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

That ConAgra in Frankfort, IN turned out to be a drop and not a live unload. Put the NM/AZ BH on me next which Ill deliver early cuz both those places usually will take it early. I was close to needing a 34 anyway too plus needed to go grocery shopping since the WM wallyworld took out truck parking and put one of those hanging beams up. Plus hit up game stop too next door. That would suck to lose BH, must be short drivers or bad planning or bad drivers, lol!

 

Truck out the dealership was told to head home,wont be back till Tuesday,maybe Monday.

 

Cleaned and detailed interior of my truck and feel so much better after decluttering everything, lol!

 

Welp, currently pitched up in a hotel in Bakersfield. Truck is half a mile away at the KW dealership. They say they should at least know what's wrong with it by tonight.

 

Back in the truck after two nights in the hotel. Apparently the truck had a couple of bad sensors, and was not getting the signal from the DPF system that the regen had completed. So it just kept running and kept me in derate.

I was under load when all of this happened. This was the load from Betty Ann in Sparks. The one who told me how much trouble she usually had getting this load delivered properly. The Kenworth shop doesn't have room on their lot for trailers, so the towing company dropped the loaded trailer on their lot before towing the truck to the repair shop just a few miles away.

All of this happened on Thursday, and the load was due to be delivered in Huntington Beach on Friday. So I did my due diligence and called the appropriate folks, letting them know (A) the load needed to be rescued; (B) the address where the trailer could be found; and (C) the address of the Kenworth shop, since I forgot to put the paperwork in the manifest box and whoever rescued the load would need to grab the paperwork off of my passenger seat.

Got back in the truck this morning with a fresh load assignment (bobtail to Sylmar, grab pre-loaded trailer, haul to Richmond), and the first thing I noticed was that the paperwork for the previous load was still on my passenger seat. So either the guy who rescued it delivered it without paperwork or they didn't rescue the load. And given that my start point for my new load was the Colton Yard instead of the repair shop in Bakersfield, I had a pretty good idea which one of those two things it was.

Weekend dispatch asked if I would swing by the towing lot and see if the trailer was still there. And if it was, could I hook it and haul it to the Colton yard before heading to Sylmar? Sure thing.

Got there and the gate was locked, the doors were locked, the windows were dark, and the parking lot was empty. But the trailer was still there. So I updated HQ on the disposition of the trailer, told 'em I couldn't hook it, and it is now once again someone else's problem.

Not sure why it wasn't rescued. Maybe it slipped through the cracks. Maybe they tried but there just weren't enough drivers in the area (since we don't send nearly as many drivers out this way as we used to in years past).

I do feel sorry for Betty Ann, though.

 

Went to grab my westerly BH load yesterday morning and got to the gate at New Castle and no guard. Sat for thirty minutes then checked the other gate and no guard there either so back to the east gate again for another 15 minutes then one finally shows up. Found out night shift was sleeping and ignoring me until shift change….I will see if I can kick off these three stops Monday and Tuesday. They added a third stop to Phoenix.

 

Bad enough the industry seems to not have enough good drivers but security companies can't find good people to even stay awake while on duty.

 

Ya, when I do come across a good security guard, which does happen often, I try to be extra pleasant and thank them.

I’m sure they too see a wide variety of drivers out here. We might as well express a bit of appreciation to the good folks out here with us.

 

Kicked off my Albuquerque stop today and the other two said they would unload tomorrow instead of Wednesday so empty a day early. Saw an Abilene Freightliner on the shoulder and asked if they was ok but no answer on the cb, was going too fast to stop when I saw it was an Abilene. No triangles out either. Waved at you when I saw you going opposite direction @ExtremUnction.

 

<wave wave>