Along the Oregon Trail

Mike made it up to Springville, Utah to spend Sunday night and Monday with Lori. He even got some early training when he went along to the drop-off location (Stouffer's) and helped unhook the trailer. Since Lori's next pickup (back at Stouffer's) wasn't going to be ready until Tuesday morning, they "bobtailed" (no trailer) back to the local truck stop where Mike got back in his car to drive home and Lori spent the night.

Lori picked up her new trailer Tuesday morning filled with more Lean Cuisine pizza headed for the Safeway distribution center in Clackamas, Oregon which is just outside of Portland. Her route took her north to Idaho where she followed the route of the Old Oregon Trail through the Snake River canyon, through Boise, down "The Cabbage Patch" (east Oregon's version of the Grapevine grade), and alongside the Columbia River through the Columbia Gorge. She's spending Wednesday night at a truck stop near her delivery location before her drop-off appointment at 4:00 a.m. Thursday.

Close(r) to Home

Lori is heading out west and Mike is heading out to meet her.

After dropping her beer in Kokomo, Lori was sent to Schaumberg, IL to pick up a load of "Lean Cuisine" frozen pizza (another location she's been to before with Tamara.) The pizza is headed for Springville, UT just outside of Provo, not exactly our home turf but close enough for Mike to make a run to meet her.

Lori should be able to make it to Springville early Monday morning so Mike has taken Monday off work so they can spend the day together. Unfortunately, Mike HAS to be back to work by Tuesday evening for a "Town Hall" community meeting but hey, a little time together is better than none.

We'll report back after Mike returns home.

Just the Black Keys

Mike has been a musician since before junior high school, playing saxophone and keyboards in a variety of bands all the way through college. He spent a few years away from public performances after that but eventually starting playing keyboards and singing in church.

Among the church groups he is currently playing with is a gospel group at Calvary Chapel East Anaheim. It was here that he developed a deeper appreciation for all styles of gospel music. Even so, he had never heard the truth that is described in the video post entitled "Amazing Grace: Just the Black Keys!" You can view it by clicking here.

Perhaps Senator Obama should have been listening to messages such as this instead of those spouted by Reverand Wright for the past 20 years...

Beer Run

Lori has completed her next delivery; a trailer full of Anheuser-Busch products going from the brewery in Williamsburg, VA to Kokomo, Indiana. Frankly, Lori's getting a little tired of running back and forth over the Appalachin Mountains. While they're certainly beautiful they do have some steep grades, which are challenging to navigate with a full trailer.

The weather has been nice the past few days; in fact, Lori says it's been a bit humid with highs in the low 80s. Nothing too bad but you can tell that spring is here and summer can't be too far away.

"I will bless those who bless you..."

Genesis 12:1-4 is just one of many Biblical references that points out how God feels about the nation of Israel. As believers, Lori and I feel strongly about Israel's rights and the role it plays in the future of this world. That's why we are supporting an effort aimed at eliminating federal funding for former President Jimmy Carter's Carter Center.

Carter's recent meeting with the anti-Israel, pro-terrorist group Hamas is an abuse of power and misuse of American citizens’ hard-earned tax dollars. We will not stand for our federal dollars being spent to support terrorist negotiations!

We would ask you to prayerfully consider joining with us, Members of Congress, and the American Center for Law & Justice in calling for an immediate halt of federal funding to the Carter Center. Click here for more information on this effort and to add your name to a Petition to Cut Off Carter Center Funding.

Catching Up

Sorry; we couldn't get an Internet connection yesterday so we're a bit behind on posting. Fortunately, Lori's latest run wasn't a rush so we didn't miss much. She left Columbus Tuesday morning to pickup a load of yogurt and refrigerated biscuits in Hamilton, OH headed for Mechanicsville, Virginia (just outside of Richmond). Along the way, she stopped at Wal-Mart to stock up for the week.

Lori set a leisurely pace since the load isn't scheduled for delivery until 12:30 a.m. Thursday morning. It was the first time in a long time she didn't need to set her alarm to wake up. And when she did, she was greeted by a row of beautiful flowering dogwood trees lining the rest stop. But even with this slower pace, she arrived at the location Wednesday afternoon around 4:30, enough time to take a nap and watch a little TV.

