Life and times at swift...the good the bad and everything in between

Thanks for the vote of confidence fellas. I couldn't update last night cuz my phone was acting up. Yea, I write these long posts on a 5 inch smart phone with swype. Anyway, before I update let me answer those questions. I've been with swift close to 3 months now. 1 with my mentor and 2 months solo. Before I came to swift, I worked for watkins shepard for 5 months. I went to their orientation and did east coast for a month. Then a northeast position opened up, where I could be home every weekend, and did that for another 4 months. Now, before any rumors get started, let me say that watkins is a VERY GOOD COMPANY. their training is top notch, and I was home EVERY WEEKEND. they even gave me 2 weeks off to take care of my wife when my daughter was born. The reason I left is because their bread and butter is furniture, and thats what I did all day every day. The most I made with them was $900, the average being $600 to $700 a week, and that was being brand new to trucking. But, I'm a lazy bum, and the only thing I like to lift is my daughter. So, I signed on with swift, and haven't touched any freight whatsoever since I've been here, which makes me a happy MRTWEETY. also, swift has the mentor program which leads me into my next update here. I took off from the TA in troutville, VA yesterday morning, fueled at flying j 70 miles down the road, got some hot chocolate ( the hot chocolate is banging here). I checked my map to see how far I could get. Option one to AR did nt work,neither did option 2 to west memphis, they were both to far. So, I went with option 3, the memphis, TN terminal, zoom zoom. I drove 651 miles, and got here last night with exactly 6 minutes on my 11 (hey I can't make this stuff up, I'm on elogs). This place is biiiig, I find out I gotta drop my trailer so I go to park. In the first spot I picked there was a flat bed next to me, the thing is black so I could barely see it. I was all crooked, so I pulled out and tried at another spot, on this one,i set up all wrong, and didn't have enough wiggle room to clear the left trailer. Ok, lets try this one more time. On spot 3, I set up perfect, and 2 pull ups later, I'm in the hole and drop my trailer. Give me a second for part 2 of the tweety saga, before my phone alarm goes off and I lose every thing I just wrote.

 

Ok, part 2 the saga continues ssssss.
I park in the bobtail section, and get a call from my boy C. I tell him about my little backing adventure. We exchange some backing tips, and he tells me that his paychecks are going up. I tell him im getting a $40 paycheck next week. But, before anybody runs out the door, my paycheck is so low cuz of home time, and because this load I'm under is so long. He tells me how he gets some anxiety every morning, before he starts driving. I remember I used to get that same exact feeling when I first started. So I tell him its just a pain period, and it goes away after a few months. He tells me I should be a mentor. I tell him thats exactly what I've decided to do today. I he'd into the drivers lounge, and fill out the application. Shower,yell at my phone for not working, and hit the sack. At 5 this morning I got a preplan back to PA 1100 miles. Followed by a message from my DM " lets commit to get you into the mentor class, your application was aproved". I like my DM, he takes care of business quick. My decision to be a mentor comes from the fact that I always read, and hear of people like bluebonn and silent ly sailing, who have had negative experiences with mentors. Even though I'm faaaaar from being an authority on trucking. I am more than proficient and experienced at teaching, coaching, instructing, and motivating. hopefully my efforts, and those of others, like my mentor, bluebonn, etc. will improve the quality of the new students experiences. Ok, time for a power nap, and then hi ho hi ho its off to work I go oooo
Later,
MRTWEETY

 

Yea bigmikectn, the miles are good. I had a conversation with my friend c the other day about people who complained about not getting miles. He told me about 2 times he was at the terminal.the first was when he was with his mentor, and some dude was there trying to get other drivers to take his 500 mile load. When c questioned about it, the guy said the load was to short for him. The second time c was at the memphis,TN terminal. He got a short 300 mile load out of there. When he goes to pick up his paper work at the window, the guy in the office tells him " I got like 8 of these short loads, but nobody wants to take them. They rather wait for the long loads, and then they sit around complaining that their not making money. Its true here. Just so every one can see the sequence of loads i run here you go :

857, 877,140, 272, 268, 648, 332, 272, 331, 639, 739, 265, 288, 592, 232, 261, 1030, 433, 172, 404, 122, 754, 16, 439, 505, 89, 1748, 1190.
Thats every loaded trip I've had since I went solo some were in jerzey. As you can see, I've only done 3 loads over 1000 miles since I started. Also,i think the drivers getting good paychecks are the ones willing to drive at anytime. Ill drive day, night, snow, rain. It doesn't matter, as long as I'm well rested, safe, and legal. I say this, cuz I've known of drivers that won't drive at night, or only drive at certain hours to avoid rush hour traffic, and not fight for a parking spot at the truck stop. Me, I don't care. I deal with it when I get there, if I have to MAKEa spot to park, so be it. I'm glad to hear your coming to swift bigmikectn, I still talk to my mentor to. And your first run brings back memories lol. Scary, exciting, and empowering is all I can say.
Yesterday was a short day, took off from the memphis, TN terminal drove 400 miles with a 1 hour lunch break in between. Delivered, and now I'm just waiting at walmart 7 miles away to pick up my load today at 14:00. The only thing is I was still kind of asleep when I talked to my DM yesterday I could of sworn he said this load hada built in reset, but my trigonometry isn't showing that, so I'm gonna double check with him again. Mcds for breakfast,mmmmm hashbrowns, and walmart to stock the fridge (tweetyadvise: get a fridge asap, youll thank me when your eating your cocoa pebbles in the morning, and don't have to get out of the truck to buy milk in freezing weather. Also, your comdata card works like a debit card at mcdonalds and walmart. Experiment and let me know where else we can use it).

Later,
MRTWEETY

 

Yes, most definitely start a thread on your experience. Would be very helpful if you could tell us about the process from going solo to mentor, and what to expect. Cuz I'm kind of in the dark right now. Maybe we can also start a thread for mentors to exchange tips and info on diferent situations and how to deal with these training issues
I think that would be helpful for both mentors and students.