Semi Travels Part 3

On Saturday we got our load assignment; take garage door parts to Pompano Beach, Fl and oh by the way did you want to take two days off down there? Woohoo, Florida! Spring was very slow in reaching Erie this year so the warmer weather sounded like a welcome break. Tara had to drive her limit of 11 hours per day in order to make it on time though we did stop at a Huddle House off Exit 11 on I75 in Kentucky that had the best breakfast EVER! Fantastic short order cook, really nice waite staff and the best sausage gravy I've ever had. If you happen to be traveling that way I highly recommend a stop there. I one day we went from southwestern Ohio through Kentucky, Tennessee, North and South Carolina into Georgia. The next day was on to Florida all the way down I95.
The mountains in Kentucky, Tennessee and North Carolina are absolutely amazing. We went over Jellico Mt. and down Black Mt. in the Smokey's.
View from Jellico Mountain

The Smoky Mountains really do look smoky. Black Mountain was beautiful and very steep but was so overwhelming there was no way to get it into a photo.

On Sunday night we were only 100 miles from our destination and stopped for the night. We got up early to make it to Pompano Beach on time only to run into stopped traffic near a Rest Stop. Apparently a dump bucket truck was entering I95 from the rest area and pulled in front of a semi that did not stop or get out of the way in time.

Hopefully everyone was ok. We saw the dump bucket - solid steel construction meant no damage for him.
Finally we got to Pompano Beach where it took the hard working gentlemen at the garage door place 4 hours to unload the fully loaded semi. They did not have a dock so they had to pull the parts off by hand. The load was 33,000 lbs so most of those parts were fairly heavy. After delivering we went to a hotel in Boca Raton compliments of some rewards points I had and got a chance to stretch out and relax at the pool. Next up: the day at the beach and return travels.

Semi Travels Part 2

Off to Vermont on Friday afternoon. North from Connecticut, through Massachusetts to the Great state of Vermont where there were actual Moose Crossing signs. I really wish I would have gotten a picture of that or better yet, actually saw a moose. We picked up a load of rolled fiberboard in multiple bright colors. I have no idea what you use fiberboard in bright blue and pink for but it was important to someone in Indiana. We only took the load as far as a small town in central Pennsylvania called Sayer. There we met another truck driver named Kris who has been driving for the same company as my partner for a number of years. He had our load. Apparently it was going to be a 3 way switch. We dropped the trailer containing the fiberboard and he dropped his trailer with its load. We hooked up to his trailer and he had to wait for a third driver. The third driver was going to take our old trailer and give Kris his.
Confusing but gave Kris and the other driver a chance to go home for the weekend and us a chance to go to the yard in southwestern Ohio to get our load to Pompano Beach.
Friday and Saturday are a bit of a blur with a ton of driving and swapping out trailers.
Saturday afternoon we finally made it to the yard. Her company takes great care of their equipment and the yard was filled with neatly parked trailers and trucks, a very nice office building and a nice shop for truck and trailer repair. They also have their own fuel island. We dropped the one trailer, she turned in her paperwork which I have learned is fairly extensive - attention to detail and good addition and subtraction skills are key, and headed to get our load of garage doors for Florida.
Next...off and running: 6 states in 2 days, mountains, ocean and accidents.

