Just trucking along

Sorry to say that summer has finally made it to Wisconsin. The temps made it into the 90's with high humidity for the first time this year. Needless to say I did a whole lot of nothing yesterday. The extent of my activity was going from my nice cool Tahoe to a nice cool building and didn't linger too long between the two! I don't mind the heat or humidity one bit if I don't have to spend any time in it!
Had the day off yesterday and just relaxed as much as I could. I'm sure that dispatch will make sure I pay for the time off! I probably won't have time to slack off much for the next couple of weeks. I'm sure they will have me leave out early on Sunday and not get in until real late Friday for the next couple of weekends.I don't mind doing that as long as I'm kept busy during the week.I'm like everyone else, when I'm out on the road I don't want to be sitting around. It would be different if I was payed by the hour. I'll do all the sitting around they can give me! But like most companies,if they do happen to pay the driver something for sitting it is such a small amount that it generally falls way below minimum wage! We are lucky to be able to do a fair amount of drop and hooks. The places that we do have to load or unload are generally pretty quick. Of course every company has loads that involve sitting around. I guess there's no getting away from that. As long as the trucking companies are afraid to charge customers a large amount for the truck and driver sitting, these places won't change.
My dispatcher knows which loads involve sitting and will avoid putting me on them. He knows I raise all kinds of hell when I get stuck at these places. I don't limit my hell raising to my dispatcher. I've been known to go into the custumer and give it to them as well. My company has recieved a number of phone calls from custumers about the tongue lashing they recieved from me. It really breaks my heart when I don't get sent back to these places. I never use any foul language or raise my voice too loud at the customer. But I let them know what I think of the loading or unloading of the trailer. I figure that if enough drivers raise a little hell with places, soon these trucking companies and shipper/recievers are going to have to change the way they do business. My parents always told me that if you want things changed in this world it has to start with that person that stares back at you in the mirror. Don't wait for the next guy to do it.

Category: General