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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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220621 MN-ND 1 mixer to Fargo ND (delivered) 1 roll-off to Lake Elmo MN (Wednesday) ... spending the night at Fargo ND Wasn't expecting this. It did end up raining overnight and the temps dropped into the low 70's. At those temps I could have gotten out in the garden long enough to do some planting. But did not realize it until it was too close to time to leave. We pull out at about 7:30. No issues with traffic. I thought maybe I would see the company shuttle van but I did not. 1st stop is at the shipper in Dodge Center. Only one cement mixer so it was easy to spot. The numbers were a little hard to read on my key tag but there were very few keys in this box and none in the other. Not a whole lot of trucks in the lot either. Even before I check the oil I notice that the front bumper is bent and scratched so I took pictures of it. Also the truck has less than a 1/4 of fuel, usually they are almost full here. And there are a few basics missing out of the cab. 1,500 miles, it looks like a used truck but it also doesn't. I call dispatch before moving the truck and they call the shipper, our way of doing things. I will need to pull the truck up to the office so they can look at it. I do, and someone comes out to take pictures and make a phone call. It seems like I have issues with just about every truck I pull out of here. As I was pulling up, one of our drivers from my other company was just dropping their paperwork. I didn't get a chance to talk to them ... Not sure why no-one seemed to know about the bumper but I am cleared to go. 2nd stop is the Fleet Farm in Owattona. I had just under a 1/4 when I got in the truck, before I get to fuel I am down under the 'E' line. As long as I am stopped I put in $100, the credit card max at a lot of stations. I wasn't sure how far I would go before I fueled again but by the time I was 20 miles down the road I knew I needed to stop before the cities. When I pull from I35W to I694 there is a cloverleaf. Traffic comes to a stop and as I downshift, I forget to downshift my splitter. As traffic starts to move I realize I am still in high gear so I pop it out of gear, downshift my splitter and put the shift back into gear ... reverse. I do not think I have ever done that before. I might have moved a few inches before realizing it so no damage done. Everyone was already stopped. But still getting some 'firsts' on these trips. 3rd stop was the Flying J in Northfield. Trucks were backed up but only because people were not paying attention. There were two pumps open and I got one. I had planned on putting in 35 gallons but at 29 gallons it was full. When I go to leave the trucks are backed up again. I am able to weave between the trucks to get out and as I do I see a car coming from the auto pumps. In my peripheral vision I had seen the car behind me and then it was gone. After seeing the following events, I think the car had hit/gone over the concrete curb in the median. When I saw it again it was in the left turn lane, but when we got to the stop sign ... I stopped. The car, actually a van, took a right turn without stopping in front of me and in front of an oncoming truck. When the van got to the left turn lane to get on the freeway it had to stop because the car ahead of it was stopped. When it did turn the driver threw a bag of lunch, onion rings, etc out their window. As they went up the entrance ramp they drove on the shoulder next to one of the other cars before finally falling in behind it. When they were not in the wrong lane or no lane, they were straddling two lanes, even once they were on the freeway. But I was governed at 65 mph so I did not see them for long. Plan was for BB to go ahead and get food from Culvers and meet me at an outlet center parking lot. There are not a lot of good parking spots for large vehicles. 4th stop is the outlet center in Albertville. I take my half hour break and call dispatch for my daily check in. It is still too early to know if we will make delivery today. Loves, St Cloud? That is new since I was here last. Also there is a lot of six lane highway where it used to be four lane freeway. Lots of other changes. At one time I was running this route 5-6 times a week with buses. Now it has been over two years. 5th stop is the Pilot in Alexandria for fuel. I'm guessing that I will need another 15 gallons to get to the drop with 1/8th of a tank. When I pull away from the pump I see yesterdays truck :) I walk past the truck and talk to the driver. Yes, the driver did pick up the truck where I dropped it. He is moving the truck from location to location doing demo's. From here I call the drop, I think I can make it. I call twice and get voicemail both times so I leave a message. Just back on the freeway I get a call so I pull over to answer. They will be open until 5 PM and later, and they tell me where the shop is. We did meet a 60 ft city bus but could not see if it was one of 'ours.' We also saw a couple of coach buses being transportered. Being governed at 64 mph I am guessing pretty close on timing. We cross the border just a couple of minutes before I had guessed. When I pull off the freeway for the last time, I loose my gears and almost come to a stop in the center lane of traffic. But I find it again so no issues. The fuel gauge had dropped below the 1/4 mark, that is what I need to deliver at, not 1/8. But the gauge comes back up once I am driving straight again so I do not stop for fuel. I do see the cement trucks but I don't see any signs so I miss that driveaway. I thought there was on the side street but there was not ... so I had to go around the double block. The fuel holds. 