She's already "pre-planned" for her next trip, which includes a pickup in Williamsburg, Virginia at 6 a.m. tomorrow morning. Not sure yet where it's going or when it has to be there. We'll find out tomorrow.

A Bit of Italy - from South Carolina?

Lori had to hightail it to South Carolina as her load of pork from Wisconsin took longer to load than expected. That meant no stopping for church service, otherwise she would have missed her delivery appointment time in South Carolina.

No sooner did she get that load dropped off when she was given another assignment; a load of Cheddar Garlic Cheese bread going from Pioneer Foods in Prosperity, South Carolina to Columbus, Ohio. She's getting a bit tired of driving in Ohio - known not so affectionately in the trucking industry as "Slow-hio" because the truck speed limit is 55 mph.

Not a lot of time to dally on this load either as the delivery time is 10 a.m. Tuesday morning. At least that means Lori will be able to have the load included on this week's paycheck. All loads whose paperwork are submitted by 4:00 p.m. Tuesday afternoon make it on that Friday's paycheck.

REady, SET, Go

As of 9:30 this morning, Lori's hours-of-service "reset" after 34 hours off-duty so she was able to start driving again. She may not hit the road for a few more hours, however, since her next pickup (45,000 pounds of butchered pork) won't be ready to go until later this evening.

Her delivery location in Milwaukee was directly across the street from Harley-Davidson's headquarters. It was interesting (but not surprising) to see how many Harley motorcycles were in the employee lot. The local newspaper did have some bad news for Harley Friday morning; 750 employees laid off. There's no doubt the economy is in a significant slump. While it will certainly impact the trucking industry, Prime may avoid much of the impact since most of its business is food-related and people still eat even during a bad economy.

Lori's plan to take in a baseball game during her break didn't work out since the Cubs were the only team in town and they played Friday afternoon, too early for Lori to make the game. Actually, that was fine as it gave Lori some time to do laundry, clean up the truck cab, and just unwind with some reading and relaxing.

Once the pork gets loaded, it's off to Fort Mill, South Carolina (just across the border from Charlotte, North Carolina). It's a 2-day trip, so Lori will overnight somewhere in Kentucky and hopefully get to attend a church service at a truck stop along the way.

Chocolate of a Different Kind

Last week, Lori delivered a truck full of Milky Way bars. She now has another load of chocolate, only this time it's in a different form; cocoa powder - 80 barrels of it.

The cocoa is coming from the Archer Daniels Midland plant on the coast of North Carolina, a place she visited before when she was teaming with Tamara. The load is headed for Milwaukee to a location on Harley Davidson Blvd. [INTERESTING HISTORICAL SIDE NOTE: Harley Davidson was started in Milwaukee in the early 1900s by two Davidson brothers and Mr. Harley. It is still the site of the company's world headquarters.] The trip length is almost 1100 miles, two full days on the road.

After Lori makes the delivery Friday morning, she's going to need to do her 34-hour reset. Since she's going to be in the Milwaukee/Chicago area she's thinking she might go to a baseball game. Mike is checking the schedules on the Internet to see who's going to be in town Friday night.

More Lumper Tales

Just when Lori thought she had seen all there was of the strange new world of lumpers, her arrival at the Piggly Wiggly distribution center this morning revealed yet another aspect of this link in America's consumer distribution chain. [INTERESTING HISTORICAL SIDE NOTE: Piggly Wiggly was the world's first fully self-service grocery store, opening in Memphis in 1916].

As Lori got off the interstate, she drove past a dirt lot filled with parked cars and guys trying to wave down passing trucks. Not knowing what they wanted, Lori drove past and got in line with the other trucks waiting to go into Piggly Wiggly. At that point, a gentleman approached the truck and presented Lori with his business card. All it said was "D, Certified Lumper." (Turns out D is short for "Diesel;" Lori didn't bother trying to find out how one gets "certified" as a lumper.)

