jormagund

The problem with the guy was that he was brand new at his job and we were maybe his third recruiting presentation ever. He also hadn't been a driver for that company. Though his wife had.

Way I look at it is most any company you start out with is your training wheels company. Learn to drive the truck, be on time and have no accidents and you can move on to bigger and better things when you've got your 1 or 2 years behind the wheel.

Was thinking that transporting cars might be good to get into because in addition to paying good money you're delivering to nicer areas, commercial rather than industrial, and there might be more of actual civilization around you, decent restaurants and grocery stores. You also are in charge of your own unloading(I think) and you're not going to have to wait for some lumper or dock worker to show up and do your unloading. But, who knows where the road will lead. Cars might be a pretty unstable bouncy load, but that's what they're paying you to deal with.

Oh, and yes, Yankee Candle does have its own trucks, but it's hard to get a job with them I hear. Certainly you aren't going to get hired out of school.

Glad you're getting a break. Have a relaxing time of it.

All done with classroom portion of CDL sclool. Very glad to be outta there.

Who do you think makes better meatballs, the Italians or the Swedes? Question is not meant in cannibalistic sense.

I've only see that one truck stop. I didn't find it dirty or disagreeable in any way. Except that all of the available food was junk food. The parking lot was pretty packed. One thing I'm nervous about is parking my truck someplace like that, backing in and trying not to make contact.

Maybe when I'm driving I'll figure out what areas tend to have better parking and see if I can't run mostly in thoes areas.
Ken told us about the frequent fueler cards. He also mentioned that you get a free shower if you bought at least $50 dollars worth of fuel, i think the figure was. I think the most interesting thing I saw there was actually the load finder, the TV screeen with all the available loads displayed on it. It seems that if you were an O/O with a reefer there's always a lot of loads available. Maybe you could sort of fart aroud wherever you felt like going, pulling reefer loads.

I looked at a bunch of trucking jobs that were listed on masslive.com. Pohl actually had a job posting today. One field I might be interested in when I've got my year of driving experience might be transporting cars. There seems to be good money in it. Might make you a good hijack target, but I think even if you're hauling bricks someone might want to hijack you and bring your load to a crooked contractor.

A handwritten note? I've never heard of Providence cops being so ..... courteous.

Iron Butt

I'm through eight out of ten weeks of classroom time and then I'm out in the field. I was going to get my learner's permit today and surprise! RMV not open on saturdays. Bastards. Next week we're going to be studying the weight distribution phenomenon. Sliding fifth wheels, sliding tandems, bridge formulas.

You might say that the only challenge ultimately worthy of a sentient being is to work towards happiness and being at peace with himself and the world without the use of magic. With only the power of your own mind and your own hands. And with a finite span of time to work with.

A lot of what great artists and poets and others do is at the edge of magic, finding things and making things that previously had no existence. You might read Eugen Herrigel's Zen and the Art of Archery for some clue as to what is possible for human beings to, for what is within reach of the mind.

The TMC rep was in this week. It seems like a fantastic company to start out working for, but they're highly selective it seems. Only about a third of their candidates make it through orientation.

My instructor has some stories about experieces he's had with people trying to hijack trucks. At one time a big black guy tried to hijack him but got himself blown out the door with a .45. Another incident led him to not ever park at night in NYC. Back in 1973 he was hauling swinging meat from denver to brooklyn. He was running with a couple of other guys. When they were close to NYC my instructor stopped in Pennsylvania to shower and get a bite to eat. The two other guys went on ahead. When My instructor got to his destination in brooklyn, he parked on the street and went to sleep until he heard a loud banging on his door. The police wanted to know if he had seen anything. The two guys who had arrived an hour before him had been killed and they were hanging on meat hooks in their trailers and their loads had been stolen.

This got me thinking a lot this week about what to do about personal security. I was wondering if you had ever been assaulted or knew anyone who had.

I have some handguns and while it's highly illegal and against most company policies I'd think real hard about bringing one along. And getting something small to carry.

There's other alternatives. Pepper spray at the very least. I think one could also carry an accessory SLR camer flash. At night if someone accosts you in a dark place you could blind him with that flash. IF you're in your truck you could blast a guy in the face with a fire extinguisher or a can of spray paint. A million things you can have in the cab of your truck but it's a lot harder to protect yourself when you're outside of it. If someone attacks you where you can't get help, on the plus side he can't get help either, and if you've got him blinded with a camera flash or pepper spray you then have the advantage to make him understand that you were really the wrong person to run afoul of. Whatever. I hope this discussion remains nothing more than hypothetical.

Yeah, Saturday's the big night. Sucks that you're away, you could've met everyone under the sun.