My company shipped the other driver that was at our store back to the main branch. That leaves me as the only CDL driver at our branch.
Today - I ended up driving both trucks - the semi and the 10-wheeler.
What I like about the arrangement is that I stay BUSY whereas before - because of the collapse of the economy - 2 drivers was overkill for a small outpost type of store.
I'm not above sweeping floors and doing other mundane work - but every day gets old.
An interesting occurence today at work.
THere is a particular contractor that we are "forced" to deliver to - the guy that runs the show at the site is not a pleasant man. Not at all. I have been delivering to this company, that site and this man for almost the 3 years I have worked at my current company. The man has yelled at me, insulted me, hurled all kinds of nastiness my way - for no good reason and has done the same with other drivers.

He also gets into frequent arguments over the phone with the salesman whose account it belongs to.

Anyway. I'm making a rush delivery - whatever it is they're doing out there, they want this stuff today. The salesman brings the material from downtown to our branch that we don't have, the truck is already loaded, I take off.

This is at an Intel plant where they make microprocessors, so you have to go through the gated entry, turn the truck off, open the hood, give them your driver's license number, on and on. It takes 5 minutes just to get through THAT process alone. A pain, yes, but part of the job, I just smile and give the same information every single time.

I get through there and drive by their yard where they store their material. No-one there. I go by one of the jobsites they are working on out there, no-one there. I go to the third and final place that I have delivered to at that plant in the past - no-one there, either. I don't just wait around and hope something happens. I start making phone calls. The phone number for this foreman isn't on the paperwork, so I call the inside salesman. He puts me on hold and comes back on and tells me HE doesn't have this guy's phone number, either. Wonderful. He says to me: "I don't know what the (bleep) to do in a situation like this". Well, I do.

Standard operating procedure - call the company's main office to get a phone number for the foreman. I tell the salesman that's what I'm doing, he says fine and that's that. I call the company, a rather sweet-sounding lady gets on the phone, I tell her I need the foreman's phone number cause' I can't find him out there. She replies that she can get me his number, but that if I need directions, there is a man sitting right next to her that can tell you.

Great. This man gets on the phone, I introduce myself and tell him where I'm at. He says no, that's not where I'm supposed to be. Okay, where do I need to go? We finally get it straight that I am AT the place I'm supposed to be at. "Well, there's no one out here, not even any equipment. I didn't know who this man was, but he got pissed in a fast hurry, said he didn't know where the f*** those guys were at but that he would find them and send them over in a hurry.

Umm, okay, thanks. That didn't sound good, but - I do what needs to be done to get someone notified that a truck is sitting there, waiting.

Now, not 2 minutes later, this man drives up with a look on his face. He's glaring at me. I get out of the truck and say my cordialities - regardless of how sour this guy is going to be, I'm always professional in demeanor with him. He asks me if I was the one who just called the main office. Yes sir, I didn't see you guys out here and I didn't know where to take this material to. "Well, what's the problem, you don't have my number?". No sir, it's not on the ticket, and I called the inside salesman who didn't have your number, either.

I KNEW something was going on. He takes the ticket from me, tells me he'll meet me at the yard, and then immediately gets on the phone.

I have had run-ins with this guy before, the best thing to do is simply be totally respectful and keep myself out of trouble as best as possible. The problem is, this guy IS a trouble-maker, owns his own universe, and we're just a part of it for his entertainment.

Delivery made, I get back to the yard, get in the semi which is already loaded, drive downtown and deliver that pipe, back to my yard, and then I hear from my co-worker that he had heard the boss talking to the outside salesman about what had happened.

NOTHING happened, really. But sure enough, that foreman had called the outside salesman, harped on him. The outside salesman called my boss and asked him why I'm calling the main office? Fortunately for me, the boss stood up for me. The salesman said I should be reprimanded for it.

Lol. This particular salesman also owns HIS own universe and EVERYONE should do things HIS way. My boss is asking him what I was supposed to do in a situation like that? He basically told this salesman that if we can't get a hold of either salesman on the account, and the salesman didn't put a phone number on the ticket, then we ARE going to call the main office.

Now, let me tell you, the man I talked to at the main office? I was totally respectful, congenial, nice, cordial, all that stuff with him on the phone as well. Didn't have a clue what title the man held, but it was obvious from the way he was talking he was definitely higher up the ladder than this guy at the job site. And so it was - turned out the guy is the vice-president of the entire company!!

