart i was cruising the craft supply isle and found this little jewel......it's got sturdy sides and has kept it's shape.....it has loads of various sized individual pockets that make almost custom-crafted homes for all my goodies and it wipes clean with a damp cloth!!.....
outside pockets hold my eye-glass cleaner and cloth, hand sanitizer and a small bottle of a great little cucumber pick-me-up-spray, pens, post-its, and a comb........ an interior row of pockets are sized just right for my sunglasses, tissues, ipod, phone and headset.....and the huge inside pocket holds whatever audio-book i'm listening to at the time and keeps my wallet in handy reach!

i'm not embarrassed to tell ya that i'm just a little bit in-love with this handy little bag!....i set it on the floor beside my seat when i'm driving and everything i might need while driving is within handy reach......i've not yet given up my cupholder space for my coffee, water, tea or whatever tho...although the designers seem to keep making these smaller and shallower all the time, so it may not be long before i have to add a bottle holder to this little number!....and when we switch out and brad drives, all i have to do is pick it up and set it back on the bunk or a shelf and it's out of his way.....and he thinks that's pretty sweet!

council bluffs, iowa

i take alot of pleasure from simple things in life......one of them is watching all the new decorative bridge railings and intersection landscaping that so many cities across the country are installing as they upgrade and expand the infrastructure.....pennsicola, florida has the blue angels navy show squadron on their overpass abuttments.....seattle has fish and waves and mountains......las vegas has fighter jets from nellis airforce base.......albuquerque has huge mosaic pots and a giant cactus that changes colors at night......salt lake city and ogden have beautiful tin sculptures of ranchers, cattle, horses, and miners and skiers.............recently, while coming thru council bluffs, iowa for the first time in awhile we were greeted by this............we looked.......we looked again......we picked our jaws up off the truck floor and looked again.......we looked at each other and then at it again.......whaaaaattttttt??????????........

i'm pretty certain they paid alot of money for this "art".....upon a little closer inspection it looks like parts of tractors and farming implements welded together in some grotesque and eerie fashion.......perhaps inspired by a transformer movie or even edward scissorhands....... i guess i'm just missing something here.......i've seen the remains of a three-car pileup loaded on a rollback that made more sense than these do.......

on another recent trip thru council bluffs at night, we did at least find something good to say about the sculptures........"at least they're not lit up after dark!"

sittin & waitin......

most people think all truck drivers do is run down the highways of america taking things from one place to another......and that is a good part of our job.....it's the part that usually makes sense and earns us a paycheck......but it surely isn't all that we do.......on some loads, just the paperwork involved, alone, could send the hardiest of pencil pushers into a frenzy.....and then there's the driver's who load and unload their own freight......we try to avoid those kinds of loads.....occasionally we'll get stuck with one and i always argue with them over it since i have a strong aversion to touching freight.....it's not that i'm lazy....well, not entirely that i'm lazy, it's just that while i drove 500 miles thru the nite hauling said freight, i never once looked over and seen a shipper or receiver sittin in the passenger seat telling me funny stories to help keep me awake.......they never fuel, they have never once come out and cleaned my mirrors.....nothin........so i take great offense when they think i should work on their dock......just doesn't happen very often and i can assure you, NEVER without protest!!.....

anyway, the other big part of truck driving is the sitting-and-waiting........the past couple of weeks we've been doing alot of that.....first off because our load got picked up by another truck....then an entire week in a hotel with our truck in the shop.......then another day & a half waiting on a shipper to rework a load that was too heavy on the front....TWICE.....they reworked it and still couldn't get it right.......i mean, jeesh, it's not like they load trailers everyday..(insert sarcastic eye roll here)...........we didn't sit & wait much for the next few days, as we came down from seattle to los angeles, delivered, picked up another load and headed to baltimore......three days comin across the country meant three days that they had to get everything worked out on this load......three days till our 0700 delivery appointment this morning that i got up at 0300 in order to make on time......just to be turned away from the port gates because someone had not bothered to register this truck at the port for the past three days.......hmmmmmm.....can we say "incompetence"???????.......

so now it's 1645 eastern time and i'm still hooked to the same load and still waiting for them to tell us where to take it.......we are supposed to be headed home as soon as we do drop it.......i can assure you i won't be sittin & waiting for them to tell me to go!

theives among us!

