Pictures Tenn, Wyoming, Utah March 2008

First, after sitting the weekend in Ardmore, OK I finally got a load this morning. I am going up to Edmond, OK, near Oklahoma City, to pick up a load tonight going to Houston. I pick up at 11 pm tonight and deliver to Houston at 1am Wednesday morning. Truck is in need of a PM service and although I am going by the terminal near Dallas, I will probably not have time to get it done and still make my appointment. This means I will have to head out next week still needing truck serviced and be that much more over due for one. Should be going home for a few days after I get unloaded in Houston though.

The pictures below are from a trip I made to Salt Lake City, UT about this time last year. Again, forwarded to me by a good friend who kept the emails of the pictures I sent. I lost all that I had before Oct. 2008.

It starts with a picture coming north on I-75 into Cincinnati, not the same trip. Then 3 pictures around Lawrenceburg, TN of Amish buggies there. This is the furthest south I know of them living. There are also some groups in Oklahoma.

The next group of pictures are going across I-80 starting around Laramie, WY with sunrise. Then on over to Rock Springs, WY in the Southwest corner of Wyoming. The rest of the pictures are all of mountain range on the east side of Salt Lake City. I got pretty lucky with the weather on that trip.

Wisconsin to Oklahoma

I picked up a load yesterday in Janesville, WI going to Ardmore, OK. Was supposed to pick it up at 2pm. I went on in and they loaded me at 9am so was able to drive across Illinois and down into Missouri before I had to stop for the night. This was important because of the blizzard rolling out of the Texas panhandle and right up through where I was going.

It was a matter of timing and points out how many things I rely on when it comes to weather and trip planning. First I read USA Today every day and watch the weather page on where I am going. Then on XM Radio there is a 24/7 weather channel that tracks storm systems, I have the NOAH weather radio channels on truck radio for local forecasts, and finally I pull it up on my laptop. The one on laptop is most important. The weather.com page you can pull up the weather forcast hour-to-hour on any city on your route. When I left out this morning I knew that the rain was not supposed to start turning over to mixed precipitation until around 7 or 8am in Joplin, MO. I was going to be able to get through there at 7am. The snow was moving in from Oklahoma City which was getting pretty heavy snow. The storm was rolling up I-44, the direction I had to go. Knowing all this, I turned south on US-69 down through eastern Oklahoma keeping the front to my west. Doing this I only ran through a short snow storm this morning of about 10 to 15 miles wide. It was heavy too. The temperature dropped 5 degrees at that moment, but once I got 15 miles further down the road I got out the other side of the cold front again, the temperature got back up to 38 deg and back to all rain.

I made it on down to Atoka, OK and cut across some two lane roads to Ardmore. I came in the back way and dropped the load a day early. No snow or icy roads. If I had been running about one hour behind the schedule I set for myself I would have hit it bad coming out of Joplin, MO. That would have slowed me down letting the front run right over me, and as hard as it was raining, once it turned to snow it was going to be bad. It worked out.

Now I set here 290 miles from the house and no freight until Monday. Supposed to be headed to house for home time, so set here, set there. Will post some pictures later tonight or in the morning of some of the trip down here.

Made it to the Dairyland

I made it into Madison, WI about 1230pm today. Left the Toledo area around 530am. Was nice drive today across I-80. Sun began to peek out while coming across northern Indiana.

Made it to Chicago at 9am and breezed through pretty well, morning traffic had already died out. Another part of the preplanning part. Got into Wisconsin and found the state had built a brand new weigh station on I-90 near Beloit, WI. Hadn't realized been that long since I had been up here. Close to a year now I guess.

I went back to the posting on March 17 and added pictures I had taken on the trip from Kentucky up to Rochester, NY, so you might want to go back to look at those. The 4 pictures from the cave warehouses in Kansas City were from March of 2008.