So, basically, surmising that the foreman got into trouble for not having his crew over there working. They were NOT working, but who knows what - maybe they were on lunch break. Apparently, whatever they were doing, they should not have been doing it, though, cause that vice-president got hotter than the sun's surface in a fraction of a second when he realized I was where I was supposed to be and NONE of them were over there doing anything.

Well, at least I didn't get into trouble - and rightly so, common sense. I make claims that I still have some of it, regardless of whether half the rest of this world doesn't.

TrooperRat

I haven't posted anything for awhile and I've been avoiding the boards. Just a little more contention on those boards than I want to deal with right now, I have enough going on in life. I'm not saying this is a BAD site, but there are always people that want to argue, even when the consensus is predominantly AGAINST them. It gets old. That's all.

Trucker Buddies wrote me an email today asking me to register for this school year?!!!
This school year is WELL underway, what's up? I registered a few months ago. They said they have "a lot of unprocessed registrations sitting on their desks".

Ummm, well what's with that? Well, I didn't cop the tude' with them, I just filled out all the information again and hope to get back with a classroom of kids again.

If you like kids - you might consider registering with Trucker Buddies. They match you to a classroom full of kids and you write back and forth with them. The first year I did it, the class regularly sent me hand made pics - from EACH kid in the class!! It was totally cool. I loved it. I wrote them back and told them of some of the more adventurous things I was into.

It's probably more geared for the OTR driver who is seeing different states and cities and things every day - but - I drive all over Arizona and THAT is enough in itself to provide very interesting stories. I'm a bit of a writer anyway and can make it entertaining for whatever age level of kid I'm trying to communicate with.

So, how's the economy affecting you? Is your company having trouble giving you the miles? I laugh at the conpsirarist drivers who think their companies are doing it on purpose. EVERYONE - including trucking - is feeling this. One of our drivers got the can notice Friday. He's gone. I have absolutely NO job security right now - but then again - who does? I just hope and pray that I have a job to go to everyday, and I get a big smile when I see that the boss isn't calling me in to have "The Talk" with me. Well, my boss doesn't do that stuff anyway, the general manager does the sit-down, see-ya-later stuff.

I have tenants living in my house at this point - my hours have been cut back. I have been continuously talking with the drivers that are coming into our yard with varying loads of stuff - there are few that have good prognosis. Many companies are laying off drivers, parking rigs. Even some are going out. L.A.Yuma is history. I spoke with a driver from Estes who said he is going full-bore and thought the company is doing well.
A LONG list of LTL companies that definitely AREN'T boding well. It's expected. There's less freight being ordered, there's less freight to deliver.
I don't want to live in fear, at the same time, I'm a realist. This is a day-to-day thing and I'm in the same boat with everyone else.
The good side for me? For me, I'm so happy that both my parents (divorced long ago) are financially secure and don't have to worry about money. They go on vacations, do what they want, when they want to. They outright own their homes and only have to pay the yearly taxes. I would SO hate to see either my mom or my dad suffering in poverty and scraping by. Of course, if that were the case, I would have them living with me if they needed it. They are both very independent people, getting very old, and still in pretty good health.

THAT - folks - makes ME happy!

TrooperRat

..........wants to become a truck driver.
I hadn't seen him in ages, he called me out of the blue last weekend and asked to come over. Sure, why not? Always up to having old, current, new friends over.
He didn't tell me about the idea of becoming a trucker, he just said he wanted to visit.
Well, we're visiting.

This that and the other thing - his kids, my kids, his ex - as I said, it was a fairly normal conversation until he gave up the information that - he's going to be a truck driver.

I was a little bit shocked, really, that this college-educated guy that has very good-paying jobs over the years was going on the road.

But only for a fraction of a second. I have been following the economic disaster going on in our society for a while now - a LOT of people have lost their jobs and those people are looking for ANY pastures - green or brown - as long as they have a paycheck attached to them.

He then said how he was going to get into the trucking industry: Swift Enterprises via their school.

GAG.

He just shrugged me off when I started to warn him that that particular company has one of the worst - and I do mean WORST - reputations in the trucking industry.

I was really a little taken aback that he really didn't want to hear anything I had to say about my 25 years of trucking experience, but then again, I've known this guy for a decade, I know how he thinks.