D was trying a little too hard to be helpful, offering to take Lori's paperwork to the supervisor, break the seal on the trailer, and open the doors. Lori told him "thanks, but no thanks," she'd rather take the responsibility for doing all that or have a Piggly Wiggly employee do it. At that point, D says "I am a Piggly Wiggly employee; they let us lump on our days off." Man, I think I'd want to spend my day off at home, especially since the lumping business at Piggly Wiggly is so competitive. Some of the guys, wanting to get whatever advantage they can, used the CB to solicit approaching trucks with phrases like "Hey, northbound Werner truck! Need a lumper for Piggly Wiggly?"

D took about four hours to finish unloading and collected his $200. Lori's work hours were up for the day, so she drove over to a nearby truck stop and slept. When she woke up, her next assignment was waiting for her; drive empty for 250 miles to the Pict Sweet frozen veggie plant in Brownsville, Tennessee to pick up a load headed to Greensboro, North Carolina, a 600-mile trip.

The plan is to get all loaded up late tonight, take a 10-hour break, and then drive straight through to Greensboro. Lori ought to be able to make it within the allotted 11-hour driving day.

Dodged a Bullet

Whew, that was close! The Ohio Turnpike between Toledo and Cleveland was closed last night when severe weather brought down some power lines that cross the turnpike - just AFTER Lori drove through.

Unfortunately, that made it a little tough for Lori to find an empty truck parking space to spend the night since all of the trucks heading east had gotten off the turnpike to wait until it re-opened. She managed to grab one of the last two spots at the second truck stop she visited in South Bend, Indiana.

Ten hours later, it was back on the road to drop off the candy bars. She's now on her way to Beardstown, IL to the Excel pork processing plant. This is one of Lori's least favorite stops (she and Tamara were there back in February); it smells, has an all dirt lot that gets muddy in the rain, and is just not an attractive place. It's a "drop and hook" load so she won't have to stay long.

The pork is headed, ironically enough, to the Piggly Wiggly distribution center just south of Birmingham, Alabama. It's due for delivery Monday morning.

Taking Your Lumps

As promised, here's a post describing an interesting role in the trucking industry, one that we had never heard of before - lumpers.

Basically, lumpers are the people who load and unload trailers, known in the vernacular as "lumping." Not sure where that term came from. If we find out, we'll let you know.

We knew that over-the-road truck drivers typically don't have to load and unload the trailers. We assumed the people who did were warehouse workers employed by the warehouse company. While that is sometimes the case, more often than not the lumpers are freelancers who have permission from the warehouse company to work on the loading dock but aren't their employees. And, the warehouse doesn't pay them - the truck driver does! Even more bizarre is the fact that you don't know what the lumping fee will be until you get to the dock and actually "hire" a lumper. Lori has seen the fees range from about $40 up to the $200 she had to pay the other day to have her load of coffee creamer re-arranged.

Payment is made in cash or through the use of a "Com Data" check, the paper equivalent of a debit card. The driver pays the agreed fee, gets a receipt, and submits it with the rest of the final paperwork for each load so they can be reimbursed by Prime. Prime then charges that amount back to the shipper as part of their final invoice.

Some places will allow the drivers to lump their own loads. If they do, Prime will pay the driver a lumping fee based on the size of the load. But as a rule, most drivers use their dock time to rest up. It's nice to know, though, that you can make a few extra bucks if you want. However, some places make it impossible for a driver to lump the trailer by not allowing "unauthorized" persons to use their pallet jacks or other loading equipment. Some won't even allow drivers off of their truck. The frustrating thing is there are no hard and fast rules on lumping; they vary from company to company.

It seems a person could make a pretty good living as a lumper. But not knowing all the ins and outs, we don't know how someone would get into that line of work or how steady it is. Anyway, it's not a career path we'll be taking!

"Light" Chocolate

It's surprising how light candy bars can be. Lori's current load of Milky Way candy bars (original, dark chocolate, and mint) fills the entire trailer front to back but weighs only 17,000 pounds (just 1,000 pounds more than the trailer itself and 35,000 pounds less than what the trailer could carry).

