Heading For Little Rock! Maverick

wow, i haven't been to Ghent in a while.


i don't miss it.

 

Hey guys I'm still alive. I made it through my first week with my trainer and yes I just about quit. I was a hair from saying I can't do this, but I stuck it out and am leaving for Nebraska tomorrow morning with a load of slinkies. Hey if any of you guys go to Mac Steel be prepared to sit for 20+ hours; because we sit there Monday for nearly 24hours before we got loaded. Then we drove from there to Georgetown Ky (I can't remember the names of the places, just the towns. I'm trying to remember sooooo much stuff it seems overwhelming). From there we went to Ghent Ky to NAS to get a load of flat steel and coils (That's the day I just about quit). We sat there for nearly 15hours. From there we went to Phoenix Metals in Spring Hill, TN and drop that load off and went to Gallatin, TN to get the load of slinkies that is on the trailer now. I don't get to get on the internet through the week because I am driving all the time, plus I'm trying to learn the "real world of loading" versus what we did in the barn. My trainer is great and he said I am doing better than I think I am, but, I think, my confidence level is lower than it should be; considering after this week I will be on my third week; which is what he called he double hockey sticks week. I will have to do everything on my own although he will be in the jump seat. If anyone wants to call or text me my number is 931-265-7449. If you do call or text and it takes me awhile to get back with you, it's because I am either driving, setting up for a load or tarping, but I will get back with ya. Thanks for all of your help!!

Michael

 

it get's easier, hang in there, you'll be fine.

 

Oh I almost forgot that I got cussed out at Ghent Ky from a Boyd Trainer. We picked up out sheet steel at door H8. If you guys ever have to pick up at that door, go through the scale house and go all the way to the back of the building, turn right, go across the railroad tracks and when you get to the stop sign turn left. From there go around the building until you come to a gravel parking lot on the right. When you get there turn right and right when you think you are going to drive through the wall look to your right, that will be door H8. You can't see it from the road because it is set in behind two walls.
Anyway, we got our sheet steel and had to pull back through the scale house to wait until we got called to get our coils (that took hours) we finally get called and they tell us to go to door C7. We waited out turn and my trainer went inside to check in. While I was waiting, this boyd driver came up to my door and said, "hey maverick why don't you move your f'in truck out of my d*** way. I was like hey guy, I have never been here before and my trainer went inside to check in and we are next in line to go in. He said, "I don't give a da** who told you to wait, move your truck. By that time I am like I have no idea what to do, this warehouse is massive, can't find my trainer (I went in the door and didn't see him; so I went back and got in the truck); so I asked a guy that was tarping his load behind my truck, if he would spot me while I backed up. He said sure no problem. As I was backing up the door raised and there stood my trainer and he was looking at my like what the heck are you doing. The whole time the trainer driver from boyd was calling me everything but a white guy. Saying you s.o.b f'n maverick driver can't back for ####. I stopped the truck because my trainer told me to and then he came to the door asking me why I was backing up and I said, "that boyd driver right there told me to move my f'n truck and cussed me out. Well that went over like a led balloon. It was reported and needless to say, if the boyd guy had just kept his mouth shut and waited his turn, then he wouldn't have saw us waving at him as we left Ghent. They let the boyd guy pull in first, loaded the wrong stuff on his truck on purpose, let him get it almost fully tarped, then went out and told him, that he had the wrong material and also told him that when the four other trucks that were inside the building got loaded that he was to back, back in the building to get unloaded and reloaded with the right material.
I have almost quit twice already. Once was when I was in the barn at NLR because one of the instructors made a comment about me being a small guy; which I weigh about a buck fifty. I didn't like the comment and was a hair from telling him that I didn't want to work for a company that put people down like he just did me and he could shove Maverick up his ***, but I never went and told Curt about it. I don't want to be labeled as a problem maker, I just let it go in one ear and out the other. However, we were getting loaded at another place and a driver from another company made a comment like that and my trainer politely told him to back off.

 

Sorry to hear about the "close calls". You were warned about quitting.lol

All of these steel mills have different procedures that they expect the drivers to follow. Of course they won't tell you what these procedures are... Then you have the local drivers or drivers who have been in these places many times and think that for some reason they have more "right" to be there than you do.

Revenge is sweet sometimes

Find out who that Boyd driver was. Maybe we could pull a few strings and make the problem "disappear".

I am sure you are doing better than you think. You must be doing more right than wrong, which in my opinion is a good day.

I got my pilots license many years ago and I will never forget the first solo flight. I was all calm and cool until the tires left the tarmac..then that bead of sweat broke out on my forehead...holy crap! It is all up to me. Nobody sitting in the other seat to bail me out. Scary as h*** but absolutely amazing too.

I will try to give you a call sometime this week. Be careful and keep up the good work.

Dave

 

wow, 100 pages!!

 

Keep your chin up ramloghauler. You'll be fine. I think we all had those days we wanted to quit in training. I still do sometimes Hell, just yesterday I was cussing up a storm while tarping a load of pipe lol. You just got to calm down. After awhile you get to use to it. I have my days, but I still love pulling a flatbed.

 

Yea I see different drivers from other companies showing how "unprofessional" they represent who they drive for. Makes me glad I chose the cream of the crop! I told my trainer this past Friday that I had thought about quitting when I was at Ghent Ky and he said he knew I was, but he wasn't going to let me. He said man you lived through IED's and all that s*** overseas; so all of this is nothing compared to what you went through. This past week seemed harder than anything I went through overseas including playing russian rullet while pulling a flatbed over IED laden roads. However, I had been doing my job for over a year before I even went overseas; so I knew how to chain/strap down loads. Sometimes I would load a piece of heavy equipment and have an oh #### moment, but I just over secured it and nothing ever fell off my flatbed. Driving here in the states just seems overwhelming, but as I am typing this, driving either here or over there, the job is still the same; at least here I don't have to worry about rolling over an IED and knowing it..... Once I was traveling on MSR (Main Supply Route) Bronze and had both a D7 and a John Deere 1150 dozers on my RGN lowboy and I saw an IED in the middle of the road. There was no way I could stop my truck in time because of the weight of the load; so I told my A driver (passenger) to hold on and say a prayer because we were fixing to roll over an IED. We didn't hit it THANK GOD!!!!!!

 

Hopefully, I will be off next weekend to catch up with you guys. Until then be safe out there and if you go to Mac Steel, maybe they finally got caught up; if not be prepared to sit awhile! FYI if they ask for your phone number when you check in, you will be sitting for hours or at least we were!