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

I dunno…..sometimes we would get backhauls of landscaping blocks that delivered to WalMart. They tore up the straps used to hold them, and I heard barely paid for the fuel.

 

Amusing moment today.

Was hauling some stuff to deliver to Lumber Liquidators in Sandston. Route took me past the exit to our yard.

Literally 60 seconds later I get a phone call from my DM.

"Did you drop that load at Sandston?"
"No, heading there now. ETA about 15 minutes."
"Oh. Because I just pinged you and it said you were on the yard."
"That's probably because you happened to ping me just as I was driving past our exit."

 

Heading to Lakeland,Fl to drop at a forward air facility tommorrow.

 

Parked in a reserve spot at flying j here in Aurora OR which is 7 miles from my LUL at Winco Foods. So I could get out tonight easy and in case I needed to come back after unload if for some reason they went fast instead of a few hours breaking stuff down. Watched this Indian driver try to jack knife his truck in two spots down from me because he almost hit me several times. Wide open space where he could just pull straight forward and go straight back. He stayed at it for over two hours.....why, just why do drivers insist on doing dumb things.....

 

That was the fastest Ive been unloaded at Winco, only took an hour and a half. Last time Winco took 5 hours.

 

Jeez, I’m parked at the TA across the street. I unload at noon at the Staples DC. Wish I knew you were there. Would have met up and chatted.

 

Maybe next time if there is one. I parked about 1230 then took off close to 2300 then came back after empty for couple hours this morning for a nap before heading to hometime in Yakima.

 

Picking up for a show in Orlando,heading to Tx and Ca.

Hopefully I'm not waiting here all day tommorrow waiting on the call.

 

Got a phone call from my DM this morning at 7:14am.

DM: "You ready to roll?"
Me: "Yep."

I had woken up an hour and a half earlier, was already halfway through my first 24oz travel mug of coffee of the day, and was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. But I normally wait until the load planners arrive before I send in a qualcomm message asking for a load, and they don't get there until around 7:30am.

Load assignment was to take an empty to Givens in Chesapeake, get loaded, and deliver to Sulligent, AL at 8:00am Monday morning.

Givens doesn't start loading until 10am, and they're two hours away from the Richmond yard. So I need to leave at 8:00am. And it's 13hrs 30min from Givens to Sulligent.

Which means HQ called me this morning at 7:14am and asked me if I was ready to roll so they could give me a load assignment with 58.5 hours of extra time on it.

Like...why?

I don't mind being called at 7:14am and being asked if I'm ready to roll.

And it's not that I mind being given a load assignment with 58.5 hours of extra time on it, either. I like my leisurely weekends as much as the next guy.

But if you're going to call me first thing in the morning to ask if I'm ready, that implies something of a sense of urgency. Why else would you call?

And there is zero urgency for this load.

So mainly I'm just puzzled.

I infer (perhaps incorrectly) that this is part of another initiative by HQ to have the DMs stay more in touch with their drivers.

 

Hmmm.....I haven’t gotten any good morning calls, checking in on me or asking those type of questions that I’ve always thought were reserved for the screw ups. The first time it happens, I know exactly what will be said from my end, “please, babysit someone else, after 7 years here with absolutely zero late loads, I’m thinking you have the wrong number.”