Offline Notification

DATELINE: HOME, 10:30 p.m. EDT

Well, gang, I made it home as scheduled on Tuesday (7/15), although later in the day than I would have liked. But I don't have time to tell that story. In fact, I don't have time to tell any stories now 'cuz, like most of my brief stays at home, I have too much to do before I head back to my truck and the road. And I do that tomorrow. So I have to make this composition short 'n sweet. Well, it probably won't be very sweet, 'cuz it'll be my last one for a good while.

I know you've noticed my lack of updates recently. Well, that's 'cuz of more laptop power problems. This time it wouldn't even work when plugged in when I got home, so I've taken it in to the fixit shop, and it'll be there for at least a week. Seeing how I'll be on the road for the next 4 weeks 'til I come home again (for Mrs. R.T.'s and my anniversary), I'm going to be offline (and, most likely, bored stiff) 'til I can get that laptop back. :-(

Anyway, when last I blogged, I was on my way to a delivery in the Dallas area. Well, on the way there the next day, I got a message directing me to swap loads with another driver in Texarkana, AR. Guess where that new load was headed. That's right, I was on my way once more to Laredo. That made the third time in that 3-week tour of duty. But that's OK, 'cuz those trips mean lots of paying miles. And with a nice, new truck with working air conditioning and cruise control, it's almost pretty nice. (The downside being, of course, having to be on the road and away from home at all.)

Anyway, I did make it home just fine on Tuesday, spent Wednesday sweltering at the Ann Arbor Art Fair (the reason I wanted to be home this week), and have been handling all the necessary errands to prepare for my next stretch on the road. And I still have much to do, so I'll wrap this report up here. Again, you won't have any updates to look for here for a while, unless I dash off a quick one at a Flying J internet kiosk (where I can get 15 free minutes of access per week). So I encourage you to check for those periodically.

Until I can get my laptop back and online regularly, thanks for following along, and keep on truckin'.

West Once More

DATELINE: WEST MEMPHIS, AR, 9:00 p.m. CDT

Miles Today: 529

Gotta make this quick tonight 'cuz I'm running my laptop on battery power and I'm tired after a long day. So here goes the nutshell version of my day.

Started work at 6:45 in Fairview, TN; delivery at 9:00 in Russellville, KY; pickup at noon in Owensboro, KY; long drive here to West Memphis once again. The load I picked up today is bound for Garland, TX, (a NE Dallas 'burb) with delivery on Thursday morning. So I'm headed back to the Lone Star state for the 3rd time in 2 weeks. Fine by me, that means lotsa' payin' miles.

Nothing special about today, 'cept for the delivery and pickup both being right quick, and driving through some heavy rain for a stretch. Tomorrow I'll drive to the Dallas area and stop at one of the truck stops along I-30 east of town. Don't know if I'll be able to blog tomorrow night or not; we'll see how the battery and/or plug-in situations are.

Sorry for keeping this entry so short tonight, but that's how it's gotta be. Thanks for taking your valuable time to check up on me. Take some more and drop me a line, and keep on truckin'.

Bonus Monday Coverage!

DATELINE: FAIRVIEW, TN, 7:15 p.m. CDT

Miles Today: 192

Just a short drive today, 4 hours plus a lunch stop. I'm at the Flying J here once more, and it's quite hot (mid-90s) in the Nashville area. I'm in a bit of a better mood now 'cuz things are going a bit better at the poker tables today.

I've been playing No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em sit-n-go tournaments exclusively, and in the last week I've had a couple of disastrous days--bad beats, card dead, you name it. But today I've played 4 9-player SNGs so far--2 before leaving West Memphis, 2 more since arriving here--and cashed in all 4 of 'em. Two third places and two seconds. So I'm up a whole $4.20 for the day. But because of those disasters, I'm still down $7.20 from my bankroll's high point. But hey, this isn't my poker blog, it's my trucking blog, so I won't bore you with any more details. However, I'm sure you are interested in how I spend my days, and the factors that go into my state of mind, so the poker news is part of full disclosure.

