Driver Greg here.  All alone.  No navigator.  No sweetie.  I know, it’s sad.  I’m sad. But on we go. Freights gotta move.  Got parked early last night but DOT inspection was about to expire so thought I would get that done. Well they found a leaking brake canister so had to get that repaired in order to pass the inspection.  All thoughts of an early night went out the window, so after getting a shower and eating dinner which was interrupted with a call from the garage, finally got in the bed with alarm set for 3:00 am in hopes of getting at least six hours of sleep. No deal. Driver manager called at 2:45 wondering if I was ready to roll. Sure. Why not. So off I go. 

The shipper name didn’t ring a bell but as I got closer to my pick up I realized I had been here before. The “Hogwash” truck washing place across the street gave it away. 

Drop and hook, which is good but still taking an hour and I haven’t yet checked out. Then will have to weigh and hope the load is right. 

Load was right. 44000 pounds of ribs. I’m tempted to have a bbq.  Any takers?

Well, after much deliberation dispatch directed me to a Flying J just outside of Indianapolis where I swapped trailers with another driver.  I hope this is the last leg toward Kansas. 

Talking to the other driver it appears that Trans Am has had its share of troubles. There’s just something about this company I can’t put my finger on but know that i will be glad to move on. 

A couple of pictures. If you look back at some of our early pictures of the Mississippi you will see a big difference. 

It is up. 

I thought this was interesting.  It’s a movie theater surrounded by corn fields in the middle of nowhere.  

  
Weird huh?

And the biggest caterpillars I have ever seen. Don’t want to be around when they turn into butterflies.

  
Well, that’s all folks. Hope all are well. I miss you terrible my love. Can’t wait to get home. 

Good night and God bless.

Annie – Boy it really sounds like I need to get back in the truck!   

It’s been a pretty slow day around here.  I have been working on taxes again and will tomorrow too it looks like.  

Finally got to the grocery store for a few things though so that’s good.  I didn’t get the Loreal for my hair yet though.  Not sure what Sadie is going to say.   She doesn’t like it when my hair is gray.  Lol  

Well, turning in.  Missing my sweetie something awful!   Hope you are here soon!   

Goodnight, y’all! 

Slept until 8:30.  This could become a habit.  Lol 

Another day without my sweetheart.   Hope I don’t have too many more of these.  Miss you awful sweetie! 

Not too much going on on my end.  Going through receipts for the past few months and organizing them for taxes.      What fun!

Greg went through St.  Louis today and sent me a picture in case I forgot.   Not likely but thanks Honey!

Thought you might like that. I am in Kingdom City, Missouri. Waiting for the garage to call me and do my six month DOT inspection.  Not sure what all that entails as this  be my first. 

Weather is weird this evening. Sunshine then dark clouds and rain then sun again. Oh well, as long as I’m not getting wet. 

Probably get some dinner shortly. Being in central time zone throws off my hunger timing. Ah, who am I kidding. I can eat about any time of day in any time zone. Okay, that’s it. There’s a Buffett calling me. More later. 

Annie – I’ve been working on tax stuff most of the day and probably all day tomorrow.   Fun fun!   Come on fair tax!! 

Got to see my Abby girl for a while this evening which was nice.  

Maddi called tonight to FaceTime Papaw and she was disappointed when I answered.   She says “Hi Mammie!   Where’s Papaw?”   LOL.  Greg said when he finally got to FaceTime with her she kept kissing the iPad.   Is there anything better in the whole world?  I can’t think of anything. 

Well, turning in.   Can’t sleep without my snore machine beside me so I stay up late until I am really sleepy.   Yawn!  Getting that way so to bed I go.   

Goodnight, y’all. 

Boo Hoo.   My sweetie left this morning without me.   He is working his way back to Olathe to take the truck back.    I miss him already!!

Well, our renter has officially moved out.  Got some cleaning to do but otherwise the house looks good.   Hope it sells quickly.   I called this morning to get utilities put back in our name and got quite a shock.   The water was no big deal.  No deposit.   The electricity however was a different story.   They want an average electric bill for the last year as a deposit.  $800!!!   Goodness gracious.   What was he doing in that house that the electric bill was $800?   Wow.  Didn’t see that coming. 