I guess he was just looking for a support committee. I went through a long list of things about trucking - he didn't care. Okay, then. Good luck. He has one big thing going for him: His mother died last year and he inherited some money. Not enough to live off of for life, but enough to float for several years considering he also got her house which is paid for.

That simply means any pressure is off in terms of the low pay he's gonna get while he's in training. I know, I've read the Swift threads, I understand what the place is about - at least from what I have read and there's a lot there. Oh well. I also warned him about the throes of having to drive with a trainer.

You know, some people just have to learn the hard way. They won't listen to anyone, they get their mind made up and that's that.

So, I changed subjects. I got off all of that. He's gonna do it - he's gonna do it. Hey, I said, after you go through school and do all that double-clutching junk, you'll learn how to float gears! I knew that would take him for a loop - who but truckers and their friends/family have ever heard about floating gears? Imagination might put it at having a shifter floating on the water in a lake somehow...........

I guess I wish my friend luck, but darn, what a wicked time to enter the trucking industry.

TrooperRat

Long story. I grew up as a preacher's kid, one of 3 boys, the youngest in my case - whose dad was a full-time minister. He was gone a lot - out doing "church" stuff that I didn't understand.
Growing up in the church, Jesus seemed to be nothing more than a fictional character to me. That's how the children's ministry portrayed Him. Cartoonish - right up there with Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd.
I hated going to church as a little boy - my parents would have to carry my out to the car, I would be kicking and screaming. When I got to church, I wouldn't sit in the pews, I would wander around this massive building - all levels of it - until the service was over.

Fast forward. I'm 13 years old. I hated my life and I made a conscious decision to rebel. I followed in my older brothers footsteps - who were right there to help me out - in starting to drink alcohol and then marijuana - and then graduating to whatever drug I could get my hands on. I took pleasure in destruction. I hung out with 2 different groups of people. The first group was around my age and we got into destroying people's property and getting into fights. The second group was much worse - bikers - throughout my teen years I would come to see many friends and people I knew, die.

With death all around me, I never gave it a thought. I continued on my rebellious, evil, wicked ways. I was a drunkard by the time I was 14 and was smoking pot morning, noon and night. I was selling pot in order to feed my habit - which wasn't small - I was stoned constantly for 7 years. I was popping pills, taking LSD, snorting/freebasing cocaine, downers, uppers, meth, whatever.

I met a friend along the way who very quickly became my best friend. I would go over to his house - he hated his mother but I loved hanging out with her. We would get drunk - this 40 something year old woman and I. Words about Christ would come out of my mouth and I wouldn't know why - in those times I would be so drunk, it wasn't logical for such things to be said.

Time passed. I met some more people - I was a socialite, meeting people was great fun. I had a CB radio in my bedroom at my house - and through some very unusual and violent circumstances, met a guy that I started hanging around with quite a lot. He knew a girl whose mother was Christian. We would go over to this girl's house a lot - drunk, stoned, fried, whatever - and this mother would sit there in her living room, paying it not a thought, but would inject a few statements here and there about the Lord. Very subtle, but - eventually had a great impact on me.

This relationship grew, but I was still very rebellious. The Lord sent various people my way throughout my teen years to witness to me about Him. To Christians: you know how you meet a stranger and feel prompted to say something about the Lord to that person? And you do? And it doesn't seem accepted? Think again. God has HIS ways and they are FAR above anything we can imagine. Words have POWER. Just look at God - He spoke some words and the earth was created.......not that we're gods, but there is definitely power in the spoken word.

There was the time a man chased me down while I was riding my bicycle - I had flipped him off for no good reason - I was in GREAT shape and couldn't believe this guy outchased me. He knocked me over, into the sand, I was still cussing him out. He claimed to be some NFL superstar - I don't remember his name because I didn't care at the time. He toned down and started telling my about my life - and the Lord.

There were many such instances. I would see those Chick tracts on telephone booths and take them home - hiding them so no-one would know I was thinking about "getting religion" as everyone I knew called it.

Eventually, I actually graduated high school through all of this and was then kicked out of my house by my mother - who was throwing everyone else out as well, including my dad. It was rough, I was working at a small airport at the time but it wasn't paying much and I ended up sleeping in my car for a while. At least it was a station wagon, and those old station wagons were great with the room to stretch out in.....