By the way, I still haven't figgered out why my laptop won't draw power from my truck lately. It seems to be an intermittent situation. I thought that maybe the problem occurred when the battery was somewhere between fully charged and fully drained, since that was the behavior it exhibits sometimes when I try plugging in inside a building. (I'm sitting inside the Flying J to work on the laptop tonight.) But I filled the battery this morning at West Memphis, and when I tried working in my truck here, no AC power. Grrrr! So I've come inside, still unsure of what's going on. (Besides poker results, these laptop irregularities influence my state of mind quite a bit, too.)

Well, that's enough complaining for tonight. Make sure you read this morning's post if you haven't seen it yet. Thanks for following along, and keep on truckin'.

Return from Silence

DATELINE: WEST MEMPHIS, AR, 4:00 a.m. CDT

Apparently all good things do come to an end. This time I'm talking about my laptop working perfectly inside my new truck. After a week of no problems, or even any sign of problems, all of a sudden the power supply setup--outlet in truck to power cord to laptop--has given up the ghost. Grrrrrrrr! So I haven't been able to sign on and post these brilliant, insightful compositions for you. Also, as a result, with nothing else to do, I've gone to bed way early the last couple of nights, hence my early waking and blogging this morning (you did catch the time on the DATELINE above, didn't you?).

This morning I'm at our West Memphis terminal, having arrived here yesterday afternoon. I was going to try plugging in inside the drivers' lounge last night, but the room was busy and they were playing some pretty lousy DVD movies on the TV, so I passed. This morning seemed a better time for it. And, lo and behold, "inside power" once again is the answer. So now I'm gonna let the battery charge fully and bring you up to speed with my latest activities.

When last we met, I was back on my way to our terminal in Laredo, TX. I reached there Friday afternoon, dropped that load, and got my next assignment. That was to grab another loaded trailer there and haul it to the same place I hauled the last load I had picked up in Laredo, a company in Russellville, KY. So I'm repeating myself after only 6 days. But that just makes things easier, when I go someplace familiar and I know their procedures. Fine by me.

The delivery appointment is tomorrow (Tuesday) morning, so I've had plenty of time to make the trip. I spent Friday night in Laredo, Saturday night in Rockwall, TX (just east of Dallas), and last night here in West Memphis. Today I only need to drive about 4 hours to Nashville, where I'll spend the night at a truck stop in that area (probably a Pilot in town). If you recall from last week's posts, Russellville is in the middle of nowhere, with no truck stops anywhere nearby, so Nashville's the "base camp" for the hike to that town.

So that gets you caught up with me. I'll continue my efforts to figure out just how to get my laptop to work in my truck so I can get these reports to you every day. Thanks for your patience during my incommunicado periods, and send me your favorable vibes that I get the problem worked out. And, as always, keep on truckin'.

Back to a Familiar Route

DATELINE: WEST MEMPHIS, AR, 9:30 p.m. CDT

Miles Today: 461

Quick update...must get to bed...

Long, busy day...worked 10-1/4 hours (9-1/4 hours driving) in 13 hours...delivery this morning in Waverly, TN...quick unload...next pickup in Clarksville, TN...(no, I didn't take the last train to there)...live load there, but relatively quick...headed back to Laredo, TX with this load...I do like making that run...gonna get there Saturmorning...tomorrow making for Waco again.

Thanks for reading...send me something to read, too, please...keep on truckin'.

Hours Overage

DATELINE: KINGSTON SPRINGS, TN, 4:45 p.m. CDT

Miles Yesterday: 416
Miles Today: 211

Pardon me for not blogging last night, but I figured with a short work day coming up today (because I was closing in on my 70-hours-in-8-days limit), I figured I'd just take time today to give y'all a good report. So, first of all, yesterday's action.

Not much to talk about on the trucking front. I just made the leisurely drive from the TA in Prescott, AR to the Flying J in Fairview, TN (just a bit west of Nashville). Just the normal rest and/or grub stops in North Little Rock, AR, West Memphis, AR, and Jackson, TN, but nothing non-routine. I slept in and didn't hit the road 'till 7:00, and I reached Fairview before 4:00. Then I decided it was time to get back to the poker tables.

I wish I hadn't. It was one of those nights when the cards, the poker gods, or fate--or probably all of the above--conspired to pummel my attempts at all turns. I played 8 sit-n-go (SNG) tournaments and 1 multi-table freeroll tourney (all no-limit Texas Hold 'Em) and only managed to cash in 1 of 'em--a 3rd place in a SNG. I'll spare you the details of all the ways I was getting beat, but I was not a happy camper. But this isn't my poker blog (which I haven't updated in quite some time now), so let's move on from that topic.

