Long Haul Trucking

I made one more trip, this was my last one, I promise. As I was talking to my boss, we were discussing what I was going to do after trucking and he mentions when am I going to give up the heroin? This is my last time, really, I swear I won’t do this any more. I can quit any time I want to!

Anyone that knows anything about addictions knows the love – hate relationship involved in any addiction. The definition of addiction is that it’s progressive, meaning it gets worse and worse. If it’s interfering with your life and you’re entire life’s goal is centered on getting another fix of a drug, cookie or a NASCAR race, it could be an addiction.

Trucking definitely qualifies. It’s progressive, takes over your life, the people stuck in this addiction realize it’s killing them and they need to do something else, but they can’t. Your entire life is centered around the truck, every dime you make goes back into the truck one way or another. You might think you’re making a good living at first, but all of a sudden, you’re 67 years old, you’re still driving and broke, especially now. There are more than a few examples of drivers that have to drive because they have no other way to make money and they didn’t save money for their future, it all went into the truck, because the truck makes the money and it has to be kept running no matter what.

I’m not saying every driver is like that. There are drivers that have been successful, have saved money and may be driving because they enjoy it. There are people that can take a few drinks without bingeing and passing out too. Those with the curse, know they have it and can’t do much about it and may not want to do anything about it.

I’m not quitting cold turkey, I’ve already made arrangements to go into the office and play Safety Manager once a week (it’s a small company), if things pick up and it actually becomes busy, we’ll renegotiate. But for now, it’s some pocket change so I can keep my Big Mac addiction alive and well.

The boss was saying that I’m going to miss the truck. He still has his truck but misses driving it. I’ll miss my truck like a ex-junkie misses his kit, but it’s something I need to do, so I can go on with the rest of my life. We’ll get an RV if I really have to out on the road someday.

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The day I completed and passed my A+ tests I updated all my online resumes. Careerbuilder, Monster etc… That same day I get a call from a recruiter from one of the IT staffing companies in town, checking to see if I’m available for a contract (temporary) computer support job. I won’t find out if I even have a chance to interview till next week, but it was kind of cool to get called like that.

A real corporate type interview; You know when the last time I had to do that was? A long, long, long time ago. This will be the test, if I can get an interview, a job and still do 12 credits (4 classes) in my voluminous spare time.  It’s not like I’m done dealing with the truck either, I still have to do something with it. Now that the camshaft is fixed, I need to get the generator fixed. It will be nice when I’m out to have the microwave working again. Put it in the shop next week while family is in town and I’m not going anywhere anyway.

I’m now studying for my Network+ certification. I already paid for the test (at the 50% school discount), took the class the previous semester and trying to study and take it before the next semester starts on 6/08. Plus the recruiter said it would help if I had it. I feel like I’m cramming, but I’m not. I already went through the book and class once so this is just a review. Except I waited long enough that now the test has been updated. Networking is going back to my roots. I was into networking before there was an Internet. At least before it became popular. The concepts, terminology and even some of the equipment are the same (but updated), it’s like one big refresher course.

Since this might be (if I even get it) my first job interview for a tech position in a long time, I’m not holding my breath. If I don’t get it, it will be good practice and I still have enough school to keep me busy this summer.

I’m going to study in the mornings then go into the office for a half day or two to see how the freight biz is going. When we brought the truck back to the office, the parking lot had a lot of trucks in it. But most everyone likes to be home on the weekends so it wasn’t that unusual.

I know my “empire” is supposed to be supporting me by now, but I like the studying and I want to work. That may change once I get there, but for now that’s what I want and it seems to be working out that way. The empire will always be there and will be something to fall back on if I need it.

Because the Volvo hospital in Vegas is now closed and the local mechanic thought it was too serious to perform surgery in the parking lot. I drive the patient the 100 miles to the next nearest Volvo shop. I was hoping for a terminal diagnosis and the only solution would be to put the beast out of its misery.

