.

Loading in New Orleans.

2009-09-25T20:49:00.004-05:00

I got up this morning about five. Dot always calls to wake me up and this morning was no different except earlier than normal. After having several cups of coffee and reading what a disaster this Democratic administration is I figured it was time to take off.

Me and the other driver, whose trailer I was going to load, and his escort toodled on down the interstate before dawn. Busy, busy. Lots and lots of early birds in New Orleans.

We got to the port about daylight and met our first "issue". We were expecting some kind of parking (at least a wide spot?) so that the other driver could wait. Due to our Omniscient all knowing all caring government mandate one must have a TWIC card to roam freely about Maritime Ports (and other places). I have one and he didn't. He wasn't allowed past the first gate.

They made him turn around in a space where I feared for the integrity of his trailer and KNOW that many, many miles of normal wear were scuffed off his tires. He proceeded to go find a place to hide and wait.

I proceeded on in and had my second "issue". The dispatch clerk was an anal orifice in human form. He was one of those types, a petty tyrant, who MUST display his superiority. If he was a dog he'd be pissing on fire hydrants....or your leg.

After dealing with Mr. Master I swung around behind and onto the River Dock where the piece was. A couple of hours later we got it loaded. I noticed that my air gauges weren't showing what I anticipated. It didn't seem near as heavy as it was supposed to be.

At any rate I threw some chains on it, drug the trailer over to a laydown area, dropped it and bobtailed in search of the other driver.

I found him behind a WalMart. NOT in Walmarts parking lot. Heavens no...it was pack full of minivans and suv's. Mommies just a shopping up a storm.

His trailer was unhooked, all I had to do was swing around, back under it, hook up my lines and go.

Which I did and headed back to load his trailer.

I got there, had to endure mr macho sphincter again and swung around back to load.

And waited. And waited. And waited. I started waiting ....oh.....say eleven oclock (being charitable...it was probably 9:30...but I'm being Kind).

It was after two before they got me loaded. We supposedly has AM appointments.

Now I'm strapped for time. Curfew. If were not outa there by three thirty or so we run afoul of the four to six curfew.

So I threw some chains on (not easy...it was an awkward load. Sixteen foot wide, two pieces). and headed out. I called the other driver and he was to meet me at the agreed upon location. Right outside the gate at an outbound widespot. (a road was closed, I figured we could use it temporarily).

I got to where he was and he wasn't. No where in sight. Now you must understand....from that point on I'm in "old new orleans". Right down on the river front. Heavy, heavy traffic, narrow streets, twisty, sidewalks and streetlamps. Also something I call a "starfish" intersection. Three (as opposed to two) streets run together into one intersection. Very confusing and difficult to maneuver for an eighteen wheeler. Much more so for one that's taking up two lanes.

I finally, (after some "testy" language) located his whereabouts and got to where he was. He was basically along side the street. No wide spot. Just stopped. No other choice.

The port police had run him off from where we had decided. We had a nice, safe, out of the way place...but nooooo. Couldn't do it.

So we played in traffic.

Oh....did I mention it started to rain. Heavily? VERY heavily? The rain killed my bluetooth headset for my phone. Now I'm pretty much incommunicado. Definitely NOT hands free.

The rain also caused me to miss my turn going back to my trailer.

Three times.

The rain was COMING down. I Could NOT see.

Finally it let up and I found the trailer, hooked up. Dot called the police escorts. I headed back. Found the other driver , taking up a lane and a half ,and causing horrible traffic jam, where I'd left him.

Cops showed up. He left.

I was going a different route so I couldn't go with him. Only had one cop too. Needed two.

Wait. Thankfully it's not raining any more.

However....curfew has arrived.

Curfew? We don't need no stinkin curfew!!! Or red lights, or...or....not with COPS!!!!

I followed the red and blue cop lights on back of the motorcycles. Magically, like moses and the red sea, the traffic parted.
Since there was a broke down truck on the ramp getting up onto the interstate we took the scenic route. Thru the French Quarter, down town....really, really, down town...New Orleans.

More cops. There were a swarm. I just toodled along.

Finally came to a on ramp for the interstate. The interstate was a "parking lot". Traffic was stopped. The motorcycle cops, driving BETWEEN lanes, got up on the interstate...stopped three lanes of traffic...I got in the left lane....and rolled.

Looking in my rear view mirror there was a tsunami of automobiles and trucks....held at bay by the motorcycle cops blue lights.

We rolled.

I got back to the truck stop where I'd started twelve hours earlier and weighed the wagon.

Sure enough. We were expecting a gross weight of about 120. Turns out to be about 90.(thousand).

Tomorrow's another day. Glad this one is over.

Didn't kill anyone, or break nuthin....guess it was a good day.

How to influence people and make friends.

2009-08-28T11:52:00.005-05:00

So.....me and a crew are working HARD trying to get the trailer put together.

Lemme "splain. "Big" trailers, such as the one I'm pulling, are transported empty in a "stacked" or "broke down" configuration. That means that the Jeep and stinger are stacked on the trailer and tied down. Similar to a load but it's just the trailer. That's why I have such a high empty weight. (61,000 lbs).

Upon arrival at the shipper and before loading the trailer must be "built" or put together. The stinger and jeep must be unchained, set on the ground and attached to the main trailer.

This is time consumeing. It helps to have help, in fact it's just about impossible for one person to do. Forklifts, overhead cranes, sledgehammers, jacks and winches are sometimes useful.

We was doing this.

This guy walked up and started giving directions like it was HIS trailer. He started moving stuff.

It didn't take but just a tiny bit of this to be way TOO much. So I politely told him that I appreciated his attempt at helping (directing, I didn't notice him swing a hammer) but please let me do it. Thankyouverymuch.

He puffed up like a toad frog and said something to the effect that he was in "Special Equipment" (so am I) with Daily, (so am I) and that if dispatch EVER told me to call him to ask for advice regarding how to do stuff NOT to call.

I asked him why in the world would I want to call him.

He said that he'd been doing this for 21 years.

I looked at him and said that since I'd been messing with trucks since the fifties why I'd want to ask a rookie "such as yourself" about how to do stuff?

He left.

Welll...I HAVE been "messing with trucks" since the fifties...

Tonka Toys are trucks.....kinda.

Humorous

2009-07-17T12:17:00.001-05:00

What can we expect from our Masters during this time of stress?

Surely more than this?

Amazing....

2009-07-17T10:45:00.000-05:00

What would you think if anyone else had said this?

Why not?

2009-07-14T13:58:00.001-05:00

Comander in Chief.

2009-07-01T22:34:00.000-05:00

obama to raise electricity prices...

2009-06-28T17:44:00.000-05:00

XR3

2009-06-15T19:30:00.001-05:00

Corrupt Politicians

2009-05-16T14:41:00.000-05:00

If you've been awake for the last few decades it should come as no surprise to learn that "Congress is corrupt." You might treat that statement with all the incredibility that you would also apply to....say..."water is wet".

Duh.

It's been said. "Politicians, like diapers, should be changed regularly....and for the same reasons".

If you've been awake for the last few weeks/months/years you are aware of the antics of the democrats and particularly those of "Nazi" Pelosi.

If she had any scrap of decency she would resign.

If not she should be kicked out.

Compared to her the former governors of Illinois and New York are saints. (hmmm....they're democrats also...do I detect a pattern?)

The Truth is Not a Defense.

2009-04-28T16:52:00.002-05:00

It's not?

If not why not?

At any rate that's what an attorney thinks. Imagine that. An officer of the law doesn't think very highly of the truth.

Being a lawyer and all....

........no....I won't go there.

What am I talking about you ask?

This

I'm at the Port.

2009-04-28T16:18:00.002-05:00

The Port of Baltimore. Dundorph....or something.

I've decided what I want to do when I grow up. I want to work at a port. I pulled in to the gate. The guard was on the phone. When she got to a stopping place in her undoubtedly important conversation, (it was absolutely entertaining....she laughed and giggled a LOT) then she took care of letting me enter the port.

I then went to the check in office. Had to wait in line. No telling where the guy was that was to check me in, he was gone. When he got back he had "other stuff" to do before he got to me. Then I had to go see another guy, and another...finally got the paperwork done.

It's now two hours since I drove in the gate.

I pull around to the crane.

I've seen turtles move faster.

Watching those guys work was like watching paint dry.....only not as exciting.

It's now four hours since I drove in the gate.

Nope....couldn't get to me. Come back in the morning.

That's what I want to be when I grow up. A port "worker."

If they're getting paid ANYTHING it's too much for what they're producing. They certainly never get tired. No doubt there are benifits. (vacation, sick pay, retirement, medical...all of which I don't have)

Ideal Job.

Pain in the butt...

2009-04-24T20:54:00.003-05:00

It's not particularly heavy....I'm only grossing about a hundred and five thousand.
It's not wide.
It's not tall.

Thank goodness for small favors...

What it is is looooooooooong. The piece is seventy five feet. Bumper to bumper I'm a hundred foot.

Makes it pretty difficult to get around corners.

Coming out of the plant I had to make a hard right turn (WalMart was on the corner...and it was five oclock...heavy heavy traffic.). There were "never to be sufficiently damned" medians all over the place.

I had to turn right from the faaaar left lane...jump curbs...AND have a flagger.

Seriously annoyed a bunchaton of minivan moms.

Now I'm in a rest area...too long to risk trying to get into truckstops.

Gonna be a fun trip. No escorts required till I get to Ohio.

Oh....It's going to Baltimore..

fun...fun....

I wonder if this is true.........

2009-04-24T20:39:00.001-05:00

Guess our national leaders didn't expect this, hmm? On Thursday, Darrell Scott, the father of Rachel Scott, a victim of the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton , Colorado , was invited to address the House Judiciary Committee's subcommittee. What he said to our national leaders during this special session of Congress was painfully truthful.

They were not prepared for what he was to say, nor was it received well. It needs to be heard by every parent, every teacher, every politician, every sociologist, every psychologist, and every so-called expert! These courageous words spoken by Darrell Scott are powerful, penetrating, and deeply personal. There is no doubt that God sent this man as a voice crying in the wilderness. The following is a portion of the transcript:

"Since the dawn of creation there has been both good & evil in the hearts of men and women. We all contain the seeds of kindness or the seeds of violence. The death of my wonderful daughter, Rachel Joy Scott, and the deaths of that heroic teacher, and the other eleven children who died must not be in vain. Their blood cries out f or answers.

"The first recorded act of violence was when Cain slew his brother Abel out in the field. The villain was not the club he used.. Neither was it the NCA, the National Club Association. The true killer was Cain, and the reason for the murder could only be found in Cain's heart.

"In the days tha t followed the Columbine tragedy, I was amazed at how quickly fingers began to be pointed at groups such as the NRA. I am not a member of the NRA. I am not a hunter. I do not even own a gun. I am not here to represent or defend the NRA - because I don't believe that they are responsible for my daughter's death. Therefore I do not believe that they need to be defended. If I believed they had anything to do with Rachel's murder I would be their strongest opponent.

I am here today to declare that Columbine was not just a tragedy -- it was a spiritual event that should be forcing us to look at where the real blame lies! Much of the blame lies here in this room. Much of the blame lies behind the pointing fingers of the accusers themselves. I wrote a poem just four nights ago that expresses my feelings best.

