what? a schedule? what's next armageddon?

june 27, 2011
we have completed one round trip from seatac to lax. (ok actually hawthrone airport)
southbound we have one stop at pdx where they add stuff going to la. that route is fairly easy. mostly i5 for my driving time anyway.
the north bound route is more stressful. after dropping in la, we hang out and leave a couple hours later, with a different trailer.  there are two stops north bound. one in hayward airport and again at pdx.  
they are timed loads and the time from lax to hayward is very, very tight. it is only 370 miles, they do give us  6 hrs and 45 min. but that time line doesnt really allow for la traffic. (i dont think they sleep down there) 

it was still bumper to bumper. add to that the road construction in veris areas. going down to one and two lanes on a 5 lane freeway makes for very slow going, even if it is only for a mile or two. the time also puts us in bayarea morning rush hour traffic. will did it with 15min to spear. but he did not stop at all. no bathroom breaks, no closing his eyes to rest breaks, no get out and walk around and wake up breaks. no vehicle checks.
when i contacted the customer service rep. he really didnt want to hear anything i had to say.  i told him our info says we are picking up a preloaded trailer at 22:00 but it is a live load and we left at 23:30, so i felt like our delivery time should have been adjusted 1 1/2 hours to reflect the fact that we left 1 1/2 hr after our apt time.  he says it is scheduled to leave at 23:30 etc. we went back and forth of course i lost because it is what it is.  i also mentioned to him the new csa rules state we are suppose to stop after every 2 hours of driving. that would mean for 8 hour of driving we should be showing on our logs 4 breaks.  his response was."who is csa and why do they say you have to stop thats a new one on me ". my response was,  "csa is the new set of rules governing the trucking industry,"     

then i contacted our dm and mentioned to her. who is this guy, is he new here. doesnt he look at the posters all around the office stating the new rules. every truck stop has those poster. every swift has those posters. new fines. new penalty's. how can someone  in the trucking world not know about csa. maybe he needs an in service class to bring him up to speed.
 
im not saying we do stop every 2 hours.  i stop about every 200 miles which is about 3 hours. that rule really cuts into our pocket. since we only get paid when the wheels are turning and we have to stop the wheels every 2 hours.  in  an 11 hour driving shift we would need to stop 5 times that totals 1 hour and 15 min. since we are allowed to work 14 hours a day, but can only drive 11 hours within that 14 hr window, it makes our work day longer. now it takes longer to reach my 11 hours driving point.  its confusing.  i was mostly trying to get an extra hour so will could stop and rest his eyes, and go to the bathroom.  the csr did not care. he said this time has been set and it is the time schedule.  so i told will next time do not drive over the speed limit. stop every 2 hours and do your in route vehicle safety check , stop to use rest room if you have too. and if its late, its late.  but speeding and not stopping and showing up on time isnt going to fix anything. thats only going to get us a ticket for speeding, and log violations. and show the csr that it can be done.  will is afraid that if we show up late they will take us off this route.
 
the finale delivery , back up in seattle is a little messy.  we have a 7am appointment, but there are 3 trucks in front of us and the business isnt even open yet.  its a live unload. seems like we wont get out of here until noon.  
but the good news is, since we dont have to be back  in seattle until monday at 6pm we will be able to go home for the weekends.  YEA!!  HIP~ HIP ~HOORAY!! YAHOO!! YIPPEE!!!  HAZAA!! and so on and so on.
we should be able to be home late saturday afternoon until monday afternoon.  we are going to pick up one of the cars to leave up here that way we dont have to drive the semi back and forth. that will save us some fuel cost and the oregon road tax, since even empty even just bobtail oregon wants that money. 

 
 im so excited. home on a regular schedule. church. kids. grandkids. family. friends. exercising. gardening. housework. hot tub.  i almost dont care about the la and bay area traffic with all that to look forward too.

