Calex Express....My New Home!

Thank you so much for this phrase. This tells me exactly why my chosen profession is for some very special people. My next blog entry will tell everyone just what the meaning of your phrase is. Thanks!

 

Well here is an update to my trip out west.....

I got to the terminal around 9:30 am. Garylobo drop and hooked in Mountaintop PA with his load from SC and picked up a load going to Merced CA.

I went into safety to find out about my truck and was shocked to hear it wouldn't be ready until next week. I went into the shop to find out just what the deal was and was told that when they tried unbolting the turbo to replace a valve, they broke 3 bolts in the engine that hold it in place, and they had to replace my manifold that was on back order.

I will now give you my feeling about the Volvo truck company. It totally blows my mind that a manufacturer like Volvo, who has the most class 8 trucks on the road in the US, has a piss poor parts division for stocking parts. I thought about this when I had to replace my driver side mirror back in November when that seagull committed suicide on my truck in NC. and 3 Volvo dealers didn't have the mirror in stock. Come on Volvo, we are talking about an everyday part, not some part for the Space Shuttle!

So after finding out the facts about my truck, I went back into safety to find out what they will be giving me to drive until next week. Mort told me the truck # that I would be using temporarily and the first thing I said was to call the cleaning service we use to come out and clean the truck. I did my time with a filthy, smoke choking, nicotene filled truck when I got my truck last year, I was not going to do it again. He told me that the driver assigned to this truck was a non-smoker and that the truck was ready to go. Understand something, I'm not an ex-smoker, I'm a non-smoker, I'm 54 and never put a cigarette in my mouth my entire life, I saw what smoking did to my Dad and it wasn't very pretty. I have other faults and smoking isn't one of them.

I went and found my temporary home on wheels and was very surprised to see a spotless truck. The only problem was that the fridge didn't work and all my food that I took from home that the wife made not only was going bad in my fridge due to the fact that the shop unhooked the batteries the day before after putting my truck in the shop, but now I had no fridge so everything perishable had to be thrown out. Not starting off good!

I went up to see Louie to find out where I was headed and he told me I had a 2 drop load that was being loaded that afternoon at the same place Garylobo had loaded. The first drop was El Monte 4am Wed. and the second drop was Fresno at 10am. I figured that after switching all my stuff from one truck to another and setting up house, I would be wiped out, and I was.

It took me quite a while to move all my belongings from xx227 to xx277 but I figured it would be worth it to have a truck with 430,000 miles on it instead of 827,000 miles. I moved all my belongings into the new truck, saw that it had just been serviced, put fuel in it and bobtailed to Mountaintop to pick up my load. Garylobo called and said he was going as far as Barkeyville then shutting down for the night. I told him I would meet him there that night and we would run out west together.

I got my trailer around 2pm then parked out of the way and set up house. That took me 2 hours. Understand this nut job of a driver, everything in my life has to be in order, including my truck. When I left the shipper, everything was in place and I was listening to Howard Stern on my way out of the driveway.

On my way to meet Garylobo I noticed that the trailer was swaying more than usual and my truck seemed to be all over the road. I figured it had to do with it being a different truck and a lot less miles on it. I figured by tomorrow I would be use to it. I got to Barkeyville around 10pm after going through a 12 mile, 3 hour construction zone. This started my next learning session in my life as a truck driver. My regular truck is an automatic with a clutch pedal. I never understood why it had a clutch pedal if it was an automatic until I backed this new truck into a spot for the first time. It has no clutch pedal, and if anyone was watching me they where convinced this was my first time backing up. I will admit that one of my finer points about driving is my ability to back up. I guess working as a kid at my family's trucking company in the Bronx while growing up and running LTL into NYC with a big truck for 15 years taught me something, but this was a comedy hour this night!

We got up the next morning, showered (not together), had breakfast then left. Gary is a lot like me, we both need to plan our trips down to the last detail. We figured out our route, our fuel stops, our 650-675 miles per day and of course our food stops. One place that's a must for Gary is Imo's Pizza in St. Louis. He told me countless times that as a kid growing up in St. Louis, Imo's was the place. Granted it's good, but I'll take a slice of Pizza from any corner pizzeria in NYC anytime. Me being Italian and growing up that way allows me to be very picky with Italian food. But, I will say that many years ago I was delivering in Seattle and I asked the receiver if there was any Italian restaurants around and he told me to leave the truck where it was and to walk around the corner to this little Italian restaurant. I did and to this day I tell everyone the same thing, that was the best Italian food I ever had on the road!

We left around 8:30 Saturday morning and I was still trying to get the feel of my new truck. As we were going through Akron, my truck started vibrating and riding real rough. I told Gary I needed to pull onto the shoulder to see what the problem was. I got out and found the problem, the bar that connects the air leveler rod to the suspension had come undone and was just hanging. I knew this wasn't a major fix and that all it needed was a lock washer, but I didn't have anything like it. I called into the shop and told them what the deal was. I also told them I was only 12 miles to the T/A in Lodi and that I will limp it in to there. Gary headed to the T/A and I drove the last 12 miles at 35 mph with my flashers going. I got to the T/A wrote the work order up, told the shop guy that If it should take more than 15 minutes to get in touch with road service that I had plenty of money on my fuel card and that I would pay cash for it. I guess the guy liked my idea because he gave both me and Gary a coupon for a free meal each. We went and ate and about 15 minutes later I was paged to the shop. i get there and was told that it's been fixed and that they got the P.O. from the shop and I was good to go. I started the truck up, all my air-bags inflated and I was good to go. I hooked up to my trailer and we left. Boy was I feeling good now. That lasted about 1 mile to the on ramp to I-71 south.

