Hello from Atlanta again! Let me try to catch you up on the last few days. We were here last Thursday doing a re-start and waiting on a load. We finally got a load out Thursday night. Well, kinda. Our load was in Charlotte, NC and it picked up at 0500 on Friday morning. Around midnight on Thursday night, J hooked up to an empty trailer and headed to Charlotte. When we got there, we dropped the empty and only had to wait about 20 minutes until our load was ready. This load was going to Dallas. Since it was 0500 in the morning, J woke me up and I took off driving. I drove through NC, SC, GA, AL and into MS. About 1600 hrs I woke J up and he took over driving and got us into Dallas where we dropped that load.
When we got to Dallas they had another load ready for us to take to Chicago. J picked it up and got us out of the DFW area and woke me up and I took off driving. I got him into Troy, IL where he took over and got us the rest of the way into Chicago on Saturday night. Things were going good because when we got there, they had another load for us ready and it was coming back to Atlanta. J got that load hooked up and got us almost to the TN border where he woke me up and I got us the rest of the way to Atlanta. I pulled into Atlanta around 1300 hrs on Sunday.
I should have known coming to Atlanta would not be a good idea. Right now it is about 1030 hrs Monday morning and we are still sitting. I was in the drivers lounge talking to a couple of drivers and they said that on Mondays about the only thing that goes out of this terminal is dedicated freight. That means that we are probably going to be here until tomorrow sometime. They do pay us layover pay, which is $150 (each I believe) when we sit for over 24 hours without a load. That helps, but when we can cover over 1200 miles a day at $1.12 a mile, that $150 really isn't much. But I guess it is better than nothing.
Another bad thing is that we are supposed to be home on Wednesday. So it looks like when we leave here that we will probably have to get a load to Dallas so we can take our time off. With weekly payments on this truck, I have a feeling that we will come out in the hole when we come back from our time off. We need about 2000-2500 miles to break even and I don't see that happening this week. We are taking time off because J's 30th Class Reunion is over the July 4th weekend in Pagosa Springs, Colorado and we are not going to miss that! It is a small town where we grew up and we know so many people there, so we are really looking forward to getting back and seeing everyone.
Another thing I am looking forward to on this time off is seeing our house. We have done a lot of remodeling to it but haven't been able to get some things finished. My mom has hired a contractor and is getting some stuff finished. I know she said he taped and mudded the sheetrock that we put up, scraped the ceiling (to get the popcorn off of it) and then painted. The walls are a gray color and the ceiling an trim are white. I am so excited to see what it looks like. We still have to get the windows cased in and painted but it is going to be a great surprise to see what he has gotten done. Also, we still have to get the flooring installed. When we put the new flooring in the new kitchen, we bought extra for the living room and the hallway. If we can't find anyone that can install it for a decent price, then we will probably have to spend a full day getting the flooring done. But it will be worth it to see the final result! There are so many little things that still need to be done but we have managed to get most of the bigger stuff done ourselves. Now that we are on the road again, we will just have to pay someone to come in and get it finished up.
Sorry I don't have any pictures to post today. It is hard to take pictures while you are driving. There is some beautiful scenery out here. I need to take pictures when we switch and I am in the passenger seat. We are also looking at getting a dash cam. I bet if we did that then I would be able to upload some of it on here so you can see some of the awesome things that I see. That is something to think about!
Monday, June 29, 2015
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Atlanta, GA
Good morning folks! Sorry I didn't post the last few days. I usually post before I go to bed, when J takes over driving, but that was impossible due to the roads.
After we dropped out last load in El Paso, I headed over and got the truck washed and we hung out at the Petro so J could get some non-moving sleep. After he woke up, we went in and grabbed some dinner and then headed back to our terminal to wait for the load that night. I headed to bed and J stayed up and waited for the load to be ready. Once it was ready, he hooked up and hit the road.
He made it to Van Horn,Texas and that is where he woke me up and I took over. At this point, we had a little over 1200 miles to go and about 24 hours to get there. I drove all day and got him to Shreveport,LA where we switched out. After we switched, I grabbed the laptop to blog, but it wasn't going to happen. I-20 through Louisiana is horrible! The laptop kept trying to leap out of my lap! I decided it would have to wait until later. I decided to head on to bed and get some sleep, what I could anyway with the bumpy roads. J got us into Atlanta around 0200 hours, so we dropped the trailer and came around back to park. We had run out of hours so we have to sit here and do our re-start so that we have our full 70 hours back. Our re-start ended this morning and we have been available since 0500, but we still haven't gotten a load yet. They better hurry up and get us something. We are not getting paid if we are sitting, and that is no good.
