Recent Graduate needing hometime any help???

Let me take a moment and tell you what home time in a 18 wheeler looks like.

Friday am 500 miles from the house. 8AM you get a preload message 200 miles away towards the yard going the other way for today. By the time you got home it's 3 am Sat. You need a little time to sleep and decompress so call it sat PM say 2 or so before you come out and be with family. Sunday morning phone rings says you have a load to timbuktu for monday 900 miles. You need to be moving in a few hours if not before to make the schedule.

That's home time for a trucker. We give up so much of our lives for this Country that demands the food, good things to have and all sorts of very important things that keep us free.

 

I would stick it out another year until your 3 tickets are 3 years old. I would also keep asking your current company for a shot. Don't rush into things

 

I'm going to give some sound advise here, STAY THE HE** OUT OF TRUCKING, these companies will lie through there teeth to get you signed on. If you expect to have any kind of real weekend hometime you will not be getting it with these companies. Possibly try to find a local position with someone like NFI or who dose a lot of regional freight and gets you home a lot. Even then your weekend might not always be free, something to keep in mind is that any trucking job is not about you it's about the freight you haul PERIOD. That's where the money comes from and to most companies that's what comes first not you. I know the recruiters will promise you the world that's there job, so buyer beware.

 

The truck driver body is from very bad diet and very little work.

You probably understand that food = calories. You need a certain amount each day. What you put into your mouth and do NOT BURN OFF each day goes to fat as storage by the body. Eventually you are Mr Round. Follow me?

I started in the 80's working out of many grocery places including sysco etc. and was a little runt about 135. My first big job was around a crew of 7 foot cro-mongans God Bless them... all work and no brains but they knew enough I was weak and told me to my face too. I should quit and go home first day.

I lasted 6 weeks with this crew. I learned so much from them in Baltimore and maybe they learned a little something from me. But yes compared to those knuckle dragging work horses I was weak and little. But I worked. Maybe even a little beating if I screwed something up causing two or more to do more work twice to fix it. (That's another lesson. Do it once and be done with it.)

Fast forward to 2001, I was with wife and we were hauling medicines hardly doing nothing but drop hook once a day. Wife started gaining 30 pounds that month, I gained 20. And it wont stop.

A few years ago after being retired medically from trucking and doing nothing really, and eating all day I was 270. Im back below 185 where I need to be. And eating much less. Maybe 1000 calories a day mostly protein.

My life lesson to you is simple. Don't worry about becoming Mr Fat Trucker Body Round Round, just do the work and watch what you put into your tummy in the way of food etc. Always stay a little bit hungry. If you are just a little hungry, that means you are in a position to do alot of work quickly having put your body into a mode in which you will do some work for food.

But not too much.

As far as the custody fight etc. Get all of that cleared and settled. Once that Judge bangs in his hammer on the table and makes it all go away, then you are free to go running about with a big truck. You follow me?

 

BTW. Most recruiters are soul takers. There is money in your body... all you have to do is sign this, that and the dotted line there. MWAH thank you very much.

Reality of hometime? In trucking? HAW... it's nothing what you think. Again the freight decides when you can leave out of home and get on the road. Not you decide to stay home unless you QUIT.

 

What are they for? Simple speeding under 10 shouldn't cause you this much grief