While not considered a "high value" load Mars does take some extra precautions when shipping its candy, such as even putting a lock on the small "inspection" door that is typically used to check out the contents during a trip. Since the load comes right up to the door, I guess they don't want anybody reaching inside and snatching a few boxes.

Speaking of free candy, Mars does provide its employees with as much candy as they want in their break rooms. Lori was talking with one of the guards in the drivers' lounge, who told her there are literally bowlfuls of every kind of candy Mars makes; Milky Way, M&Ms, Snickers, 3 Musketeers, etc. The only restriction is the employees have to eat it in the break room; no candy goes past the door. Lori asked if employees ate a lot of candy at work. The guard said "only for the first couple of weeks on the job." After that, they've had enough!

Lori's run of good weather ran out this afternoon. Approaching Cleveland, she drove right into a major thunderstorm with blinding lighting and lots of rain. Fortunately, she was traveling perpendicular to the storm front so she was quickly under clear skies looking up at the real Milky Way.

She'll be ending up her driving day shortly, probably just on the other side of the Ohio/Indiana border. Tomorrow, it's on to the Chicago area.

A Lovely Day

Lori's days seem to be following a pattern; one crummy day then a great one.

The weather across Pennsylvania today was beautiful, the route didn't include any small rural highways to drive, and the rest stop where Lori had lunch had aspen trees (her favorite).

She arrived at Kraft in the late afternoon and dropped her trailer at a loading dock. Her next assignment requires that she pick up an empty trailer from Kraft, but they're one shift behind so she can't get another trailer until tomorrow morning.

Once she gets her trailer, she's heading up to a distribution center to pickup a load of Mars candy for delivery to a city just south of Chicago, a nice two-day trip. Hopefully, the weather won't get too bad, though there is a big winter storm heading east across Minnesota.

Getting Hosed

Lori's starting to feel like she can't catch a break.

After finally getting the last part of the coffee creamer load to Sam's Club this morning, the trailer Lori was pulling somehow managed to cut through the air hose leading from the tractor to the trailer, resulting in a complete lockup of the trailer's brakes. Headquarters told her to get the trailer to as safe a location as possible, unhook it so "road assist" could come pick it up later, and then head over to a local mechanic who would be waiting for her.

While all these challenges are frustrating, it's a great learning process. Situations such as this are a fact of life in the trucking biz, so it's best to just roll with the punches and not let them get you down. If they do, then over-the-road trucking is probably not the business to be in.

Fortunately, installing a new air hose is a fairly quick process so Lori was able to get back on the road to her next pickup location: Great Lakes Cheese in Hiram, Ohio where she picked up a trailer that was all ready to go with 31,000 pounds of sharp cheddar cheese headed for Kraft Foods in Allentown, PA.

She had to stop the truck around 11:00 p.m. for her 10-hour break near the Ohio/Pennslyvania border. Tomorrow morning it'll be back on the road for the rest of the trip to Kraft.

When in Canton...

As expected, Sam's Club is as inflexible with missed appointments as Wal-Mart. Lori couldn't get a new delivery appointment until 11:00 a.m. Wednesday.

It's not all bad news, though. Lori's fleet manager authorized $125 in layover pay for Lori, the downtime will allow Lori to "reset" her 70-hour driving clock, and she had a chance to do some sightseeing. And when you're in Canton, Ohio, the only place to go is the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The truck stop Lori was staying at is about 5.5 miles from the Hall of Fame, so she called Mike to give her directions from Google map and she took off walking. Along the way she stopped at an organic food store to get some cheese and an apple for lunch (which she enjoyed at a local park) and some basil gnocchi to cook for dinner back at the truck, arriving at the Hall of Fame after about 2 hours. She wasn't really interested in going inside without Mike, so she shot a few photos, took a quick nap under a tree, and then headed back to the truck.

She's looking forward to restful night's sleep before heading over to Sam's Club in the morning.

And so it Continues...

