Help with Roehl and trip planning

I kind of have that sinking feeling but it's so comical it relieves a lot of the stress. I just delivered my load and I'm not sending any messages and I have no idea how I'll respond when they eventually want to know what's going on.

Anyway, you've been great, so I appreciate all your responses, here.

God's got my attention and I can't go anywhere. I've got a whole day to look for some answers.

 

Thanks for taking the time to type all that. I just don't know what to think. Safety, safety, safety, oh and, rush, rush, rush....

You talk about all these miles. 10 trips now, the longest was 750 loaded miles, a couple under 200 miles, and my reward for sitting at this truck stop on Thanksgiving with an APU that blows cold and an idle shut down I can't get to override? A nice, phat, 289 mile trip I get to hand off to somebody else.

I don't think this is salvageable even though I have no idea which way I'll turn at this point.

Yeah, I eat while driving plenty, but usually that's a matter of choice. You've got to woof something down at a fuel stop; you have no time to shower en route and you sleep where there is no shower; a service failure because you waited on your load info...

You have no idea about this electronic logging...

I'm just bummed, I was trying to move up and it sounds like I'm with the bottom feeder of bottom feeders...

 

Yeah, if they had thought enough about us to show up in orientation and welcome us to the company, I'd follow that lead. I went straight from the training group to the my fleet manager.

When I got back after my first time out, I wasn't happy. I was getting my things out of my truck (slip seat) and was called in to inventory the new permits. I told her I inventoried the permits already (when I got the truck) and that the next guy could inventory the permits. Some guy sitting in the office inserts himself in the conversation and tells me I "get to" inventory them again. I figured this guy, whoever he was, must be somebody, so I inventoried the permits again.

This stranger who didn't think enough of me to introduce himself was my fm's boss.

Now, you talk about management groups. What is that. I go through recruiting, I'm assigned an fm, I stumble across her boss who, while he seemed nice, was just full of baloney and is a big part of the reason I'm sitting in this cold truck on Thanksgiving morning with my coat on (I need to grab a hat, my head is cold).

Yeah, a little professionalism? A little respect? Some avenue of someone to talk to who isn't trying to "break me" or some young dude who never drove a truck and is just trying to please all the right people so he can keep his job and stay on his management track...

The more I talk, the deeper the hole gets, I believe. Seriously, I'm not making any of this up. Not the average length of haul, not the pace, not the conversations, not the way I feel sitting in this truck Thanksgiving morning making no money, apart from my family.

Look, where is this going? I'm coming across like a whiner, right? I just haven't got a plan B right now. Before coming here, I went through 5 days of orientation with Central Transport before finally concluding that wasn't going to work (just read about Central Transport, otherwise, certainly no hard feelings) . So, since leaving Bynum 8 weeks ago, this is my second job. Don't know which way to go

Don't pity me too much. House is paid for, car is paid for...there's a path, somewhere...

Oh yeah, the electronic logs, I was actually looking forward to them. As I indicated before, I've worked under "match tolls and fuel receipts" and "match to Qualcomm", so I've done all this first hand. There is a little wiggle room even under "match to Qualcomm" but with this electronic log, I went back and edited in a pretrip and all hell broke loose. I got a red line on the drive line and no one could figure out why, certainly not the trained safety expert they sent me to. What I had done, I edited down the the 10 hour break to 9 hours and 58 minutes. Took me quite awhile to figure that out.

So, in this safety conscious company, we've already got the admission that a trainer is teaching his trainee to fudge his line four and drivers are having to grab Fritos on the run to make their delivery times. I guess some of them stink, too. That's safety, eating hot dogs behind the wheel...

Listen, I know the industry, none of this would be an issue with me and normally I wouldn't call anyone out. Just, in my case, I'm stuck right now, literally, in this cold truck, and I kind of laugh because I really don't care who knows about it...

 

She explained the 14 hour rule for me, I found out it hasn't changed in 16 years. Then she said, 'oop, this is wrong.' And I looked and I said, 'no, I didn't go over 11 hours.' She gets her pencil and calculator going again, 'oop, this is wrong.' 'No, I didn't exceed the 14, and even if I did, I can work all night long on line four as long as I don't drive.'

'What? You think you can just work all night long!? You're going to have to talk to your fm about that.'

'No really, I can, besides, even the final post trip is within in the 14 hours.'

So then, the fm calls me up and starts chewing on me for "my attitude."

I was a lieutenant, once. I know what it is to have a little education and training and to be placed in charge of experience people when you scarcely know what is going on. I get it. I've done it It's no fun and I can be sympathetic. But, I tried to clarify this rule with this woman and she got in a huff when I gave up and asked her name so that I could say who I was talking trying to solve this problem.

Again, no big deal except for the 'you don't know, I'm the expert' attitude and I've still got this red line and I have a load committment and the guard is kicking me out of the parking lot at Aldis and I just need answers, all I needed was an answer.

Comedy, right?

I appreciate having you to talk to about this stuff. When I flunked my driving test I told another trainer, 'look, I just want a truck and a load assignment', not trying to get tangled up with personalities. I had no idea the fun had only started. Did you know, you've got to play with that trailer lock a little bit before you can easily get it on and off the door. And when I picked up this Columbia and I've got it in the repair shop because the door doesn't open when you pull on it, even hard...double lock, you have to pull twice, who knew? The head of maintenance punking me easily opening and closing the door over and over and my FM standing right there snickering...

 

The Alex Jones radio show from noon to three CST on XM 166! The economy isn't coming back, IMO. Could there be a bump? Maybe, but the die was cast in 1913 and through the haze, within the matrix, no one can see the Illuminati staring us in the face right there on their Federal Reserve notes. *cough*

Hey, I just got a phone call. If I haven't completely shot myself in the foot there may be a glimmer of hope, here. Probably need to shut my mouth at this point.