The following pictures on this post are on the trip headed here. All are along I-80 starting in the Pocono Mtns. and going west toward Ohio. In 7th picture in the group is a picture of an Amish farm in a beautiful valley not far from Lamar, PA. After I snapped the picture I went about a mile further down the road and saw about two dozen Amish children playing ball near a small school house. All were dressed just a like, in all black, girls with bonnets and boys with the flat brim straw hats. They are an interesting culture and are all along the nothern midwest from Pennslyvania to Iowa and south. I have seen them in south central Tennessee too.

Halfway There

Finally got rolling today, up at 5 am and drove up to Tobyhanna to pickup the load. It was a drop and hook, but took a while to get past the security gate. They are pretty slow letting you in there. Was in and out in about one hour. Dropped down on I-80 and headed west. I made it as far as Stony Ridge, OH for the night. Finally got a shower, first since Saturday. What happens when freight so slow you sit a lot. Sometimes you are stuck where there are no showers. Use plenty of Febreze in the truck.

Started growing a beard about this time last week. Had a full week's growth today. Since I got tired of the itching, one week was all I got out of it. Found all my gray hair though, hidden on my face.

Took a few pics of Poconos but not much to look at, nothing budding out yet. I'll get some more on next trip when the color is out.

Going to post a few pics today that were from last year. They were very interesting and I had never seen anything like it. In the rock cliffs around Kansas City, MO they cut warehouses into the mountains underground. You drive in and there are docks and warehouses and all. The streets going in and out are very narrow, and you have a heck of a time getting the 53' trailers backed around those rock columns.

This is the first time I went into one of these. The first time there was a one way in and out, and it took over 5 minutes of driving back into the mountain to reach the docks. The second underground warehouse I went in and out the same way and it was a little crowded. Got stuck getting out when there was a truck trying to back into a dock and had a devil of a time doing it, and had the drive blocked in and out. Happened to be around lunch time so time he got it in there, there were a lot of cars and trucks backed down the tunnel wanting out. The pictures here are a little blurred, I found out after the fact that I had the wrong setting on the camera. I had the camera only about 4 months at that time, and first pictures in low light.

I had several more pictures but lost them all when my hard drive crashed last fall. A friend was kind enough to forward these back to me to use. I have a memory stick I back the the pictures and files up now. I have lost a lot of pictures over the last 4 years due to hard drives blowing up. Try to stop that from happening in the future.

Get a Load Tomorrow

Well, I finally was dispatched this afternoon on a load to pick up tomorrow. I travel north of here to Tobyhanna, PA to pickup at 7am in the morning. The load goes over to Windsor, WI for delivery on Friday.

Tobyhanna is right in the middle of the Pocono Mountains. A lot of resorts in the area and a big vacation area year round. Beautiful there in the fall. Mom and Dad may remember coming back through there when we made the trip to Vermont back in 1989 to see the fall colors.

Also not far from Tobyhanna is the NASCAR race track where they have two races each year. Not a fun place to drive through when that is going on though.

When I pickup the load I will be traveling I-80 all the way to Chicago, then up I-90 to Madison, WI. Will be toll road across Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Some years ago we used to carry large amounts of money to pay for the tolls, never let yourself get below $300. Now they have what they call EZ-Pass which is an electronic sensor attached to your windshield, as you go through a toll booth it reads it automatically and you just drive on through. The company gets the bill in the mail. EZ-Pass is good for all toll roads in the north eastern states, West Virginia, Indiana, and Illinois. Doesn't work in other states, still have to come up with the cash and turn in receipts for reimbursement.

Going on to Long Island New York used to be a minimum of $100 to get in and out. Had to cross 2 bridges going in and 2 coming out at $25 a pop. EZ-Pass system sure helps.

Have a blizzard blowing through the Dakotas right now, but according to weather on internet Madison will miss that. Supposed to slide off to the south of there. I will try to get a picture or two of Poconos tomorrow when go in there, but the trees haven't really starting budding up here yet, so may look a little dull.

Another Day Another Set

I delivered my load yesterday at Noon to grocery warehouse in Bethlehem, PA. Grocery warehouses are another sticking point to truck drivers. They have a lumper scam that has been in place probably over 50 years.

