New to OTR and I sort of hate it

Nailed it!!

 

One other tip, when you are sitting in truck stops or loading docks, watch all the other trucks. Watch how they set up their backs, how they maneuver, and watch for any mistakes they make and learn from that.

 

For finding the right hole for your tandems, look at scale ticket to see which axle is over the legal maximum. Divide that excess weight by say 300 pounds, some say 250 to 500, and that will tell you how many holes to slide for your first re-weigh. Each time you reweigh write down which hole position for the tandems. Divide weigh shift by number of holes moved to find out what each tandem hole represents FOR THIS LOAD.

Do yourself a favor and back into a parking spot every time you go to truck stop for more than fuel. Backing stress will ease the more practice you get. The sooner you get that practice the less time you will spend worrying about backing. Some lazy drivers avoid backing and even 5 years later they can't back better than a rookie with his eyes closed.

 

Whether you are OTR, regional, daily daycab you have stress. You are just choosing your form of stress. All the stress an OTR driver has is compressed to fit in the schedule of a regional, or dedicated, or daycab driver. Same with pay. It doesn't really matter if you are paid per load, per mile, per hour you will change one form of stress for another, not avoid stress. I assure you drivers that go home daily and are paid by the clock seldom respond to a traffic jam or a customer taking 3 extra hours with "I'm so relaxed". They are wondering WTF is going on? I'm supposed to be home by 8:16 so I can do Y by 8:30 and still get to bed by Z so I can be at work on-time tomorrow and repeat it all over again.

 

Many truck drivers have no instructional benefit except as a "Do NOT Do What I am Doing." What I see most often is drivers pulling so far ahead of their parking spot they disappear behind a building or row of trucks and then start backing with ZERO vision of what is on either side. They just "suddenly" appear to traffic out of the blue going in reverse and hope not to meet the 75% of truck stop drivers that keep their speed often below 60 mph in the truckstop. "Oh some guy backing up? HURRY UP and squeeze past him before he closes off the space."

 

Trucking is like any other job. You have to put in the time to move up the proverbial ladder. I started out being gone a month or 2 at time, while being in a new relationship. We stuck it out. Been married ever since. Moved to a different company after 5 months that got me home every weekend. Yes a truckers weekend is get home tired Friday night exhausted and leave tired on Sunday from the partying or the work you caught up on at home. It's hard to leave the house, I admit that. But once on the road, things get better.

After the job of home on weekends, switched companies angain. Got local work. Longer hours, less pay. Even at $15.00 an hour. Only home long enough to sleep. Then back to the grind.

A few companies later, with similar results, I bought a truck. This was after 7 years as a company driver learning and studying. Now 10 years later, with all equipment paid for, I work when I want for as long or short as I want. Been off since before Christmas. Might go back in a week or two. Depends on how I feel.

The secret with home time is quality. I remember being on corporate America, working 40-80 hours a week. Getting home tired. Hating the work. The evenings at home went by as fast as a truckers weekend. Two weeks vacation per year. Screw that. I take time whenever I want.

I, like so many others, have embraced the trucker lifestyle. The freedom, office with windows & great views. Climb the proverbial ladder and enjoy the ride.

 

Payback to the trainer; find a new job then when Prime calls, say the trainer fired me and told me to clean my stuff out of the truck, then took my set of keys.

 

My opinion wasn't requested, but I'll offer it anyway
If I didn't have a daughter I'd still be OTR. It takes about 6 months to figure out the lanes you like, and the truck stops you like to stop at.
Training sucks imo, but the solo driver life is pretty nice. Once you have an apu and a decent setup for food and entertainment, you'll feel more at home in the sleeper than "at home". It's worth spending 300$ on a great mattress for the truck if you don't slip seat, and some decent carpet pads for the bunk.
Get past your training, and find a carrier that fits your running pattern.

 

Yes, it does, a lot easier. I was only in training for a month, but I hated everyday of it. Once I got the keys to my own truck and stretched out in the bunk it was all worth it.

 

I stay out 3 to 4 months also. Once you mentally accept that your truck is your "home" you don't miss the other one. I am taking 10 days off this week primarily to spend time with relatives, some of whom are elderly now and won't be around for long, not because I have a personal need to get out of the truck.

Apart from getting the guns out of storage and blowing through a couple hundred dollars worth of ammo at the range, there isn't much I will be doing at home that I wouldn't be doing in the truck. TV, PS4, net surfing etc I can all do while on the road.