 
**see you soon**
love and miss you all

june 23, 2011
we have started our dedicated route. but before i get to that, the last delivery we made rather tried to make was a mess. 
the business was hard to find.  seemed like they were hiding behind a tree.  will walked up to see what the dock location was like.  he does that most of the time when he isnt sure and doesnt want to get into a situation he cant get out of. notice i said 'he' cause 'me' never gets in a backing or docking situation.  the shipping papers had a note that said, must use experience driver, blind side docking from busy street...do not send trailers with skirting.  thats a sheet of metal that a lot of companys are putting on trailers to help reduce drag and increase mpg.

  at first we thought they didnt want trailers with wind shield because they were going to use a mirror to look under the trailer for bombs or whatever. but thats not why they had that statement.  when will went in to talk to someone, the supervisor told him most trucks cant come in. the railroad tracks routinely grab and tear off the landing gear. the supervisor told will last week he helped the driver pick up  the pieces and toss it in the trailer. that would suck.  he said the problem is the degree and and peak of the tracks. the supervisor told us they are always contacting the city of portland and the railroad and each says its the others problem. 
so we contacted our dm told her the situation and waited for directions. she said she would contact so-and-so. we waited about an hour with no response. will decided to go over there and see if we could do it.   mostly just to be able to tell  dispatch that we did so try. thought maybe from an angle stuff wouldnt get hung up. but you can see that didnt work. 

good thing will was going slow, if he had been hurrying to get out of the way of traffic we would have torn up the truck. after we decided this wasnt going to happen and i and the supervisor got enough pictures will decided it was time to head back to the swift yard and give them back the loaded trailer.  will starts to pull forward very slowly because i was on one side and the supervisor was on the other side watching the landing gear. they scrap across the tracks just like they did when backing up. then the angle of the trailer changes and the corner of the dot bumper gets hung up and pops.

 
we call our dm and report it. she said bring the load back and they will figure it out.  so i emailed her the pictures.
now we are starting our dedicated route. seattle to los angles (hawthorne) and back to seattle. there is a south bound stop in portland. and north bound we will stop in hayward and in portland.   so far it seems to be working out. but we've only just begun (hey someone should write a song..) we are almost to la as i write this. 
while i was driving past los banos there was a fire on i5. it was on both sides and in the middle. but they let us drive through.  

fire season in california. they had helicopters and planes.

 i think i would change the name of the exit.

love and miss you all

a new route??

we are getting ready to start a dedicated route.  i know youve heard that one before, but this one sounds like a true dedication.  from seattle to los angles to seattle. two round trips a week.  we are hoping the times work out so that we will be able to be home 2 days a week. that should really reduce our out of pocket expenses. laundry, hotel, resturants, etc. part of the down side is the, oregon road tax.  the kingdom of oregon charges truck drivers 16 or 19 cents for every mile we drive in oregon. also the  lower miles about 4200 a week we want to average 5000. and on the rare weeks we get 6000, that is just icing on the cake.  so all we can do is try it and see how it works out. if it doesnt work out i guess we can just go back to what we're doing now. fighting and scratching for 5000 miles a week.

im going to gather all my pictures of the rest stops and post them later. some of the rest stops are amazing. there might be a couple of post with just pictures. expecially that last one we were at in missiouri. then you get into arizona, california, oregon and washington. just a little step up from honey bucket.   thers something oregon can do with the money from truckers, give us a nice place to pee. its no wonder there are so many bottles and other containers tossed on the side of the road with urine in them. no people its not apple juice, bunch of pigs.

and in case you havent read it on my facebook page, IT IS HOT!!  it certainly takes a special kind of person to live in some of these places. (special, special) i dont know why anyone would choose to voluntarily live where the temp gets above 75' and then places where it regularly is above 100', 110'.  i look around expecting to see people spontaneously combust

oh and just a side not some of you may have felt a disturbance in the force. if you have not heard the shocking news,  the other day will and i were both given the senior dinner discount.!!!
i know, thats what i said, WTH!!!.  i pay good money for this hair color. i was raised a good irish, catholic girl. i never did drugs, i never (really) killed anyone, i have karma points as a back up and still this happens. i could stand to lose some grandma weight. i love and embrace my grandma~ness but i am still  6 months away from having to open any mail from aarp.  i think little Suzie Q waitress was tired it was obviously pass  her curfew.  screwed herself out of a tip. will thought it was funny and gave her a tip anyway.
love and miss you all