Abilene Motor Express....A New Place To Call Home

Ive only gotten layover to "sweeten" a favor for dispatch. In those cases it was mentioned as part of the asking/telling to do them the favor. Usually works out in my benefit.

 

Speaking of favors, this story illustrates one of my routine experiences being a ne driver. (Lack of communication, 'do your best' etc) Came in tuesday morning and given a evening hill phoenix in rehoboth beach delaware. The wife hopped on board so i took my time and lazily headed up there and expected to spend the night at the drop and wait till 8am when dispatch came in. Ended up getting there about 3 hours before the appt time. About an hour before i got there the ne planner called and asked if i could drop hook at halls in nj, then deliver at 4am in newark nj. Even in the best of circumstances was gonna be about an hour short on my 14 to get to the final destination ahead of the appt time. Planner basically said 'do your best' well did my best and got it delivered that morning, late. Ran into the planner the next day when i was on the yard and he told me that he was happy and didnt actually expect everything to happen like it did.

So moral of the story. Abilene asks a lot and usually dispatch/planners know when they are asking unrealistic things and dont penalize the driver for not meeting unrealistic times. **NOTE** this was for BROKER load, not customer load.

 

I have run countless loads that were well past the appt time before I could legally deliver. The main thing is that they can see you ran it as hard as you could. I've never had a complaint about a load being late because they can tell from your elogs that you drove non-stop except for the required 30 min break and that you only took the 30min/10hr and no more.

When I first started I used to get into a panic when I trip planned and realized I couldn't make delivery on time which resulted in frantic QC messages and phone calls on my part. Now I don't even bat an eye if the delivery time can't be met due to getting the load past the time where I can physically make it.

 

Conditions have been very treacherous here in the Texas Panhandle today. I am thankfully through the worst of it, but earlier today, west of Amarillo, it was just all kinds of Chaos. Snow, rain, heavy cross winds, etcetera. Miles and miles of slow-moving, one-lane traffic. Several cars in the median, or off the side of the road. One 18 wheeler who had completely crossed the median into oncoming traffic. Fortunately, it looked like no one was hurt, presumably because traffic was already at a crawl.

 

After delivering Sabra in Riverside Wednesday at 3am, ran up and got a produce load in Salinas CA Wednesday afternoon bound for Rochester NY. Quite the messy winter run thru WY and NE but sitting in Pembroke NY at the Flying J. 46 miles from delivery which is noon Monday. 80 was a construction nightmare the last 60 miles of IL and all the way across IN. Set me back about 2 hours with 1 lane and 45 the whole way.

Ran nights in storms from west to east. Snow until out of WY. Torrential downpours the rest of the way. Finally stopped raining as I hit the OH/PA line on 90. But it's following me. Lol ... Should get here tonight. Wicked winds from west to east.

Steak lunch / dinner today.

 

When last we left our intrepid hero, he was hauling a load of hay to Coalinga, CA, due Saturday. Why, then, was he crawling through winter weather in the Texas Panhandle earlier today?

I'm glad you asked!

Friday, long about, oh, 1:00pm Richmond time, I called Alan my Fleet Manager and told him that I'd put in a hometime request the previous Friday and still haven't heard anything about whether or not it'd been approved. He said to wait until Monday, and if I hadn't heard anything by Monday to call him back.

Alan and I have a good working relationship and I know I can trust him on this kinda stuff, so I said "Groovy, will do. Thanks." and motored on down the highway.

So there I was in Primm, AZ, putting fuel in the tank just before crossing the Califnordia state line so as to minimize my chances of having to put fuel in the tank IN Califnordia. Got back in the cab, and lo and behold I had a new load assignment. Drop my trailer full of hay at the Colton yard and pick up another trailer that's due in Pennsylvania on Tuesday.

And it occurred to me that Alan was looking out for me by making sure that I had a load assignment that would get me back on the East Coast by the time my scheduled hometime is supposed to start. So that was pretty cool of him, I thought.

The tricky business is that the load is due at the Amazon facility in Lewisberry, PA by 4:00pm Tuesday. According to my GPS, it will take 41:24 to get from the Colton yard to Lewisberry, PA. And according to my calculations, I was only going to have a total of 40:28 driveable hours to get there.

Well, okay, not as bad as it sounds. My GPS thinks I can't go any faster than 63 MPH. I do that because if I have enough time to get there at an average speed of 63 MPH, I'll surely get there on time at 69 MPH or 71 MPH. So I know the 41:24 estimate is actually a lowball, and I will make up time on the way.

And I did! I had gained quite a bit of time on the clock...right up until the treacherous winter weather nullified all of those gains. Now the GPS thinks I'll need 19 hours for the rest of the trip...which is exactly how much total drive time I'm going to have between now and 4:00pm Tuesday...

Gonna be a squeaker.

 

Weather won't last forever, I'm sure you will beat that time easy. I've found that with the faster trucks I can usually get close to the Google maps eta.

 

You jinxed me. Road closures on I-44 in Missouri due to flooding. Gotta go way outta my way.

THANKS, Obama Redtwin!