It took years for me to come to the Lord, is what I'm really saying through all of this. Yes, there was the one day - the day I repented and gave my life to Him - but it was such a long process. Eventually, I ended up living with my oldest brother for a short time. I was broke - even though I had a job, paying my portion of the rent consumed much of my finances. I had little left to live on.

One day, my friend - the guy whose mother I used to get drunk with - called me and wanted me to go to a biker bar in south Chandler. We'd been there many times - drink beer and shoot pool. God caught up with me there. Trust me, there weren't any Christians in this place. I was getting drunk and shooting pool when all of a sudden, I started having a vision. It was a vision of me falling into the black depths of wherever I was falling - until I saw this enormous hole with nothing but flames inside of it.

I had consumed large quantities of beer that day - and yet suddenly, I was as sober as if I hadn't had a drink. I had had enough - I was ready to die anyway. Life sucked at the time. Broke, no hope, nothing to live for. I gave my life to the Lord - inside of me, yes, but still, I did it. I looked at my friend and asked him if he could take me home, he had brought me over there. He didn't know what was going on and I didn't want to tell him, a huge stigma was attached to anyone in our group of people that was "found out" to having "turned religious". He was mad at me and couldn't understand why I suddenly wanted to leave - normally we would have stayed there for hours and hours.

My conversion was total and complete. I totally abandoned my friends and started hiding in my bedroom at home - spending all of my time reading and consuming the Bible, listening to Gospel tapes and watching preachers on TV. They all serve their purpose whether anyone wants to relate to that or believe that or not.

I think it was 8 months later - another long story I won't go into here, but I ended up on the full-time, volunteer mission field. It was an amazing journal which took me to a lot of places, encountered a lot of evil and threats, and was probably the most outstanding thing I have ever done with my life. There are other things I have done in public service - but I certainly have never regretted my time on the mission field.

TrooperRat

I should have known better. In these parts, newly started constructions always have an in and out area to access the site that is lined with river rock.
When it's first laid, it isn't compacted and trucks get stuck in that stuff because the drives just sink into it.
So it was today. I was trying to pull into one of those things so I could turn around off a street that dead-ended after just having had made a delivery there.
Freakin' truck sank like busted boat in water.
What made the situation worse was the phone call I had just recieved - I had to high-tail it downtown to pick up a fusion machine to turn around and high-tail it another 60 miles to the site -which was shut down because of the thing this fusion machine was going to fix.
I'm frantically kicking out the rocks behind the drives and attempting to clear it so it can back out of the mess.
I gave up after 10 minutes and highly-winded from the rock-kicking waste of time - if I had had a shovel I probably could have cleared a backwards path out of it.
I decided, instead, to go drag the nearest backhoe/operater and have him pull it out.
Yes, it pulled it out, but that backhoe struggled for at least 30 seconds with it before the tractor finally broke free of the rocks.
I've been driving for 25 years and I still do dumb things at times.....................

TrooperRat

So, I got into this new house here early this year. How I got into this place, I'll never know with all the financial/mortgage/housing catastrophe going on out there. But I did.

The problem is this place is totally undeveloped. The lot was cleared entirely of mature fiolage in order to put the house in. So I'm starting from ground zero. PLus there are things I want to do to the inside of the house to get things the way I want it.

Not to mention I would like to get some money saved up in something other than a 401k account - I have that, yes, and I can get loans from it as well, yes - but it doesn't take the place of a savings account.

So I started looking for a second job. My usual haunts are all dried up. A little surprising considering the time of year it is. Usually there are lots of places needing fill-in drivers for seasonal work - too much cargo and not enough drivers to fill the seats. I gladly do some of that and get some extra cash.

Times are tight and tough right now. Who knows if this bailout's going to do anything for common Joe Dirt like me. Probably NOT, I'm guessing. Dang if I haven't searched the entire Phoenix area for part time jobs. I have found PLENTY of full-time positions - which seemed strange considering there is one guy who keeps posting on the forum that there isn't anything available. I can list one site that has all kinds of full-time, local jobs in the Phoenix area, right now. Well, not my problem. I didn't have to look very long to find it, though.

So, as much as I hate to, I'm going OUT of the trucking realm and into something else to find some extra cash. I still have my full-time career, no problem there. Well, maybe. Who knows. My company and it's direct ties to the construction industry isn't a good position to be in right now.

