Millis OTR journal

They do that for a bunch of reasons. Usually if I get pulled off a load, Opie is using that load to get another driver home.

 

Sup y'all. Tonight I'm in Knoxville, Tennessee. I've been a slacker the last few days and haven't posted anything, so here's my recap. Last I left you, I was in Cartersville. I got a load the next morning that picked up in Chatsworth. It was a carpet load heading to the Menards DC in Holiday City, Ohio and due anytime yesterday. I had a preplan waiting for me after that in Trenton. My goal was to get to the drop lot in Trenton and get to the terminal before my 11 was done. On Friday, I stopped for the night at my spot in London, Kentucky. Originally, I was just going to grab a restroom break and grab some coffee and keep going. However, traffic was ramping up in Cincinnati. Coupled with the heavy construction going on there now, I decided to stay put. In retrospect, I should have pushed further north. Like to the Love's in Sadieville. Yesterday and today would have been much different if I had. I did the math, and I had time yesterday to get everything accomplished and end up at the Trenton terminal for the night. However, fate is a prankster. There was construction on 127 on the way to Holiday City. The road was shut down, and there was no way around. One of the guys on the road crew directed me to a feed mill where I could turn around and head back south. I found a way around on my GPS, but it killed 45 minutes of my time. By the time I got to my final, I had just under 4 hours left on my clock. Then I had to head back through the same detour to get back to 127 south of the construction. There went my time buffer. I didn't even have enough time to just go straight to the terminal and skip getting the load. I went to the last place I could before time ran out. The Walmart in Eaton. I was definitely not happy, but there wasn't anything I could do about it. Man I really wish I had listened to myself and gone to Sadieville. I would have made it to the Trenton terminal with my next load in tow. And I would have had time to fuel up and weigh the load. Crimany. So this morning I got to the drop lot where there was absolutely zero room to drop my empty. I dropped it off at the terminal, fueled up, and went back to grab my load. I got my paperwork, hooked up to the load, and more fun came my way. I went to strap the load and discovered that one of the pallets of beer was badly shifted and looked likely to fall. I informed dispatch and they pulled me off that load and gave me this load heading to Spartanburg, SC. For some reason I can't figure out, traffic has been extremely heavy today. I have to go through The Gorge on this trip, and I wasn't in the mood to fight that road and all the moronic four-wheelers as well. So I'll be leaving here at 4:30am to get through it as easily as possible. It'll be dark, but I'll take that over today's traffic. I'm 3 hours from my final, and leaving at that time will give me an hour of cushion. So, barring any unforseen bs I should have plenty of time. With my luck lately, the highway will be shut down or I'll get a blown tire. Let's spin the roulette wheel and see what happens. Hope you guys are all doing well. Talk at ya tomorrow, it's time to call it a day. Keep the rubber side down. Peace y'all.

 

Greetings from London.....again. If I'm here again in the next couple days, I may have to put up a mailbox lol. Today went really smooth, all things considered. Traffic through The Gorge was awesome, which made my decision last night look like a smart one. I looked up my final before I took up this morning. The satellite view showed an extremely small lot, so I stopped at a truck stop about 15 miles away to burn off some of my buffer. Anything more than 15-20 minutes early could prove to be a bad choice, as there isn't much room. I was right, it was ridiculously tiny. Just turning into the lot was a feat. I pulled back to the dock area, and there was another Millis truck there unloading. This place was so small that we had to coordinate our movements so that I could pull in and he could pull out. Unreal. There was trash everywhere in the dock area including broken glass. When I finished unloading, no one let me know I was done, they just signed my bill, stuck it in the door and walked away. I had to hunt someone down to be informed of that. When I pulled away from the dock and turned to get out, I had to turn so sharp that my cab extender was an inch from the side of my trailer. I couldn't see the reflector on the trailer anymore so I had to actually get out and look to see how close it was. Nice people, for sure, but c'mon fellas...gimme a fn break with this lot. At least the unload was fast. I've been here for almost a year and I've never been there before. Hopefully it'll be another year. Or never, that would be even better. Opie gave me a choice of two loads after that. One was almost 700 miles, and one was about 500. I took the shorter run. The longer one picked up in a place where I had a guaranteed wait of 5 hours before I'd be loaded, and I'd be spending the night there. No thanks, I've done that one too many times at that place, someone else can deal with it. So I happily took the shorter run and ran my tail off to get to London. I had about 30 minutes left on my 14. So basically this is as far as I could possibly have gone with my remaining time. That's a happy coincidence, I'll take it. There is one more truck stop I could have reached about 9 miles further north but that place is an absolute dump. It is ironically one of my trainer's favorite spots. Bring a penicillin shot with you if you go, you'll need it. They have free showers, but honestly they should pay you to take one there. Consider it hazard pay. Another bonus for taking this load is time. My final is 3.5 hours away just a little to the northeast of Cincinnati and it isn't due until 1pm. So I'm gonna get a ton of sleep and get some laundry done as well. @keen98 I know you'll appreciate this....I had two stops for my fuel solution. One was at a Love's for 60 gallons, and the other was at the Trenton terminal for a complete fill. In order for me to make that fuel stop I would burn an entire hour because it's so far off route. Some day I'd love to see that fuel program in person at BRF. Friggin stupid. Trenton should never be used as fuel solution unless you are picking a load up there, or dropping one off. It isn't on the way to ANYWHERE. David, you asked me to post the good and the bad. There is very little in the bad column. But Trenton needs to be removed from the fuel list when it is considered to be a stop that is "on the way". It isn't on the way to any destination, ever. I completely filled my tanks at the Love's. I am still 100% compliant, but 50 of the gallons I pumped won't count on my bonus because it was over the 60 I was given at that location. I don't care about the money, because it only works out to $5. But that situation is ridiculous. 2 stops on a 500 mile run, and one of those stops burns an hour of my time. I think the system needs tweaked. I know for sure that I'm not the only person here who shares that opinion. I promise you that you'll get suggestions if you ask for them. Alrighty, that's all I got for now. I don't have to leave here for about 13 hours, so I'm gonna eat and hit the sack. And hopefully get a load of laundry done. Hope y'all had a good day. Be safe out there, and keep the rubber side down. Peace y'all, see you on the flipside.

 

No, because I know how that's gonna go. Confusion on their end. F it man, it's just 5 bucks on my check, and I'm still at 100% so it's cool. Not worth my time.