Hazleton,PA

This past week has not went like I was hoping. Well, other than the fact that we stayed north and avoided the messy storm that hit I-40 from New Mexico to the Carolinas.

When I last blogged, we were in Ontario,CA getting a restart after delivering in Carson,CA. We were available Wednesday morning and didn't have a load right away. Our FM finally calls and says for us to head towards Salt Lake City because they were WAY short on loads in Southern Cal. So I said sure, just pay me some fuel money. Off we go and we get a dispatch to pick up by 1700 on Thursday in Rigsby,ID almost 800 miles away. No problem since we are all rested.

Off we go and I head to bed that afternoon and J wakes me up leaving me about 400 miles to go. He ran into snow and after watching a FedEx truck go off the road, he decided he better stop. So he stops for a few hours and gets me up and I decide to take off and see how the roads are. They actually weren't bad since J seemed to get out of the worst of it, but the fog was very very heavy. I make it about 80 miles and decide that is enough until the sun comes up. I stopped for a few hours and took off again when the sun came up and I made it into Salt Lake City where I stopped at our yard to get fuel. Boy was that I bad decision!

I pull into the yard and then go to the inspection bay before heading out because I needed a windshield wiper. I got my wiper but it appears that there is some damage to the roof of my trailer that they want to fix. I didn't know it was damaged since the interior on the top was fine and it isn't like we carry ladders and check the roof of the trailers when we pick them up. Anyway, they have an empty for me so I just switch trailers and go BACK through the inspection bay because I now have a light out on the new trailer I picked up. Ok, get that fixed but they dropped the trailer dirty so now I have to go through the wash-bay to get a washout. Would you believe that I pulled in there at 1100 and wasn't done with all of this until 1430??? Three and a half hours to get all that done. Mainly it was waiting in line to get INTO the inspection bay and wash bay because of the trucks in front of me.

By this time I realize there is no way I am going to make it by 1700. No problem since I have four days to deliver this load a whopping 2200 miles. I notify dispatch and they let them know we will be there Friday morning. We go ahead and head out and stop about 80 miles short for the night on Thursday night. Friday morning I get up and drive the rest of the way in with no problems, get loaded, get scaled and I am heading out of town by around 1130. I get back to north of Salt Lake City and J takes over and off we go to Pittston,PA.

We are doing find driving across I-80 until J gets to the west side of Chicago to get fuel and he realizes that one of our drive tires is flat. He calls it in and they send us to a repair shop where we have to wait for the oncal person to come out since it is around 0300. We get that fixed and I head out from there and then later that evening around 2000 hrs J gets us to the yard in Pittston where we spend the night. That left me getting up this morning at around 0800 to go grab a shower and BS with the drivers until I had to leave to deliver which was a 1200 appt about 5 miles away. We managed to get that done and head back to the yard where we grabbed some lunch and then we got out next load assignment.

Right now we are sitting in Hazleton,PA where we are picking up at Cargill and we are making a short overnight run up to Lewiston,ME. My FM gave me a choice of this run or a run to California but I picked this one. I prefer the California load normally, but with only having the one load that we delivered this morning on our check so far, I decided to take the overnight run because that would get on our check when our payroll cutoff is tomorrow afternoon.

Other than that, we are still plugging along. I can't believe the complete mess that the storm created down south this week. I normally HATE running up north in the winter, but I sure enjoyed it this week. Beautiful days, a full moon at night and clear roads the whole way. That doesn't happen too much up north in the winters!