Well, Lori finally left with her load of International Delight coffee creamer after nearly 12 hours of waiting, giving her six hours to get to her first drop-off appointment in Lima, OH. Normally, that would have been enough time but the route across West Virginia was suprisingly hilly, which meant a significant drop in speed for much of the trip.

In any case, Lori managed to arrive just 30 minutes past her appointment time. And that's when she discovered this comedy of errors was not over. The shipper knew this load involved three drop-off locations but they had loaded the trailer in reverse order, putting the items for the first drop-off in the FRONT of the trailer. That meant the entire trailer had to be unloaded and then re-loaded, which meant another delay and an additional $200 in "lumper fees" (an interesting part of the trucking industry we'll explore in another post.)

By the time Lori finished the second drop (which was only 17 miles from the first location) she had to take her mandatory 10-hour break, meaning there was no way she could make the scheduled appointment for drop-off number 3 in Canton, Ohio. Prime's sales staff is supposed to contact them and get a rescheduled drop-off appointment. It's a Sam's Club warehouse. If they're anything like their parent company, Wal-Mart, the new appointment time could be as much as a day or two later.

Hurry Up and Wait - Again!

Eight hours and still waiting for the load to be ready in Mt Crawford, VA. (Not exactly sure what the load is but the company makes Silk soy milk, International Delight coffee creamer, and other dairy products.)

It's quite frustrating to plan out your driving/break schedule and then have it completely screwed up by having to sit and wait and wait and wait while the trailer is loaded. You would think that a company that was that far behind would at least call and let somebody now. When we're King of the World, then well make that happen. In the meantime, we'll just have to deal with it.

Lori has let headquarters now about the delay but since it's the weekend, none of Prime's sales staff is around to call the receiver and reschedule the delivery time. Oh well, all Lori can do is drive until she has to take a break and see what happens.

High in the Middle and Round on Both Ends

In case you couldn't tell from the title, Lori is headed for O-hi-o. She made her drop at Wal-mart early this morning and then headed for a nearby truck stop (along with several other trucks from Prime) to sleep while she waited for her next load assignment.

Her driver communications unit (known as the Qualcomm after its manufacturer) announced her next load late this afternoon; pickup at Mt Crawford, VA at 9:30 Sunday morning and head to Ohio for drop offs in Lima, Delphos, and North Canton throughout the day Monday. She's headed for a rest area about five miles away from her pickup location for a full night's sleep. Hopefully, that will help her get over the "frog" that has developed in her throat. It's been a bit cool and very humid this last week, which has given her a case of the sniffles.

Once she completes this load, she'll have 2400 miles for the week since leaving Springfield last Tuesday, which will mean a larger than "minimum" paycheck. (Any miles over 2000 in a week earns her an extra 30 cents/mile over the minimum.)

Just in Time

Whew, that was close. Lori arrived for her 8:30 a.m. delivery at 8:27. Fortunately, her trip from Wilkesboro was uneventful (including a stop for fuel) otherwise she wouldn't have made it on time. Her truck (along with all the other company trucks) has its top speed limited to 62 mph so she couldn't haven't gotten there any faster even if she wanted to.

She did have to miss meeting up with her brother and his wife. They were leaving Baltimore last night headed for Memphis traveling along part of the same route Lori was going to be on (except in the other direction). However, Lori's late start meant they were already past her before she got on the road.

Lori's now at her next pickup spot; National Beef in Selinsgrove, PA nestled on the shores of the Susquehanna River. As soon as she's ready to go she's going to grab a few hours sleep and then head back south to the Wal-Mart distribution center in Gordonsville, Virginia. After that drop she's going to turn off her phone and get 10 straight hours of sleep!

"Fowl Up" at Tyson

Lori finished her delivery in Black Mountain, North Carolina this morning and was sent to pick up a load of chicken at the Tyson packing house in Wilkesboro, NC. She arrived at about noon and expected she'd only be there for a few hours. Ten hours later, she was still waiting to leave. And no one else is leaving either, with more trucks arriving. Sounds like there must be something wrong with the production line inside.