Your laws ignore our deepest needs,
Your words are empty air.
You've stripped away our heritage,
You've outlawed simple prayer.
Now gunshots fill our classrooms,
And precious children die.
You seek for answers everywhere,
And ask the question "Why?"
You regulate restrictive laws,
Through legislative creed.
And yet you fail to understand,
That God is what we need!

" Men and women are three-part beings. We all consist of body, mind, and spirit. When we refuse to acknowledge a third part of our make-up, we create a void that allows evil, prejudice, and hatred to rush in and wreak havoc. Spiritual presences were present within our educational
Systems for most of our nation's history... Many of our major colleges began as theological seminaries. This is a historical fact. What has happened to us as a nation? We have refused to honor God, and in so doing, we open the doors to hatred and violence. And when something as terrible as Columbine's tragedy occurs -- politicians immediately look for a scapegoat such as the NRA. They immediately seek to pass more restrictive laws that contribute to erode away our personal and private liberties. We do not need more restrictive laws. Eric and Dylan would not have been stopped by metal detectors. No amount of gun laws can stop someone who spends months planning this type of massacre. The real villain lies within our own hearts.

"As my son Craig lay under that table in the school library and saw his two friends murdered before his very eyes, he did not hesitate to pray in school. I defy any law or politician to deny him that right! I challenge every young person in America , and around the world, to realize that on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School prayer was brought back to our schools. Do not let the many prayers offered by those students be in vain. Dare to move into the new millennium with a sacred disregard for legislation that violates your God-given right to communicate with Him. To those of you who would point your finger at the NRA -- I give to you a sincere challenge.. Dare to examine your
Own heart before casting the first stone!

My daughter's death will not be in vain! The young people of this country will not allow that to happen!"

If it's not true it ought to be.

I agree with much of the above.

And there's no doubt that the Main Sewer Media would not mention it.

Coalition of RINOs

2009-04-21T20:37:00.002-05:00

From Tracy McCain.

It seems that Senators can donate to other senators election campaigns. I didn't know that they could do that. I thought that if I gave money to "my" politician he'd use it to do things to benefit me..

Apparently not. Benidict Arlan......er....Arlan Specter from Pennsylvania has lost a great deal of popularity. So much so that he's facing a tough primary battle. To help him out other republican senators are apparently giving him money that THEIR consituents gave to them.

That isn't right.

Then maybe it is. It identifies those who we should eliminate from public office.

Unfortunately the Junior Senator from Texas is one of them.

By that I don't mean Bailout Hutchenson.

(sigh).....not hardly worth voteing is it? No one worthy of voteing FOR.

Maybe that's the reason so few people vote.

I read.

2009-04-21T08:34:00.004-05:00

A LOT.....several hours a day. Every day.

I usually have one or two books going plus I spend hours and hours on the internet.

Why?

Well for one thing I'm inherently curious. For another thing TV is so execrable that I'd rather watch sewage bubble in a holding tank than be in the same room as a TV.

Case in point. The Somali Pirates.

For a more accurate take on what happen than youre likely to get by watching the so called news media you might check out one of my most favorite authors.

A former Army Ranger name of John Ringo.

And that's just one tiny, tiny example of why I read rather than watch TV.

No Electronics?

2009-04-19T22:53:00.003-05:00

The horror, the horror.

From The Jenifer Morque by Charles Stross

I don't mind going without clothes, but being without a microprocessor is truly stripping down. It's like asking a sorcerer to surrender his magic wand, or a politician to forswear his lies.

This is what passes for truth and accuracy in the Main Stream Media.

2009-04-16T21:13:00.001-05:00

From NewsBusters

In Reality, Nearly Ninety Percent of Mexican Cartel Weapons DON'T Come From U.S.

By Mike Sargent (Bio | Archive)
April 2, 2009 - 18:08 ET

Apparently, America’s love of firearms has not rubbed off on our Mexican neighbors quite as much as the mainstream media led us to believe.

Who Next....the Girl Scouts?

2009-04-16T19:31:00.001-05:00

From:
Interesting News Items via The Other McCain

DHS Targets Salvation Army
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Department of Homeland Security has identified the Salvation Army as a right wing extremist organization.

How Much Is Obama Costing You?

2009-04-15T14:34:00.002-05:00

You aren't going to like it.

Proud to be a Texan

2009-04-15T11:22:00.000-05:00

By: Creighton H.C.R. No. 50

CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the
United States reads as follows: "The powers not delegated to the
United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the
States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people";
and
WHEREAS, The Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of
federal power as being that specifically granted by the
Constitution of the United States and no more; and
WHEREAS, The scope of power defined by the Tenth Amendment
means that the federal government was created by the states
specifically to be an agent of the states; and
WHEREAS, Today, in 2009, the states are demonstrably treated
as agents of the federal government; and
WHEREAS, Many federal laws are directly in violation of the
Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; and
WHEREAS, The Tenth Amendment assures that we, the people of
the United States of America and each sovereign state in the Union
of States, now have, and have always had, rights the federal
government may not usurp; and
WHEREAS, Section 4, Article IV, of the Constitution says,
"The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a
Republican Form of Government," and the Ninth Amendment states that
"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not
be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people";
and
WHEREAS, The United States Supreme Court has ruled in New
York v. United States, 112 S. Ct. 2408 (1992), that congress may not
simply commandeer the legislative and regulatory processes of the
states; and
WHEREAS, A number of proposals from previous administrations
and some now pending from the present administration and from
congress may further violate the Constitution of the United States;
now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That the 81st Legislature of the State of Texas
hereby claim sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the
Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise
enumerated and granted to the federal government by the
Constitution of the United States; and, be it further
RESOLVED, That this serve as notice and demand to the federal
government, as our agent, to cease and desist, effective
immediately, mandates that are beyond the scope of these
constitutionally delegated powers; and, be it further
RESOLVED, That all compulsory federal legislation that
directs states to comply under threat of civil or criminal
penalties or sanctions or that requires states to pass legislation
or lose federal funding be prohibited or repealed; and, be it
further
RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward official
copies of this resolution to the president of the United States, to
the speaker of the house of representatives and the president of the
senate of the United States Congress, and to all the members of the
Texas delegation to the congress with the request that this
resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a
memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.

Obama Said.

2009-04-01T15:56:00.001-05:00

“I can make a firm pledge,” he said in Dover, N.H., on Sept. 12. “Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.”

Today federal taxes on tobacco went up.

Dramatically.

A record increase even.

Does this show how much the O's word is worth?

Barack Obama has a media that will see no evil, hear no evil and certainly speak no evil.

2009-04-01T01:51:00.000-05:00

Thomas Sowell says......

Change you can beleive in.

2009-03-31T18:05:00.001-05:00

since it was NOT a politician who mentioned it.

(How do you tell if a Politician is lieing? Their lips are moving.)

Weasel

2009-03-31T14:08:00.002-05:00

Some folks, such as myself, place a premium on "plain talking".

Apparently the current Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is NOT one of those people.

I got this from Stacy McCain

I dunno who said it but it's true. "A difference that makes no difference IS no difference" or as Lincoln is supposed to have said. "you can call a tail a leg but it's still a tail".

Well Dirty Harry isn't too sure of what voluntary means. He know's its a good thing and he'd like people to think he's in favor of good things. Consequently he's trying to redefine "mandatory"....as in mandatory taxation....into "voluntary " taxation.

Expect to see more of this kind of behavior.

Stay tuned with the Obama Administration for "voluntary" public service.

Cajun Crawler

2009-03-23T00:06:00.000-05:00

Some Days you Just Can't Win.

2009-03-22T23:15:00.002-05:00

The Beginning of the End

2009-03-10T13:11:00.002-05:00

.......of American Freedom.

Secret ballot. Is there anything more fundamental to the American way of life?

Obama wants to eliminate it. First will be in the process of worker's rights when deciding to join or not join a Union.

NO ONE wants this. But Obama is pushing it.

What next? Gun confiscation? Euthanasia for those who "cost to much to heal"?

Why we're in this mess.

2009-02-24T17:52:00.002-06:00

Interestingly enough there is no mention of the Democraticly sponsored and enforced Community Reinvestment Act. Said act came into place under Carter and was systematically re-enforced under subsequent administrations....Clinton in particular.

Stripping off the fluff what it did was FORCE the banks to take on Sub-prime lenders. So...while factually accurate the above video's seem to ignore the motivations.

Plenty of blame to go around here.

Recent Loads

2009-02-22T17:09:00.001-06:00

A million Dollars a day for Two Thousand Years.

2009-02-22T16:37:00.000-06:00

Hybrid

2009-02-22T12:39:00.001-06:00

So....tell me again why the Chevy Volt is such a big deal?

Why is it taking so long to market?

Why is it going to cost so much?

GM? Hah!!

Just the facts ma'am.

2009-02-17T09:37:00.000-06:00

Demonstrated Incompetence?

2009-02-13T15:18:00.001-06:00

2009-02-10T00:38:00.000-06:00

Where to begin...

2008-11-06T07:28:00.003-06:00

Things have been happening since the last road post..ungood things. Beyond the election I mean.

Start at the beginning the man said.

Ok. Last week I loaded a Grove 700E Crane going to Salt Lake City Utah. The Crane weigh a touch over ninety thousand pounds and it was a shade difficult to get it to axle out correctly.

Just as I was heading out the gate I got a call from dispatch.

The destination had been changed. I was now going to Jackson Mississippi.

Ok...fine by me.

Going across Interstate 68 in Maryland and West Virginia is tough. Too tough. Somewhere along there I shifted wrong...gassed on it too roughly...or just had bad luck. At any rate shortly after leaving the inbound West Virginia Scales I noticed a noise.

The noise got so bad that I parked it at the NEXT West Virginia Scale that I came too. Luckily not too far.

To make a long story short I'd broken a tooth on the ring gear in my truck's differential. Luckily there was a shop nearby. I mean RIGHT there near by. Not five miles from where I parked. In Freemont WVa. Thompson's Truck and Trailer Repair. Good Guys.

They got me fixed up and I was off having missed only a day.

I got out of WVa before Dark (barely) and headed on across Kentucky.

Upon entering Tennessee I was suprised to discover that I required an escort.

$$$$$$$$

Upon acquireing same I then discovered I BARELY had time to get out of Tenn. before dark.

I managed that but wound up in a little RatHole of a "truck stop" in Senatobia Mississippi. It was all right I guess but I have nothing favorable to say about it. I spent sunday there. Monday I went on down to Jackson and unloaded.

I was informed of loads available in Morton Illinois if I wanted them.

So I came up here.

Yesterday I spent all day seeing to getting the trailer fixed. (It had a boo-boo) and loading.

No permits yet thought. Illinois permit office was closed Tuesday for the Election and I figure they spent all day Wednsday recovering from hang overs.

Today it's raining.

Hopefully I'll get this thing scaled out and rolling toward Texas sometime today.

Heavy.

Thomas Sowell on the presidency

2008-10-29T19:55:00.000-05:00

Loaded...going to Salt Lake City.

2008-10-28T11:08:00.001-05:00

The Big Beam

2008-10-25T13:05:00.003-05:00

Here it is....

Well...medium sized anyway....

.........this is big.

This is even bigger.....(not a beam though)

Trying Something New....again.

