Time for an update

Well, I am sitting at a shippers waiting to get loaded. It is now 1030 and I have an 1130 appointment but they don't open until 1100 so I am killing time. That gives me an opportunity to get this thing caught up.

Since I'm not in a rush, and in a good spot where I have coverage, I will tell you about the other day that was so frustrating! Ok, came out of TAH on Thursday morning. Wednesday night we met some friends for dinner so we just went to the Dallas OC and spent the night there so that we didn't have to drive all the way back home and then right back in the next morning. So we get up at 0600, grab a shower, grab some breakfast, fuel up, and then about 0900 we get a load. So we head over to Fort Worth for an 1130 appointment for a live load at Motorolla. Get there and get loaded and are ready to go at 1400. Well, this is one of those high value/expedited loads that we can't stop for 200 miles once we stop OR 200 miles from destination. So I hang out in the parking lot until 1500 when it is J's turn to drive. If I had started driving, it would have been almost 1800 before we could stop, because of the 200 mile rule, and that would have been 3 hours past time for us to switch. So I just stayed there and let him sleep until it was time to get up. J wakes up and we hit the road.

He drives about 460 miles or so and stops at a rest area east of Springfield,MO. (We are headed to Indiana) We are due in at 1000 for a live unload and he got there around midnight, so we had time to stop for a few hours and then I could get up and get us there in time for the appointment. 0230 rolls around, I get out of bed, get ready, and am rolling by 0300. Around 0345 I am cruising past a Prime Inc. driver and he gets me on the CB and tells me I have a blown trailer tire. Just great!! I thank him and get on the phone to call into dispatch to see what they want me to do. Now, I know, this seems like a no brainer right? Get it fixed. DUH! Well, due to the load being high value and them not wanting us to stop, I wasn't sure how they wanted to handle it. And I knew I could make it to the Edwardsville,IN OC which was only about 150 miles further. So I call in and she isn't sure, so she transfers me to SEM (emergency maintenance) He also determines that I can make it to the OC for repairs, HOWEVER, it is the right rear outside tire and if I get pulled into a scale house, they aren't gonna let me go until it is fixed. So he tells me to stay put and he will get someone out to me. At this point I had gotten off the road and was sitting on an entrance ramp.

About an hour goes by and I get a message on the Qualcomm that says they can't find anyone to come out and that I need to go to exit 189 (I was at exit 150) to the I-44 Truck Stop and someone would meet me there. The shop was closed but someone would come in because they are 24 hour service. Ok, cool, I am running again. So I toodle on down the road and take exit 189 and lo and behold, there is no I-44 Truck Stop. The only thing there is a Love's. So I call SEM back and make sure I have the right exit. He tells me to check the Love's and I tell him that I have never seen a Love's that has a shop. He keeps looking at his info and finds something. This is what his computer said, "Turn into abandoned truck stop parking lot on the south side of the highway. Shop will be behind adult book store." Well, I look up and sure enough, there is the huge well lit "Adult Book Store" sign. I mean, can they make these things any brighter. I think you can see them from the moon. Anyway, so I get on the access road and follow it around to the Adult Book Store. Not seeing any kind of truck stop or shop, so I pull into the book store parking lot and head to the back. I find a building that looks like a shop, that has 2 large bay doors on both ends large enough for a semi. But it was the cleanest place I have seen. I mean, think about it. How many times have you taken your car to a shop and there are broke down cars, car parts, equipment and just all around junk laying around? There was NONE of that here. I was beginning to think the place was abandoned and that they had moved until I noticed a sign, faded as it was, that said I-44 Truck Repair. AND, the porch lights on both ends were working. You know that abandoned places aren't going to have working porch lights.

So I sit and wait. I pulled over and called in originally with the blown tire at 0345. By the time the guy showed up at the shop to fix the tire, it was 0645. So much for him getting out of bed and coming in early to meet me huh? Then I ask him what time they open, and he says 0600. So not only did he not come in early to meet me, he was 45 minutes late to open the shop. ARGH!! Finally, at 0730 I am back on the road. I stop at a Pilot to fuel but we aren't authorized there so I head to Edwardsville, which is a little out of the way, and wait 15 freaking minutes to get in the gate. And while the bobtail in front of me and the truck behind me were waiting to get in, they let about 10-12 bobtails out. Now how does that make any sense??

So get to deliver at 1430 local time for what was supposed to be a 1000 appointment. Find out when I get there that they hve rescheduled me for 1700. Fine, but I wish that info would have been passed on to us. Finally at almost 1900 they get me unloaded. Then I pull down about 7-8 docks to the shipping end and let them know I am finally ready to be loaded. See, they had us live unloading there and then live loading at the same place and delivering right back to the place we originally picked up from on Thursday morning. It was a mess. I think it was about 2130 by the time we got out of there local time.

Now, because we are picking up from here, it is high value/expedited again so we have to start out and go at least 200 miles before we stop. Luckily the Edwardsville OC is about 220 miles from there so that is where we head. Have to fuel up anyway and we had to have them replace the mud flap that was broken when the tire blew. We didn't have time to fix it when we stopped going through there the first time.

So get that fixed, hit the sack for a while, I get up and we shower and then take off at 0800. We get into Dallas at 2200 last night. J got us unloaded and then drove back to the Dallas OC where we dropped the trailer off because it needed more repairs that couldn't be done while it was loaded. Got up this morning and now I am sitting here waiting to get loaded.

So THAT is finally the update for the last few days. This load that we are on may be escorted so it is super top secret and I can't tell you where we are going, sorry! :)