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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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Trip 53c - '94 Used Freightliner -
Flatbed ... from Londonerry (Boston), NH 8/26/04 - As we are pulling in to the airport ... which is also the bus station in this town ... dispatch calls "You haven't bought a ticket yet have you?" ... seems they have a truck in NH heading home. This is dispatch live ... they are on the line with the customer ... and me ... and the clock is ticking ... I should have just bought a ticket to Boston and then taken care of the details ... I do find out that there is only one bus a day going to Londonderry daily, I may as well spend the night in Augusta. The ticket office closes before the bus gets there ... about the same time I get a call from my wife ... "Are you sure the bus runs on SATURDAY? ... it doesn't show they do on the web ... " I quickly go find the bus schedule ... but being short on time I ask the bus driver who looks at the schedule and says ... 'Seven days a week' ... so I'm staying in Augusta for the night. I was told that there was a couple of motels with a 'mile or two' ... so I'm off ... it's not that hot but I do work up a sweat ... and see the usual assortment of ... drivers. Like the car getting out of the way for the ambulance ... or they think they do ... as it sits behind them with the siren on ... The first motel is a Best Western ... well over $100 ... and unlike some I've seen in the last couple of days ... I can see the Motel 6 at $52 ... so I stop at the Econo Lodge first just in case ... $80 ... so the Motel 6 it is. I'm guessing it was about a mile hike ... maybe two. It's only about 4 PM but I really haven't slept in the last ... 36 hours or so ... After getting my paperwork faxed to the motel I walk across the street to a Bonanza ... when I heard they were out of baked potatoes I should have waited until they were done ... guess someone 'forgot to turn on the oven' ... instead I ended up paying $8 for a 1/4 beef pattie and fries, and one trip to the salad bar. But it was the only real food I'd had today and the first sit-down in two days ... 8/27/04 - I was in bed by 6 so I was awake quite early ... good thing ... cuz I didn't get my wake up call ... My only complaint for Motel 6, DO NOT rely on their wake up calls ... Oh, and my cell battery was going dead and wouldn't have lasted the night so I had shut it off. Good thing I didn't over sleep, the bus wouldn't wait ... and neither would the customer, who had offered to give me a ride from the bus depot. I had thought I would stop at the Burger King for breakfast but I wasn't sure how long it was taking me to walk up hill ... I get to the depot just as the ticket office opens ... they knew why I was there, they had given me all the trip info yesterday. I give them my licence and credit card, the guy starts typing in the computer and then puts his head in his lap ... then s-l-o-w-l-y he sits up and turns over his name tag so I can't read it ... I knew what was going on ... As I had double checked yesterday, the bus does go to Boston seven days a week, however it DOES NOT go to Londonerry on weekends, next bus is Monday. Bus does go to Nashua which is only 10 miles from Londonerry ... (and it went to Nashua yesterday ... and I could have been on my way yesterday) ... what a trip. About five little towns between Augusta and Boston ... interesting towns, narrow streets, New England style. This bus driver would have never made it in the big leagues ... I had asked a question earlier and got a flat 'NO' ... then after a few hours he said something to a passenger and then 'thank you' ... I was half a sleep and hadn't heard what it was ... a couple more miles and he stops on the side of the interstate ... the emergency? ... seems an eight year old girls plastic braclets were making too much noise for him and he asked her to remove them ... Wow ... what does he do when he gets a couple of mothers with a half dozen kids each??? Did see one interesting motel coming into Boston ... under the motel name it lists the 'perks' as they sometimes do ... the first on listed was 'Adult movies.' Boston's South Station is one big place ... 