Calex Express....My New Home!

Unfortunately they don't.

 

I was in safety while you were on the phone with Jim the other day. I'm glad it's going in the right direction for you. Good luck, the only thing left is to pass the physical/drug screen then it will be Pittston bound.

 

Same to you and yours. I take it you are at the house. I need a favor from you, I need your full name in order to get a little bone from safety for you getting hired on. If you don't mind, email it to me at, johnfioretti@aol.com. Thanks and enjoy your holidays with your family.

 

As I'm quite sure everyone knows, I'm home. I got here last night around 7pm after making a drop in Atlanta yesterday morning. I finished my last drop in West Palm Beach this morning. I'm preplanned for a lettuce load out of Belle Glade Tuesday afternoon for a drop back in Florence NJ for Thursday then off to California again. This works out just right for me, I need to see my Lawyer Monday to put the final signatures on the paperwork to end this lawsuit I've been involved with for the last year. Anyway, it's over with and I now can go on with my life.

Here is an update to my return trip from California. I left Ontario and headed to Coachella to stop and get my load info and make some phone calls. As I was getting off the 10 freeway my computer came to life. I pulled into the T/A and went over the info. My load had changed but again, for the better though. I now had 3 p/u's in Yuma, and they were through our on site load arranger. I've dealt with him about 4 other times in Salinas and let me tell you, he's worth his weight in gold. What he does is make our appointments for the pick ups and goes to each packing house and gets our freight staged to load as soon as we get there. Him being Mexican eliminates the language barrier and really speeds things up. On top of all that he happens to be a real nice guy. The best thing is he oversees the loading and all I do is sit in the truck and wait to sign my bills. My 3 pickups were 2 miles apart from each other and I was done around 2am.

I scaled out to make sure I was legal then went to bed. I woke up at day break the next morning and called Gary who had loaded in Vernon the day before. He too spent the whole day loading and only made it to Barstow before calling it a night. I called him the next morning and he was west of Flagstaff and I was south of Flag on 17. I needed fuel so I decided to fuel off network and fill up at Little America. The only problem was the more North I was going the heavier the rain was getting, then it turned to snow and all plans now were up for change. By the time I got to the 17/40 split all roads were snow packed. I made it to Little America, fueled, had lunch and waited on Gary. About an hour later here comes Gary and off we went.

As we pushed east the snow stopped. Until we got to Holbrook Then it started again. It got a little heavier then it got dark and I decided to call it a night at Gallup. Gary wanted to go on but I told him the roads would be getting worse as the night wore on and that we would be better off to let the storm get in front of us. I would much rather deal with this during the day instead of at night anyway. He finally agreed and we fueled then went to bed. The next morning I opened my curtains and saw it had stopped during the night. We showered and got ready to leave. I shut my APU off and started my truck to find it wouldn't build up air pressure. I put some alcohol in the air dryer, then let in run for a while to maybe clear the blockage. It didn't. I told Gary to go on without me and hopefully I would catch up with him in OKC. After an hour of this I decided to undo the main airline from the compressor to see if the compressor was working. As I was holding my hand over the fitting it started spitting out water, oil and then the alcohol until it was finally spitting out all air. I hooked up the airline and got back in my truck to see the air pressure building up. Problem solved, ready to go.

I called Gary and asked him how the hill was going toward Moriarty. He said the road was shut down at the top of the hill because of a jackknifed big truck. By the time I got there I only had to wait about 45 minutes. Clines Corner was it's usual mess then it was smooth sailing the rest of the way to OKC. I got there around midnight and went to bed for a long deserved sleep.

We got up and fueled then left. We both needed to stop at Walmart so we decided on Vandalia Ill. After the short stop we had enough time on our clocks to get to Cloverdale Indiana for our break. We got up the next morning and drove to Clayton In. for fuel. From there it was onto Ohio. Gary needed to stop at the rest area before Columbus and I kept on going to the truck rest area north of Columbus on 71. I left and called Gary on the phone to find out he was only 2 miles behind me. From there all I had in mind was to get to PA and try to beat the lake effect snow they were calling for before it got dark. Gary decided to stop at the 79 mm to take a shower. I decided to go all the way to the 215 mm which is 3 miles to my delivery. I got there, showered and went to bed.

I got up the next morning at 5am and drove over to my delivery and was empty by 9am. It's an automatic deadhead back to the yard so I was headed back and saw Gary going the other way to go get his Florida Christmas at home load. I had an issue with the balancing on my steer tires so I got to the yard and spent the day there while they changed the 2 steer tires and both tie rod ends. My Florida Christmas home load was sitting in the yard waiting for me. I finally left that evening and made it to Greencastle where I went to sleep. Got up the next morning and made it to Commerce Ga for fuel and sleep. Got up yesterday around 5am and was done with my first drop at 7am. Got home last night at 7pm. When I got to my parking spot by the house I had only 13 minutes left on my 70 hour clock. I started this trip from California with a fresh 70 and ran out of time as I got to the house. I picked up 7+ hours the next day so I wasn't too concerned about the clock. For the select few (1) person that questions how you can legally run those miles in a week, I just did, again. I'm just fortunate enough to be able to do simple math and plan my week. Time management with an electronic clock is very important, and here I sit till Tuesday. That's all folks!

 

Thanks, dinner will be on me when we meet.

 

Thank you, same to you and your family, God Bless.

 

yes ,i am at the house got here monday afternoon ,already planed for monday out of Griffin GA back to Maspeth N Y . I must say i do not enjoy going into the city in my truck. I guess I am just not that familiar with the best way to get in and out of there. Have you ever been to 88 trading co. off 48 th st. ? I'll send email now.

 

Yes I've been there. It really isn't hard to get there. My brain isn't working right now. I'll get you all the info you'll need to get in and out without any problems. Just give me a day or two.

 

Merry Christmas Everyone!

 

SAME TO YOU, AND THE FAMILY




lARRY