6th stop, the drop. I pull the lot and find someone to sign. As I am cleaning out my truck I get a text message ... "Are you still at Flying J?" So I call, I was never at this Flying J. BB had saw some other truck and assumed it was me. She puts me on speaker in the car and I direct her but she is going to fast and also misses the driveway. By then I am signed off and good to go. When I get to the drop one of the first comments was about the damaged bumper. I said it was that when I picked it up ... the guy says "It was that way when it came the 1st time too." (Just no one mentioned that to me) As soon as BB picks me up we drive a few blocks back to Loves to park and make a hotel reservation, no truck parking needed. We decide on the Comfort Inn a few blocks away. The other option was the Sleep Inn a couple of blocks away. This area of Fargo used to be fields when I started driving this route. Now it is wall to wall buildings for miles. 7th stop is the Comfort Inn. They have cookies, soup and lemonade. We start with a cookie. Then we drive to the Petro across the freeway for Charlies. This Petro also has a Popeye's, Papa Johns and a sit down restaurant. Only one person working today do the have to take orders, cook and clean. Traffic is thick getting out of the truckstop but people are good. Back at the hotel I grab some soup and some lemonade. But that was too much food. I am stuffed. Load board US - 326 IA - 151/149 MN - 3 Tomorrow we can pick up at 6 AM and from there it is five hours back to the office. The truck is going to AL but I am not taking it there. Not sure if we will do more driving this week or not. Hmmm. We just always run together, BB and I. But we would not have needed to today. BB followed me about 300 miles to take me from customer 1 to customer 2 ... nine miles apart. We'll need to look at that in the future. 220622 ND-MN 1 roll-off to Lake Elmo MN (delivered) ... spending the night at home Alarm at 6 AM, breakfast at 7 AM. I just had yogurt. I am still stuffed from last night. 1st stop is the shipper in Fargo. There are only two new trucks and mine has a sold sign in it. The person I need is at the service desk when I walk in. I get the keys and do my inspection. There is a light on on the dash but it goes off when I move the unit and does not come back on again. My plan out of Fargo is to stay on the city streets until I am past the scale :) If I am on the freeway, I stay on the freeway ... but if I am not, I stay off. I have done this a few times so I do not look at the map in detail. Opps. I take the right street from the drop but the map shows that the road takes a right turn at the rail road tracks and I will end up on US-10. Except now there is a bridge over the tracks and I miss that turn. I guess there is also a sign for 'truck route,' but I miss that also and end up on a 'no trucks' street. (I likely weight half what the city buses weight that run the same street so I am not doing any damage.) So from there I zig and zag trying to find US-10 without going into downtown. I remember that US-10 is Main Street ... in Fargo. So when I get to 1st St in Moorehead I do not see any signs so I keep going. As I am crossing the street I do see the signs but too late. Then I'm on Main Street and it is closed the direction I want to go. So I take the detour which does get me back on US-10 at a stop light. As soon as I am on the street I see a 'stop only if directed' sign. A scale I have never seen open in 20 years is open today and I am in the wrong lane. I assume I turned onto US-10 AFTER the flashing lights saying the scale was open. One truck did cross and then a car (?) The patrol walked over to the car and started talking and didn't pay any attention to me. Phew. All that because the roads were not where I remember them being. From there I was OK. BB stopped at the rest area near Alexandria but I was only going to stop once so I planned on stopping later. Just east of Alex there is a gun range. Yesterday there were hundred, thousands (?) of people with at least a dozen event sized tents and a constant bang, bang, bang as we went past. Today it was all empty. Before I get to my rest area, dispatch calls and leaves a message. I am only 10 minutes from the rest area so I do not pull over. 2nd stop was the rest area near Avon. I call dispatch, no answer so I try a few minutes later. No answer so I call a 2nd dispatcher. They say the other dispatchers phone isn't ringing ... because they have turned the ringer off. (I'm guessing that will not happen again) Why dispatcher is calling is because they want me to pick up some keys in St Cloud. I can be in St Cloud in about 10 minutes, and the dealer is the first business off the freeway so it is really on my route. 3rd stop is the dealer in St Cloud. I get there and have to wait for someone to get off the phone but that is the only delay. Not sure what happened but it sounds like maybe a repo (?) and the driver somehow locked the truck keys in a locking panel. So I was picking up a variety of keys that 'may work,' if not someone will have to call a locksmith. 4th stop is our office in Lake Elmo where I park the truck. Someone else will take it to AL. No other work today. I call in later and no work tomorrow yet either. There is work from IA we could do but BB has been in pain since last weekend so we opted to take the day off. I'll do gardening/yard work. She will at least not sit in the same position for hours at a time. Load board US - 366 IA - 170/168 MN - 7 Dispatch did ask me again about going to MO next week. I told one dispatcher I didn't have a reason not to yet. Later I told another dispatcher that I was slated to go to MO ... if they can't find me a non-trash truck.
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