The diagnosis is critical but not terminal. I was hoping for a quick painless death to this problem, but instead I get to apply another bandage and continue on. We have a plan in place in the case of a sudden death but I guess it’s not time yet, so I’ll keep dragging this beast to the next load and the next load after that.

I was ready to get an estimate that was going to be so expensive that I couldn’t afford to fix it and the solution would have been simple. Put the beast down, call Volvo and tell them where it’s at. But instead I get more pain and another bandage to keep on trucking. It’s just enough where it would be silly to let the truck go because of a relatively small repair. It’s still a big bill, but in the big picture, not impossible.

The shop in Vegas closed down so I had to drive to Saint George and buy a new camshaft that is being shipped from Germany. It would have been under warranty except that the roller bearing isn’t under warranty and that’s the part that broke and screwed up the camshaft. These manufacturers aren’t stupid, they know what breaks and what doesn’t. Good thing I don’t care otherwise I’d be really upset about waiting a week for a part. I am really glad this happened so close to home.

So we go back to the plan of a trip a month or so, make the payment, put it up for sale or find a driver.

Okay, so this is really the state of MY trucking. I still have a truck and now I’m leased to the previous company doing pad wrap freight in Las Vegas. The deal I have with the owner is, I can do what I want. I can go in the office and help dispatch look for loads, go out on sales calls, or I might straighten out the safety office. If I go in a few days a week, keep going to school, my boss ( the owner ) even signed up for a few classes when I did, so we’re going to school together kind of, it’s still online, but by fall, I may need to actually go to class.

It’s still a fluid decision and could change at any moment, but right now, I’m only doing loads out and back. A couple a month, I can make the truck payment. It’s really not good to lose the truck and have it taken back by the bank, especially since it only has another year to go to be paid off. If I can keep up the payments with a couple of trips a month, fine, if not, then it’s back to the original plan. If freight starts picking up, I’ll find someone to drive it and work in the office. That’s a plan and it depends on what happens that will determine how things progress.

I really haven’t been home any longer than usual yet. I’ve been cleaning out the truck. Volvos have a lot of storage inside and after three years I didn’t realize how much stuff had accumulated. Even if I happen to drive some more short trips, I’m only going to pack what I need for one trip. I want the truck ready to sell and be able to clean it out in a few minutes.

I can go into the Bohemian office and basically do what I want, dispatch, find my own loads, whatever. I’ve been talking to the owner and since I left on good terms and things have changed in the office I can go back like nothing happened.

Besides cleaning out the truck, I’ve signed up for four classes this summer and I can register for Fall classes later this week. After this summer I’ll have 27 credits out of the 61 for an AAS, plus all of the certifications I can test for. If a computer job comes up fine, if not I’ll have plenty of practice trying to get one. Bohemian has their server that runs Windows Server on site in the office so I can get some actual experience with that instead of the Linux servers my websites are on while at the same time expanding my website empire to make more money that way too.

As far as plans go, it depends what happens. We have plans that will cover most everything that we can foresee coming up. I’m not stressing over the truck or anything else right now because we’ve been planning for this day for a couple of years. It may have come a little early, but we’re flexible and see it as a good thing.

I need to get into a daily routine so I don’t just sit around the house, because after a while I may be sitting arouuund the house.  I’ve run out of excuses not to exercise, eat healthy and be active. I haven’t seen much TV in the last few years and that’s probably a good thing.

As far as Clark Transfer goes, the couple of posts on Adventures in Trucking about Driving for Clark Transfer show up on the same search page and are actually seeing traffic. They’re really not worth my time, but mess with my last paycheck and things might change. I don’t even need to show them on my resume, I can keep Bohemian on and stretch through those few months and no one will even know or care.