Yup, I'm going for it. Retail sales or something that gives me a lot of flexibility in hours, as my full-time job takes priority over any temp/part time thing. Having Sundays off, I just got done putting in all kinds of online applications - it's the way to do things nowadays, I guess. Used ta be that you HAD to go into each place and fill out an appy-cap. Very time consuming, I love the internet - one app after another, no running around, wasting fuel, time and my Sunday after noon.

I'll still keep my eyes open for temp jobs in the trucking arena, but they seem to be hard and far and few to find.

Oh well. One way or another, I hope to make Christmas - which is only a few months away - SWEEEEEET!!!

TrooperRat

I will have to admit something, and if nowhere else, at least on this blog (I have several). I see the day, after my kids are grown up and gone, that I will do OTR again. Not because I have to out of necessity, not because I can't find a local job, but because I want to.

As much as I like (and dislike - love/hate relationship) local driving (nothing like being home every day when you are bringing up a family) - I always loved OTR when I was engaged in it.

The aspect of going to all 48 states and seeing all kinds of different things that most people will never see - at least not to that scope - was wonderful. From Florida to Washington, from Arizona to Maine - I have been to all the mainland states. I was once given the choice of taking a load to Alaska, which I readily accepted, but a driver with seniority found out about and took it from me. That was a big bummer, I have always wanted to go to Alaska.

I know the OTR lifestyle - but admittedly - except for what I read on this particular board - I have no idea what it's like in terms of dealing with all the regulations that are imposed nowadays. I haven't done OTR since 1994. That's a pretty long time ago considering the changes in the trucking industry and the mandated regulations that have been spewing out from the Federal Government ever since.

Actually, I try to stay up on all the newest regs that come out, or about-faces to regs that Feds thought were such a great idea and then decided they weren't so great after all. I have to at least stay up on it enough to stay knowledgable enough to inform my boss about what needs to be done or what we have to do to stay legal - my boss is not, after all, a truck driver, never has been one and has no intention of becoming one. He relies almost totally on me to tell him what we're doing right and what we're doing wrong.

I am NOT considering such a change right now. First and foremost, the economy has totally tanked and finding a good OTR job might be next to impossible. The good spots are undoubtedly taken and there is a waiting list - undoubtedly. I have lots of friends, though, in the right places, if need ever came up. It's a good idea - to newbies - to never burn your bridges if you don't really have to. That bridge might come to your rescue someday, you just never know.

When the eventuality comes that I might entertain the idea of going OTR again, first my kids will be up and out of the house. Several years til' that happens. The other thing that must be right is the economy and booming business. Obviously that ain't happening right now. The third qualifier for me is that I MUST be allowed to take a dog with me!! How can you live without your dogs? Why would you WANT to? That's just me, though, dogs aren't for everyone, I've had them in my life since I was in my mother's womb, and that's a fact. And not just any dog, either, it would be a Great Dane. Have a bunkhouse - the Dane can sleep in one and I'll take the other.

Okay, I'm just saying. How could a dog that large want to be in a thing that small? Notta problem - Danes are mostly house dogs. They would rather lay around doing nothing than running around all over the place - I can tell you that from experience.

What I always liked about OTR was the diversity of people I came into contact with, and not just other truck drivers. Farmers - I had more encounters with those kinds of people than anyone - are some of the most interesting characters on the face of the earth. You don't have to believe me. I went to farmer's fields too many times and always had personal interactions with the farmer that actually owned the place. I dunno - there were just so many different kinds of people that you would never meet in person if living an "ordinary" life.

I was never at the same place. Maybe I went to the same place more than once, but it rarely ever happened in consecutive runs. I mean, once, Werner dumped me on a run that went from somewhere in Texas to somewhere in Nevada and I was stuck on that run for over a month. I came to HATE the stretch of road that lied between the two, and was hating the job in particular. I finally had to threaten to quit to get off of that run - and yes, I was serious about quitting. That was a regional type of run at best, which I MIGHT have been able to handle if ANYWHERE along the line, my home was to be found. My home at the time was 1,500 miles from the nearest point of that run.

That was the other thing I was contemplating. Maybe a western region run that has me out for however long but home frequently as well. I know the UPS Freight driver that comes to our yard frequently is home every other day. He's making good money - according to him anyway - and he is content with the job.

Yes, there are certain aspects of OTR I really miss. There are others that can be dumped into the nearest landfill, undoubtedly and definitely.

Someday.......

TrooperRat