Heading Back East

DATELINE: SOMERSET, PA, 10:30 p.m. EDT

Miles Today: 402
Miles Yesterday: 0
Miles Saturday: 618

Oops! Missed a couple of days again. My humblest apologies, but I managed to get home Saturday night and spent my free time with my family instead of blogging on my laptop.

As you recall when last I wrote (Friday night), I had stopped for the night in southern Tennessee. On Saturday I managed to make it all the way home within my available work hours. So I parked at my "home" truck stop for the night, Mrs. R.T. came over, and we went out for a quick bite to eat. Since I was under a load and not "officially" home, I spent the nights in my truck. But I did get to spend quite a bit of time with my family (well, except for our oldest daughter, who's at college) on Sunday, even doing a bit of much-needed yard work.

This morning I got to sleep in 'til 7:00 before leisurely getting ready to start my workday. I was on the road a little after 8:00, headed to my delivery in Wyandotte, MI. The drive there and the delivery went OK (it was a live unload, but didn't take inordinately long). After that, my next assignment came across a few minutes after I left: Pick up a load at the place I had just left. (Note: I had made a pickup there once before, a few months back, so I knew that could be a possibility. It would have been nice to get a "heads up" about that while I was waiting.)

Anyway, I turned back around and returned. It turned out the pickup was a drop-and-hook, so at least I could do that quickly and not have to wait around during a loading process. This load is headed for eastern Pennsylvania, just outside of Philly, but my task is to take it to our terminal in Bethel, PA and drop it there. So I hit the road in that direction, making it this far today. I'm at the Somerset Service Plaza along the PA turnpike--I've been here before--for the night. I had a couple more hours available to drive today, but I was getting tired, it was getting dark (I stopped around 7:30 p.m.), and the truck stops and rest areas/service plazas were filling up. So I figured I'd just stay here.

I have about 3 more hours to go to get to Bethel, and I'll do that in the morning. Then I'll get to find out where I'll be headed next. Be sure to check in tomorrow to find out where that'll be. In the meantime, thanks for following along, please drop me a line, and keep on truckin'.