You arrive at a grocery warehouse and you have the option to unload the truck yourself or pay a lumper service which is conveniently set up in an office next to the receiving office. If you choose to do it, you do it by hand one piece at a time because you can't use their pallet jacks or other equipment to do it with. You hire the lumper service to do it for you, the prices to unload the truck can range from $50 to $350 depending on where you are. The $350 I paid in Salt Lake City once.

You take the price they give you and you have to get a Comchek from your company or pay them cash. The company turns around and gets the money usually from the shipper. Why the receiver can't just bill the shipper for the unloading is beyond me. The lumper service is not on the receiver's payroll so they have no responsibility if the lumpers hold you up for hours or tear up the product getting it off the truck. Very convenient. Kind of puts you at the mercy of the receiver, but that is always the case with driving a truck. Part of the job.

Had a lady tell me the other day she had trouble with a driver and he really copped an attitude, pulled a hand gun and wanted the stuff off his truck. He got a free room for the night, idiot. No wonder we have a bad name.

After getting the load off the truck, no freight. They were still working to find loads for drivers sitting over the weekend. Now it is Tuesday morning and hoping something will come up soon and get moving again.

Everyone have a good day. Down to 18 deg last night, but the sun is out.

What Fun

Since I am only about 2 1/2 hr drive from where I deliver, and I have an appointment time tomorrow of 12 noon, I decided to stay here in Binghamton, NY. Had good signal for computer and get CBS for basketball, and Fox for NASCAR. If I move down closer to where I deliver, I probably won't have any of those things. If I got to sit this long anyway, I'll just stay here.

This kind of waiting on loads is very uncommon. I haven't seen it in all my time out here, especially with this company. Weekends have become super bad. There just aren't any loads on the weekend to pick up anymore like used to be. And if you only get one of 250 miles on Friday that delivers on Monday, it is all you going to get.

So nothing much to write about today, don't feel like standing on a soapbox. Back to my races and everyone have a great week.

Anti Idling Laws

Now I get into some things that stick in my craw. I'm afraid when I do that, if you are interested then grab a pot of coffee and read on. If not, quit reading at any time and I will return to normal in 24 hours.

Most everyone has pre-conceived notions of truck drivers. Most of them are from the ones who are tailgating you or speeding. The ones that fall out of their truck and don't look like they have taken a "poly coated rinse" shower in 3 weeks. And when they open their mouth...well

No matter what the opinion, most are hard working good people. They keep the nation going. Nothing you have in your home, wear, eat, etc, did not come most or part of the way to the store but by truck. Even if you grow your own veggies out back and save your seeds, unless God dropped the first one in your back pocket the initial one got to you by truck. I know the hoe did.

This is a rough life. You deal with traffic, some of the hardest traffic laws and parking restrictions in the country. How many times do you see no truck parking signs on mall, department store, grocery store parking lots. The result of those is the only place you can park is at a truck stop where the prices for lousy food is a good 20% or more than you would pay at a good decent restaurant. They know they have you over a barrel and can't park elsewhere so they charge top dollar.

Truck stops are failing because of the economy and states are closing rest areas so they don't have to pay to maintain them. As a result there are fewer and fewer places to park at night to sleep. One of the deals with pre-planning your trip is where you get to, and at what time of day to get there, in order to have good chance of finding a parking place. I have stopped way short of my delivery point when there was another truck stop closer in, only because I knew that the other one would be full by the time I got there. Northeast is a bad place because there are few truck stops to start with and the population makes it very crowded. Real estate is at premium price, well used to be.

When it comes to parking, your truck turns from your office to your home. I spend 300 to 320 nights a year in this truck. Seven feet wide and approximately 9' long. It is what they call a condo sleeper with an overhead bunk, plenty of room to stand up. Lot better than what I had in 1976 when I first crawled into one. The cab was so short my knees touched the metal dash.

