My Mercer Experience 8-31-15

Sorry. Forgot to update.

Thursday, I took a bus into the city. Went to the 9/11 memorial and museum and walked around the city. I had a blast. Ended up walking a little over 7 miles by the end of the day. I'm still feeling that.

Got up Friday and decided to take the GW so I wouldn't have to pay to get back on the turnpike. It took me about 30 minutes to go from the service plaza to Amsterdam ave so it wasn't bad. I was going to get on Broadway but the exit said "passenger cars only". I didn't notice the sign next to it that said truck route. So I went on up to Amsterdam and headed south. Crossed over athe 155th and got on broadway. Called the customer when I was at 99th and broadway. It's 8:00 and he says "I've got another truck in here so I can't take you right now. I'll call you about 9:15". Wonderful. I'm 20 minutes out with no where to park.

I got on down to 51st and 11th ave (a block from where I had to deliver) and just parked against a curb. I figured someone would complain but no one did. He called about 30 minutes later and said he was ready. I got there and had to pull into the middle of 12th ave and back on to the pier. I was slightly blocking a bike path and an old man riding his bike said "what makes you figure this is ok"? My inner new yorker came out and before I thought I yelled "F*** off buddy". He made some noise and kept going.

After I got unloaded I was going to hit the Lincoln tunnel and get out of the city. I was on 41st street about 3 blocks from the tunnel and something in the mirror caught my eye. It was a yellow shirt. This black girl on a skateboard with a yellow shirt tried skateboarding to between me and a straight truck. I didn't realize what had happened. A nyc bus pulled up next to me on the right and the skateboarder was going by. The bus driver was a very big black lady and she was yelling at me. I rolled the window down and she said "did you see this dumb black b****" as she pointed to the skateboarder. I said no ma'am. She said "this dumb black b**** fell off her skateboard and it went under your trailer and she was trying to get it while you were moving. Your tire hit her and knocked her into the other truck and she bounced off of it and back into you. These stupid b*****s around here do stupid s*** and want to blame us because they're retarded". I could only imagine the look on my face. I said "well it would have been her fault". The driver said "you d*** right". I said is this the way I need to go to the tunnel? She said "yes go up 2 lights and turn left". I said thank you ma'am and have a good day. She said "you too booboo". Very nice lady.

At the next light, something happened. 6 fire trucks and 4 ambulances come flying through to the tunnel and they make us turn on to 10th ave. At this point I just decided to go back up through Manhattan and get back on the GW.

I got out of the city and since I was empty and didn't have anything lined up I wasn't going to pay to go back down the turnpike. I jumped on 78 and came over to Hershey PA. Got here about 4pm yesterday and the coordinator called and found me a load from painted post, NY going to Houston. It's about 150 miles from me so not too bad. I have to pick up Monday and be in Houston as soon as I can get there.

All in all, driving in NY wasn't nearly as bad as people make it out to be. Going back again would be a lot easier now that I know how to read their road signs. The hardest part was figuring out how/where to get on and off the bridge. The turns were tighter in Chicago than they were here and there are cops at every corner that stop traffic if you have to make a sharp right turn.

The adventure continues.......

 

The person never said anything to me. She just kept walking down the middle of the street. If the bus driver hadn't said anything I would have never known. Apparently she didn't get hurt. Sneer never acknowledged anything happened