30 bus doors ... plus the train depot down stairs ... dozens of bus lines, Amtrak and Boston's Commuter Rail. I did finally get a hold of the next customer ... I tried to use a pay phone but they weren't working, so I had to use the last power on my cell instead. As my 2 hour wait time winds down I'm sitting by the door next to a gal who is making audible comments about others in the depot. As another gal gets in line she says 'She's tired ... and sad' ... later as we bored the bus, I hear that 'sad' gal telling the bus driver about her ride to the depot ... seems someone wouldn't leave her alone and once off the bus the cops came to deal with her aggressor and see hid behind other passengers and cried ... Finally at Nashua ... a few minutes later the customer is there to pick me up ... the customer is a truck jockey ... buying and selling trucks around the country ... had I known that I may have gotten him to pick me up ... ? anywhere ? yesterday. The truck is a '94 Freightliner ... it starts, always a good sign ... and goes into gear. Less than a mile away I stop for fuel ... it was on empty, and I'm paying the fuel on this one ... As I am walking back to my truck after paying for fuel, I see a huge puddle of ... anti-freeze ... Back to the C-Store for a gallon of anti-freeze. THEN I look to see where it's coming from ... the overflow hose ... they must have topped off the fluids right before I picked it up ... oh well, never hurts to have an extra gallon. It sure would have been nice to have been leaving last night and split this into a three day trip, now I'm going to try and make it in two ... 1,500 miles ... and it's after 3 ... 4 local ... some traffic ... some times not moving, like when people loose a living room chair on the interstate ... unless you are one of those that use's the shoulder anytime the traffic stops. The good news is that MA, NY, PA all have speed limits of 65 mph ... the not so good news is that this trip will cost over $60 in tolls. To start with the tack and speedometer don't work, and the fuel gauge only shows 1/2 after I filled it to the top ... I fuel again at a Sunco Oasis in NY, again it only shows 1/2 full. This truck does have power ... a speed limit of 65 doesn't help if your truck only does 55, this one hum's pretty good at <> 70 ... and the hills in this part of the country don't slow it down ... OH does ... slow-hio. About now I realize that this truck has TWO fuel tanks ... guess I need to do a better pre-trip ... 57 gallons. I was hoping to make it to Toledo tonight, knowing it is 650 from there home ... and there are cheap motels there. But by Cleveland I am tried and out of hours so I stop before I get on the I-80 tollway where I see an Econo Lodge ... $62 after discount ... ouch, but I don't feel like going anywhere so I take a smoking room, it's all they have left ... ugh ... my $31 motel a couple of nights ago was a better room ... but it is now 2 AM and I've been awake for almost 24 hours. 8/28/04 - Lucky for me this motel has a Noon checkout so I only have an hour to kill before I can leave ... lots of places are 11 AM. As I check out the bill has gone from $62 to $72 (Taxes) ... "What? ... I have stayed in better motels than this for $20 ... dirty towels on the counter, toilet never flushed ... and yes, I know it was a smoking room (I've stayed in them before), but this room reeked ... burns on the counters and carpet." It's no uncommon for me to comment about rooms but for the price this was bad news ... with only saying 'Sorry' ... she took the receipt and re-did (to a more acceptable rate) and even apologized for how long it took to re-do. I had hopped for a breakfast next door and Bob Evans ... Country Kitchen was closed / for sale ... but I'm not going to wait for it and the line is long so I have to walk across the street to Denny's ... no waiting. As I'm sitting there, I'm looking at a motel coupon book I picked up at the door ... at the same exit there is a Super 8 for $45 ... MAYBE, if it hadn't been 2 in the morning I would have thought of looking at my coupons last night ... From here the trip is a blur ... same road, different day ... heading toward Elk Hart, at times I am meeting new motor-homes at the rate of one ever ten minutes or so ... normally I head threw downtown Chicago going west, but not sure how it would go with a truck so I stick to the road construction on I-80 ... the only major backup is because of a car stalled and is being pushed threw road construction as there are no shoulders for miles ... About an hour from home there is a blinding flash of lighting so bright I instinctively close my eyes ... I had seen the lightning in the distance but that one had to have hit close ... me, maybe? ... a minute or so later there is another flash close ... this one lights up the country side and I see the bolt ... how close was that first one??? By only doing my morning inspection and one fuel stop, I am able to be off duty in 11-1/2 later ... in my own bed. But instead of it being Thursday night, it is Sunday night and I still have a truck in my driveway 8/30/04 - Dispatch has three trucks going to this customer and wants to wait until Tuesday to drop the trucks and we will get a company ride back to the office. Had hoped this would be the first leg of a busy day ... but all possibilities fall through and I'm off for the rest of the day. |