Well done. Finished. Complete. If you were a dispatcher at Clark Transfer, would you get an attitude about a driver that was at the load out late, going to a warehouse the next morning that didn’t care if they got their stuff back today or next week. Okay, give him the “don’t be late” speech. But while you’re at it, tell him how to drive and how he should have done this or that. Keep in mind this driver is in his home city, not across the country. He sold his trailer and his truck is for sale and he’s pretty much tired of your crap anyway. So, get the attitude, talk down to him and treat him like crap for nothing and expect him to drive for you and be happy. How’s that working for you?

If I was a dispatcher, I wouldn’t have done something that stupid. Drivers aren’t employees and even if they were you don’t treat them like that and expect them to hang around when things get better. Drivers are a dime a dozen right now, so keep treating them like it and see how long they stay when others pay the same or better.

I’m done with Clark Transfer. Give me the lecture about being late, but not like I’m your dog and you think I’m going to bow down and be grateful for a job. Not me. Our bills are paid with Cindy’s paycheck except for the truck. I just spent $1600 on the truck for simple stuff the other day. I’m tired of spinning my wheels, using up log books like they were TP and working hard (when there’s work) for someone that thinks they can treat me like crap and I’m supposed to enjoy it? Nope, not me. If Cindy wasn’t working, I’d still be looking to go elsewhere. Too much bobtail and driving around empty, which pays less than loaded on top of the on butthead manager that all the drivers complain about, but nothing changes.

So, I was a little late. I didn’t get out of Dana Point till 9:30pm and it’s California, the speed limit is 55 for trucks. 300 miles to Las Vegas, I stop at 2am and sleep, probably a little long, but I was a half hour away and it’s a warehouse. I get there at 9am instead of 8am and I’m unloaded in a little bit after they round up some people from across the street. No they weren’t waiting on me. I have to explain that three times and hear how I had the entire day off and I should have driven straight through. I was up all day and the one time I took a nap, they called me about some crap that wasn’t happening for three days that they could have emailed to me. And then I have to hear how fast I drove from when I checked in to the warehouse? Bite me. Speed limit in Nevada is 70. If it was a show I would have drove another 30 minutes and been there last night, but for a warehouse with no parking, I had to park somewhere, thirty minutes away is close enough.

I have an offer for some part time work or just drive regional. If I make the truck payment, fine. If not, that’s fine too. The trailer is almost sold, I can stay home anytime, I wanted to try and put away just a little bit more (but that’s like two steps forward and three steps back) and this idiot calls me while I’m ten minutes from home to give me a bunch of crap about nothing?

Our schedule was that I was going to drive till Fall, then it changed to June, now it’s today. Probably for the better anyway.

While I was getting my truck worked on, I met a driver getting his clutch replaced ($3100) and he asked about Clark Transfer. He had already heard they treat their drivers like crap so didn’t drive for them. So, I’m not the only one, no matter what the office says. And two other Clark drivers quit just last week.

Another freelance job board, hire or be hired.
http://www.odesk.com/users/~~633b855b7e8ac156 Profile is a work in progress.

There are tests involved in their certifications, you don’t just say you’re qualified and get these. They’re linked to my profile on oDesk where I can be hired. Until I get home and have the time to take the CompTIA and Microsoft tests, these will have to do. I’d put them on the sidebar, but they’re too wide.

Scored in the top 20% on both of these:

Update: While waiting for the summer semester to start I did a couple more tests. A really good testing system. 40 minutes, 40 questions, not enough time to research the answers. After you finish you DON’T get to see the answers, ever. You can retake in 30 days. Each test is different. It’s not CompTIA, but I have to wait till I have the same time at home as the testing schedule.

I’m picking up next week in Boston to head to LA. West, finally! Three thousand miles, the first decent trip I’ve had in months.  I feel like finishing in two days, but probably won’t, maybe three, then head home. I’m looking for an audiobook for the long trip. I don’t listen to audiobooks while I sit around, too many distractions and I should be doing something  productive.

I’ve always wanted to read Atlas Shrugged and now the new book I’ve heard a lot about Daemon. One is about the struggle between capitalism and socialism and the other is about computers being used to hack into the power grid. Both a little too close to real life right now and I don’t feel like listening to the news for 62 hours.

