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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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Trip 28 - New IH - Refer ... to Grand Rapids, MI Trip 28b - New Peterbuilt - Chasis ... from Beloit, WI I was offered a Tampa run for last Friday but they called back saying the trucks weren't ready and offered me the Cinci trip ... but still wanting me to do the Tampa run on Monday ... although I packed for a long trip, I wasn't so sure that the trucks would be ready ... they weren't. 12/29/03 - I show up before our "9 AM" dispatch to do the paperwork for my last trip ... no one seems to know what is going on ... our dispatcher had been gone last week and isn't up to speed ... only two drivers showed up for the five Tampa trucks ... but another five drivers do show up, hoping to get work, others are calling. Finally a decision is made, the Tampa trucks aren't going today, instead they want to run four refer trucks to MI ... these are the ones I can't make any money on, but they are the only trucks going today. First they want to run all four together, I and the other senior driver show them a few flaws in that ... the trucks are going to different locations and the last driver to get picked up would be waiting up to eight hours. Then a couple more trucks open up for the second leg for each driver. That's makes the planning easier ... another driver and I will take the two northern MI trucks, then come back to Rockford, IL and pickup two chassis for AB (I first decline the chassis, but the other drivers say the "aren't THAT bad.) ... the other two drivers will take the southern MI trucks, then head back to IA and pickup trucks for the east coast. All these decisions take a couple of hours and it is 10:30 before we get going ... and just to keep things interesting, we have to pickup two used trucks to be dropped at our customer ... they pay OK but it adds two hours driving ... which in turn will run us out of hours before the MI trucks can be delivered. Again the trucks are froze in, but the warm weather the last couple of days has melted the drifts around them and they are fairly easy to get moving. All this moving of used trucks has cost us three hours and it is 3 PM by the time we pickup our trucks, but we are finally on our way. The driver I am running with has problems with ComCheck so the two drivers heading to southern MI beat us out of the truck-stop. By the time we get south of Wausau, WI it is starting to snow ... and snow ... which doesn't bother me, but the other drivers on the highway do bother me, never know what they are going to do. I keep holding the speed limit until we catch up to the other MI drivers ... then I use the cell and check with my partner "Think we should slow down? Or keep going the limit?" "I'm fine, lets go" was his response, so I pull out to pass ... don't know which of our drivers was first and second but the guy in the rear was less than one truck length off the others bumper ... (found out later my partner called and told him to BACK OFF). When I get right along side of the other leading truck ... I see people WALKING across the freeway ???? Both trucks hit the breaks and start sliding ... I let off the breaks and start blowing my horn ... the walkers finally decide they better hurry. I realize they were going to a car in the ditch ... but don't they realise that the reason the car went it the ditch would be because the roads are bad ... and maybe the cars still on the road aren't going to be able to stop??? This is why every week or so you see where someone is killed trying to help another motorist. Over the next hour we'd see another dozen or more cars in the ditch ... we did slow down, sometimes to 45 but kept going ... I checked in with my personal help line (my wife) and she was able to tell me that we'd be driving out of it in about an hour ... and we did, but it cost us another hour ... we had hoped to drive the Grand Rapids truck yet tonight, but an hour delay here, and hour there and we decide we will stop short. Fuel in Beloit, WI is $1.59 ... a couple miles away we fuel for $1.54 in South Beloit ... a couple hours later in Gary we will see it for $1.33 ... then prices rise again in IN and MI. After two trips of going around Chicago we save ourselves 40 miles and head through it ... and make it in just over two hours, almost record time. One minor problem did arise ... I was trying to read the cost of the 'unmanned' toll booth and ended up in the EZ-pass lane staring at a camera with no coin funnel in site ... what now?? I finally pulled ahead ... hoping I don't hear anything from the patrols ... If we tired to make it to Grand Rapids tonight it would be well after midnight, we end up stopping 74 miles short ... the other driver wanted a Motel 6 and we find one for $44. 12/30/03 - Last night this guy wanted to run all night ... this morning we don't get going until almost eight. Making my drop was easy and quick ... getting back to the freeway was a problem, the exit I took was only to the south and we were heading north, to Saginaw ... we finally found a four-lane and then the Interstate ... (again) I realize an hour later that we are on the wrong highway, but unlike my last trip to MI, this was our second choice of routes to Saginaw. Dispatch gives us these nice little maps of our (pickup and) drop sites ... the Saginaw map showed the Interstate and the end of a runway on it ... Great, it should only take a few minutes to pickup the car, drop the truck and be on our way. One minor problem, the airport on the map had no rental cars ... just a couple of airport hangers and a wind socket ... the airport we were looking for was twenty minutes on the other side of town. I do prefer the smaller airports ... (still) no notice-able security ... no hassle's getting in and out ... and for the first time with a rental car, we have XM radio ... something to keep the passenger busy with for the next five hours. If we would have stayed on schedule, we should have been through Chicago around noon ... now we would hit it at rush hour ... but being between Christmas and New Years, there wasn't much of a rush hour and we would sail right through. Did see a MAJOR spread in gas price in Gary ... Flying J as $1.33, across the street it was $1.59 at Steel City ... one had a line waiting, the other had an empty lot. On this trip the driving did get split fairly evenly ... the other driver did more of the truck driving because dispatch had given him the run ... but in the car the driving was split OK ... the place we would be picking up our trucks at were almost an hour from the airport ... so we still had hours ahead of us, but we could still be home shortly after midnight ... but by now I am hinting to the other driver that I may just get a motel after we drop the car ... and he's free to make a run for it ... under the current rules we should still be legal all the way home (under the Jan 4 rules we couldn't touch the trucks) SURPRISE, when we get to our trucks ... they have no mud flaps ... our trucks have been placed outside the locked gate so we can pull out tonight ... you would think a place who only sells trucks would know the laws ... as should our dispatch. Luckily we did get to our trucks before dispatch shut off the 'emergency' phone ... their reply was to drive them to the nearest all night truck dealer ... the other driver had it right (this time) ... "These trucks are not legal ... they are not moving tonight ... You have two choices, you can pay for a motel for us tonight ... or ... you can tell us to come on home" ... not sure what's going on, but dispatch had to call the owner to get an OK for a motel ... and then told us "... don't go spending $60 on a motel." We cheapest we've seen so far is a Super 8 ... which we find out is $57 ... so we spend another half hour of our time to save the boss $15 ... we find a room for $44 ... it would have been less, but we requested two beds. A quick meal at the Country Kitchen and we hit the hay ... the customer wouldn't open until 8 AM so we will get a full nights sleep 12/31/03 - 8 AM, the other driver calls the customer and requests mud-flaps ASAP. A half hour later we get to the customer ... still no mud-flaps ... so we went to get some coffee. Then a light bulb went on ... MAYBE would could borrow a company vehicle so we could get the car returned and be on our way as soon as the trucks are ready. Back at the customer, I'm not sure what the other driver told them, but we ended up with a loaner car ... not only did this get us going earlier, we didn't have to spend an extra two hours in a chassis ... or pay for all the fuel for those two hours. So far this part of the trip didn't work out too bad ... the boss is going to pay for my motel and we just saved $30 on fuel and a couple of hours in a chassis ... thanks to who eve didn't put on the mud-flaps. The other driver was one of those who can be penny wise and dollar foolish ... he wanted to drive back into IL for cheaper fuel, until I did the math for him ... so we take the shortest way home. In less than an hour I knew this would be my last chassis ... maybe not as bad as some chassis ... but this was no (six hour) joy ride. 18 hours later than expected I was home ... getting paid by the mile. |