2008-10-25T12:30:00.003-05:00

Sometime back I got a BlackBerry Curve. I've grown more and more accustomed to it. Unlike the Palm Treo it replaced as my AT&T "backup" phone (Sprint is my primary)

it's easier and more convenient to use. Like the Treo it's a "smart" phone and has several capabilities not found in "ordinary" phones.

For one I can put e-books on it. Which I do. That way I always have something to read.

Also like the Treo I can "remote blog"...with pictures. Except that it's easier than the Treo.

I've got it set up now and intend to do so....frequently.

Pictures with little or no text. (texting on such a tiny keyboard with my thick fingers is hard...so forgive the inevitable typing errors)

Stay tuned.

One addittional thought.

I'm a Trucker. Just a RedNeck trying to make a living. Kind of like "Joe the Plumber" whom the DhmiCrats are trying to destroy.

No one special and with no significant amount of knowledged or money. I'm sure any give highschool junior is more technically sophisticated than I am. Just ask them.

That being said if I can use afford, acquire and use this kind of technology then anyone can. ANYONE. Anyone meaning from children in school to old folks in nursing homes.

ANYONE. It's cheap and it's everywhere.

Two things about that.

One is that the Antique Socialist Media are probably NOT happy about it.
Two is that the Political Candidates and other Politicians are equally not happy.

McCain has already proven he's against free speech by his infamous law "McCain-Fiengold". A bipartisan bill supported by both DhmiCrats and Republicans...and signed into law by Bush.

That does NOT bode well for freedom of speech in the US.

The big BO is equally unhappy with free speech as demonstrated by his attacks on both Joe the Plumber and his "Truth Squads" in states like Missouri.

Interesting times.

We have the technology for umbiquitous information flow....and an informed electorate.....do we have the will?

Wonderful day.

2008-10-25T12:18:00.000-05:00

The New Beam

2008-10-24T23:05:00.005-05:00

Since transferring my lease to the new company back in march I've been pulling a Removable Goose Neck Trailer (RGN) sometimes called a lowboy. Small trailer...just a thirty five ton (load capacity).

Recently I was asked if I'd like to "upgrade" to a beam.

After much fear and trepidation I said ..."er...suuuuure.. I'll give it a spin".

This is my beam.

Notice that there's not much to a beam?

It's got a neck (removable, .....hydraulic even) , wheels and axles like a normal trailer...but in the middle there ain't much.

Just frame rails.....beams.

The piece to be hauled is sat on top of the beams........straddles it.

Makes for an interesting time loading, and unloading.

Different techniques are required. New skillsets are used.

Heavy lumber "dunnage" is moved around.....a lot.

Hopefully tummy fat will remove itself due to all the extra exercise.

Which was kind of the point. (...I'm also thinking of buying stock in Bayer)

Well I delivered ONE...count em folks....ONE load with the baby beam pictured above and I get this telephone call.

"How'd you like to latch onto a serious trailer?" dispatch said.

"Uh...me?...You talking to ME?" I squeaked.

"Yup"...he said...

"Okaaaaay"....I gulped.

Soooooooooo....tomorrow I swap my baby for a full grown beam.

It's a 2+2. Or ....it can be a "quad". What that means is it has four axles and the axles can be configured in a couple of different ways.

Heavy too. (empty weight for me and the baby was only 44 thousand.....I'm skeered of what the big boy will weigh....probably fifty or more)

Able to carry HEAVIER freight though.

Stay tuned.

Big....REALLY, REALLY BIG

2008-10-24T22:49:00.003-05:00

I've hauled some pretty big stuff in my day.

For example....
An Escavator....grossing about a hundred and twenty thousand I'd say.

And a Dump Truck....not so heavy but bulky....

And a transformer....high and top heavy....just plain heavy too.And don't forget where Texas Permit "service" sends us...I had to back up over a mile to get OUT of that perdiciment.

But of all the stuff I've ever hauled it ain't NUTHING compared to these guys....

Something for Politicians to think about

2008-10-22T07:19:00.000-05:00

545 People

2008-10-18T15:31:00.000-05:00

Charley Reese has been a journalist for 49 years.

*545 PEOPLE
*By Charlie Reese
Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.

Have you ever wondered why, *if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, WHY do we have deficits?*

Have you ever wondered why, *if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, WHY do we have inflation and high taxes?*

You and I don't propose a federal budget. The president does.

You and I don't have the Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of Representatives does.

You and I don't write the tax code, Congress does.

You and I don't set fiscal policy, Congress does.

You and I don't control monetary policy, the Federal Reserve Bank does.

One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president, and nine Supreme Court justices - 545 human beings out of the 300 million are directly, legally, morally, and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.

I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress. In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered, but private, central bank.

I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason. They have no legal authority.
They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman, or a president to do one cotton-picking thing. I don't care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator's responsibility to determine how he votes.

Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.

What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall. No normal human being would have the gall of a Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits. The president can only propose a budget. He cannot force the Congress to accept it.

The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes.
Who is the speaker of the House? Nancy Pelosi (sp)

She is the leader of the majority party. She and fellow House members, not the president, can approve any budget they want. If the president vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if they agree to.

It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million can not replace 545 people who stand convicted -- by present facts -- of incompetence and irresponsibility. I can't think of a single domestic problem that is not traceable directly to those 545 people. When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.

If the tax code is unfair, it's because they want it unfair.

If the budget is in the red, it's because they want it in the red .

If the Army & Marines are in IRAQ , it's because they want them in IRAQ.

If they do not receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available to the people, it's because they want it that way.

There are no insoluble government problems.

Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take this power. Above all, do not let them con
you into the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like 'the economy,' 'inflation,' or 'politics' that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.

Those 545 people, and they alone, are responsible.

They, and they alone, have the power.

They, and they alone, should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses.

Provided the voters have the gumption to manage their own employees.

We should vote all of them out of office and clean up their mess!

-- Charlie Reese is a former columnist of the Orlando Sentinel Newspaper.

--
eh

Say bye bye to the RGN

2008-10-14T20:10:00.002-05:00

I've now transfered everything to the beam.

Took a day.

I'll try to post a picture tomorrow.

Lost a ton of weight and almost five feet of length.

Should be easier to permit and transport bigger stuff.

I wonder if this is real?

2008-10-11T14:31:00.002-05:00

So....if it is real and he gets elected he's an unlawful (illegal) president?

I dunno how it works(being a trucker and not a lawyer)....but I find it suspicious.

In other news....Texas and Okklahoma are currently battling it out. At least this is honest...the better team WILL win.

Not like politics.

Politics...from the greek ....poli and ticks. Poli means many. Ticks.....blood sucking pests.

I haven't posted in a while....

2008-10-10T23:26:00.002-05:00

......dunno why.

Last week I came home. I'd been out for four months. Believe me when I say that I had long hair and beard.

Years ago I would get haircuts and beard trims at truck-stop barbershops. For some reason said barbershops tend to run bankers hours. (9-5) ...Seeing as I'm heavy haul I run non stop from sun up to sundown.

What I'm saying is....the barber shop's are NOT open when I'm not running.

.......and....if they (by some chance) ARE open....they do a remarkably horrible job.

Like...why spend X$$$$ on a bad haircut.

So I don't.

My wife cut's my hair when I'm home. (Four months residue was SOME haircut)...but not the worst. When I first met her some many years ago it was, like, four YEARs. (hair down to mid back....and beard....think.....ZZTop.

But I digress...

I came home after four months and I was TIRED. All I wanted to do was ...nothing.

Sleep mostly.

I told dispatch that I was taking a week off .

t was not to be. After a few (not nearly enough) days I got a call....they have this load you see.....

Being as the economy has been thoroughly screwed by the demoncrats I figure "make hay while the sun shines"....so I took it.

Odd load......Power Only.

But....it worked to my advantage. The deal was I bobtail to Okie city and pick yup this tow-away going to Carlsbad NM.

I actually talked my wife into going with me. First time in a year or so.

Purty good trip. I hooked on....checked it out....flagged and ragged....monday morning. By nine in the AM we were rolling....and made it to Post Texas that night.

Little Bar and Grill called BJ's. Good place. Awesome hamburgers.

Spent the night there.....rolled at first light.

Made it into Carlsbad by ten in the AM....dropped and headed to Dad's. (my dad)....had a fine visit and spent the night....went to my boys house. (had a fine visit and spent the night) went to my (ex) father in law's house....had a fine visit and headed on back to Austin.

Good week.

Got home yesterday....really tired but feeling good.

Got a call from dispatch this afternoon.

They want me to swap trailers. They want me to pull a "beam".

I've been expecting this. Actually I kind of welcome it. It'll give me a chance to get back into shape. (loose the beer gut maybe?) plus....(big, big, reallly big plus) there's a whole lot of beam freight out there...

So .....I'm a gonna....

Monday will see me in Okie City again dropping my RGN and hooking to a beam.

Interesting times.

totally inconsiderate.

2008-08-20T10:09:00.001-05:00

This guy.

He's been ideling his engine for the last few hours. I've been tempted to confront him with the fact that he's in a "no idle" zone. I've refrained.

People like him make me wish that the high cost of fuel will continue. I'm hopeing that morons such as him and the companies that he works for will go out of business.

Bad Day

2008-08-15T20:02:00.002-05:00

Well, it didn't work out.

The load I mean. Yesterday the customer said to call at about eleven so we did.

It wasn't ready.

Then he said to call around three so we did.

It wasn't ready.

So he said it'd for sure be ready about five...to call about four thirty.

So we did.

It wasn't ready.

I suspect that they'd been playing me along all along. The menaaana syndrome.

Too bad. We're charging them for "truck ordered not used" as well as all the permits ordered for the load. It's gonna cost them about a thousand dollars.

I'm outa there.

I'm back in Ft. Pierce heading toward North Carolina. There will eventually be an escavator out of Kernersville to haul. Better pay.

Eventually. But it beats sitting in the heat, damp and skeeters paying ten dollars for hamburgers and four dollars a gallon for gasoline to run my generator/AC.

More lovleliness....

2008-08-14T15:23:00.004-05:00

Today has been a hell of a week.

It started out pretty good. I was blocked in last night when I went to sleep but when I woke up this morning almost all the spaces around me were vacant.
It was no trouble getting out.

It's a good thing I left when I did though because the early rising chicken trucks were returning to their roost. All the reefers that had delivered early in Miami were returning. I expect that in another couple of hours the truckstop would have been packed again.

So I rolled into Miami. Heavy, heavy traffic from Ft. Pierce South. Some places there was heavy construction as well. I say heavy....for south florida it was light. It was moving wasn't it?

Heading into Miami Interstate 95 was ten lanes....five lanes each direction. For a good while there it paralleled the turnpike which was another four lanes. Bunch of people live down there.

I got off the interstate at exit 7 and went east. A block or so past highway 1 was the place. Max's Marine Shop or something like that.

The problem was that there was NO place to get off the street. That ment I had to unload on the street. Easier said than done but we done it.

The locals did NOT make it easy though. We were continually shooing off morons who were parking in the loading zone. Either they couldn't read (English....a real possibility) or they were just Stupid. I vote for stupid.

The guy who bought the crane had lots of problems with it. Before he even got it off the trailer.....it wouldn't start. Dead batteries. He finally got them boosted and it ran for a couple of minutes then died.

Out of fuel.

He got a couple of five gallong cans of diesel....removed and replaced the fuel filters and primed the system....and it started up again....and he almost rolled it coming off the trailer....then almost hit a sign and a fence.

