Des Moines,IA

Well, after my last entry, we made it into Arcadia,FL and delivered to Walmart. After that, as expected, we ended up with another flower load. This time they had us head to Miami and pick up there, then go to Pierson,FL where we dropped that trailer and picked up another one with our load on it. What they do is bring trailers full of product from the Prime Floral in Miami to the Prime Floral in Pierson. Once the trailers get to Pierson they unload them and then reload other trailers based on what the customers order. So we grabbed a shower there and were off. This time we only had six stops instead of the 14 so it wasn't near as bad. What was cool about this load though is that the last stop was in the Chicago area. So when we dropped our last bit of flowers, we told our FM that we were taking the night off to see Justin since that is where he is stationed at. We were also able to spend the first part of the day with a high school friend of mine that I hadn't seen in about 9 years! It was so good to see her again! We had lost touch and she had an unlisted number but she happened to find me on Myspace. How cool is that?

We had a nice time visiting with her and then later with Justin. Then we headed to the hotel for a night of rest that was not in the truck. We told our FM we would be available the next afternoon at 1600 so that we would be able to get a 34 hr restart out of the deal. We got up the next morning and did a little shopping at the mall. We still have our summer clothes and we were in serious need of some warmer clothing. While we were at the mall our FM called and said he had a load for us. As soon as we were finished shopping we headed back over to the Mars facility to pick up an empty trailer. While I was on the way over there he sent a message saying that he was going to take us off that load because it was only 900 miles and didn't deliver until Saturday which meant we would be sitting because there was too much time on it for a team. A little while later he sends us another load headed to Sacramento. It is a FedEx load but it didn't pick-up until this morning at 0800. We decided that we would head to the I-55 Truck Stop in Bolingbrook,IL and spend the night there since it was only about 17 miles from where we needed to pick up and there aren't many choices in the Chicago area when it comes to truck parking.

Well, we picked up this morning and hit the road. J went back to bed for a while and after hitting the road at 0900, I made it to the Bosselman's Pilot on the east side of Des Moines,IA a whopping 349 miles down the road. Now we are left with 1736 miles to go by 2300 tomorrow night in Sacramento,CA. We are going to be late. There just isn't enough time on this load. Even with J driving 600 miles tonight on his shift, me doing 600 miles tomorrow on mine and then him doing the last bit, it looks like we will still be a couple hours late. At least it is just a drop and they won't be waiting on us to get there for a live unload so a couple hours shouldn't matter.

Our FM is going on vacation starting tomorrow so I sent him a message asking to get us pre-planned on a load going back to Arcadia,FL with some produce out of the Sacramento area. That is usually a good paying load to that Walmart and then we should get a flower load out of there which also pays good. Plus, a little physical labor unloading those flowers is good for us after sitting on our asses all day!