Driving OTR has reminded me of a lot of things that bug me that 4-wheelers do around trucks. That is what we call cars and pickups. With that being said, I will just point out one thing today that drives me nuts and not EVERYTHING in this post!
A semi truck and trailer can weigh up to 80,000 lbs. For comparison, your car probably weighs around 3,500 lbs. A semi truck weighs the equivalent of about 22 cars. That being said, a semi truck going 55 mph needs a MIMINUM of 100 yards to come to a complete stop. That is locking up the brakes to get stopped. How many highways are 55 mph anymore? Not many. There is a reason why we leave space in between ourselves and other semis or 4-wheelers. We need that room to stop. Please, please, please do not think it is ok to jump in front of a semi , right on our front bumper, in the middle of traffic! If you do that, and we are in traffic, what is going to happen to you when the truck in front of you stops and the other lanes are blocked and you can't get over? I will tell you, and it is sad. You will most likely get stopped in time. But that semi that you jumped in front of, and took up his stopping space? He will probably get stopped also, but not before ramming your car into the back end of the truck in front of you and quite possibly killing you and anyone that is in the car with you. That is the cold hard truth, and something I want you to think about next time you take up the space a semi needs to stop. 80,000 lbs does not stop on a dime like a car can. When we hit you, it will be like 22 cars just piled up on you. I pray to God that it never happens to anyone and that it never happens to us while we are driving our semi. But I see 4-wheelers do it every day, and it makes me cringe, because they have no idea what kind of a situation they just put themselves into. And if you have children that are at the age where they are starting to drive, please share this with them, because they have no clue. Or heck, share it with anyone you know regardless of how long they have been driving. Chances are they don't know anyone that drives a semi and are probably clueless also.
That is my rant for the day. I figure I will share a little of them so that people understand what we, as truck drivers, have to contend with on a daily basis out here. I do understand that there are those truck drivers that are just jerks, and I get that, but you should not judge all truck drivers actions based on the actions of idiots that you have ran across in the past.
On a happier note, I did get some pictures while we stopped at a rest area. There are some really crappy rest areas across the US, but there are also some really nice ones. This particular rest area was in Mississippi. They had some cool tile work in the restroom and the grounds were beautiful. They even had 24 hour security on site. Very nice!
After we dropped out last load in El Paso, I headed over and got the truck washed and we hung out at the Petro so J could get some non-moving sleep. After he woke up, we went in and grabbed some dinner and then headed back to our terminal to wait for the load that night. I headed to bed and J stayed up and waited for the load to be ready. Once it was ready, he hooked up and hit the road.
He made it to Van Horn,Texas and that is where he woke me up and I took over. At this point, we had a little over 1200 miles to go and about 24 hours to get there. I drove all day and got him to Shreveport,LA where we switched out. After we switched, I grabbed the laptop to blog, but it wasn't going to happen. I-20 through Louisiana is horrible! The laptop kept trying to leap out of my lap! I decided it would have to wait until later. I decided to head on to bed and get some sleep, what I could anyway with the bumpy roads. J got us into Atlanta around 0200 hours, so we dropped the trailer and came around back to park. We had run out of hours so we have to sit here and do our re-start so that we have our full 70 hours back. Our re-start ended this morning and we have been available since 0500, but we still haven't gotten a load yet. They better hurry up and get us something. We are not getting paid if we are sitting, and that is no good.
Driving OTR has reminded me of a lot of things that bug me that 4-wheelers do around trucks. That is what we call cars and pickups. With that being said, I will just point out one thing today that drives me nuts and not EVERYTHING in this post!
