Is home every other day a common schedule in trucking

It is, indeed.
I'm not sleeping in a truck & I'm not working for miles.
Home is important.

That's a solid run.

That apparently didn't pay for ####, or had zero bennies.

 

To be fair, I made extra money that day, but it made for a long week.

 

Unfortunately, that's how my rollover seemed to have happened. Tried extending my waking hours by hitting the gym during my 10 and while it worked for awhile, you start nodding off at the most inopportune time. Of course, that time was on the side of the road in a mangled tractor.
11 years later, I start hitting the gym again, but I get my sleep regardless of how much I try to throw a fit about it.

 

No

 

After being medically put out to pasture I went to college a few years. (Old man 40's with students half my age.. yeesh... plus spouse getting her 4 year, it's worthless. Uncle Sam School Bill total for both of us 46000 cool dollars. Paid off in 12 years flat. (Sold a house that helped finish this payoff...)

Im glad I took a stab at college. Especially in IT, security and related with Cisco etc. Telecommunications and so on. I did discover that there was joy in specific things within those fields and I also discovered sheer horror at say programming, line by line breaking big rocks into little rocks hunched over a computer fighting errors in math. UGH. I also learned how to penetrate and bring down hostile computers and networks. I actually succeeded at bringing down the feared and famed classmate who is actively working for the local internet provider and had some serious skills. But when he was brought down in that classroom in view of us all especially with me next to him, his physical and emotional reactions were that of someone who probably has the potential to do harm. Now I suppose it's understandable when his castle was destroyed and burned by little old man . that's me. The teacher learned how I did it and rebuilt that classmate's computer ready the next class day. I HOPE that teacher took him aside for a few minutes and taught him how it was done. It was a simple Domain tree admin stack commands down from top to bottom inside his machine to select shut off at any and all possible dialog messages requiring a yes or no. His machine shut off regardless of a dozen dialog boxes as it proceeded down the tree. His behavior was illuminating. Almost like a trucker without any brakes half way into a runaway and a batch of school buses at the bottom coming up.

Back to topic.

I had to make changes in my life after I was blind in 2009. Surgery fixed that problem and saved my life because at that year was very important. To a deaf man without sight was a unlivable situation. Essentially Helen Keller Situation. My spouse would not put up with that. ESPECIALLY since we were a team undergoing a cancer fight and I was needed. (Driving etc) I did that year carefully consider end of life. Learned some things about our laws etc. But not all of it.

Fast forward many years. I am seeing several doctors several times a year and consider my care top notch with adequate medicines I require to be independent and function. That's a blessing. But at the same time as a pain patient it is a curse to anyone else who has to deal with me. For example if I took a fall and was brought to the ER who checks my medicine history with the state pharmacy board and discover 10+ years in active pain management they are suddenly very less inclined to be aggressive in certain medicines as directed by CDC in the so called opoid war.

When they withhold higher level medicines for acute ows, I reach deep into myself and recall my trucking years and how much I managed to get by when things got really bad. Then I show them that I can be tough and endure. I don't like it one bit. I actually get mean if it hurts enough. I cannot help it, the next level is where the brain will pass me out and that's that for a while.

The problem with being tough is simple. You burn the candle at both ends in life. And make it even shorter. If given a choice to reborn and get back into trucking as a life? I would absolutely have done trucking again in a heart beat. It's who I was before I got old enough to legally drive them and I'll die a trucker.

I know this much. Getting old is not fun and gets worse each year. Thankfully I wont be around to be TOO old like some. We already have burnt way too many candles over the years. And lived the way we wanted to live the best we thought how without regrets at all. Disappointments and problems yes. But regrets NO.

 

I've been kind of plugging away at the college thing ever since I graduated high school in 2001. English composition skills were great, understanding of sciences were okay. But if one thing has derailed my college career, it's been my constant struggle with the maths since grade school.

With most of the jobs and degrees being worth any salt having math as their core, this has kind of put me at a disadvantage in that arena. It's a hard thing to deal with when you're stuck repeating what amounts to high school level algebra courses. Taking notice of the consistently changing faces speeding through and eventually moving along to other things.

Before you know it, you're either dealing with a college policy that limits course repeats to four before they kick you out the door for sucking. Or the elementary age kid you used to make fun of down the street is now running circles around you in the arithmetic department. Whatever the case may be, the mental strain of being the rowboat getting splashed by the speed-boats gets a little harrowing after awhile.

That said, I feel I'm a glutton for punishment and come back around again for some more. Problem with my rate of repeat in that particular subject is that government aid and loans will only take the habit so far. So I got to do what I can to keep my health in balance and that medical card always current. Because as I search for other methods to get that material effectively into my head and advance to the next level, this will pretty much be the only way to fund it without going into super debt.

On another round though, I recently submitted an app to a Union Pacific train crew position after whigging out on one back in 2011. It could go both ways, but there's a hiring bonus involved and it's in the Denver area(other jobs in the area seem to be creating a bit of an employees market, along with the atypical high rents and such). So with those two factors in the mix, there could be a chance a bit of a relaxed, career change will be on the horizon.

 

Don't worry about how common it is to be home every other day. You only need one job. If you find a job you like, that pays enough, and the other details are agreeable what difference is it if it's common or uncommon?