He got it off the trailer and had to go into an alley to get behind his building to his yard in back. His hired help and relatives "shut the street down" (four lane....heavy, heavy traffic, zoned business and bums)...and he got it pointed in the right direction.

He ALMOST got it off the street when the power steering lines broke. GALLONS of power steering fluid everywhere....and he run into his building.

Oh....Welll.

He seemed in pretty good spirits for all that. He signed my B.O.L. and chatted for a bit. It seems he got this thing off of E-bay. Paid more for the freight than for the merchandise.

Amazing.

I left heading toward my next load. Hardly got rolling and it began to rain.

If it goes ten hours in Miami without raining the locals think it's a drought. It wasn't a drought. It rained HARD. Five lanes of traffic on I95 heading north at a creep.

Almost too late I discovered my exit was from the left. I barely had time to change 4 lanes to make it.

Then the customer said the load wouldn't be ready until tomorrow.

Lovely.

So....I declined to stay in Metro Miami overnight. Homeboys and Porch Monkies are more dangerous than Alligators I figured so I headed out into the Everglades across Alligator alley.

Here I are.

Little truckstop in the middle of the swamp at an Indian Reservation. Hell of a deal when I feel safer here than in a city.

An Inconsiderate (expletive deleted)

2008-08-13T15:34:00.004-05:00

Miami is a lovely place. It is NOT however a good place to take a truck. For some reason or another there are no truckstops. Nothing to speak of. You'd think that a city of multimillion inhabitants would have places to park the trucks that take them their food, their clothes, their cars.........their everything except maybe fish.

Nope. The nearest truckstop of any consequenceis Ft. Pierce which is over a hundred miles out.

So that's where I am. At the Flying J at exit 131 on I95 near Ft. Pierce. I pulled in here about three thirty local and, no big suprise, the parking lot is pretty much packed. There are still a few parking spots though.

On the back row. Heaven forbid that some of the Chubby Truckers might actually have to WALK any further than absolutely necessary.

But that's OK. I like the back row. Most of us Heavy Haulers do. There's a bit more room back there.

Most places. Not here. Flying J didn't do a good job of planning this parking lot.

And this guy didn't help any....not at all....at all.

Parked like his is trucks can't get far enough over to "make the swing" to get into the parking spots. What few there are. Interestingly enough "what few there are" are the one's he blocking. That's why they haven't been taken yet. No one can get in because of him.

It's not like his has much to drive. Pretty small actually.
SO.

I had a pretty difficult time getting parked. Partly because of the design of the truck stop and partly because of him. When I finally succeeded I found that I was a bit out of sorts and mildly annoyed. More than mildly to be honest.

So....armed with my trusty camera I took those pictures.

And who would it be that showed up?

Him.....the man himself.

Isn't he a fine speciman of a trucker?

He asked me what I was doing and I told him....and I told him why. I even went so far as to draw "word picture" of the problems he was causing.

Didn't help.

He said some unkind words.

And left.

Key word is left. He's not there any more.

Too bad. So sad.

Several other truckers watched the exchange.

I was applauded when I walked back to the truck.

It probably didn't do any good in the long run though. The way the parking lot, like I said, is designed is just tooooo tempting for a lazy trucker to park along the curb instead of parking in a space.

When the spaces are all gone......well it's a given that they'll park there.

Oh well....

Congressional Response....

2008-06-15T00:31:00.001-05:00

Is it Safety or is it Revenue?

2008-06-01T17:17:00.001-05:00

The grizzled old trucker repressed a groan of dismay as he saw the situation ahead of him.

"Right Lane Closed Ahead" the signs said. Such signs were a rather frequent occurrence since this was "construction season" . His load was oversize, but not THAT much oversize, only about twelve wide, but very heavy.

The construction signs weren't what caused him to groan in dismay. No, the problem was the OTHER sign. The sign that said "Weigh Station 1 mile".

The weigh station was right in the middle of the construction zone. If safety was a major concern then the weigh station would be closed. Trucks merging into high speed traffic from a weigh station was bad enough in a normal situation. When the weigh station was in a construction zone and the slow trucks had to merge with fast traffic into a single lane, well that wasn't safe. If , on the other hand, revenue was this station's major concern, not safety, then it would probably be open.

Closing in on the weigh station the old trucker remembered other encounters with "revenue centric" weigh stations in the past.

That time, maybe ten years ago, in Arkansas. He was leaving the state and had pulled into the Weigh Station at Ft. Smith. The weigh station was very near the border, a little further and he would be out of Arkansas. It was Christmas Eve and if he hurried he would be able to spend the holiday with his grandkids, a VERY rare occurrence. It seemed that he only got to see them every year or so, this year he might be lucky.

Nope, no luck. The weighmaster decided that his load was an inch wider than what the permit stated. The permit was voided and the trucker had to leave his load at the scale until a new permit could be purchased which would not be until after Christmas. There was a fine too. The Truckstop nearby was OK but he'd much rather spend Christmas somewhere else.

Then there was the time not to long ago when he was involved in a Bridge Reconstruction Project in New York. The piece he was carrying was fifty foot long, about fifteen foot wide and over a hundred thousand pounds. It was a bridge section. The piece was made of reinforced cement and sat on a steel saddle. Since steel and cement don't play well together bouncing down the road there were rubber "cushions" between the two. For some reason just about every other load was being rerouted to a state facility and inspected by the New York D.O.T. This inspection was about par. The D.O.T. trooper decided that since one side of the beam had a half inch thick piece of rubber cushioning it from the steel then the OTHER side must also, have a half inch piece. The three-eighth's inch thick piece which was there wouldn't do.

Fixing that little fiasco resulted in a huge crane bill, and a hefty fine.

And then there was that time in Nebraska. He had been hauling a combine or some such. It wasn't much of a load. He wasn't even grossing a hundred thousand and barely eleven foot wide. He WAS oversize though. He was within a mile of the scale on a narrow two lane road with no shoulder, when it started to rain.

When he pulled up onto the scale they just grinned at him, and told him to come inside. In Nebraska it's against the rules for oversized loads to travel in the rain. Big fine.

And then there was the time....., but he was just about to the scale. Yup. Revenue Scale. It's open.

To add to the fun another truck was parked crosswise across the parking lot.

This was Louisiana. Louisiana scales were mostly old and not designed for today's larger trucks. Nobody seemed quiet sure how to park in a Louisiana Scale. The scalemasters didn't even seem to know. This driver definitely didn't having effectively blocked the whole parking lot.

So just exactly how was he going to do this? It took a LOT of room to turn his rig. There wasn't a whole lot of extra behind that parked truck. Oh. Well. Play it by ear.

So he parked it, somehow, and then went inside and talked to the nice man. The weighmaster acted suspicious.

"Why were you taking pictures" he asked.

The Trucker replied "Oh. I was just documenting your little death-trap out there. If, when I pull out of here, and while I'm trying to avoid that other truck and my trailer drops off into that hole I'm liable to blow out some tires. I might even roll over. I'm kind of worried. What do you recommend?"

The weighmaster blinked, obviously conflicted. "Oh, I was wondering what those other guys was looking at earlier".

Meanwhile the driver of the truck which was blocking the parking lot was getting visibly agitated. He didn't speak very good English perhaps being from Eastern Europe.

"I move...is OK! I move truck!" and he went running off to do just that.

The weighmaster checked the Old Trucker's papers. Visibly unhappy the weighmaster couldn't find anything wrong.

"Have a nice day" the weighmaster said, handing back the papers.

The Old Trucker walked back to his truck, got in, CAREFULLY updated his logbook, CAREFULLY donned his seatbelt, and CAREFULLY pulled out of the weigh station.

Is it Safety, or is it Revenue?

Global.......warming?

2008-05-26T16:09:00.003-05:00

It's been a while since I've posted here.

I've been kind of busy. New company. New procedures. Higher price of fuel. Must run faster to stay in one place.

It's probably going to get worse.

I still read though. A LOT. One of my most favoritest author's is John Ringo. He just wrote a new one. It's called

The Last Centurion

I've got it as and EARC (that means electronic advanced reader's copy) from the publisher. I'm reading it now.

The other day on a chat board I frequent the man himself...John Ringo....was talking about....stuff...

he said another person could post this on HIS blog so I took that as blanket permission for me too....so here is what Mr. Ringo had to say .....

About the sun in recessive condition

When I wrote TLC I said it felt like dictation, but this is ridiculous.

I'm sure others have posted the various articles. But to reiterate.

The sun goes through sunspot cycles. All but the most hardcore 'it's all CO2' idiots recognize that those drive global tempertures along with current shifts. (More on that later.) Cycles vary in length from 8-16 years with the average being 11 and they overlap for about a year at the minimums. The 'cold' (low) cycles are longer and the 'hot' (high) cycles are shorter.

(High and low are based on the graph of the period. High/hot cycles have more sunspots at the high point of their graph thus go 'high' and cool ones go 'low.' I'll be using the terms interchangeably.)

Due to some new understandings and tracking ability, we know that Cycle 25 is going to be low. The driver is the lower-level 'racetrack' which is trackable now. It wasn't in time to figure out 24. Slow racetrack means low cycle. The norm is 6 meters per second. Current rate is .25mps. Low cycle for 25. (Cold)

We entered the 'low' period of Cycle 23 (which was a normal to high cycle, part of a series of normal to high that go back to the '80s and which account for most of the recent 'global warming') about when I was writing TLC. We should have seen the first sunspot for 24 around September.

There wasn't one until last January. Several months late.

As of this writing (late May) there have been only six or seven 'microspots'.

We had unusually cold weather in 2007. Guess why?

The IESE is the official group that looks in their crystal balls and tries to determine (for various reasons having to do with satellites mostly) what the 'normal curve' of sunspots will look like during a cycle.

The IESE had two predictions for Cycle 24. Exactly even among the predictors. One was a normal to hot cycle. The other was a flat cycle ala what they're predicting for 25. (In which case, we're going to be going into a minimum at least as bad as the Dalton. The Dalton was what caused the famine that's the background for Les Miserables.)

The current conditions are well into their 'normal curve.' Yeah, it's the sun. It could change. But the current normal curve is 50% under the low prediction. The sun is acting more or less exactly as I wrote about (I won't say predicted) in TLC.

It should kick up. It better kick up. Despite liking cooler weather (what I wrote in TLC was more wish-fulfillment than prediction, I hate heat) I fully recognize the nightmare that a truly reduced insolation would cause.

But wait! There's more!

Meteorologists, by and large, ignore sunspots. Their systemology is based on the sun being steady-state. I won't say that's changing alot, but it's starting to change a bit. But what they mostly look at is oceanic currents.

(On a side note: I personally think that's because it gives meteorologists a reason to take cruises. If they didn't have currents and only looked at sunspots they'd be stuck in observatories looking at the sun all the time. Which would you prefer? End digression.)

Thing is, they've identified four major currents that, from their perspective, are the major drivers of weather. Basically they're north and south Atlantic and north and south Pacific. The two biggies are north pacific and south Atlantic. (POD and AOC)

(Oh, by the way, according to them there's a 'notable oscillation frequency' between AOC and POD that is the driver for all long-term climate change including iceages. Uh-huh.)

Both, nearly simultaneously with the solar recession, have gone into recessive conditions.