All the states in the northeast and liberal nuthouse California, have put in place anti idling laws where you can not idle your truck to stay warm in the winter and cool in the summer. The extremes in most places is 32 deg or below you can idle, and when it gets to 80 or above, I think, because every state is different. In California the only option is dying in your sleeper.

Now don't get me wrong, I am a supporter of cleaner environment. Trucks on the road today run so much cleaner than even 5 years ago it is a big change. People like Al Gore preaching to the rest of the country about saving the planet and doing without, the whole time he lives in million dollar mansion with every light burning, driving SUV's and flying around the country preaching to the rest of us in a gas guzzling private jet. I don't care for hypocrites very much.

The truck I drive has an Opt-Idle system to save fuel, and cut down on idling time. It keeps the truck from idling all the time in extreme weather. What it does is works by computer sensors. In the bunk you have a thermostat much like the one you have at home. You set the temperature to say 68 deg with a 4 deg spread, then set heat. When the temp in side the cab gets down to 64 deg, it will turn the engine on automatically, run until the cab is warmed up to 68 and then shut it off. In the summer you set it to 74, and it will cool it back down to that temp automatically. It saves fuel and cuts down on idling. It normally doesn't idle more than 3 mins at a time unless you are in extreme conditions. Only exception is when the battery charge gets down to 12v, it will turn the engine on and idle for 2 hours to recharge batteries. This happens a lot in cold weather. The short idle times are manageable, it is the 2 hour one that will get you in trouble if the PC police are out roaming.

In northeast you can usually get by if not in a populated area. In California, opt idle is not acceptable and neither is APU's (auxillary power units). These are small engines that set behind cab and runs off diesel, it cools/heats your cab and keeps your batteries charged. Gives you AC plugs in the cab to run TV, Computer and small fridge. Mine doesn't have that. Company gave out list of trucks that were going to get one installed last summer, and it would go on all trucks with less than 225,000 miles on them. When the notice came out, I had 225,001 miles.

The whole point of this is, with all the preaching on the environment, all the things that the industry has done, money spent to comply, it is never enough. The driver suffers. The driver gets a $300 fine in California for idling his truck so he can sleep, the driver pays it. If the driver complies with the law and can't sleep as a result, he then goes out and runs down a family of 5 because he falls asleep at the wheel, the driver goes to jail. You don't have the option of telling the dispatcher you didn't sleep and not going to make your appointment. What is the use, you are still sitting in extreme weather and you are not going to sleep anyway until you get the heck out of that state.

Even at 35 deg, the cold eventually seeps into your bones, and you start shaking and can't stop. The temp outside can be 60 deg with sun shining, the skin on this truck is so thin it will be up to 90 deg in the sleeper within a hour. I can roll down the windows, turn on the little fan, open all the vents, 70 deg outside and I will be sweating up a storm in the sleeper and unable to sleep. I have seen temps outside in 70's and check the temp in the sleeper and it will be up in mid 90's. If it is humid outside then it is worse. You ever been to California in the summer time when the normal temperature is 100+? Even 120. You turn your a/c off and sleep in that. I know Al Gore won't, and you won't either. I am forced to.

This is why there are more and more drivers beginning to quit and do something else. Think things are bad now, wait until you really have a driver shortage. Food on the shelves will disappear. If you don't think about that much, look at what the high diesel prices did to prices on the grocery shelves, that cost is passed on to you and me. They didn't bring the prices back down much either when the prices dropped $2 per gallon. But hey, won't be able to get anything to eat, but boy it will be clean air to breath. Until the smut from China and Mexico blows in to the atmosphere.

Shower Correction

And this is for David's benefit. When fuel at truck stop I get a shower coupon good at that particular truck stop chain that is good for 5 days. Didn't mean the shower took 5 days to wear off. If it did I would go to TA Truck Stop, theirs is good for 7 days. Poly-Coat rinse, now I don't care who you are, that's funny right there now.

And Wisconsin beats Florida State 61 to 59.

Album below was from Feb. 21, 2009, starting in Ohio, across Indiana, Illinois and into Iowa on I-80.