As I was merging onto the interstate the same thing happened. I told Gary to go on and that I was going to turn around and go back. I got off at the next exit which had a Love's at it, dropped my trailer and headed back to the T/A. I got to the shop and told them what happened. They put me right back in and realized that the mechanic put the wrong size washer on. After 10 minutes I was good to go, except this time I was driving around the parking lot hitting every whole I could find to make sure it would be ok. It was and I was off to get my trailer. I called Gary and we decided to meet at Imo's just south of St. Louis on 44. As I was getting close to the 270 split Gary called to let me know that the Cardinals baseball game was just letting out and not to go through town but go around 270. It was about 10 miles farther but a lot less traffic. He told me that he was at Imo's and that they closed at 11. I told him I wouldn't be ther until at least 11:30. He told me that he asked the manager if they would stay open a little later and they said sure. I got there at 11:30 ate and then went to the pilot 10 miles down the road to sleep.

I have gotten very spoiled with my wife's cooking for me. It was killing me to have to buy all my meals out. I find it very funny when I hear drivers say that such and such has great food, or that this truckstop has great meals. Sorry folks but the best meals I have are the ones I have at home. I get absolutely disgusted when I have to spend 10-15 dollars on a meal in a truck stop and find it totally disgusting. I had all my dry foods with me, so I told Gary that I would be hitting a Wal-Mart on Sunday to by a cooler and some food and milk to take the edge off my food bill for the next 10 days. I have said this before, I can leave my house with $50 in my pocket and get home 5 days later with $40 left. Going to California, I was nauseated with the fact I had to spend a bunch of money on food that wasn't very good. Oh by the way, my refurbished GPS that I bought 2 years ago for my motorcycle trips finally died so I decided to buy a new one. Not at the truck stop though. I bought one for my wife 2 years ago and find it very user friendly so I decided to get the same one for the truck. I don't need those 7 inch screen trucker specific deals that started out at $500 last year. All I need was one that showed me miles to go, total miles and ETA's. Just something to help me keep an eye on my electronic log.

I must tell you about this head case that was in the Wal-Mart parking lot in El Reno Ok last Sunday making a jerk out of himself. If you doubt it, just ask Gary, he was watching the whole thing. I went into Wal-Mart, did my shopping and bought the same exact GPS that I bought my wife 2 years ago for $390, except now I bought it for $90. I bought a 28 quart Coleman cooler and a bunch of food that required ice. I told the clerk I needed 3 bags of ice. Sorry sir our ice machine is broke but you can get it at one of the gas stations outside. Right kid, I'll just put this truck and trailer in my back pocket. As it would only happen to me, I went to 2 different gas stations and both of them had no ice. After the second try I was walking back to my truck in 95 degree heat, kicking air, talking to myself and being very animated about the fact that only me can be in need of ice and the whole intersection filled with gas stations has no ice.
I got back into my truck and Gary called me on the CB. I told him about the ice and at this moment I was turning the truck around and going back to Pittston to wait on my truck. He tried to calm me down and I told him that I would stop at the next truck stop to get ice, except the next truck stop was 50 miles away. Great the $40 I just spent on food and milk will now need to be thrown away. I made it to the Love's and went inside and told the girl at the fuel desk that I see you have an ice chest outside, but does it have ice in it? She looked at me like I was nuts, which at that moment I was, and told me that yes they do have ice and that they make their own. Gary was with me and apologized to the girl about me and my antics. I now had my, food, milk and ice tea all on ice. Life is good again.

I need to tell you about the fact that I might go a whole week and not talk to anyone at Calex. This is one of the reasons I like this company. But on this trip I have spoken to more people about issues related to this truck than I have in any given week. Since Saturday I have spoken to Melanie about my breakdown, I have spoken to Mort about the missing registration to the truck, I have spoken to the new girl in safety to fax me a copy of the reggie, I have spoken to Eddie about the problem with my fuel card not being assigned to the new truck I'm in and I have spoken to Louie and Pat in dispatch to let them know I won't be taking a reset when I get empty. I told Gary that so far I'm not enjoying this trip to California. I keep hoping it will get better then I realize that exactly what problems do I have? I am able to run at least 3000 miles a week, I'm home every 5 days, my check is in my checking account every Friday morning without any mistakes, and the people I do have to speak with back in Pittston are great to work for and with.

Gary and I split up just past Flagstaff last night. I had enough hours on my day to make it to Kingman AZ then wake up early enough to make my drop in El Monte a day early. My LTL days kicked in last night, I only had 3 pallets to kick off at the first drop so I decided to go in a day early and deliver. It was only 3 pallets and my thinking behind it was to able to get done earlier tomorrow then scheduled. I was originally set up for 4am Wednesday and then 10am in Fresno. I didn't call the first place, I just showed up. My rationale about that is if you call them they would probably say no, but if you just show up, especially with only 3 pallets they more than likely will take you off, which is what they did. I called my second stop and asked if they would be able to take me earlier than 10 am tomorrow. They said sure and they open at 7am. So here I sit in Wheeler Ridge at the T/A with 132 miles to go. I called dispatch today and told them about my new empty time and that I would be ready to go as soon as I get empty. They told me they had a bunch of summer fruit coming out of the area I will be empty at and that they would have me loaded tomorrow sometime. The good thing about that is that I will deliver Sunday night and be back in Pittston first thing Monday morning to turn in both these trips at the same time to be paid next Friday. Lets see, that will be a little over 6000 miles in 10 days. Not bad. Like I said, what complaints do I really have? I'll update my trip during the week. Be safe all, God Bless!