It may not be OTR, but it's SOMETHING

A company that runs little mobile billboard trucks has a contract near me (30 miles away) for the next 8 weeks. They also need fill-in drivers from time to time. DOT recordkeeping, under CDL trucks, physical card and drug test required (my medical card is good to 2/2010, whew!). I train in the morning, going to bed now. The good news is I'll get paid for training no matter what. My background still concerns me but they claim they only check for felonies and only for 7 years. My misdemeanor assault charge has a conviction date of 10/2003, so I hope it isn't a bar to employment. We'll see what happens.

They say they have a DOT exemption for overtime. I'll get $11 per hour, 8 hours a day, 6 days a week, total of 48 hours weekly. So $528 weekly gross and they provide a Comdata card for fuel and incidentals. Of course now I have to pay for childcare and commuting fuel in my '76 Gran Torino which is finally roadworthy, but I'll still clear $200 a week or so after that. My youngest boy is now preschool age and only have two little girls to put in daycare.

Maybe they'll have more stuff for me to do after the 8 weeks is up? They did ask if I could travel, I told them a few days at a time up to a week or two is fine. My wife was listening when I said that and she groaned. But I really would love to be traveling.

 

Well, I've been sitting at home twiddling my thumbs with my duffel bag packed up ready to go and I know for sure I'm flying to Vegas, driving to Tulsa, working there, still don't know what to do with the truck when it's over, still don't have a flight number, still don't have a hotel booked, still don't know if anything is available on Comdata for per diems, I'm lost.

I would think if they wanted me in Tulsa by Sunday afternoon, that they would have had me in Vegas tonight? 1240 miles and truck is governed to 65 and suspectible to winds. They look like a 3 foot thick billboard on a flatbed, 13'2" clearance height, and the truck are little Isuzu NPR's lightweight and all.

I figured Albuquerque was the halfway point for the trip with two full days of driving. Maybe they're thinking something else now? I do know they have an open position in Odessa but it doesn't start 'til July 6th. Would be nice to know if that's what they're thinking because my wife and I could be out doing contract merchandising work all this past week and all next week and bring in some extra cash, desperately needed...

 

Flight is booked, hotels...not...I'd rather stay at a cheap motel than a chain anyway, especially since most of my route is I-40, aka Route 66. I won't be lucky enough to stay in say, the Teepee Hotel in Holbrook, AZ, but we'll see what they come up with.

I don't have to leave until 945am Central time Saturday now. 5.5 hours of flight and layover time. They expect me to fly to Vegas, ride around with this guy from 2pm to 6pm VEGAS time. That's 4 more hours. Leaves me 4.5 hours of actual driving time. There's NO WAY I can make ABQ like that. I'll be lucky to get to Flagstaff. Trucks have city fuel tanks. 42 gallons. I'll have at least one refueling stop in between, sucking away another half hour.

I really don't know DOT logbook regulations. I have the logbook, I have an idea of how to fill it out, but going by this Love's book I have, I can drive 11 hours, be on duty 14. So if 9.5 hours is on duty, not driving, flying and riding along, then I only have 4.5 hours of on duty, driving time available this first day, right?

11pm Saturday night rolls around I'll be tucked into some hotel room somewhere along I-40 probably still in Arizona. I think I have ten hours before I can be back on the road. 9am Sunday morning I can start driving again, 11 hours plus fueling stops and whatnot and it'd be 11pm Sunday night and even if I get lucky and average 60mph with a 65mph governed truck, I'm still a couple hundred miles short of Tulsa, probably not even quite to OKC? I'd have to get another hotel room and finish driving Monday morning, then have to log some on duty not driving time to get the ads placed on the side of the truck (12 foot by 18 foot sheets of vinyl over a welded aluminum frame, held to the frame with grommets and ratcheting straps, then strapped together with shorter straps inside the body of the truck, it's a 2 person job MINIMUM, 140lb weight assembled for each frame, easiest with 3-4 people). My Monday will be a short shift. But then I'm good, I guess.

I really thought I was going to have a relaxing cruise across Route 66 on the way to Tulsa. now it looks like I'll be competing with Father Time and Uncle Sam, LOL!

PS Trucks are regular cab, no sleeper berth, I have to log 10 hours off duty before I can reset the clocks I guess. The examples on the FMCSA website were helpful to me, and I'm hoping I remember some of this stuff. I assume fueling and whatnot is considered On Duty, Driving? A 42 gallon tank won't take long to fill, but waiting for an open pump might. Maybe I should just use the car/RV side since I'm under CDL and those pumps turn over more often. 42 isn't much bigger than my last Suburban's 40 gallon fuel tank. That didn't take long to fill at Love's in Hillsboro.