Now the meteorologists are saying 'It's going to get colder.' (Of course, as soon as this 'masking' (their term) goes away, we're going to heat up and the world will end. Better hope we do.)

What I find fascinating is that there should be no connector between currents and solar output. At least, not without one hell of a lag.

But simultaneous with the last solar maximum we had an El Nino (which is what is credited with driving temps up in 1998. Not the fact that we were near a solar maximum. Oh, the El Nino and 'man-induced global warming' of course.)

And now we have a La Nina and cold conditions with AOC and POD.

There's something funky going on that defies theory. Even sunspot accepting theory.

Currents do have an effect. Don't get me wrong. They do. So does insolation. More than most climatologists are willing to admit.

(The latter I can back up with some original research. I'm still trying to figure out how to make money from it, though.)

Bottom line is that with the currents going into recessive condition and reduced insolation...

I said that damned thing felt like dictation!

Seriously, my completely un-accredited WAG is that we're looking at a 50-75 year minimum. Temperatures will drop rapidly after 2016 and may not go up alot during this cycle. (The currents are going to fight agin it.) If the sun doesn't warm up fast, temps may drop fast. But there's no way to tell when it's going to kick in or if as of now.

(If I could figure that out, I could make one hell of alot of money.)

Okay, digression.

Space is really big and really cold. We're on a ball stuck in space. What keeps that ball warm is the sun. When the sun is putting out extra energy, it gets absorbed by the seas. When it puts out less, the seas should be releasing heat.

If the seas aren't releasing heat and we're losing heat due to lack of insolation...

Think of a house in the winter and the heater goes out. It was warm. It doesn't suddenly get cold but you can feel it creeping in. By morning it's really freaking cold.

Extend this over a period of time. Right now, if you've been paying any attention to the weather, you can feel it creeping in.

Extending the metaphor. The heater went out in the afternoon. The house is well warmed. (It's summer in northern latitudes.)

This winter is probably going to be interesting. If we don't start having more sunspots (and neutron output)... It's going to really, really suck.

There was another thread having to do with gas prices and such. A bit on that.

You don't have to have an iceage for reduced insolation to affect commodity prices. The obvious one is heating oil but it's more complicated than that. A 'Bandit Six' discussion of farming.

This 'creeping minimum' hasn't really affected planting seasons and probably won't for a while. Maybe by a few days but farmers are used to a few days here or there.

What it does effect is production.

Plants need both light and warmth to maximize production. They are not hot-blooded thus they fall under Q10 rules. Their metabolism is reduced if temperatures are reduced. All things being equal (equal sunlight, equal rain, equal fertilizer) if you have cooler weather, you have less production.

Corn kernels are a bit smaller and less plump. Ditto wheat. Your soybeans are just a tad smaller. Ripe and harvestable, but...

It doesn't sound like much, but when you weigh your harvest, your field has produced a couple less hundred pounds/tons (depends on field size) than it would in warmer weather.

5%? 10%? Doesn't matter. It's the difference between 'bumper crops' (price goes down for the commodity) and 'reduced yield' (Price goes up.)

For us non-farmers, even without the biofuels craze, things get more expensive.

The commodity markets have been going insane, lately. Everyone factored for the biofuels. They're scratching their heads, mostly, as to why there's not more grains on the market.

Reduced. Insolation.

And we're doing the biofuel dance at the same time.

People, we don't get our head around reality sometime in the next decade, I'm afraid we are totally and completely screwed. We're heading for 'the perfect storm.'

And the possibility exists that this isn't a minimum.

It's possible, no way to tell for sure, that it's the first notes of a grand fugue called: Ice Age.

In which case, we'd better get our heads around nuclear. Fast.

Really, really bored....HighWay Runnery

2008-04-16T15:15:00.000-05:00

Bored

2008-04-16T15:08:00.001-05:00

New Resturant Opening In Austin Tx.

2008-04-16T12:29:00.002-05:00

Sushi Kyu
2438 West Anderson Lane
Austin Tx.

www.Sushi Kyu.com

"The first of it's kind in Austin we offer fresh made to order Sushi at affordable prices in a fast casual atmosphere. Our menu focuses on Sushi Rolls but we offer other Japanese entres as well."

Loading and Unloading an RGN

2008-04-16T12:17:00.001-05:00

I used to pull a van....and after that I graduated to pulling a stepdeck. (I've only rarely pulled flatbeds....their deck is too high...gives me a nosebleed being up that far off the ground). Vans and stepdecks both need docks to unload...mostly. A stepdeck can be Crane unloaded or it can use makeshift docks.....(shudder)....but mostly they need regular, back up and bump it, docks.

I learned to hate docks. They cost me a bunch of money. I got to saying that a dock was good for two things.

Thing one: they occasionally, sometimes, now and then unload freight off a truck there.

Thing two: most of the time they store trash there....and don't clean it up much to unload a truck. Hence the hate....flat tires by the boodle. I really, really got tired of buying trailer tires which were ruint at trashy docks.

I got SO tired of it that after a while I bought a different type of trailer....and for other reasons..the deck of which is LOWER to the ground.

Consequently I don't need no Stinking Docks.......

Loading/Unloading An RGN

All I need is a flat piece of ground. Admittedly it needs to be a rather LARGE flat piece of ground...but hey...I drive a large truck. I haul large STUFF. So I need my room.

The advantage of an RGN is that the "neck" comes off. Hence the name. Removable Goose Neck....also called Detach, Detach Double Drops ...etc.

Since the neck is removable and the bed of the trailer lies flat on the ground that makes it real handy to drive equipment on and off. The way it works is like this:

First...find a big, flat, level spot. Then disconnect the air lines and electric lines.

Then (in my case...I have a four axle tractor) Slide the fifth wheel all the way to the back.

This can be a B*&@$...bother some times, particularly if the load is heavy. It's always best to keep the fifth wheel slide well greased.

Next...pull the fifth wheel release and sloooooowly, gently ....or as gentle as you can be with heavy equipment....pull forward. There are frame ramps on the back of my tractor behind the fifth wheel.

Rollers on the trailer neck guide the trailer and it rolls off. Gently...sometimes NOT so gently. Care is important.

Next. Get under the trailer neck and disconnect stuff.

Make This:

look like This...

Being absolutely CERTAIN not to forget THIS

the hoses and airlines that connect the trailer neck to the rest of the trailer.

Now...back in the truck and Back up under the neck....just a touch. (oh...did I mention that you can't SEE the neck? ...in the mirrors....too close and too narrrow). Experience counts.

by just baaarely lifting the neck...pressure is removed from the release pin....

which can then be pulled

....disconnecting the remaining link between the neck and the rest of the trailer. The trailer neck is now bridged between the tractor frame ramps and the trailer.

DONT pull forward....just DONT....it would be........BAD. (also wildly embarassing.....trust me on this)

Back up instead.....slowly. Until the neck rides up onto the fifth wheel...the kingpin slips into the jaws and it locks.

Then release the fifth wheel slide lock and back up some more.....easy does it.

Dump the air in the air bags and MAKE SURE the lift axle is UP.

Insert a piece of lumber between the frame of the tractor and the trailer neck...for support.

then air up the suspension....to lift the trailer neck...... and pull forward .....carefully.

For about the first ten thousand times you do this it's always a good idea to GET OUT OF THE TRUCK AND LOOK. The consequences of inattention can be time consuming.

If everything is OK....pull forward.

Then get to work....the job is to turn this:

Into this....

and get it off the trailer.....

The job is now HALF done. It's time to clean up the mess...pack stuff away....and hook up again...

.........and get ready to go somewhere else....

And do it all again.

Setn to me by the Ragin' Cajun

2008-04-16T12:13:00.001-05:00

There's getting to be some bored truckers out here....


 Reverend Boudreaux was the part-time pastor of the local Cajun Baptist
 Church, and Pastor Thibodaux was the minister of the Covenant Church across
 the road.  They were both standing by the road, pounding a sign into the
 ground that read: 'Da End is Near! Turn You self Around Now Before It's Too
 Late!'
 
 As a car sped past them, the driver leaned out his window and yelled, 'You
 religious nuts!'
 
 From the curve they heard screeching tires and a big splash.  Boudreaux
 turns to Thibodaux and asks, 'Do ya tink maybe da sign should jus say
 'Bridge Out'?'

Why is it............

2008-04-11T23:03:00.000-05:00

That:

When I get an Oversize Permit:

Georgia requires that it be signed in BLUE ink....no other color will do....must be blue.

Alabama requires that it be signed in RED ink...no other color will do....must be red....

.............and if the officer (in either state) is in a bad mood....tickets may ensue.

No other State (that I know of) gives a flip WHAT color the permit is signed in. For all I know Crayon would work. Quiet a few states don't even require it be signed.

That :

Oklahoma, Arkansas, Nebraska and many other states have one page permits.

Texas, Illinois, and many other states have a one or two page "provision sheet" to go with the permit.

Missouri and Kansas have twenty or thirty page booklets that go with the permits.

California and Oregon and a few other states have permits the size of a telephone book for a small rural town....complete with tables and multi-colored maps.

That:

While most states permits are written in English some aren't....dunno what it is....Lawyereese? The words are English but the meaning is obscure.

That:

All states require that I follow, without exception, the permit. But that if things go bad...its MY fault (and liability) even if the permit is wrong.

That:

We drive on a Parkway and Park on a driveway

That:

Most states only allow oversize movement in daylight hours ,

Texas and most western states define daylight as when you can see....that is half an hour before sun up until half an hour after sunset.

New Mexico, Louisiana and some other states define daylight as sunup to sunset. (except at the new mexico weigh station on interstate ten west of El Paso who defines daylight as " when the sun comes up over that mountain" ...which is some time later than normal sunup)

Georgia and many of the Eastern states define daylight as half an hour AFTER sunup until half an hour BEFORE sunset.

Kentucky doesn't care.....run day or night...doesn't matter.

Virginia REQUIRES some oversize to be moved at night....as does California.

That:

Many western states allow movement seven days a week. Some don't...New Mexico won't allow it on Sunday. In Arizona it depends on the width.

Many Eastern States won't allow movement on Sunday.

Some northeastern states ONLY allow movement on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday....making for a short work week. Good thing they're small states.

That:

Many states have a list of holidays during which oversize movement is not allowed. Most include Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years etc. Louisiana includes Good Friday. Nebraska includes Football Friday. Oregon includes Fishing Weekends.

Kansas doesn't care......run 365 days a year.

That:

Missouri doesn't recognize a quad axle group.....for a normal permit. But with a superload will allow 96 thousand pounds? Same load...same trailer....same route...just call it "super".

That:

Nebraska and Kansas only charge Five Dollars for an oversize/overweight permit no matter how heavy or what the route.

Tennessee and Mississippi (and others) charge by the mile.... a LOT. (A thousand dollar weight permit for Tennessee isn't unusual)

Some states are flat rate....some state are "ton" but not "ton/mile"

That:

Some states require certain special lights but other states prohibit them. (making a cross country move "interesting")

That:

Some states require escorts starting at twelve foot wide..... Texas starts at fourteen

Some states require escorts starting at seventy six foot long....Texas starts at a hundred.

Some states require a front escort with a high pole for a load that's fourteen foot six inches high....Texas starts at seventeen foot.

Some things ARE bigger in Texas....and if you need escorts in Texas you need then everywhere.

