Captain's log date 8-8-10

After a long weekend last week which would be the first in three weeks I was sent to Belle Mead, NJ for a Wednesday night delivery. So Monday afternoon I left out with no reason to hurry. I shut down in Vandalia, IL and started at a not so early time the next day.

Tuesday I got to a travel plaza in PA. At this point I was sent my next load assignment. It was a drop and hook picking up in Topton, PA. So now I had to time things right. If I started wednesday morning too early and I don't get unloaded until after my appointment time I could run out of time and not make it to the friday delivery time in Indianapolis. But if I started too late well, that could make me late.

Wednesday I decided to start out around 11am. It was perfect. The receiver did take awhile to get to me but I was only there for 2 hours and I was unloaded. I got to PA and picked up my next load. Routing should be simple. Just go back the same way I came in. Straight down I70. I get my paperwork and some hazmat placards that put an end to my simple routing dream. I cant take this load through the tunnels of the PA turnpike. So instead I need to take I81 down to I68 then up I79 and then get back on I70. I shut down in Carlisle, PA hoping I wouldn't be pushing more miles thursday than can be done legally.

Thursday morning I get some decent news that my new route wasn't too many extra miles. I was only looking at 540 miles to drive today. My appointment was for Friday am at 0930. But I was pushing my luck. I discovered (I am still new at this job.)that I 68 is very mountainous and I was pulling 45,000 lbs. After four hours my average speed was only 54 miles per hour. Jiminy Cricket. I made it to Spiceland, IN where I fueled and spent the night. I could have slept at the receiver but I wanted a shower so I stayed put.

Friday I roll to the customer. I am assigned a dock, back in. after an hour I am told to switch docks. Apparently I needed to be at the magic dock. I was unloaaded in 15 minutes once I moved. I pull out, sweep my trailer, found a corner to hide in and await my next load.

It never fails. I will sit for two hours. I will finally get an assignment with barely time to get to shipper before appointment. This time I couldn't even look this up on my laptop to know how to get there. So I was following my GPS blindly which is never a good idea. While rolling I finally get the phone number I needed and listened to the auto-voice directions and found my way to the shipper with only a minute to spare. My trailer needed to be food grade clean. After sweeping it three more times they finally accepted it and loaded me. This load was going to the yard but due to my 14 running down I wasn't gonna be home until Saturday morning.

So I shutdown in Vandalia where my week began and cruised into town yesterday. I won't even get a reset because I am rolling in a couple of hours towards Tyler, TX.