DG:  I miss you too my love. It is lonely out on the road. I have the radio but it doesn’t listen when I talk. I talk to the voices in my head but they don’t listen either.  And once again I am waiting.  I don’t feel like a truck driver.  I am a waiter.  May I take your order please?  GPS struck again by misdirecting me past my stop. And the stop is one of those that is behind another business and the name on my information is not the name of the business now as they have changed their name. So after riding around for 30 minutes, calling the shipper who has an automated phone system so they do not have to talk to anyone, but they did have a recording of the directions so I listened to them as I retraced my steps and finally found the place just one and one half hours late which didn’t seem to matter in the whole scheme of things as the real issue is that my delivery contains three POs and whereas the standard bill of lading may contain only one, this has grown somewhat of a kink in things. So here I sit, two hours later and no one has even begun to load my trailer. 

Sometimes I get paranoid and think they are conspiring to keep me here as long as they can, but that only gives them an out for their disorganized operations.  Yea.  

Had a heck of a time backing in here too.  There’s not enough room to pull your truck up so you have to cut pretty hard and then wiggle a little to get back in the dock.  Another trucker knew I was going to have trouble so he spotted for me.  All in and nothing broke and nothing scratched.  

Annie – Not much going on today which is good every now and then.   Going to turn in.   Goodnight y’all.  

Wow!   Slept until 8:30 this morning.   I think I could still sleep but I don’t like to sleep late.   Abby and Lindsey are still asleep though.  No surprise there as they are teenagers and were probably up late.   

Happy Birthday Jake!   Can’t believe he is 10 years old!   Where does the time go.  

DG:  well I tried to add something last night but lost it when I went to save.  Just wanted to affirm Annie’s post.  New Avenger movie was great.  Excited to spend the weekend with our nieces.  

Getting the weekend off feels good.  Relaxing, getting caught up on some personal things.  

So not much to report. Looking forward to starting with a new company.  There’s a lot of talk coming from trucking companies about how important drivers are and how they respect drivers and offer the best deal, but the only way to find out is to try them.  So that’s what I’m going to do. This will be the third company I will have driven for in my short driving career.  

Here’s hoping all are well.  God bless you all.

Annie – Got the truck all dusted and vacuumed.  Greg will have to clean a bit when he drops the truck off but this should help quite a bit.   Excited to try new company.  Maybe see something different besides St. Louis and Nashville! 

Got my plane ticket this am.  Going to go see my babies next weekend for two days while Greg is in Mississippi for training.   Can’t wait.  Hopefully we will make more money with this new company and can get to see them more often.    

Went to the house on Southern Hills to check things out since our renter moved out.   House looks good.   The girls went with us and Lindsey fell in love with the drums so Tony came and got them for her.  It’s good they will be used again.  She is so talented she will be playing them pretty soon.  

Well my sweetie has to leave early in the morning so we better get some sleep.  Goodnight y’all. 

Got to sleep in until 7:30 this morning.  Yeah!  

Headed over and cleaned out most of truck.  Will finish up tomorrow.  I can’t believe how much stuff we had in there.  

Mom, Abby, Lindsey and I went to lunch and to hobby lobby.   Greg stayed home and watched the Kentucky Derby and did laundry. Isn’t he great!   Thanks honey! 

Now we are off to the movies to see The Avengers 3D!  

Wow!   What a great movie.  I could watch Thor all day!   Greg bought a souvenir cup for our drink and it had a 3 inch Scarlett Johansen figure sticking out on top.  You wouldn’t think it would be a big deal but every time I went to get a drink I kept putting her head in my mouth instead of the straw.  You had to drink sideways to keep from getting poked in the eye.  Not a very well thought out plan.  

It’s 12:30 so turning in.   Goodnight y’all. 

2:16 am.  Greg is up and getting ready to go to Canton, Ohio.   I  am going back to sleep!

Got in to our stop at about noon.  Little late but traffic and time change plus clock didn’t give us enough time.   So, we are here.  Hope it doesn’t take long to unload!

Canton Ohio started off nice with big Victorian houses and nice neighborhoods but where we ended up wasn’t so nice.   Railroad tracks running by the place and I figure we were on the wrong side.

Time for a break while we wait.

Got unloaded in about an hour.    That may be a new record.   I woke Greg up and told him to go lay down on the bed so he would rest better and not 30 seconds later they came to the door and said unload was done.  Too funny!

We made it to Ashland about 8 oclock.   Got picked up at the truck by mom, Jr. and Ashbey.   We will go in the morning and clean out the truck so Greg wont have to worry about it next week when he takes the truck back.