That:

It's not required to be crazy to haul oversize....it's inevitable

Oasis Travel Plaza

2008-04-10T23:13:00.000-05:00

This is a review based on my observations and experiences. I haven't talked to any of the truck stop personnel about this post....this is entirely my own personal opinions

The Oasis TruckStop is my idea of what a REAL truck stop should be.

It's not one of the Fabulous Four chain for one thing....being one of 140 truckstops nationwide that belong to the AMBEST Cooperative association

It's located at Exit 53 on Interstate ten. Years ago there was a "greeter" gal in a tower that was on the property. It might have been an old Forest Service Fire Spotter lLook Out tower...it looked like it....sure was tall. (Sadly...the tower is gone now) Any way...this gal...she'd be up in the tower. She knew enough about trucks to know the difference between a PeterCar and a FreightShaker or a KayWhopper. She'd holler out on the CB...channel 19.

"How bout that shiney blue PeterCar eastboun!!! You huuuungry honey? Need some cofee? Need some fuel....well guess what? This is your luckeeeey day....you're HERE!"

.........and like that. For hours. They rotated gurls....must have. Had to have had shifts.

I thought it was kinda neat. Back then I was single. I thought the sound of a friendly female voice was kinda nice.

They don't do that anymore.....more's the pity.

They remodeled the place a few years ago. It's all bright and shiney on the inside....still a dirt (sand...this is south Alabama) lot on the outside. A HUGE dirt lot. They can park a LOT of trucks here.

Dirt lot...no ammenities. Park where you want to.

Several fuel pumps....maybe ten?

Inside it's nice. Lots of trucker stuff...unlike the Fabulous Four (you KNOW the chain stores I'm talking about) which have (at most) an isle or two of trucker stuff...this place has a whole section of the store filled with trucker stuff. Maps, Logbooks, stuff for flatbedders (a chain here...a binder there...Straps even), some chrome...oil, additives, lights ......you know...stuff....you find precious little of at the Fabulous four.

There's another part for food....as much as I've seen in a normal convenience store. Food like in "put in your truck" kind of food. Dry Cereal, Milk, canned goods.

And then there's the Restaurant. It's unusual in several ways. One way is that it's one of the few places left that allows smoking. There's s smoking section. I don't smoke when I eat but I don't see why others shouldn't be allowed to...if they're separated from ME so's I'm not affected. They do well enough here.

And the service is friendly. They're happy to see you and prompt.

And the food was GOOD.

Hamburger Steak with grilled onions and gravy complete with three side dishes and unlimited Ice Tea for .............ten dollars.

I recommend them completely. I wish there were more like em and less of the Fabulous Four.

Don't let an Ass

2008-04-10T23:11:00.000-05:00

..........umption ruin your day.

An incorrect assumption that is. I know, I know....it's easy to say. Sometimes it's not so easy to do.

Take me for example, the other day.. .......please.

What a Mongolian Cluster........er...mess.

It started out as a normal day. I rolled into the shipper bright and early...told the appropriate folks that I had arrived and after a reasonable amount of time I rolled on over to the "south lot" to load. Everything appeared to be normal. I "dropped the neck" on my trailer and sat there like a good little boy waiting for the yard dawg to bring my load around.

Presently two of 'em showed up with the piece. It was a Cat 14M MotorGrader. A pretty respectible load but nothing major. This should be a piece of cake.

One guy asked me "How do you want it loaded?"

I told him to go ahead and load it like they thought best. I figure they load more of these things in a day than I haul in a couple of years.....they're the experts. (assumption)

They took a look at my trailer....assumed it was just like all the other trailers that they'd been loading that day....and loaded er up...

They went away and I Hooked up, chained down, flagged up and ragged out. I measured all dimensions and taped the exhaust. The I took it over to the scales (on the property....real handy) to axle it out.

Then I called in all my dimensions and weights to my Travel Agent so he could start the permit process. We hadn't pre-ordered the permit because I was unsure about how motorgraders would axle out on this trailer....not having hauled one in a while. I figured after an hour or so I'd have a permit and be ready to roll

Didn't happen that way.

It seems I was OverHeight. Not much....just an inch or three....but enough. My Travel Agent suggested that I let some air out of the tires. Sounded reasonable. (assumption) Back when I was hauling farm equipment letting some air out of the tires was standard procedure. Drop maybe six inches in height sometimes back then by doing that.

So I proceeded to get ready to start doing that.....and was immediately prevented from doing so by the yard personnel.

No, no no nooooo! Not allowed. It turns out that a special mixture of Nitrogen and seven essential vitamins is in the tires...not just regular air. Letting it out is a BAD THING (tm)

Hmmmmmm.....so what do we do NOW Kimo Sabe?

(follow the link and find that there is also a miniature donkey named Kemo Sabe. Co-incidence? I think not.)

So I'm standing there with the two yard dogs, a shop supervisor, and a couple of truckers who had nothing to do, were consequently bored and thought they'd join in the fight....er....lend their expertise. There were lots of loud voices, waving of hands....gesticulations....and aggravation....

"But I always.......", " Back when....", "Not on MY Yard...".

..........and like that. Pretty comical actually.

About that time a secretary walked by. She was heading out to her car. When she walked by us she said "turn it around".

Stunned silence.

We'd not even CONSIDERED that.

So we did that. It took a while...most of the rest of the day. It worked though. The height came down to 13' 8" or so. Good enough since I was traveling a permitted route and we were asking for 14'.

And that leads me to the moral of my little story. Always be aware of your assumptions. Ass -u-me is " just an Ass in front of u and me." the saying goes...and can cause and AWFULLY lot of trouble.

In this case it cost me a lot of sweat and a lot of time.

Global Warming

2008-04-10T23:03:00.003-05:00

I'm currently driving across I-10 in FLORIDA , in the middle of April, and it's almost chilly outside. I turned on my heater last night. Looking at the weather across the nation I've noticed that there's still snow in a number of places... some in Colorado, Wyoming and Nebraska...TODAY....not all of them are all that far north either. Snow in Nebraska in April....

It snowed in BagDad some time back....that generally doesn't happen. That's what the residents said....they'd never seen snow before.

I saw on the internet that one or another flavor of Scientists have deployed underwater robots . Guess what? The deep ocean is getting COOLER>

Last season South America experienced the coldest winter they can recall right off hand.

There were some Protest Meetings some time ago against Global Warming. They got frosted

Just think how bad it might be if there were no Global Warming.

If it wasn't for Global Warming it would REALLY be COLD.

Do you ever wonder how some people........

2008-04-07T18:37:00.002-05:00

........fine their way to work everyday?

I got my registration, finally, in the middle of the afternoon. Since my toy printer is broke (Hp) I had to go inside and have the beautiful bride fax it to me. Took awhile standing in line waiting for Millie Mini-Van Mom and all her friends, Kids and MotorHome folks to buy their bubble gum...candy and what not. You'd think the Flying J might have more than one person at the counter? Just a thought.

I rolled outa there and as expected stopped at the scales just a little ways south. No problems. They looked at my permit and waved me thru. That's one thing I like about Georgia and a few other states. They have a clue. Oversize isn't the easiest thing in the world to maneuver ...they realize that. They come out of their scale house and I hand them the permit. Sometimes they check "stuff"...sometimes not.
Today was a "not'. The nice gentleman looked the permit over....then waved me thru. I didn't even weigh.

So.......the beautiful bride had called ahead to find me a landing spot. As late as I left it was to late to unload in Savannah so it would be tomorrow before I unloaded. She had a place all lined up in Register Georgia. Only about fifty or sixty miles out.

I rolled into the little fuel stop about an hour before dark...fueled up...and parked. Then I looked around.

I called up the Beautiful Bride and asked...."didn't the say there was a resturant around here?"

"Yup."...she said..." about a hundred yards south."

I looked and couldn't see anything. She called back....yup...a hundred yards south...at the Cheveron Station.

Okaaaaay. I pulled outa the lot and headed south.

About two miles down the road I found a place to turn around. Wasn't easy.

As you may have guessed it was NORTH. On the other sided of the Interstate too. Walking distance? Yeah...dodging rednecks in a hurry to get home and open their first sixpack while walking across a freeway bridge? I don"t think so.

How do some folks find their way to work in the morning....oh yeah....they live there.

So I'm still sitting here.........

2008-04-07T13:48:00.002-05:00

.......it's Monday afternoon and still no updated registration. Precious little info from my Travel Agent other than the "we're still working on it" variety.

I've often wondered about something. Trucks are fairly "old tech", they haven't changed drastically in forever. ....they are still "something with cargo on/in it rolling along the ground". The speed has increased some but not a whole lot....not really when compared to say...computers.

So Office Workers....have these computers see. And copiers, and fax machines, and telephones and they're all connected together by micro-wave, and fiber-optics via a multi-zillion dollar world wide system such that in the information processing field it's thousands of times faster today than it was just a few years ago much less a few decades ago much less a century ago BUT....

It still takes them longer to move a piece of paper from one desk in a building to another desk in that same building than it does for me to move a multi-thousand pound piece of equipment across the country.......

..............or very nearly.

Why is that?

Nothing happened yesterday....

2008-04-05T21:02:00.003-05:00

.......unsuprisingly. Nothing happened today and nothing will happen tomorrow.

I'm hopeing to roll on monday but that's not a for sure. State Agency's don't generally move very fast. The fact that people depend upon them for service cut's no ice.

What's that you say about Federalized Health Care?

.........don't get me started.

So...I'm sitting here with a MotorGrader on my wagon............

........waiting.

Reading, Writing and Sleeping.

The high part of my day is supper. I'm already fat ...if I were to eat three meals a day I'd be immense.....so I only eat one.

.......and read, write and sleep a lot.

Kinda boring actually.

Nailed by some office worker.

2008-04-04T18:03:00.002-05:00

So I'm toodleing along. Fat dumb and happy thinking I'm good as gold. I've been a good little boy to the best of my ability. The log book is up to the minute. The load is "over secured". I'm driving slower than max legal and keeping more than enough following distance. I'm about four hours out from delivering the load and expect to be empty by shortly after noon. I've already got several potential reloads lined up for tomorrow and I should be "loaded and rolling" on the weekend.

As far as I'm concerned everything is peachy.

Then I get a call from my travel agent.

He tell's me to find a place nearby and "shut er down". NOW.

I do that.

Why?

Well it seems that the Illinois Department of Motor Vehicles has a recurring annual problem. A paper work problem . Every year they "loose" a number of renewals for license registration. The lady in our office said that last year there were 40 drivers subjected to this stress....the year before it was 60.

This year it's me.

I've got to sit and wait for my vehicle registration. Not having one that is current is a BAD THING (tm). It could cost me big bux were certain young gentlemen were to discover that unfortunate fact.. I didn't do anything wrong. My carrier didn't do anything wrong. Somehow the renewal just fell into a time warp.

It's not just my current carrier that has this problem. As fate would have it I sit next to a driver from my former carrier....right here in the parking lot....who was shut down for exactly the same reason.

I've been here since yesterday before noon. I COULD have already been to the Consignee and unloaded...with a check "in the mail" to the house (after processing). .......yesterday. This is likely to impose an economic hardship. Just when we were starting to recover too.

So....I sit.

Until I get a squeaky clean updated registration.....I wait.

Very frustrating.

First load this month.