A semi truck and trailer can weigh up to 80,000 lbs. For comparison, your car probably weighs around 3,500 lbs. A semi truck weighs the equivalent of about 22 cars. That being said, a semi truck going 55 mph needs a MIMINUM of 100 yards to come to a complete stop. That is locking up the brakes to get stopped. How many highways are 55 mph anymore? Not many. There is a reason why we leave space in between ourselves and other semis or 4-wheelers. We need that room to stop. Please, please, please do not think it is ok to jump in front of a semi , right on our front bumper, in the middle of traffic! If you do that, and we are in traffic, what is going to happen to you when the truck in front of you stops and the other lanes are blocked and you can't get over? I will tell you, and it is sad. You will most likely get stopped in time. But that semi that you jumped in front of, and took up his stopping space? He will probably get stopped also, but not before ramming your car into the back end of the truck in front of you and quite possibly killing you and anyone that is in the car with you. That is the cold hard truth, and something I want you to think about next time you take up the space a semi needs to stop. 80,000 lbs does not stop on a dime like a car can. When we hit you, it will be like 22 cars just piled up on you. I pray to God that it never happens to anyone and that it never happens to us while we are driving our semi. But I see 4-wheelers do it every day, and it makes me cringe, because they have no idea what kind of a situation they just put themselves into. And if you have children that are at the age where they are starting to drive, please share this with them, because they have no clue. Or heck, share it with anyone you know regardless of how long they have been driving. Chances are they don't know anyone that drives a semi and are probably clueless also.
That is my rant for the day. I figure I will share a little of them so that people understand what we, as truck drivers, have to contend with on a daily basis out here. I do understand that there are those truck drivers that are just jerks, and I get that, but you should not judge all truck drivers actions based on the actions of idiots that you have ran across in the past.
On a happier note, I did get some pictures while we stopped at a rest area. There are some really crappy rest areas across the US, but there are also some really nice ones. This particular rest area was in Mississippi. They had some cool tile work in the restroom and the grounds were beautiful. They even had 24 hour security on site. Very nice!
Monday, June 22, 2015
El Paso, TX
Whew! It is HOT here today. It is 1500 local time (sorry, but military time is what we use and what I am used to!) and it is 104 outside! I feel like I am melting!
We headed out of Houston last night around 2200 hours and I got into El Paso around 1300 hours. We had only picked up at this terminal once and it was at night. There wasn't much going on and the terminal was pretty much empty. During the day however is another story. It is a fairly small terminal and it is tight getting a trailer into one of their docks. Especially when there are bobtails (just the semi truck by itself with no trailer attached) parked along the fence line in front of the docks. But, seeing as how I am a professional (LOL) I managed to get it backed in without any problems. Next time I try to back it into a dock it may be a different story, but today went well. :)
After we dropped it off we headed over to the Blue Beacon so we could get the truck washed. She needed a bath. Here is a picture of her all cleaned up. I didn't get the tires all shined up this time though.
Speaking of how hot is is here, you see that white truck I am parked next to? That is another Forward Air driver. I got out and was talking to him for about 30 minutes and I got sunburned in just that short amount of time. My face is all red!
Anyway, tonight we will be picking up our next load going to Atlanta. It picks up around 2200 and we have to have it there by Wednesday morning at 0600. It is only about 1450 miles, so that is easily doable. (Is "doable" actually a word? I guess I could Google it!?)
We just go back from having a nice big dinner, and that is something that we rarely do out here. Since my tummy is good and full, I think I will have to call it a night.
Charlene, I will try to take and upload more pictures on here. :) I am trying to get back in the habit!
Have a great evening everyone!
We headed out of Houston last night around 2200 hours and I got into El Paso around 1300 hours. We had only picked up at this terminal once and it was at night. There wasn't much going on and the terminal was pretty much empty. During the day however is another story. It is a fairly small terminal and it is tight getting a trailer into one of their docks. Especially when there are bobtails (just the semi truck by itself with no trailer attached) parked along the fence line in front of the docks. But, seeing as how I am a professional (LOL) I managed to get it backed in without any problems. Next time I try to back it into a dock it may be a different story, but today went well. :)
After we dropped it off we headed over to the Blue Beacon so we could get the truck washed. She needed a bath. Here is a picture of her all cleaned up. I didn't get the tires all shined up this time though.
Speaking of how hot is is here, you see that white truck I am parked next to? That is another Forward Air driver. I got out and was talking to him for about 30 minutes and I got sunburned in just that short amount of time. My face is all red!