Semi Travels Part 1

Adventures in Legoland.
For the first time in my professional career I took and entire week paid vacation off. Any other time I've had a week off I was either switching jobs or switching locations for the same company which meant trying to move all my stuff.
I've been planning to go on this trip since last November and I should have gone in mid-April but, the boss asked me to move my plans to be available for a major project. I'm glad I waited.
My partner, Tara, has a CDL (Commercial Driver's License) and has driven a Semi for over 15 years. In that time she has driven flat bed, dump buckets, reefers (refridgerated units) and standard trailers and is amazingly good at her job. I can't be trusted to safetly back up my Ford Escort, she backs up a 53 foot trailer multiple times over the course of a week into some really tight locations.
I've had the opportunity over the past couple years to go out on the truck for a day or overnight but never on a long trip. The short trips were like training for the real event. In those short trips I learned how to dolly up and dolly down the trailer. This means I get out of the truck, put on some work gloves and crank a large handle on the driver's side of the trailer toward the front to bring the trailer legs up or down. I've also learned how a lot of other truck terminology which I'll explain as it comes up. I also learned that a truck driver can see everything in a person's 4 wheeler as it goes past and I mean everything. That can get quite interesting.
This time Tara picked me up on Thursday, May 4 in the evening and we left Northwest Pennsylvania for Conniticut and who knew where else over the next 9 days. She drives a Freightliner Columbia that she calls her two room condo. It has a single bottom bunk, a fold down upper bunk, tv with dvd player, microwave, plugs on a converter for anything else and even a port-a-potty for those desperate situations. There is a lot of storage and being neat is an absolute necessity for sanity.
Our first load, 35,000 lbs of vegetable oil bound for a distribution center that send the oil out to McDonalds. We were carrying the key ingredient to those tasty McD fries. A truck driver relies heavily on a Motocarrier's Atlas to get from point A to point B. We took off Thursday night, slept at a truck stop somewhere in New York and woke up bright and early to deliver in northwestern Connecticut. Information on loads including directions are sent to many truck drivers, including Tara, via an on board computer called a Qualcom. The Qualcom signal tells the truck driving company where exactly the truck is and is a life line between the driver and the dispatcher. The directions on the Qualcom were less than clear and we did our best to figure them out, ended up on the correct road however, we passed the consignee (receiver) and accidentally turned into Lego Headquarters. That was one of the coolest business buildings I've ever seen. There were Lego sculptures everywhere. Unfortunately, we weren't supposed to be there and the drive was not designed to handle 75+ feet of truck and trailer. The picture of the police officer at the pickup - the officer and the hydrant (not shown) were made entirely of Legos, was directly in our way to make the turn. Tara had to be very creative and in the end, the tandems (tires at the back of the trailer) went up over the curb and a little grass by the giant Legos. No real harm done, the grass was flattened but not killed and no one came out and yelled. In the end, we made it out and two blocks down the road to the distribution center, where I watched a lot of McDonald trailers with really good looking food on the side drive back and forth.
The Qualcom is a vital piece of daily truck driving. Every morning Tara checks in with her dispatcher, when a load is picked up or delivered she has to send that information in, calls for directions, where to fuel, and other info all goes through the Qualcom. Tara has a dispatcher named Cheryl who is one of the most wonderful dispatchers on the planet. I've learned to always be good to the dispatcher, she gives you the loads and if you make her angry you don't get miles, no miles, no money. Drivers are paid by the mile so it's good to treat the dispatcher really well.
After the Oil for McDonald's fries we headed for Vermont...more on that later. 9 day, probably 9 entries and lots of photos to follow.

Quiet House

Well, the kittens went to their new homes last weekend. So far so good, they are doing well.The first two photos are of Spirit. Spirit now lives in a house with 3 kids, 2 ferrets, 1 very friendly woofie and an old cat named Moxie. Spirit and the ferrets get along famously. The woofie, Dakota, would love to be friends but every time he approaches Spirit she puffs up, hisses, spits and then whacks him on the nose. I have to give her credit, she is a 2 lb kitten hitting a 50 lb dog and winning. She loves to sit on the computer desk and play with the microphone. No they didn't cook her for dinner she managed to climb up some furniture onto the counter and into the empty cooking pot where she made herself comfortable and went to sleep.

The second two pictures are of Angel (aka Vision) with her new friend Oreo. Apparently Oreo was a little jealous the first day she came to the house but he has since, apparently, gotten over that. They now play chase and pick on each other constantly but when nap time comes they are best of friends.

The other three kittens are doing well as well though I don't have photos to show. The boys, Atlas and Artemis have retained their names and are enjoying the 2 kids and 1 cat at their new home.

Spitfire moved in with 2 cats. Valentine thinks she is the best thing since catnip and Aries is pretty indifferent to her presence.

At home, momma Cali did really well with the parting. I made sure she saw each kitten leave and she only searched the house calling couple times. The kittens older half brother, Curious George, on the other hand has been absolutely pathetic. He mopped for 4 days, not playing, crying, and just laying there. He seems to really miss the little ones, probably because he wasn't the bottom of the Kittie hierarchy for a few weeks. Yesterday and this morning he seemed much better. Charles Baron just seemed flat relieved that the kittens are gone. Charles is now on a kitten food free diet so hopefully he will drop the 3-4 lbs he gained over the past three months from sneak-eating the kitten food. I tried to get Charles to chase the laser pointer and he is so lazy at this point he walked after it instead of running...

For me, I do miss the kittens but, on the flip side the house is quiet and clean for the first time in weeks and I'm actually getting a full night's sleep now because I'm not getting attacked by 5 puffballs at 3am.