NY to PA

Sent me a load offer last night to pick up this afternoon in Geneva, NY. It is located between Rochester and Syarcuse. Pick up time was at 5 pm, got there at 3 and was loaded and gone by 5.

Only goes down to Bethlehem, PA near Allentown. Does not deliver until 11 am on Monday so I get to set on this short load all weekend. Total mileage for 5 days will be 301. Below is a picture I took of my truck in San Antonio 3 weeks ago at 6 am. Was backed up to gate ready to unload when customer showed up.

I am spending the night in Binghamton, NY, and will probably just stay here until Monday morning. It is 2 hr drive on down to delivery. Have good cell signal for computer and CBS and Fox channels are good for March Madness and NASCAR on Sunday. If I move, I probably won't have a signal somewhere else. Watching 2 overtimes games right now. Not a Wisconsin fan, but they are playing Florida State, so Go Wisconsin.

Rochester, NY

Delivered my load in Rochester, NY this morning at 10 am. One of the things of doing this and on every load is preplanning. When I left New York on Tuesday I had to keep the door shut and move it to get down past Cleveland, OH before rush hour.

When I fuel at different truck stops, Pilot's for example, they give you a free shower that is good for 5 days. Since they want $10 if you don't have one, I try to use them only when I have free ones. Needless to say I don't get a shower every day. That came into play on this trip because as bad as needed a shower couldn't stop until got the other side of Cleveland. If I did it would have been an extra half to full hour in traffic. As was I got through just as it was getting heavy. Instead of stopping on north side of Cleveland, I stopped at one south of there and was through the traffic.

On the return trip, coming back to Rochester, I had to plan my way through Cleveland, Erie, PA and then Buffalo, NY and still make it to customer as quickly as I could. So I left truck stop at 415 am EDT, got around Cleveland, hit Erie at 7 am, just before it got heavy, and then got to Buffalo at 830 am as it finished up. Did not slow down for traffic anywhere. Made it to the customer at 10am, unloaded and back on the dispatch board. Since we are dispatched first in first out, the sooner you get on the board the better. As is there's no freight and will be sitting until tomorrow.

Since there is absolutely no truck stops in Rochester, you have to travel a bit to find a place to park. Had small truck stop in Bergen, NY 20 miles away, and got a spot.

Getting to Tennessee 3/2/09

These are the pictures of unloading day when we arrived at Charlie's house. Some group photos of us too. By end of day we were pretty bushed.

And back to NY

Was up at 4 am and drove on down to Kimper, KY to deliver load. We have a lot of trailers in there for preloading so was in and out of customer in one hour.

Did what is called a drop and hook. The company I work for places empty trailers at customers all across the country. Many as they need. Shipper preloads them and we go in and just drop our empty trailer and pick up the loaded one and gone. This particular customer we take shipments in to also, so I dropped my load they had loads sitting there and they gave me one going right back to Rochester, NY that delivers next day. I am back in Canton, Ohio for the night and will get up around 3 am to get up there by 10 am tomorrow.

We also take loads in to many customers and do drop and hook to an empty trailer. Wal Mart is one of the largest we deal with. We don't do drop and hooks everwhere, but sure is nice when we do. It takes a lot of time to live load or unload at a customer. I only get paid for rolling down the road and getting miles. Sitting at each end of the trip is on me.

Still dealing with excellent weather. Upper 60s and sunny all day. Off to bed.

New York to Kentucky

Finally got another load this morning to get moving and picked up at East Williamson, NY just to the East of Rochester, right on the lake. I am taking it down to Kimper, KY. Been there before, it is southeast of Hazard and way out in nowhereville. Well has plenty of coal mines around. Not even cell signal down in there, so if they have no loads I will have to sit out there at customer until they send me something.

Had pretty drive today, sunny all day and low 50's in New York. Turned south from Cleveland, OH and it quickly started warming up to 69. What it was when rolled into Parkersburg, WV. Will get up around 4 am and head on down to Charleston, WV and over into Kentucky, then south down east side of KY on US 23 to Kimper.