Anyway, tonight we will be picking up our next load going to Atlanta. It picks up around 2200 and we have to have it there by Wednesday morning at 0600. It is only about 1450 miles, so that is easily doable. (Is "doable" actually a word? I guess I could Google it!?)
We just go back from having a nice big dinner, and that is something that we rarely do out here. Since my tummy is good and full, I think I will have to call it a night.
Charlene, I will try to take and upload more pictures on here. :) I am trying to get back in the habit!
Have a great evening everyone!
Sunday, June 21, 2015
Houston, TX
Happy Father's Day to all you Dads out there! This year there are three special guys. My dad, and of course J, and then there is our son-in-law who is celebrating his first Father's Day as a Dad!! After we dropped this load here in Houston, we grabbed a shower and went to Logan's Roadhouse for dinner. I am so full right now. As soon as I get this all typed up, it is time for bed.
I kind of feel like we are going in circles. I should get used to it though since we run from terminal to terminal and not customer to customer. We got our first load on June 9th out of Columbus. Here is a list of where we have been.
Columbus to Cleveland
Cleveland to Pittsburg
Pittsburg to Chicago
Chicago to Phoenix
Phoenix to Los Angeles
Los Angeles to Chicago
Chicago to Phoenix
Phoenix to El Paso
El Paso to Los Angeles
Los Angeles to Houston
We delivered to Houston at 1:00 PM CST and we have a load coming out of here going to El Paso that should be ready around midnight.
It looks like in about 12 days we have covered close to 11,000 miles. I did have two shifts where I didn't drive at all due to the loads not being ready and we got a complete restart on our hours when we spent the night in Genoa, IL with my closest high school friend and her husband. I guess actual working days is has been about 9 working days. I think it is safe to day that we are covering some ground!
For those of you that are not familiar with the transportation industry, there are a ton of regulations. For instance, you can not work more that 70 hours in an 8 day period. Once you have hit your 70 hours, you have to stop and completely reset your hours. We call this a "re-start" and this is done by taking 34 hours off and not working. You can also gain hours back. Every 8 days, the 1st day falls off, and you gain those hours back to your 70 that you would be available to work. It is confusing and I am not going to try to explain it! LOL If you are interested, you can Google it! :) J and I can do what is called a rolling re-start where he would start his re-start in the Sleeper Berth while I am driving. After my shift, I would have to park for 24 hours. Then J can take off driving because he has had his 34 off. I would finish my re-start in the Sleeper Berth while he is driving. It is a little easier for teams because we only have to "sit" for 24 hours, where a solo driver has to sit the whole 34.
They also have regulations on how much we can drive and how long we can work. You can only drive for 11 hours. You can only work for 14 hours. You have to take a minimum 10 hour break before your 11 hour and 14 hour clock will restart. Out of that 10 hour break, you have to have at least 8 of those hours logged in the Sleeper Berth.
A new one that has come about since we were last driving is the mandatory 30 minute break during your 11 hours of drive time. DOT regulations state that you have to have a 30 minute break BEFORE you have been driving for 8 hours. If you are on electronic logs, like we are, and you go 1 minute over the 8 hours, it will flag you with a violation. UGH! More stuff to remember. I don't really feel like we need to take that break. Of course, I am a woman, so during that first 8 hours I probably stop twice to go to the restroom, so it isn't like I drive for 8 hours straight! But I know some people do that, and then they get fatigued and get in accidents, so we have them to thank for more regulations.
I suppose that is all for today. J will pick up this load and we will head to El Paso. We have to have it there by 16:10 hours and it is only 753 miles so it will be a piece of cake!
I kind of feel like we are going in circles. I should get used to it though since we run from terminal to terminal and not customer to customer. We got our first load on June 9th out of Columbus. Here is a list of where we have been.
Columbus to Cleveland
Cleveland to Pittsburg
Pittsburg to Chicago
Chicago to Phoenix
Phoenix to Los Angeles
Los Angeles to Chicago
Chicago to Phoenix
Phoenix to El Paso
El Paso to Los Angeles
Los Angeles to Houston
We delivered to Houston at 1:00 PM CST and we have a load coming out of here going to El Paso that should be ready around midnight.