Went by Giovanni’s, of course, for pizza and antipasti salad.  Now to go home and put my feet up.   Got a nice surprise when we got to moms and Abby and Lindsey were waiting on us.   Ashbey decided to stay, so Yeah!  Slumber party.

DG:  Sorry about last night.  Everything I wrote last night went away when I tried to save and I was too sleepy to retype.

I was talking about the alien aspect of truck drivers.  Those that drive at night especially.  They alienate themselves from daytime society and scarcely know how to function in that setting.  That’s just a hypothesis. Spending days on end alone in a truck tends to make one semi antisocial. And then there are the ones that if you engage in conversation go on forever for the vey same reason.

Home time. Sleep over with the nieces.  Fun, fun. They’re really good kids and teenagers are always entertaining.

Been up since 2:30 am so I hope you will excuse me if I sign off now and crawl into a real bed.

Good night and God bless.

Up at 4:30 to go back to Tyson.  Luckily our load was ready and we were able to get on the road fairly quickly.   Bright clear sunny day.  Little chilly still but not bad.  Now we head to Canton, Ohio, with our load of 43,000 pounds of shredded pork.   Anybody got any barbecue sauce?  We could have a big party.

We got to go through the northern part of Iowa today, right along the border of Wisconsin.   Totally different scenery up there than parts we had been through before.   There were hills and rolling plains instead of just flat.

We also went through Galena, Illinois.   It looked like an old Victorian/western town.   The downtown looked to have all of its original buildings from the 1800’s.   It sits up on a hill to so we definitely put this down as a place we would like to visit some time when we are in the car.

http://visitgalena.reachlocal.net/?utm_source=ReachLocal&utm_medium=PPC&utm_campaign=VGSearch

We only got about 350 miles today before time ran out.   We are at a Pilot south of Gary, Indiana.   The plan is to get up at the crack of dawn (no surprise there) and head to our appointment hopefully by 8 am.  Its going to be cutting it close and I really am not sure we will be there on time as there is construction on I80 a few miles down the road.  Hopefully that wont hold us up too long.    Maybe since we are leaving early we can miss any traffic through there.

Going to find something to eat and then hit the hay.   Hope to be in Ashland tomorrow night!! Goodnight, y’all.

Up at 6 am.  Heading to Iowa.   Only about 200 miles to go.  It’s cold this morning.  Only 38 but the sun is shining bright already so it should warm up pretty quickly.

The farmers are really out in full force now.  Almost every field has a machine of some sort in it.  I don’t know what any of them do but it’s awesome to watch.  Some are small and some are huge.   We did see several small tractors hauling little white plastic tanks and looked up what they were doing on Google.  Apparently it’s anhydrous ammonia which Google says is an efficient and widely used source of nitrogen.  It is deadly though and boils at -28 degrees so it will also burn the hide off in a second.    Also poisonous as a gas.  Not sure I would want to use it but I am not trying to fertilize several hundred acres either.

Made it to our first stop without any trouble.   We had to wait while they unloaded but it was only a couple of hours so not bad.  Took advantage and took a nap.

Then off to Waterloo, Iowa to Tyson chicken for our next load.   It wasn’t ready and won’t be ready until 2:30 am so off to find dinner and sleep.   Found a nice little place called The Other Place which serves pizza.   Been craving a good pizza.  Here’s hoping!

Well, I don’t think we will ever be satisfied with another pizza.  The crust could have been cooked a little longer, the pepperoni was hard to find, the sauce was okay and there was lots of cheese. Better than most we have had lately, but lots of room for improvement.

We have stopped at a Pilot for the night.   Only a couple of miles from Tyson in the morning but a 10 hour drive to Canton, Ohio, so off to bed soon.

Hopefully be pulling in to Ashland for the weekend.   We have requested the time off.   Greg is wanting to switch to KLLM in Mississippi so the plan is to drop me off in Ashland while he takes the truck back to Olathe and then KLLM will fly him to Mississippi for training for a week and then he will come get me.    I have a list a mile long if I am going to be staying a week.    A manicure, pedicure, hair color (the gray is taking over), shave my legs!, massage, chiropractor, acupuncture.    I could go on and on.    Pedicure and chiropractor are top of the list.   Sorry, Greg, shaving my legs is at the bottom.  Haha

DG:  A couple of observations made lately.  First off, almost all truck drivers are aliens. Not the kind from another country, but much further. 