I will get this photo thing straightened out in a few days so not jamming up the site and then start posting them.

Moving Day 2/28/09 Lufkin, TX

We all met at Mom and Dad's home on 2/28/09 to load their belongings up and move them from their home of 23 years in Lufkin, TX to Calhoun, TN. They collected a lot. They moved in with brother Charlie until they sell their home and find something near him in Tennessee. The following pictures are of their home and our cleaning it out in one day. Well almost. Had one 26' Uhaul truck and 6x12' trailer to haul behind my pickup. We started loading after picking up the Uhauls around 930 am. We finally got to a stopping point and left at 730 pm making it to Carthage, TX for the first night, about 60 miles.

Day 1

So it begins. Today I am in Pembroke, NY which approx. 25 mi east of Buffalo. I deliver up the road in a few hours. This will be boring posts sometimes, but I will try to start loading pictures here before long. I have plenty on computer from this past winter, so I can start with those.

I just recently left home last Tuesday from a week's vacation. I will start later when I stop again, posting the pictures of moving my parents from Lufkin, TX to Calhoun, TN. They are elderly now and older brother just retired and can better take care of them.

Leaving home last Tuesday I picked up a load in Longview, TX and took to Paducah, KY. The delivery appointment was supposed to be on Thursday, but since such short trip and got there Wednesday morning, I checked with receiver and they took it a day early. This got me back on the dispatch board a day early. Since the downturn in the economy, you try to take every advantage you can get to keep moving.

Reason this is not for everyone: you are paid for rolling down road. You sit you get nothing. No layover pay for sitting waiting on loads. Sometimes you can get a little detention time if a customer makes you wait to load or unload beyond 2 hours, and that is something. This took effect because of the change in how you log your hours few years back. First comprehensive change in logging driver hours since the 1930's. Imagine still running in the year 2000 with the logbook rules they used 70 years ago.

Before you could drive 10 hours and after you take 8 hour break you could go again. You could also split up your break hours and be legal. Say if you set at a customer 5 hours you could show that as portion of your break time and drive up say 5 hours up road take 3 hour break to finish your 8 hour break requirement, and then drive the rest of your 10 hours allowed by driving up to 5 more hours. On and on.

The new rules: once you start your log in the morning you have 14 hours to work before you have to shut it down. During that 14 hours you can drive up to 11 hours, if you are sitting at a customer in that time for 8 hours then you only have 6 hours left to work. You aren't driving so you aren't getting paid anything. So the rule change forced companies to charge detention for after 2 hours sitting at customer so driver would get a pittance to make him happy. Does little on that score, but the nature of the business.

Driver's are seldom happy, that is why they change jobs so frequently. They go from one job to the next, because companies are begging for drivers to fill seats in trucks that are sitting idle.

Enter the screwed up economy. Now trucking companies with too much debt and no loads to pull are going out of business and the one who are surviving are very selective of who they put in their trucks. This is a new thought for trucking. I am fortunate to work for one of very few who are totally debt free. They buy equipment with cash and are getting great deals now because manfacturers are giving great deals just to make trucks and trailers and keep their doors open. Why it is nice t be out of debt in a downturn in economy.

As you can see, I get started on something, you will have to put up with more than just my daily escapades. Not many are going to care what the rules are for truck drivers. You should, because you are surrounded by them and they effect everyone's lives. Just about anything you eat, wear, live in or play with came to you by truck. There was a person in that truck who delivered it. They are not all great people or have great patience like they need, but most are. I don't like the ones who drive erratically anymore than I like the four wheeler that cuts me off in traffic not thinking I can't stop that fast. Maybe this can be an education page too.

Few people listen to anything I have to say, so I have found an outlet. I can set here all day and believe in my mind that thousands are receiving my words of wit, and waiting on the edge of their seats for the next day to come around. Hey, I have a lot of imagination. I think all day long while driving. It will probably never be as eloquent when I put it down as when it was composed in my mind though. Hope you will come back.