I don’t need something happy, but how about something that doesn’t remind me of what a sink-hole the country is in. Bot nets are in the news today, all about ghost nets and other hacker events. Then there’s the threat of socialism or worse. Socialism may sound good in theory, but throughout history, socialism has created a class system of extremely rich and extremely poor with everyone hating the rich. America was built on the principles that there are no classes and anyone can do anything without being enslaved by the government. Every group wants to be the one in charge making the rules, but they don’t want to live by those same rules because they’re special. They’re more important than others around them. If this is the first couple of months, I can’t even to begin to imagine what the next couple of years is going to be like.

After a major tangent like that, maybe a good science fiction to take my mind off of taxes and truck payments or a good pirate story, where the hero comes in and rescues the hostage, killing dozens of pirates with a single bullet. Both equally unbelievable, but I can let things like that pass if it’s a good story, where you can relate to the characters and if the emotions and drama seem real, the rest is just scenery going by.

I’m sure I’ll find something. I’m glad to be working and going home at the same time. I’m starting to lose sight of what our goals are. I was supposed to be making money and saving as much as I could. What’s the point of making what little money I am, only to send it to the government, spend the rest on the truck for stupid stuff like tires and oil changes, to end up with nothing at the end of the day and be away from home. How can a business cost so much, make so little and still owe taxes? It’s a vicious circle.

If I was making money, I’d go along with most anything, but these trips are barely enough to pay for fuel, let alone much else like a truck payment and forget about saving anything and they’re spread so far apart and pay so little it’s really discouraging.

And while I’m off the subject, this stupid load was spread out over the long weekend. If I have a load, there’s no layover or detention. Five days to go 1400 miles, this is stupid, but at least the company doesn’t have to pay layover, smart on their part, but I’m getting really tired of making their money and getting shafted. They may not even be making that much money nowadays, but they have trucks that can take care of their customer and that’s all that matters.

I don’t mind a company making money, but I have to be involved and get my share instead of getting the short end of a short stick every single time. What am I still doing here?

Continued on Life on the Road – http://lifeontheroad.com/2009/04/12/wheres-the-light/2190.html

In case you missed the update in Transitions:

Did you know it’s against the Truth in Leasing Act from the FMCSA (DOT), CFR 49, 376.12 (g)  for a company NOT  to show their driver the proof of how much a load pays if that driver is getting paid by percentage? The problem is that most drivers won’t rock the boat because they want the job, so a lot of these companies get away with whatever they want.

Why would Clark Transfer take a load to lose money on that moves me in the opposite direction?  That’s the mystery.  I can understand taking something that goes in the right direction, it’s done all the time.

After being ganged up on by three dispatchers for asking a question and their response was so defensive you would have thought they had their hand caught in the cookie jar. After being told I was the only driver that questioned their generosity and how I didn’t trust them (you don’t establish trust with someone by just saying “trust me”, especially where money is involved, but maybe that’s just me) and how they didn’t want drivers to know what goes on in the office (?) and how they deal with their customers. I think I was shown the number of what this load paid. If that was it, these people at Clark Transfer are idiots.

This is a whole lot different than having a real open office where money wasn’t hidden. I could ask my boss what anyone or any driver made and he would not only answer it, but showed it to me. Having my dispatchers email and working with them as a team instead of for them as an employee or worse.

The whole thing was just odd. Why so defensive about something so simple and why take a load that after paying me and 200 miles of the PA turnpike, then for me to go empty 600 miles (and paid a little), why take a stupid load like that in the first place? This is not a stupid company, they’ve been in business since 1959, Clark Transfer concentrates on the office making money, that’s what’s so odd about this. They didn’t do me any favors, I could have made the same and they would have paid less for me to just sit there, why?