2008-04-01T19:58:00.000-05:00

End of the Month Round Up.

2008-03-31T11:19:00.009-05:00

New Feature I'm going to try.

The first of the month I was still with my previous Carrier. I was disenchanted and upset because I wasn't making ANY money. The Bills were coming due and all I could do was sit and worry. Something had to be DONE (tm). As many folks know there's a grapevine in every profession. The jungle telegraph....scuttlebutt....rumors and propaganda. I keep an ear to it and followed a lead. This took me to my soon to be new Carrier.

I left Austin and went to Tulsa and got rid of my old carrier's "stuff". (Trailer and knick-knacks), then bobtailed to Oklahoma City to pick up a Trailer. From there I deadheaded to Carlisle Pa for orientation which took three days.

I then bounced to Shady Grove Pa to get this:

going to North Carolina. From there I deadheaded to Georgia to get this

going to San Diego California.

When I unloaded in San Diego I deadheaded down to Las Vegas Nevada to the big Trade Show.

I moved a couple of pieces there to a holding yard and then took this;

to Portland Oregon.

From there I deadheaded back to Las Vegas and got this:
going to Nashville Tenn.

From there I deadheaded to Chatanooga to get one of these.....going to Baltimore.....

Unfortunately that load cancelled so rather than wait there hoping for a load I deadheaded to Decatur Illinois.

Hopeing for a load.

Supposedly the odds are much better here than back in Tennessee.

So.......this is what I did this month....

Not bad. Bills are being paid....now. Less stress.

I hear we might could use a few more four-axle trucks. Maybe some three-axle. Maybe even some company drivers. (hint..I get a recruiting bonus)

I said I was in Las Vegas?

2008-03-22T02:32:00.002-05:00

.......I wish I had got there a few days earlier....at the very same Tradeshow I'm hauling out of.

They had THIS on display.

sorry to have missed it.

Looks fairly awesome.

Escape from California.....

2008-03-22T02:11:00.002-05:00

.........with my life, my fortune and my honor mostly intact.

There was a trade show in Las Vegas. I went there. We (meaning my new carrier) hauled "stuff" outa there.

This is what I got. Going to the biggest county in california.....Oregon.

Lovely....Portland Oregon. Then what?

Heading West toward California

2008-03-19T00:52:00.000-05:00

Second week second load....

2008-03-11T22:13:00.004-05:00

and this one is a long haul. Georgia to California.

It, too, pays fairly decent.

So far I'm confident that making the change was the thing to do.

It's a done deal.........

2008-03-09T12:58:00.003-05:00

I'm with a new carrier.

I didn't want to leave my last Carrier. I really, really didn't. However....I need loads in order to make money. Trucking is what I do. Sitting for days and days isn't trucking. Sitting and then deadheading long distances doesn't make money either.

So I changed carriers.

I spent all last week in-processing.

Now I'm loaded and rolling.

With this.Pays pretty good too. Over $3 a mile for all miles. And I'm pre-assigned for another load after this.....and another load after that.

Sounds promising?

...........and there are NO agents.
...........and there are NO brokered loads.
...........and I get paid for ALL loaded miles. (including "out of route")
...........and the new carrier pays for........lots and lots of stuff that I had to pay for before.........this effectively increases my "take home" without increasing my 1099.
...........and the new carrier has a LOT of policies........that I like.
...........and the new carrier does NOT require Qualcom....
does NOT require Haz-Mat
does NOT require Workers Comp.
...........and there are many incentive programs....more money if I want to work hard.
.............and......

.............and..........

I'm fairly excited. Lots of promise.

Stay tuned.

Heading out.........

2008-03-01T07:54:00.002-06:00

.......toward the NorthEast. To a new carrier....a new lease.

I notified my current/previous carrier (that I'm leased to) that I was resigning. That went better than I'd feared but not as good as I'd hoped. A little bit of "he said...she said" and like that.

Paperwork. For the new carrier....Tons of paperwork.

That's done.

Now I have to get the trailer back to where the previous carriers wants it (Tulsa) and I'm off to Orientation.(Pennsylvania)

Bleh.

I had a lot of good times where I was. Lots of friends. Lots of "we got er done" from some pretty serious challenges....Too bad they couldn't keep me rolling. Five loads since Christmas just doesn't pay the bills.

Still....this is the Information Age. No reason I can't keep in touch with my friends. Cell phones and Internet and like that. It's not like it was the Seventies like when I parted with buddies I served with in South East Asia in the Air Force. Never to see any of them again.

As soon as I can get sufficiently motivated....and get a few more cups of coffee drank...and run thru the "what I need to take" check list a few more times...well then...

I'm outa here..

Not a fun day.

2008-02-28T17:28:00.002-06:00

No loads.

Been home over a week now. No loads and no prospect of one.

Pretty bleak. We've been e-mailing, telephoning and faxing every agent and dispatcher we can think of. No luck.

I hate to do this but I can't take it any longer. Gotta do something.

Bleh.

Gotta change carriers. Go somewhere that does have loads.

I hate this.

Why do companies..........

2008-02-28T11:20:00.002-06:00

........do such things to themselves?

I'm in the market for a new truck. I'm always in the market for a better communication plan. I'm generally in the market for "stuff".

So I go to......say..........the phone company. Lucky I have hi-speed. If not it would take FOREVER to load their website. Then.....so what. It's loaded but ALL that's loaded is........Fluff. Drivel. Check their rate plan? Ha....it is to laugh.

Trucks are no better. Go to Kenworth, International, Volvo. Fluff. High Bandwidth Fluff. The data equivalent of sugar. No WAY I can learn anything of substance from the websites. Oh sure...they talk about trucks....they just about dislocate their shoulders by patting themselves on the back about how great they are. Some thing about J.P.Powers and Yadda yadda. (how can EVERY manufacture be "best"? I thought "best" was an exclusive.)

Amazing. Marketing departments have taken the best thing since sliced bread........and turned it into fluff.

Worse load than the last one....

2008-02-23T10:05:00.002-06:00

this one has allllll the "good" stuff.

It's High, Wide, Long, and Heavy. The trailer also has almost zero ground clearance....about an inch. It was NOT a fun move.

After a few days of intense stress and anxiety "I got er done". I'd just as soon wait a while for another "intense" load though.

Naturally the expenses were higher and the revenue was lower than anticipated.

Horrible High Load from Ft. Worth to Oklahoma

2008-02-12T11:05:00.000-06:00

Bored....

2008-02-03T13:53:00.000-06:00

..........boreing is good sometimes. But I'm still bored.

I'm really close to Houston....I should unload this thing tomorrow. About time. I've invested a week tomorrow (not counting three days deadhead to go get it) on this load. I've probably been sitting half that.

Of course I've been in two snowstorms....one fairly serious....shut down both times.

And naturally it was heavier than I was told. MUCH heavier. Glad I didn't go across any open scales.

Oh well.....tomorrow.....

Who would have thunk it................

2008-01-31T16:25:00.000-06:00

.........?

According to the American Spectator.

"Because John McCain disdains the conservative movement. Because he has a temper so volcanic that Democrats could easily bait him into a "Howard Dean moment" in the fall that ruins his campaign and hands a landslide to either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. Because McCain has run an entirely dishonorable, mendacious primary campaign so far. Because, from a conservative standpoint, McCain is bad on border security, bad on taxes, bad on judges, bad on respect for the letter of the Constitution, bad on respecting those who disagree with him, bad on energy exploration, bad on free-market economics, and absolutely horrendous in his zealous support for excessive regulation. He hearkens back not to Ronald Reagan's principles but, quite openly, to Teddy Roosevelt's -- and the truth is that TR was a big-government interventionist with an authoritarian streak and an out-of-control ego. Just like McCain is today."

I knew that about McNasty....but Teddy?

The inventor of the Teddy Bear? I'm shocked!!!

Crane move

2008-01-31T13:06:00.000-06:00

This has NOT been a fun trip.

Copy of e-mail sent to dispatch.

Not good.

It's still snowing. If I were to make it thru the Okie City Curfew (3:30 -6:30) I would have to leave within the hour....in good weather. The weather is not good.

Recap: I got to the load site about ten a.m. monday....after driving all over the county due to bad directions in the computer. Me and a stepdeck both missed the site and wound up way north. We eventually got turned around. There were trucks in front of us when we got there. More trucks arrived and also got in front of me. By the time it was my turn all the loading crew were tired and ready to go home. They were NOT being careful....or attentive. This was the first one of these that I'd loaded so I was unfamiliar with the routine.

They initially wanted to load me with the stinger of the trailer hanging off over the edge of the padsite. The stinger axels would have had little effect supporting the load in that position....actually the stinger landing gear was digging into the ground.....with the trailer empty. Had we loaded in that position the trailer would have gone right to the ground.....I'd have been stuck. They had a dozer standing by in case....I'm NOT thrilled about the idea of being pulled while heavily loaded.

I requested that they build a pad extension for the stinger axles. They did that although they complained a little....that took a while. The bulldozer come in handy pushing dirt.

Oh...did I mention that the wind was blowing thirty or forty mph?....and that they'd chosen a big mudhole to do this in?....

At any rate they got the extension built and backed me back under the house.....crooked and not far enough although I didn't notice that until later.

Whenever I'd ask someone about something or request something it was always the wrong guy...."go ask that guy"....a run-around in other words. If they put me off enough I guess they figured I'd "let it go"....which is what happend. There at the last the guy in charge was gone.

So it was very late when I finally got loaded , chained and down the hill.

Next morning it snowed and everything froze up. It was too late to move when the roads finally cleared up.

The NEXT morning it took several hours ...and half a bottle of brakeline antifreeze and a visit from a service truck to get unfroze.

$200 poorer from the service call the escorts and I left and now were here...Billings Oklahoma...the Cimmaron Travel plaza at mm 203 on I35.

Apparently the loading crew didn't do everything due to the conditions. We lost a fire extinguisher while in route, (i picked it up) off of the piece....also a window blew in...not broke just blew out of it's rails. The cab is full of snow (see picture)...the load is off center. Which I mentioned but they said it was only because of the slope of the land that it looked that way....it was actually alright....

In other words I got minimal cooperation. loading....can't blame em actually since the site and conditions were abysmal....and they were no doubt tired from being "in it" all day.

So here I sit... probably won't roll till tomorrow. I consider it ill advised to move with ice on the roadway. That's what my permit says anyway.

Please advise.

How they do it in the Old Country

2008-01-20T19:52:00.000-06:00

A special place in Hell

2008-01-20T12:04:00.000-06:00

shall be reserved for TV script writers...

Ok. I loathe TV. I purely hate it. It's a waste of time to watch. It rots your brain....it makes people STUPID. Almost ANYTHING is a better us of one's time than watching TV....anything.

YET....against my better judgment... sometime ago my wife "coaxed" me into watching the series CSI Miami. (There are also segments dealing with Las Vegas and New York.)

She just about dragged me into the TV room. I put up a good fight but it was no luse. I was kicking and screaming.....leaving clawmarks in the floor....to no avail. She was determined. She set me down on the couch...gave me a beer and said.

"You like high techie stuff?...Watch THIS....and besides Horatio is cool".

So I did. Had to. She swatted me evertime I got up. But she supplied me with beer so I didn't fight TOO hard.

And truth be told I got so I kind of liked it. Neat Geeky, Techie stuff. Lots of low cut blouses too, which was a bonus.