I forgot the second one. Sleep has overtaken me. I cannot think. Tomorrow perhaps I will complete my addition to the blog before eating. 

Good night and God bless. 

Up at 6:30 and headed northeast.   The traffic already outside Nashville is at a standstill at times.    We were hoping to get out early enough to miss it but it doesn’t look like we made it.

Today was pretty uneventful.   Got a few pictures today that I liked, especially of kentucky.  I never get tired of taking pictures through there.   Its such a beautiful state.

Almost to Iowa.   Not too far at all now.   Its been a good trip today.  The weather has been nice and no rain, which is great!

We were blessed to go around St. Louis today.   Nothing personal against that city but I have seen it so much I am glad we were able to bypass it.  Now if we could bypass Nashville next time!

We saw lots of farmers out in their fields as we drove by.   Spring has finally arrived in the heartland.   Some were just starting to turn the fields while others were putting down manure.  That’s a lovely smell for miles!   We should start to see the corn fields popping up pretty soon.  You can already see the hay fields growing and they are so green.

Well, turning in.  Stopped at a Pilot for the night outside Davenport, Illinois.   Hope you enjoy the pictures.   Goodnight, y’all.

DG:  Traffic and construction, the trucker’s two nemesises.  We had our share today. But it was all good as we made it to Illinois with 200 miles to go tomorrow morning. People in Iowa need their OJ.  Navigator got us here with plenty of time to spare, 24 minutes, and with supper in our bellies, a calm and clear night we will be ready for some TV relaxation and then sleep.

We’ve been listening to audio books in the road. Today we finished the first book of the “Wagons West” series, “Independence”.  It’s about a wagon train that starts in upstate New York and stops in Independence, MO.  Then the next book starts there and goes to Nebraska.  Betcha can’t guess the name of the second book. You’re right, New Zealand!  Just kidding. It’s “Nebraska”.  We will probably start that one tomorrow.

It’s an interesting series and it’s something we can share on the road. Cause right now, if you’ve seen one cornfield you’ve pretty much seen them all. And I think we have seen them all. And all the cows too. I don’t remember going through a state that didn’t have cows. I think they are everywhere.

We saw a sign by the road on the fence at this farm advertising organic beef and free range chickens. As we drove by we noticed a travel trailer sitting in the field and they were using it as the hen house. Like we say, you never know what you are going to see.

Well, more later. Love you all. Good night and God bless.

Wow!   90 days already.   I can’t believe it.   Greg asked me yesterday if I was still having fun and yes I am.   I could go without seeing Nashville or St. Louis for a while but overall it’s a lot of fun.   You never know what you are going to see.   Even areas you have seen before is different the next time you see it.   So we keep trucking!

The pictures today are of North Georgia and Tennessee.   We made it to just outside Nashville tonight before we had to stop.   700 miles to go tomorrow and probably a bit wednesday am.

Finally got some laundry done!   Good thing I packed extra undies!    Turning in.  Long day tomorrow.   Goodnight, y’all.

DG:  I asked Annie if she was still recording names of trucking companies. She said “Not unless I see one that’s really unusual”.  I don’t know how long our list is at present but I’m positive we could add 50 new names a day every day if we wanted to.  I think we just got wore out with it. But if we see one that catches our eyes we will let you know.

On our way to Iowa with orange juice. I get a chuckle out of the officers at the inspection station as we leave Florida.  Every time they ask us what we have and I say orange juice and they wave us on. The guy today didn’t even ask. I guess he figures every trucker knows the routine so when I pulled up to the window today he opened the window and just looked at me, waiting for me to say it. So I did. Orange juice. As I was driving away I thought I could have been a little more creative and said something like Florida’s finest, golden nectar, juice of the fruit, etc.  The one thing I am always tempted to say, but dare not, “cheap labor”, “amigos”, “truckload of muchachos”.  Nope, not going to say that.

Did see a big ATF Prevost Motorhome going down the road. All kinds of electronics on the top. Wonder if they were listening. Probably wanting an early version of the blog. Too bad guys. You’ll have to wait like everyone else.

Had a few more philosophical thoughts today but by the time we find a place to settle, (1 minute to spare today. Thanks navigator), I do my post trip inspection, dinner, and laundry tonight, all philosophical thought has left my brain. I should start writing these down. Hard to write while driving. Not that I’ve tried.

Okay, that’s all folks. Hope everyone is happy and well. Goodnight and God bless.