The journey begins - purchased a truck.

Thanks KW Cajun - thought I hadn't seen you round these parts for a while. I passed your best wishes on to gimpy foot - she said thanks.

Done - downloaded. I'll test it out in the shuttle on the way to orientation this morning.

Good thinking - I'll check it out. Yes, small class, 5 of us.

OK - I'll relax a bit. That's running at ambient temps of 45-60 degrees.

Correct - the garaged one is Blue, came out of the factory the same month and year as I did, coincidentally. The red one was white - I bought it in the first 6 months of being here, spent $2k on it, shipped it back to NZ in a container and into a storage building I bought. I asked my mother to roll it out and run the engine every month, which turned into her running it around town, enjoying the compliments - I eventually gave it to her. She had it repainted and the interior restored.

My 74 year old neighbor who I run around town with when I'm home, likes to have me park outside the bank and say "Keep the engine running - this won't take long" . . . good sense of humor and a bit of a prankster. Unfortunately, that model vette was one of the weakest HP years in the line-up, but I really like the aesthetics of them, hips, waist, chest - take a good look at one next time you see one.

 

Thanks Mark. This is my 'facebook' - I don't do the other social medias, and the forum has been an excellent source of information. Totalled together, there's billions of miles of experience, thousands of engines rebuilt, lots of lessons learned. I'm not doing anything new here, but the running commentary helps me clear my thoughts on to keyboard, and if it helps anybody else - as others help me, then it's worthwhile.

 

DAY 1 orientation

Small class of 5. One guy from Triple Crown, One O/O of 25+ years, one guy who is VERY quiet, and a guy that says he owns his own trucking company, 8 trailers, but he's going to lease a LS trailer (?), and see how things are before he brings his whole fleet. He's been everywhere and done everything . . . . he advised me to train on flatbed for 3 months, informs me that I'm going to kill someone. Love these guys.

The center itself is very new. Learned that this, and the other 6 or 7 centers like it, are available to go to for any admin needs, spare forms, support etc. This one has a couple of showers, laundry, wifi, PC's, large break room. Very nice. Plenty of parking. Gated securoty. I took the shuttle in - why fire up the KW if I didn't have to. I 'crack of dawn' ed it - didn't really need to. Need a driver number to access gates and doors - problem, still not 'qualified' - just wait till another driver opens a door and slip on in.

Orientation lady has obviously dealt with smart mouth truckers for a while, so she blasts through the material and takes little guff. Defensive driving course and videos, Hazmat revision, ELD rundown. Hazmat test to finish the day - a lot of time spent on the training for a commodity that few want to haul, but still course required. I have my hands on the "Landstar BCO resource guide". In here, I believe, is most of the information you NEED to know. I spent 3 hours last night entrenched in the guide. A lot of it I've already run through, the financial calculators mimic KR's book, anything that is NOT in the guide, has references (LOTS of references) to where you can go for help/info/training/extras.

Lunch was served. It doesn't matter where you go - truckers are the same. Here's what I mean. They told us "Lunch will be served, those in classes will be first in line". I assumed that would be because we had limited time to eat and get back to class. Wrong.

I happened to be 2nd to last in the "Class Line". Behind us was a snaking line of salivating, angry looking drivers that were looking at us like we were stealing their mothers jewellery. I grabbed a quick plate and sat down to eat, leaving the brownies there - I'll pick up one after lunch. No - I won't. I turned around in 5 minutes time and it appeared as a giant Wet and Dry vacuum cleaner had been through the place and removed all consumable items from the room. I guess orientation and CABS class are good days to get a free lunch. Funny stuff.

So far, so good. A lot more paperwork and details than I'm used to, but that's to be expected. Planet recruiter, Planet Orientator, and Planet Blair, may not all exist in the same universe . . . at any given time.