everybody has fears.....we all are afraid of something.....for truck drivers, it's usually nasty winter road conditions, drive tire blowouts or that mini-van loaded with kids that pulls out in front of you........for alot of us it's knowing that things "back home" are safe and secure while you're out here earning a living........today we know how that feels......we're in portland, oregon in a hotel while our truck is in the shop........brad and i, while spiritual people, are not church-goers, so we don't tithe, but are thinking maybe we should start after these past few days......it all started last friday.....we delivered here in portland and were dispatched to pick up a load here later that evening going to sacramento, but when we went to pickup, it had already been gotten by another truck....evidently the load was double-dispatched, which i never understand how that happens, but it occasionally does.......so we headed over to the truck stop and called it a nite.....then on saturday evening we were again dispatched on a load going, this time, to los angeles,but it didn't pick up till monday morning.....that meant we had all day sunday off.....we are never ones to mind an occasional day of sitting idle because even tho you're not making any money, you do get a chance to catch up on sleep, laundry, truck chores and, let's be honest, facebook!!......we walked over to a really nice little restaurant for supper sunday nite and had marion berry pie for dessert!....if you haven't had marion berry pie then you need to add that to your bucket list......alot like blackberries, marion berries are indigenous to this area and very very tasty.....i wish i'd remembered my camera, just so that i could make your mouth water, but you'll just have to take my word for it......yummo!!.......anyway, we returned to the truck, watched a little tv and settled in for the nite......all was going well till about 0300 local time when we were awakened by what we thought must surely be the second coming....light on the dash blinking, buzzers going off....and a truck full of exhaust fumes!!!!!......we quickly got up, got the truck shut off and opened up and brad got under the hood to see what was going on......we ended up taking the truck to another truckstop shop where the mechanic found a break in the exhaust line just under the bunk......he couldn't fix it, so we took it to the international dealer's shop where they found a host of troubles in addition to the exhaust leak......seeing that some of the parts needed had to come to portland from the chicago area, they found us a nice hotel room....and we settled in again and ordered pizza, since after spending all day in their lovely, but hardly air conditioned driver's lounge, neither one of us were interested in leaving the a/c of our nice room......this morning brad called to check on the truck and was told that it wouldn't be ready today either.....frustrating, but doable....it's just part of truckdriving........a little later in the morning tho was when insult was added to injury......we got a call from the guy who looks after things for us while we're gone......he'd gone by our house this morning and found that sometime in the past few days it had been broken into!!!!.......in all the years we've been on the road, we've always worried about this happening, but have never had anything bothered.....it probably took me a good ten minutes of the call to comprehend that he wasn't bs'n me and that someone had actually been in our home.........i still don't think it became totally real to me till he put the state trooper on the line to talk to me......hearing news like that is just surreal........it appears they'd entered thru a window.....they must have spent a little time there, because every drawer had been opened and gone thru......they took some change we had in plastic jars where we empty our pockets on the truck and hadn't gotten taken to the bank yet....the took some of brad's marilyn monroe wines.....they took some jewelry .....these are the things we know of so far....we won't really know what's missing until we can get home and look for ourselves.........the biggest thing is that they took any peace of mind that we had, naively or otherwise, about the house and they put a large crimp in any thread of belief in human decency......no one should ever have to worry about the safety of the things they've worked hard to provide for, but today is totally about us.....so i'm saying that truckdrivers should never have to worry that, while they're working to bring the stuff you want to you, that their stuff is being pilfered out the back door!

sh*t our load planner comes up with!

i know that some of you just shake your head when you read some of my blogs where i complain about the folks we work for.......i know you think i should just suck it up and get on with it.....pull up my big girl panties and deal.......well, most of the time i do.......i'm a dealer-with-er-kind of person, always preferring to see the glass as half-full............it's just that sometimes it harder than others to believe there's any substance in the glass at all......

take last nite for example.....we delivered our load in salt lake city yesterday morning and then headed over to the truck stop, caught up a little on sleep, got a nice shower, some supper.....spent the evening watching tv and catching up on facebook till the driver-tech beeped with our assisgnment and this is what we found.........take a close look......deadheading 647 miles from salt lake to our company yard in colton, california, just to run a load over to ontario, ca....a whopping 21 miles away!!!!.......it doesn't take an mba to calculate the business stupidity of this logic........and if you notice that the load needed to deliver by 0900 local time the next morning.....now what you can't see in the picture is that this pre-assignment didn't even come to us till midnite!......we've been doing alot of loads lately that have high dead-head miles on them....this doesn't usually matter to us since we get paid by the mile loaded or empty....but sometimes ya just gotta go "whoooaaaaaa!!!".......anyway....brad called our fleet manager, explained that there was no way we could make it on time, the fleet manager, surprisingly, agreed how ridiculous this load was when there were surely any number of drivers in the local california area who could take it and he had it taken off of us..........as it stands now, we are picking up a load right here in salt lake in a couple of hours and heading to portland, oregon....makes much more sense to me.....with over 6000 trucks in the fleet there is hardly any area of the country that there aren't some of our trucks in at any given time.....why would you not utilize the closest truck????.....i've been reading a hilarious non-fiction book by justin halpern entitiled "sh*t my dad says"......i think i may have to plagerize his title and start a blog, "sh*t my load planner comes up with!"