It looks like in about 12 days we have covered close to 11,000 miles. I did have two shifts where I didn't drive at all due to the loads not being ready and we got a complete restart on our hours when we spent the night in Genoa, IL with my closest high school friend and her husband. I guess actual working days is has been about 9 working days. I think it is safe to day that we are covering some ground!
For those of you that are not familiar with the transportation industry, there are a ton of regulations. For instance, you can not work more that 70 hours in an 8 day period. Once you have hit your 70 hours, you have to stop and completely reset your hours. We call this a "re-start" and this is done by taking 34 hours off and not working. You can also gain hours back. Every 8 days, the 1st day falls off, and you gain those hours back to your 70 that you would be available to work. It is confusing and I am not going to try to explain it! LOL If you are interested, you can Google it! :) J and I can do what is called a rolling re-start where he would start his re-start in the Sleeper Berth while I am driving. After my shift, I would have to park for 24 hours. Then J can take off driving because he has had his 34 off. I would finish my re-start in the Sleeper Berth while he is driving. It is a little easier for teams because we only have to "sit" for 24 hours, where a solo driver has to sit the whole 34.
They also have regulations on how much we can drive and how long we can work. You can only drive for 11 hours. You can only work for 14 hours. You have to take a minimum 10 hour break before your 11 hour and 14 hour clock will restart. Out of that 10 hour break, you have to have at least 8 of those hours logged in the Sleeper Berth.
A new one that has come about since we were last driving is the mandatory 30 minute break during your 11 hours of drive time. DOT regulations state that you have to have a 30 minute break BEFORE you have been driving for 8 hours. If you are on electronic logs, like we are, and you go 1 minute over the 8 hours, it will flag you with a violation. UGH! More stuff to remember. I don't really feel like we need to take that break. Of course, I am a woman, so during that first 8 hours I probably stop twice to go to the restroom, so it isn't like I drive for 8 hours straight! But I know some people do that, and then they get fatigued and get in accidents, so we have them to thank for more regulations.
I suppose that is all for today. J will pick up this load and we will head to El Paso. We have to have it there by 16:10 hours and it is only 753 miles so it will be a piece of cake!
Saturday, June 20, 2015
Phoenix, AZ
I am back! It has been about 4 1/2 years since we were OTR but we are out on the road again. If you followed my other blog, and somehow make your way to this one, I will try to catch you up on what has been going on. Well, the short version anyway. If you are new and happen to stumble upon my blog, then WELCOME! Happy reading!
Due to my fathers health, we came off of the road in 2010. I think in my head I was thinking that his health was worse than what it was, so I wanted to be back home and close. Now I realize he is not on his death bed, THANK GOD, and we have gotten back in the truck. For four years we worked at Empire Paper in Lubbock, Texas. It is a facilities supply company and we started out doing local delivery for them. After two years I moved into Customer Service and after a year of that I moved over to Sales. J (my husband and better half) was a driver for two years and then moved into a Field Service Tech position. It is a GREAT company, and GREAT people. After four years, the lure of the truck started pulling at us but we wanted to stay close to home.
In October of 2014, we moved our RV down to Big Lake, Texas and went to work hauling water in a tanker for Nabors in the West Texas oil fields. The money was awesome, granted we were working 70 hours a week, but the money is in the overtime. Things were going well until February when it got very slow. Oil prices had tanked and they stopped drilling and started closing in some of the wells. That meant the water we had to haul was drastically cut back. We went from 70 hours a week to maybe getting 30-35 and that wasn't going to cut it. We still keep in touch with drivers that we worked with previously while we were OTR. After talking to a few of them, we made a decision to come back to the road.
June 1st of this year we started with Forward Air. So far we are really happy with them. We will just have to learn more about their terminals and routes and that should only take about two months to figure out. We are on the LTL side, so we go from terminal to terminal and it is all drop and hook. No customers to deal with! YAY!! Now, this pays a bit less that the TLX division that goes customer to customer, but we decided it was worth a little less pay to not have that hassle.
We have a 2016 International LoneStar, and it is sweet! We are leasing, but at the end of the lease, there is a $1 buyout, yes, one dollar. So the truck will be ours and they consider us Owner/Operators and not Lease Operators. We are still going to look around and save up some money and maybe go the conventional route of buying another truck, because it will be cheaper to have a monthly payment as opposed to a weekly payment. Plus, if we are going to be paying this much money for a truck, I really want a truck with a custom sleeper. That is something we will consider when we start looking. But this was our foot in the door to get back on the road and we can't complain.
