CT Duty

DATELINE: BRANFORD, CT, 4:15 p.m. EDT

Miles Today: 206

A short work day due to bumping up against my 8-day hours limit. But for a short day, it had enough stress.

I had my alarm set for 5:45 a.m., but woke up 2-1/2 hours before that. I eventually did fall back asleep, but it took a L-O-O-O-O-N-G time. When my alarm sounded, I got up, wnet inside, and took a nice, hot, leisurely shower (I needed to warm up--I had left my truck's idle management system off when I went to bed, and it got chilly overnight. 'Twas quite brisk in my cab this morning--though still comfy inside my sleeping bag--so I was pretty chilled by the time I got dressed and outta' there). Once cleaned up, I hit the road at 6:45, headed for Shelton, CT.

I arrived at about 10:30. Shelton's an older town (aren't they all out here in the northeast?), so it has narrow streets. Fortunately, the company to which I was delivering was right off the highway. But I still did have a couple of tight turns to make to swing around the building to their receiving docks. But traffic was light and I made 'em without incident.

This company only has 4 receiving docks, and they were all full when I arrived. So I pulled past the the building and parked in a lot along the far side and walked back to the docks to check in. It must have been break time, 'cuz it took several minutes (10?) before someone responded to me ringing the bell for entrance to the docks area. During that time, one of the trucks pulled out, so when the fork lift driver (he must be the only one who does unloading) finally answered the bell, he pointed me to the open spot.

As I was walking back down the block to my truck, I saw the driver of another truck in the lot where mine was--and who had arrived AFTER I did--finish opening his trailer doors, hop back in his cab, pull out into the street, drive over to the docks, and back into MY spot. He hadn't even checked in with the Receiving Office (or, at least, the unloader) as I had. Some people!

I remembered that the shipper of my load had given me a bolt seal to secure my trailer, so I needed to borrow some bolt cutters from the fork lift guy to open the trailer. I went back inside and "forky" had disappeared again. He finally reappeared after another 5-ish minutes, and in that time one of the other trucks had left the docks. So I had a slot to back into. I hustled back down the block, cut off the seal, opened up the trailer doors, and headed to the docks.

Now, this company's docks are right off a city street (2-lanes), and internal (meaning I'd be backing into darkness from brilliant sunlight. AND they're kinda' narrow AND have concrete posts alongside each truck slot. So this was an instance where taking it V-E-R-Y S-L-O-W-L-Y was in order. All challenges considered, I made it in pretty well. I had to pull up a couple times early on to get the trailer's back tires properly in position to allow the front of my truck room to swing by the curb on the far side of the street (did I mention it's a narrow street?) without going up on it and taking out any "No Parking" signs. But once I hit the approach just right, I slid the trailer right into place with just a couple more minor adjustments to get square to the dock wall. And I didn't even get those concrete posts to cower any.

All told, I was at that site for just under 2 hours. Then, with only 45 minutes left of my available work hours for the day, I departed for the TA just east of New Haven. I opted to take the most direct route (CT-34) rather than the bigger highways (CT-8 south to I-95), which took me into New Haven before hitting I-95. (Consult your atlases, follow the listed roads, and you'll see why I chose 34.)

And here I am, at yet another Popeye's Chicken with a TA. I did attempt to stay here a couple of weeks ago, but it has a small lot (only 75 spaces) and was full at that time. Today, in the early afternoon, oodles of parking spaces were available. After fueling and parking, I spent some time sending in my just-delivered-load's paperwork, checking out their men's room (nice place), and then walked to the supermarket conveniently across the street to pick up some 2-liter bottles of Diet Coke to stash in my cooler. (For one thing, the 2L size is mostly unavailable at truck stops; for another, they're more expensive at the truck stops than they are at grocery stores when they are available.) When I got back to my truck, my next assignment was waiting.

Tomorrow afternoon (can you believe Dispatch actually took into consideration that I was out of hours for today?) I bop down into New Jersey (Avenel this time, a tad south of Newark) and pick up a load at 1:00 bound for Eagan, MN. That's another good 1100-mile-plus load but, alas, I won't take it the whole way. It delivers on Monday, the day I'm due to get home. Instead, I'll take it to our drop yard in Blue Island, IL, in the south part of Chicagoland. I expect I'll get there Saturday morning sometime.

I'm guessing my Fleet Manager is on vacation this week, 'cuz some other dude has been answering my mesages via Quacomm during the day. I asked today if they'd approve me running the Ohio and Indiana Turnpikes on this run so I could be reimbursed for the tolls. If the load is a "hot" one and time is of the essence (and it usually is), my FM usually does authorize it. But they guy today said that they'd pay the tolls only if routing for the load necessitated taking the 'pikes. We get the load's routing via a request on Qualcomm, and in this case (the load I'll pick up tomorrow), it only said that routing isn't available for that specific type of load. (The type that pays 3 cents extra per mile.) So it looks like I'll be taking the longer southern route (I-70 across OH and IN to Indianapolis, then up I-65 to Chicagoland) instead of the more direct route via the 'pikes.

(By the way, the IN Turnpike has just instituted a system called "I-Zoom" which does electronic tolling via transponders for those with them instead of everybody pulling up to a booth and paying cash. I-Zoom also works with E-Z Pass--NY State Thruway--transponders, which USA has in all its trucks. So I don't have to shell out any cash to traverse that road anymore. But it still cost me $30.50 to cross OH on its pike yesterday. I'm hoping they'll reimburse me for that one 'cuz that load was on a short timeframe and nobody ever responded when I asked if it was OK to take that route.)

Anyway, Dispatch asked when I could get to Eagan (a Twin Cities 'burb) in case the customer would take delivery early. My best guess was late Saturday or early Sunday, but I think that idea has gone by the wayside. I did spend some time working out my ETA there in order to respond to the query, so that ate up some more of my afternoon. After all that I did go in and get my chicken dinner, and now I've told you all about it.

So that was my day (most of it--I left out some about a turn-around in a tight lot brought on by a missed turn and low bridge in New Haven while trying to reach I-95). Thanks for your interest in my travails. Let me know what you want to read about in this travelogue, and keep on truckin'.