Los Angeles,CA

When it rains, it pours, right? We finally got loaded in Henerson with our ice cream load. It was so incredibly hot that we were just miserable. Our A/C just couldn't keep up. We figured it was just the fact that it was over 110 degrees outside. Once we finally got loaded, we headed back to the TA to scale and decided to park for a few hours till my shift started. We were hoping that since it was now dark, that we would finally cool off.

Since I didn't get to sleep till almost midnight, I slept in until 0530 and we were on the road by around 0600. J managed to get to sleepand I headed up out. I cut across south out of Las Vegas on US 93 and hit I-40 in Needles,CA. The sun was already up and my A/C was blowing hot air. Now, since it was early morning and the temps were in the low 90's, I knew there was a problem with the A/C. I made it into Kingman where I stopped at the Petro and decided that I was going to have them check the A/C.

About 4 hours later we finally had an answer. There was a leak in the condensor. Yay! We know what the problem is. It is warranty work so I was ready for them to fix it so I could get back on the road. Well, that wasn't going to work because they didn't have the part. Shit. I called our FM and the only thing we could do was have another team take our load to give us time to get this worked out. So when the other team arrived, they took our load and we took their load that was delivering in Los Angeles at 0800 the next morning. That worked out perfect for us. But I really hated giving up that load because it was a damn good paying load.

From there we knew we only had about 300 miles to go for our delivery the next morning back in LA. So we hooked up to IdleAire for the A/C and got some rest then heade out around 0200 Wednesday morning. Our stop was at Tyson which is in a very old part of LA. The street they are on has no room to turn the truck around. So you have to turn on to their street, get the truck and trailer straight, then back down the road to their docks which are right on the street. They had a guy out there waiting on us so he could guide us back down the street and guide us into the dock. Super tight place, but the gentleman was extremely impressed with my baking skills. I got it on the first try, missed a car by about 3 inches, and had to jump the curb with my left front steer as I was backing, because that is the only way it could be done. He told me that I did an excellent job and even remarked to J how impressed he was. He said most drivers can't get it on the first or even second try. Of course I did have J guiding me on one side, so it was teamwork that got me in there. But I think J was impressed to. As a team, we rock!

Anyway, got unloaed and headed to a drop lot to drop the trailer off and then off to Freightliner we went. Since the place in Kingman,AZ couldn't fix it, we headed to a dealer figuring they would have the part in stock. It is first come, first serve. So even though we got there and got in line at 1100 hours on Wednesday, it wasn't until this morning before they even got the truck in the shop. They said last night it would be a while, either later that night or this morning, so we headed to a hotel. They had flyers on a board for a Red Roof Inn that had rates for truckers and allowed pets AND they had a shuttle service. I placed a quick call and within 10 minutes, before we could gather all our stuff up, the shuttle was there.

We made it to the hotel and got comfy. Boy was it nice to be in a room with cold A/C!! Wd had been sweating our ass off since Monday when we picked up the ice cream. We ordered from Boston's and they delivered. Great bacon cheeseburgers! After that we were lazy and watched TV for a while before calling it a night. I was really tired. The heat will do that to you. I went to bed and slept almost 12 hours last night. I felt really refreshed this morning.

The shuttle service at the hotel doesn't run from 1100-1400 so we were up and ready to go by 1100 so we could catch the shuttle back to Freightliner. There was a mix-up with the paperwork or something, but after about 20 minutes, it was straightened out and they figured out that the truck was indeed ready. Thank goodness! We need to be back on the road making money!

We are currently on the way to Vitorville,CA to pick up a pre-loaded trailer that we are taking to NJ. Thank goodness we have a good FM and he got us a great paying load knowing that we had been down with the truck in the shop. This load is set to deliver on Monday morning so we will have plenty of time to get it there. It sure feels good to be back on the road!