But last night they ruined it.

A class TWO (one hundred and forty miles per hour winds they said...) hurricane picked up an already expended bullet from a "windknocked over" container (which is in a back yard shooting range in downtown miami..behind a woman's house)....throws the bullet thru a glass window.....thru the woman's neck..(killing her)..and burries itself in the wall.

Aaaargh.......!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is just sooooooo wrong on soooo many levels.

I feel betrayed.

I hate TV.

I was almost beginning to ENJOY CSI.

hint. for those of you who are mathemagically challenged.

According to CSI the "class two hurricane had winds of 140 mph
........actually it's a called a Category Two Hurricane which has Winds from 96-110

So it should be a Cat 3 at least....not two.

Leaving aside the improbability of wind picking up a bullet and then instantly accelerating it to a speed high enough to penetrate a window glass, a human neck, and embedding it self at waist high level in a wall....what about speeds?

Well....140 mph is only 205 foot per second.

A 9mm pistol round (which is what this might have been) has a muzzle velocity in excess of a thousand foot per second.

See what I'm getting at?

Aaaargh!!!

On the road again.

2008-01-08T23:47:00.000-06:00

I'm heading north toward Okie City to pick up part of an oil rig going to Houston. Different part from last time.

Stay tuned for updates.

The first post of this year..............

2008-01-01T17:51:00.000-06:00

........pictures of the last trip of last year.

Anger.............

2007-12-27T13:59:00.000-06:00

.........at the system.

In NOVEMBER my wife received a notice that our/her health insurance premiums were going up and an offer to change plans such that the deductible would increase so that the premium would remain the same.

She tried to comply.....

NIGHTMARE

From listening to her explain what she's had to go thru and is currently going thru I would not want to buy ANYTHING from those people....much less health insurance. They can't get anything right. The word stupid just doesn't seem strong enough.

Serves us right for going with a small little know company. I think it's called Blue something....

Blue Shield?...Blue Cross?....dunno....I leave all that up to her.

So I tried to write a letter to my congress critter. Lamar Alexander I think. Better I should have gone outside and talked to the squirrels. He has some kind of email filter that is convinced that I'm not in his district. So no joy there.

........If i could push a red button.........

And they wonder why the polls show such low approval ratings? Ask me....I can TELL them why .........

I'm starting to wonder if the democrats don't have something after all. Their idea about health insurance wouldn't be any better..worse actually.....but the people that are causing ME trouble right now would be inconvenienced....and that would be a good thing.

No...I have a better idea. Suddenly Ron Paul is much more interesting than before. It occurs to me that certain segments of our "system" are terrified by him.

THAT would be a good thing.

Yeah...since Thompson is loosing steam I think Paul is the way to go.

Grrrr.

The things you find on YouTube.........

2007-12-24T21:18:00.002-06:00

the night before Christmas...........

Pretty cool huh?

Merry Christmas everyone!!!!!!!!!!!

Erecting A wind tower

2007-12-22T22:28:00.000-06:00

I found this on YouTube.

I've been on site at several wind farms. A wind farm has many, many turbines. This is just ONE turbine.

I've seen this happen many times....but never had a chance to get it on a memory chip.

Other than being a relatively small wind mill by today's standards this is pretty cool.

A little bit of imagination......

2007-12-15T19:33:00.000-06:00

some engineering ability. Some modern materials....and.....

or....

Talk about a hard life.....

underwater too......

one must....however....pay attention.

Leaving out of the travel port.

2007-12-15T14:53:00.001-06:00

Maybe there's a reason

2007-12-12T23:27:00.000-06:00

.........no one else is on the freeway?

Houston....we have a problem.

2007-12-12T18:49:00.000-06:00

I sat at the house till Monday. Relaxed....drank beer....stuff like that. It was nasty outside so there wasn't much point in doing much else.

Come Monday it was time to look for work so the Beautiful Bride and I both got to busy..two phones...two computers. I had intended to go to Laredo like my friend Gary did. It seems there's a lot of stuff coming across the border and the "company" had recently cleaned house down there.

Some corrupt folks had been fired and new folks had been hired and like that.

So...let's see how un-corrupt and competent the new folks are. I called (had called actually....several times including over the weekend while I was "relaxing") to see what was up.

"See" they said. " Mui Buncho Freight"....(they talk funny down there....don't say anything though....they're sensitive)

So I asked them if there was any for me and they said they'd get back with me....I gave 'em my telephone number.

And waited.

After a few hours I called back.....and essentially went thru the same routine.

I did that several times and finally gave up and called Houston about a load they had on the (internet) load board.

To my immense surprise and amazement I actually got the load. THAT was a first. Every other time I've ever called Houston there was always a gotcha. Usually the load was gone. Not this time. Maybe they've had some housecleaning too?

So I got up about three the next day and headed out. I pulled onto the dock about ten after spending a lovely interlude in the shipping office at the port.

Naturally I had to wait. Not bad....only about six hours.

When they finally brought the load out it looked a little funny. The load sheet I had said that the dimensions were Length 38.04 ft. Height 13.00 ft. width 8.07 ft. and weight 22158 lbs.

This wasn't it.

I asked the dock foreman to make sure I was getting the right piece. He said sure and took off on his golf cart. After a bit he came back and said that that was the only one....must be it. I called dispatch to make sure and they said go ahead.

So I told them to load it.

When It was on the trailer I realized I had a problem. For the rest of the story go Here

So I got loaded and chained down and I'm outa there.

I left out this morning in the rain. It's been raining almost all day.

Lots of other oversize moving though....

For reason's known only to dear ole Texas Permits they routed me down the back roads. I continually met, and was passed by other oversizeds
I bet the folks in all those little towns have a sweet spot in their hearts for the fine people in Texas Over Size Permits..
Probably gonna send Christmas cards...

So I toodled right on down the highway.

I had a bit of a scare turning off of Texas 81 onto Farm To Market Road 67 north of Hillsboro. Other than the fact that it was a Weight Rated road and I was overweight for it. I had a "get out of jail free card" don't you see. A permit that is. A license to ...well I was allowed to be there.

Never could figure out why folks in "authority" thought it was ok to break laws...or direct other people to do so. Something about "command mentality" I suppose.

At any rate it was a really, really tight turn. Back and Fill a few times and the trailer STILL got in the ditch a little. Good thing it was a shallow ditch. Good thing I was light. (probably sixty thousand gross).

But I made it.

Another problem was that I was nosing up to the Tarrant county line.....and it was almost four oclock. Tarrant county has an oversize curfew that starts at 3:30 pm. ...and they mean it.

Particularly in the rain I would imagine.

So I was desperately looking for a place to park. Luckily I juusssst managed to fit into a space at the travel plaza (nope...not a truck stop...a traaaaaaaaavle plaza) in Alvarado.

So there I sit....till about 9 am tomorrow and then it's on to Okie Land.

The escort I'm going to need in Oklahoma has already called. Poor guy. No power at his house...he had to use his cell phone. The cell phone didn't work inside his house too well so he had to go outside to talk. It was COLD outside. He lives in Tulsa. They just had an ICE STORM.

Global Warming dontcha know.

Is the world ready...........

2007-12-10T00:43:00.000-06:00

...........for a US President that's younger than me?

That's never happened before. Sure....we've had younger presidents. But I was younger then too.

I have a hard enough time respecting any politician.

Don't make it harder.

home

2007-12-08T19:55:00.001-06:00

I deadheaded to the house.

We'll see what happens next week.

Fantasy

2007-12-07T12:19:00.000-06:00

Imagine a world in which Freight Brokers, Agents and Dispatchers were held to as high a standard as Drivers.

Think about it.

Still Sitting.

2007-12-06T21:20:00.000-06:00

I'm still parked.

The load has been put off again and again. It was supposed to load today....now it's who knows when.

I'm done with it. I can't wait any longer. I'm looking for something else.

Hope tomorrow is better.

To Continue.........

2007-12-05T22:03:00.000-06:00

I'd called the beautiful bride and she was on the way.....

The other wrecker showed up driven by the owner of the wrecker company. He was NOT a happy camper. It seems that his wrecker had been breaking a LOT lately. He blamed his driver. I blame his equipment. To haul Iron you need Iron as the saying goes. Well he has tin foil. He needs a stouter truck.

So....we dropped my trailer. He hooked up to the wrecker I was hooked up to. I got in MY truck. I wasn't about to ride with a grump. And awaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay we go.

Picture this. I'm sitting in my truck, the front end is about four foot off the ground....being towed by a truck being towed by a truck. Going down a country road...in the dark....Faaaaaaaaast.

It seemed fast. All I could see was flashing lights in front of me and blurs beside me.

And I'm thinking...."people pay money to be scared like this". Then I'm thinking...."Duh....I AM paying money....a LOT".

But I got there alive.

The (two) wrecker drivers unhooked me and left.

There I am....all alone. In the dark.

Lucky for me....and I mean REALLY REALLY lucky...the beautiful bride is on the way.

She'd called earlier and kept me informed as to her whereabouts. I'd not have too long to wait.

So here she comes thru the dark. We're in touch via cell phones. She screeches to a stop throwing gravel all over and we immediately transfer "stuff" from my truck to the lady-mobile. Then off we go in search of a motel.

In Bossier City....thirty miles from where the wrecker dropped me.

First off we find a place to eat. We knew of one such place from times before....it's called "country kitchen" or some such. It's got good food. We ate there and enquired as to the whereabouts of a motel in the area. They told us and we went there.

Bad move.

I purely hate to talk to someone thru a little bitty hole in a plastic wall. They had one. I didn't play pretty. We went away.

Second motel...same little hole. We didn't even get out of the car.!! Motel sixteen or sumpthin....

Third motel....La Quinta Inn....that means "across the street from Denny's" in English. There was no little bitty hole to talk thru. We were treated like people...it cost a little more I guess (I never enquired about what the price was at the other places) but we were treated like people instead of potential mass murderers.

So....we hit the sack.

Next day we called the mechanic....nope...not fixed yet.

The day went by.

The nite went by....oh my...whatever can we find to do? We managed.

Next day the mechanic called....all fixed.

Away we went to get the truck.

Fairly expensive but cheaper than any other option....we load up and the Beautiful Bride follows me back to Bossier City to a truck stop we know.

Bad move. Change in management I guess. It's turning into a Rat Hole.

We left there and went to a Casino. Harrah's it's called. Biiiiiig parking lot. We played penny slots for a good while then left the truck and went to DiamondJacks and rented a rooms.

Biiiiiiiiiiiig room with a Jacuzzi.

Oh my....what ever shall we do?

We managed.

We also played some penny slots there too.

Had fun....next day the beautiful bride headed back to texas after taking me back to the truck.

I sat there. There's a load waiting for me in Mobile...but it loads when?

That little detail keeps changeing.

Latest word is Monday.

I moved....right now I'm near Tallulah La. I might move tomorrow. I'm hopeing for a short haul prior to the long haul.

I can use the money.

And THIS children.....

2007-12-03T20:27:00.000-06:00

is why you do NOT pull out in front of a truck..

...........this goes for mommies and daddies too.

Look...and pay attention.

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

Brief Interlude.

2007-12-03T19:04:00.000-06:00

We temporarily break in this tale of grief and woe to bring you a message from our sponsor....

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.....remember.....
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