I was ready to just be fired right there, but that’s not how trucking companies operate. My planning report has one good load on it, if you want to call a buck a mile a good load so if that changes… I’m sure they’re going to take it personally, pout and get back at me for having the audacity for questioning their benevolence and their unquestioned obedience by everyone else. It’s already coming up on the “bad” season, so how much worse can it get at Clark Transfer?

Transitions are going on for everyone. I know more than one person that has been laid off, fired or are having to make tough decisions about keeping their truck or their house. People are helping their families and receiving help from their families all at the same time.

Here I sit at a grocery warehouse, waiting to haul 44,000 lbs over the mountains of eastern Pennsylvania 200 miles to deliver tomorrow afternoon, two hundred miles. I should be grateful I have a job, I should be grateful for the load the company got from a broker where they’re losing money (huh?), I should be grateful for what the company does for me and shut-up.

Why would the Clark Transfer take a load that pays less than what they are paying me? When Clark Transfer takes a brokered load I’m supposed to get a percentage. Lately the brokered loads have (they say) have paid less than the regular spot pay they give us, so they give us the greater of the two. How do I know they’re being so generous? I don’t. It’s their policy NOT to show the drivers the invoice on a brokered load. Even though this is going the opposite direction and I’m driving more miles empty (less money) I’m doing this load because if I don’t, I lose out on any layover pay because they offered me a load, but there’s not forced dispatch. But according to many of the drivers, don’t refuse a load or they will make you sorry you did.

Clark Transfer is a great company, but I should be grateful right? They have gone back on so many things they said at the beginning, not really gone back, they’ve rearranged what they said and how they interpret the contract.

Out of all of the crappy companies I’ve worked for I’ve never wanted to do this before, usually I just go on and mind my own business.  Have you seen Wal-mart sucks.com? Paypal sucks.com ford sucks, every major company has a sucks.com, why should trucking be exempt? Even though it would take time away from sites that make money or could make more money plus, it would take away time from school,

Since I do SEO (search engine optimization) pretty well (really, really well), I could make ten sites that just push their site off the front page of the search engines. I’ve already looked at the SEO of their site, it’s non-existent. When drivers are looking at a new company to drive for, what do they do? They go to the internet and look up that new company’s name. Hopefully, I can get to drivers before it’s too late.  I’d be gone and blacklisted anyway and not looking for another trucking job so why not? Honestly, I’ve got better things to do, but this keeps sounding like a good idea, I can’t help it.

What can a company do when sites like that come up? They can call the company that controls the domain (hey that’s me- waynes domains.com) or the hosting company (hey, that’s me too and I know the guy that owns the server I’m on), plus it’s a first amendment thing, so not much.

So, if they are being so generous and losing money on this load, why don’t they prove it and show me the invoice that shows how generous they are? You would think they would want me to be grateful at how much they’re doing for me.

I have to go in this warehouse now, bow down (or bend over) and be grateful to some dumb-*** shipping clerk. If I’m going to do stupid things and go out of business, that’s my fault, I don’t need any help going out of business from anyone else, I’m perfectly capable of failing on my own.

I know a lot of drivers and owners are doing a lot worse for a lot less, so I am grateful for what I have, I hate when someone tries to force me to be grateful to them. Kind of like respect, something that’s earned, while the more you demand, the less you get.

Update:

The point here, before I was interrupted, was that I’ve transitioned from being a business partner that worked together with complete openness and transparency with the office making money together, to a company driver with a truck payment.

I left because Bohemian didn’t have customers, they got leftovers from other companies and brokers, which was working good until a few years ago. Without customers, the leftovers dried up.

Update 2:

Did you know it’s against the Truth in Leasing Act from the FMCSA (DOT), CFR 49, 376.12 (g)  for a company NOT  to show their driver the proof of how much a load pays if that driver is getting paid by percentage? The problem is that most drivers won’t rock the boat because they want the job, so a lot of these companies get away with whatever they want, the policy that Clark Transfer depends on; Drivers not rocking the boat.