Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll

Sorry for the delay in updates. Being in the motel room I have been pretty much vegging out and just watching tv and what not.

We'll start with Monday morning, get up at 5:45am est, 4:45am for me. Get up, take a shower and watch a little CNN. Head downstairs at about 6:20 and grab some cereal and juice. Guy that manages the hotel takes me to TA at 6:45am. Odd, no one else just me. One other guy shows up that lives local and going to be doing their 7 and 7 program.

We fill out a little paperwork then they say ok we're sending you guys to Ft Wayne, IN to do physicals and road tests. WTF? So we hop in the company van, and head to pilot and gas up and hit the road, 3 hours later we arrive at a "operations center" that consists of a small brick building and a small gravel parking lot with a single truck and trailer parked.

Guy inside tells us to go get our physical done, and here is where the party gets started. I fill out the paperwork at the docs office and get called back, get weighed, eyes, and drug test taken care of. Then in comes the docs assistant, pretty little nurse probably late 20's early 30's, pretty easy on the eyes. Makes me do all these twists and turns and garbage and then "drop em and turn your head". The woohoo thought quickly ended when she about shoved her finger THROUGH me in the nether regions, roughly little woman. Now its party time... She tells me to head over to the other side of the place for my Human Performance Evaluation....

Gertrude tells me to have a sit and explains what we are gonna be doing, and I get wore out just thinking about it. Hardest part first it is I decide. She turns on a machine that has a constant beat sound and makes me step up and down onto a step that is roughly 2.5 feet tall for 5 minutes straight. First 3 minutes go by pretty quick, but then the smokers lung kicks in and the knees start turning to jello. Not to mention I start coughing because Gertrude's perfume is choking me, only for her to smirk and tell me I smoke too much. 5 minutes pass and I sit in a chair with a monitor on my finger, waiting for my pulse rate to drop below 120 in 3 minutes. Pass that fine.

Push 200lbs on a 2wheel cart 25 feet, turn around and come back. Unload cart, reload cart. Pull cart 25 feet, pull it back. Lift weights onto a bar 53 inches high. Stack them, then take them down and stack on the floor. Walk over to a step ladder and step up to the second step 5 times. Then she tells me to duck walk for 10 feet. Umm, excuse me? After a short demonstration which is hard to contain my laughter I do it. Now this all wasn't so bad but the first part whooped me. Not to mention I was wearing work boot instead of tennis shoes.

Other guy didn't pass his physical so we head back to the shack called the operations center which only 2 people work at. Only to be told, well it's too late in the afternoon to do the roadtest so just head back to Grove City and be there at 7am in the morning. No sweat, we head back and I get to take the van back with me, since the other guy was local and going home anyways.



Move on to today (Tuesday). Slept in a few minutes only to wake up and feeling every single muscle from my calves to the tip of my hair. Get to TA at 7am, do a bit of paperwork then started doing eLearning on the PC, learning how to do crap the TA way. Head out to my driving test, here comes the fun part boys and girls. You see for the past year and a half I been driving a peterbilt, split shift 13 speed. Haven't drove a straight 10 since school. Make it through the driving test while getting a crash course in shifting lol. Really made me feel like a complete noob but they guy was pretty good about it and understood and worked with me. Aced the backing test.

Back to the eLearning, got a little over half way working through lunch and I called it quits about 5:15 local time.

Sorry there wasn't anything too exciting to update with, just the boring drag of orientation. But all is going well, will finish up things tomorrow and get my truck, will get a load tomorrow afternoon or Thursday morning depending on when I'm done.


Drive safe!

 

Today's update will be rather short as I am not a very happy camper.

Got my truck today, finished all the paperwork and all the eLearning junk. After today I am kicking myself from coming to work for TA. Right now I am in a clunker truck, that will be traded in soon. No big deal, I can handle that.

Can't install my own CB, shop has to do it. Can only use 1 power inverter, Cobra 1500 watt, well don't have the money for that. Shop has to install it.

When I get to go home, I don't have room to park a truck and trailer so I can't actually take my tuck home, has to be parked some where safe because we can't drop the trailer.

There is a lot of micromanaging that I don't like but I will deal with it, for now.

Not a lot of positive to say right now. Hopefully get a load toward home tomorrow. Updates later.

Drive safe.

 

Exactly, I will deal with the crap for a while, who knows things may get better.

I have almost a 1.5 year OTR experience, once I hit that 1.5 mark there is a set in stone job I could have that would pay good, and get me home every weekend.

I guess sometimes we just jump the gun and jump at the first opportunity that comes at us. I know recruiters will say anything to get people to agree to work for them, but flat out lying is another issue.

Oh well, will try to make the best of it, I could be over reacting and just needing a good nights sleep. At least we can idle (since i dont have a bunk heater in the clunker) if its below 30 and above 80 lol

 

Oh yeah I am defiantly aware of the idle rules of the states, not so bad in the summer time, but sure does suck in the winter time.

Really need to invest in an electric blanket tho, you can even find them on ebay that will plug into a cigarette lighter plug.

I'm using my little power inverter to power my laptop, it just plugs into the cigarette lighter. Hope I don't get caught

 

Ok where to start. It's been a long week, even tho it really hasn't been. The 3 days of knowledge cramming during orientation was just mentally draining.

Got dispatched for a load Wednesday night, pickup in Columbus, OH. with a destination of Holmdel, NJ. Had to park at the Mechanicsburg, PA support center because of the load was considered high value, even tho it clearly was not. 543 total miles, ok not a bad start.

Get to delivery point in Holmdel (God how I hate New Jersey, seriously, F that place). Get unloaded within 15 minutes of getting detention time. Already knew from my preplan where I was going but had to wait so I could get directions and what not. They send the load assignment about 15 minutes later and I am on the road around noon headed to Avenel, NJ to pickup a load of Snapple, and headed back to Mechanicsburg, PA to drop it on the lot for someone else.

Get a preplan along the way to be a wal-mart pop-up driver. Basically driving my truck for Wal-mart doing their dirty work as a weekend slave. But it is not guarenteed work, you could sit around all weekend waiting on a load or go to 5000000 different stores for deliveries. I decide to air on the side of caution and take my 34 hour restart so I can start the week fresh on Sunday instead of having to take it on Monday.

So that's pretty much it. A short driving week but my brain hurts. I am trying to get used to their way of doing things but its pretty rough getting started. There is a ton of macros they use for the qualcomm, I have 2 of them memorized, but I have a nice huge laminated card for the other 5000 of them.

Drive Safe