The original delivery time for Lori's load was 8:30 a.m. Friday in Greencastle, Pennsylvania. It's going to be tough (if not impossible) to make that time so the dispatcher is working on getting the delivery time delayed.

Truckers' Strike Gets Mixed Results

News reports about yesterday's "strike" by independent truckers wanting to protest the high cost of diesel fuel show that participation was spotty. (Read article here.) Seems to my all they did was throw away a day's pay for themselves and make some "four wheelers" angry as they snarled traffic in New Jersey, Atlanta, Chicago.

They also managed to get themselves a bit of national media coverage but I don't think it's going to have any real impact on the cost of fuel. You can read our previous post commenting on why we think the strike was a bad idea in the first place by clicking here.

P.S. - Happy Birthday to daughters Shannon and Christina, and granddaughter Jenna!

One Stop Down, One to Go

Lori made her first official delivery this morning as a solo driver...with just one minor hiccup.

She got to the Wal-Mart warehouse on time, was told which loading dock to go to, and expertly backed the trailer into place - or so she thought. As she backed up, she was sure she felt the trailer bump up against the dock, so she jumped out of the cab, unhooked the trailer, and pulled the cab forward about a foot (as per Wal-Mart procedures). As she was sitting in the cab doing her paperwork, one of the dock workers came to the window and said she was about a foot away from the dock! She got out, took a look, and sure enough, she hadn't back up far enough. So, she hooked the trailer back up to the cab, backed up the remaining 12 inches, and then re-unhooked the trailer and pulled the cab forward again.

She's not sure what she bumped into that made her think she hit the dock the first time but it reinforced one of the acronyms she learned during her transition training: GOAL - Get Out and Look!

After they finished unloading (this stop only took 7,400 pounds of the 75,000 pounds of pork that was on the trailer), Lori headed over to a nearby truck stop to take her time off for the day and get some sleep. At 1:30 p.m. she was ready to roll again so she headed off for Black Mountain, North Carolina. Before she hit the road, she put a Cornish game hen into her "lunchbox" stove to cook for the afternoon so it'll be done by dinner time.

The first 30 miles or so were along a state highway in Tennessee east of Nashville. The trip took her through "Cedars of Lebanon State Park" which Lori said was beautiful. She fueled up before getting onto Interstate 40 and heading east for North Carolina. That's one thing about being a company driver vs. a lease operator; you follow the exact route you're given and you fuel at the truck stops they tell you to go to (they even tell you how much fuel to get!) It's based on a fairly sophisticated routing and fueling software program available for large trucking fleets.

After getting on the interstate she saw two convoys of NASCAR trailers headed west for the next race at Texas Speedway outside of Dallas; one for Jeff Gordon's DuPont-sponsored car and the other for Jimmie Johnson's Lowe's-sponsored car. Both of these cars are part of Hendricks Motorsports, which is based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Lori arrived at her next delivery location at about 10:30 p.m. (Eastern time), checked in, and climbed into the bunk to get some sleep until they call her to get unloaded (scheduled for 7:00 a.m.)

And She's Off!

Lori got her first official load assignment as a solo driver today. She picked up a loaded trailer that another driver dropped at the Prime facility in Springfield. It's a load of processed meat (probably pork based on its origination point), with some of it headed for the Wal-mart distribution center in Shelbyville, TN and the rest destined for Ingalls market in Black Mountain, NC.

It's actually a good load to start with since there's not a lot of miles to cover and there's lots of time to get there. The delivery time for Wal-mart is 3:15 a.m. Wednesday morning (12 hours to go 340 miles) with the next delivery set for 7:00 a.m. Thursday morning (24 hours to go 329 miles). Of course, you've got to throw the mandatory 10-hour break in there but even then there's plenty of time for her to get where she needs to be.

She's made herself quite at home already. After a good cleaning, she's added some nice rugs to the floor, loaded up the pantry and refrigerator, and found a place for Mickey and Minnie Mouse to sit in the passenger seat. (NOTE: They will NOT be staying there once I get on the truck...) I'll post a photo of the truck (and maybe some video) once I get a chance to meet up with her and get some shots.