On a personal note, this February, our daughter Jessica and son-in-law Ruben gave us our first grandchild, Elijah Cole!! He is absolutely precious and we can't wait to see him again. We were there when he was born, but haven't been able to get back. Hopefully in the next month we will make that happen.
We also bought a house in Lubbock that is in a constant state of remodeling. We got a lot done, but now that we are on the road, my mother (who lives with us) is taking care of getting a contractor out to get it finished up. We got the majority of the stuff done, so for now it is just finish work they will come in and get done. Of course, there is a bathroom that is going to be enlarged and completely re-done, and our master bath needs tile put up, but one project at a time is all we can afford!
It feels really good to be blogging again! I hope you stay tuned for more of our adventures!
T-Net
P.S. If you DID happen to follow my previous blog, Smokey is alive and well, but he is not on the truck with us this time. After we came off the road he ended up having knee surgery from all of the jumping in and out of the truck. So now he is enjoying a nice lazy life of luxury at home with my mom and our other dog, Dexter, that we acquired after we came off the road. :-)
Due to my fathers health, we came off of the road in 2010. I think in my head I was thinking that his health was worse than what it was, so I wanted to be back home and close. Now I realize he is not on his death bed, THANK GOD, and we have gotten back in the truck. For four years we worked at Empire Paper in Lubbock, Texas. It is a facilities supply company and we started out doing local delivery for them. After two years I moved into Customer Service and after a year of that I moved over to Sales. J (my husband and better half) was a driver for two years and then moved into a Field Service Tech position. It is a GREAT company, and GREAT people. After four years, the lure of the truck started pulling at us but we wanted to stay close to home.
In October of 2014, we moved our RV down to Big Lake, Texas and went to work hauling water in a tanker for Nabors in the West Texas oil fields. The money was awesome, granted we were working 70 hours a week, but the money is in the overtime. Things were going well until February when it got very slow. Oil prices had tanked and they stopped drilling and started closing in some of the wells. That meant the water we had to haul was drastically cut back. We went from 70 hours a week to maybe getting 30-35 and that wasn't going to cut it. We still keep in touch with drivers that we worked with previously while we were OTR. After talking to a few of them, we made a decision to come back to the road.
June 1st of this year we started with Forward Air. So far we are really happy with them. We will just have to learn more about their terminals and routes and that should only take about two months to figure out. We are on the LTL side, so we go from terminal to terminal and it is all drop and hook. No customers to deal with! YAY!! Now, this pays a bit less that the TLX division that goes customer to customer, but we decided it was worth a little less pay to not have that hassle.
We have a 2016 International LoneStar, and it is sweet! We are leasing, but at the end of the lease, there is a $1 buyout, yes, one dollar. So the truck will be ours and they consider us Owner/Operators and not Lease Operators. We are still going to look around and save up some money and maybe go the conventional route of buying another truck, because it will be cheaper to have a monthly payment as opposed to a weekly payment. Plus, if we are going to be paying this much money for a truck, I really want a truck with a custom sleeper. That is something we will consider when we start looking. But this was our foot in the door to get back on the road and we can't complain.
On a personal note, this February, our daughter Jessica and son-in-law Ruben gave us our first grandchild, Elijah Cole!! He is absolutely precious and we can't wait to see him again. We were there when he was born, but haven't been able to get back. Hopefully in the next month we will make that happen.
We also bought a house in Lubbock that is in a constant state of remodeling. We got a lot done, but now that we are on the road, my mother (who lives with us) is taking care of getting a contractor out to get it finished up. We got the majority of the stuff done, so for now it is just finish work they will come in and get done. Of course, there is a bathroom that is going to be enlarged and completely re-done, and our master bath needs tile put up, but one project at a time is all we can afford!
It feels really good to be blogging again! I hope you stay tuned for more of our adventures!
T-Net
P.S. If you DID happen to follow my previous blog, Smokey is alive and well, but he is not on the truck with us this time. After we came off the road he ended up having knee surgery from all of the jumping in and out of the truck. So now he is enjoying a nice lazy life of luxury at home with my mom and our other dog, Dexter, that we acquired after we came off the road. :-)
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