Except to say that because of my ire from such an amazing string of bad beats and card deadness, I was a bit too riled up to get to sleep at a reasonable hour. So I woke up early this morning (4:35-ish) on a short night's sleep. So by now I'm getting a wee bit weary. But I'll push on and finish this report for you.

I got up early 'cuz I had another couple hours to drive to reach my delivery. I didn't get any closer yesterday because Russellville, KY, the town to which I was headed, is in the middle of nowhere in terms of interstate highways, and no truck stops are anywhere nearby. So I had to truck in from a distance. Anyway, I hit the road at 5:30 and got to the delivery 2 hours later, just as I had figured.

That was still an hour early, so I had to wait a little while for them to call me to an open dock for unloading. (Darn! Not a drop-and-hook.) But the wait was just 30 minutes. Checking in at their scale house (the load was bulk scrap aluminum, so they weigh the trucks on the way in--full--and out--empty--to determine the load's weight), driving back to the dock, checking in back there, and docking, took most of another half-hour. Unloading was quick (another 30-ish minutes), then I had to sweep out the trailer to get rid of the scrap scraps that had fallen out of their bundles.

Before doing the sweeping, I sent in my "empty call" message to trigger my next assignment, and it came in before I even hit the scale house on the way out. After checking out there, I pulled into the company's waiting truck lot to check out my assignment and plan my route to the pickup. The pickup was in LaVergne, TN, just south of Nashville, and about 70 miles away. By the way, by the time I had completed the delivery, I was down to less than 2 hours left of my 70 to work. So Dispatch was cutting it close for me.

I arrived at the address given to me 90 minutes later. It was a place I had made a pickup before, but it wasn't the company it was supposed to be. This place is a "3rd-party warehouse", but I was supposed to pick up from a national brand-name company. I checked in there, anyway, guessing the big company used this one's warehousing services. Nope. My Fleet Manager was slow responding to my inquiry into the matter (and eventually responded with the same address, anyway), so I hauled down my laptop and went online to find the right address. Which I did, and found it to be the other way down the same road. Sheesh! Short on hours and I gotta waste time going to the wrong place.

That pickup turned out to be a drop-and-hook, and, because of my short-timer status, I was assigned to drop the load at a drop yard we use in Nashville. (Why the truck that picked it up there couldn't make the pickup at the original company, I'll never know. They--it was a team truck--were waiting at the drop yard when I got there. Another example of "corporate intelligence", I guess.) SO I made the short jaunt over there, dropped the load, then waited a bit for my next job. I had to have something, 'cuz I sure wasn't going to stay at that yard.

About 30-to-45 minutes later, I did get my next assignment. They had another load waiting at that yard, due for delivery in Waverly, TN tomorrow morning. That's only about 60 miles from Nashville, So I'll be able to knock that one out early, get another assignment, and roll some miles tomorrow when I get 12-1/2 hours back to work (the amount I worked last Tuesday).

Well, it's now only 10-3/4 hours, because I had to go beyond my limit to satisfy Dispatch's demands on me today. I had 4-1/4 hours available when I started out, and wound up having to work 6 to get it all done. (I think the Load Coordinators see a distance, assume a 50 MPH average, and calculate allotted times. However, most of my driving today was on a US Highway--US 431 to be exact--which winds through small towns and keeps the average MPH well below 50. Hence my hours overrun. Grrrr! I'd better not get a call from the Safety Department "reminding" me about the hours-of-service regulations.

But, anyway, after grabbing my new load, I've boogied on over to a Petro truck stop in this fine town for the night. It's just about 5 miles up I-40 from last night's Flying J, so I'm basically in the same area from whence I started the day. Tomorrow's delivery is set for 8:00 a.m., so I'll get up in plenty of time to get there 30-to-60 minutes early, as is my preference. I have about an hour to drive to get there (maybe less, but it is mostly along another US highway), so I'll get to sleep in just a little bit later than usual. Which'll be good 'cuz of last night's lack of sleep.

So that covers the last 2 days. Thanks for checking in today. Send in your cards and letters--or, at least your comments and questions--and keep on truckin'.