I completed my first week of on the road training and I didn't fare nearly as well as I had hoped. I struggled quiet a bit with shifting; down-shifting in particular. With time and practice I know I'd get it; but, I'm thinking about it too much. I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around revving my RPMs to float gears while breaking at the same time.

I did slightly better on up-shift. All this was while floating gears. I had about made up my mind to quit trying to float and just ...

Today will begin my second day out with my trainer. Mark's a pretty good guy; calm and easy to get along with (thank God.) But I guess I did ok.

We made a pretty good day. Bedtime will take me some getting used to. Jailhouse bunk. As I went to bed, I slept with my clothes on except socks, so my feet got chilly. I discovered there's a gap between the wall and my bunk because my blanket fell onto the lower bunk. I made the mistake of drinking a big glass of tea before bed. Since I can't ...

While it's not "official" until I leave work tomorrow, I'm done with orientation training. We're finished with all paperwork and quizzes, we're passed on road tests (at least well enough for now) and backing skills. We did a lil more on our backing skills today.

I was disappointed we only got two rounds. I coulda gone a couple more. Each time was a lil better than the last for me.
"Bob" on the other hand.... who knows what's happening in his head. ...

I didn't get to update yesterday because my darling wife surprised me with a visit. So I got to spend the night with my honey. Sure was nice.

Yesterday Jay took us out for some road practice and a road test. I dunno why, but I was so dang tense it was unreal. I still hurt. Jay kept telling me to relax and breath. Overall, I think I did ok. Jay never got around to critiquing us; but did say we're still passing.

On my road test, I stalled out once at a stop sign. I didn't ...

Jay, our Safety trainer, gave us some words of caution on being careful how we speak to people. Today we took a field trip to the Lowe's Distribution Center. He said a guy drove by one of our drivers one day. The driver was on top of the load pulling his tarp and tossing some scrap off. The guy said, "Driver, I would sure appreciate it if you make sure this stuff gets into a trash can."
The driver replies, "Who the ###### are YOU to come over here and tell me what to do?" ...

Something I failed to mention from yesterday concerning McElroy making you pay for hotel & safety equipment, if you miss ANY day of your training period for any reason then McElroy will deduct said costs from your pay but will reimburse you upon completion of training. And if you choose, you may accept a $5/day lunch allowance, which IS treated as a cash advance deducted from 1st paycheck.

I've learned that McElroy has been in business since 1964. They suffered their first fatal ...

Day one of orientation at McElroy in Ennis was a good one. Quiet a contrast from school. Although most of what we did was paperwork, Q&A and the typical "new recruit" stuff, it actually seemed organized.

We have four recruits. Two of us are sharing a hotel room; the other two are close enough to commute.

They will be issuing us a hardhat & safety glasses that come with a small price tag. One guy protested he already had a hardhat. The safety manager (trainer, ...