I didn't know that about southern Texas. The closest I get to that area is just going east on I-10 occasionally. Hadn't noticed any big build-up. I go through Midland quite often and they seem to be real busy over there.

Gee.... I guess Obama is really ramping up the drilling these days, huh?

 

Happy to see you are liking the local work.

So how do you like getting paid by the hour with OT after 40?? Cant beat hourly pay.



People say the little trucks dont pay LMAO.

 

I'm starting to miss the OTR work. Not so much the living in the truck, but the shorter hours. Nothing like an 18 hour day to start off your week. By the time we finished up, it was all I could do to get the truck back to the yard. Then, I had another 1/2 hour drive home.

 

And that is the quandary about local work Mal. Yeah you get paid for those hours but your dead beat a lot of times if your doing a lot of OT. I know I hate it personally when I pull a 16-18 hour day for a week, the money is nice to have but I don't have time to do anything with it because I'm so darn tired come the weekends. At least with OTR you can be home in bed just seconds after going off the clock instead of having to drive home after pulling an 18 hour shift.

 

Yesterday was a bit better - only a 12hr trip. To start my day off, I was so frustrated and tired from the day before, when the boss called yesterday morning, I quit. I literally told him where to put his trucks and told him I was done. He asked if I thought that the flatbed side of the company would be any better fit. Well, as wore out, both physically and mentally, I said I'd give it a try. So, he gave me a short run yesterday in a quad-axle straight truck.

The run was from Clarksburg, WV to Pineville, WV. Pineville is approximately 30 miles south of Beckley, WV in some REALLY nasty roads. I lost cell phone service when I came out of Beckley heading south and didn't have a signal again until I got back into Beckley 5 hours later. When I got to the area, I found out the directions they gave me were REALLY bad. After stopping at a couple places and asking, I found the correct road (if that's what you want to call it). This "road" is a service road for the well sites. I can barely fit the quad-axle on the road.

I drove around on this service road for at least an hour trying to find the job site. Remember, I can't make a phone call and maps are worthless there (since the roads only exist on mining maps). Finally I pulled to a large intersection in the service road close to the main entrance and shut the truck down. About another hour after that, they called for me on the cb. I explained where I was and they came to me to escort me the rest of the way in. Then, we come to the hill...

I've lived in West Virginia my entire life. But, I've never had a D-9 hook a winch cable to anything I've ever driven to pull me up a 35-40 degree hillside. Definitely not fun. We put 2 chains between the winch cable and the truck because the tow hooks in the truck were inside the bumper where you couldn't get the winch hook around it (no tow cables). About 1/2 way up, one of the chains snapped. Luckily, we made it to the top with no issues.

Got unloaded and proceeded to make a 40 point turnaround and had the joy of coming DOWN that hill now - this time with no weight on the truck and no cable/chain to hold me back. The truck was built for these kinds of roads, so it had both the power divider lock as well as differential locks for all 4 drives. First gear in an 18-spd at idle is pretty damn slow, but it got me to the bottom without breaking free. Forgot to mention that we kept getting showers there, so the hill was nice and muddy.

Ahhh.....

 

Country Roads - John Denver (Take Me Home, West Virginia) - YouTube



Get you a cd with that song on it..................play it while your driving those wonderful roads!! Then remember what you coulda been doing as a "Youngster"!!





John Denver - Thank God Im a Country Boy - YouTube


Give yourself a chance to adjust Mal. You stepped out into something you have never done before....and it hasn't ever been easy work....but it has usually always paid very decent.

 

Mal you are reminding me of when I was running Intrastate during Harvest Season and hauling Grain. 15-17 hour days and I would say Screw it about driving home and that was 6 miles home. I would crawl into the bunk of me old Cabover I was driving and DIE in it. Get up the next moring an Start over again. 2 harvests of doing that crap were enough for me.

 

Did your boss know that youi had to get a dozer to drag you to where they wanted you?? I pulled on a jobsite once and the guy told me they would drag me in to where they wanted the load. I looked at him and told him he was crazy. Needless to say i had to take the load back to the quarry. If they cant make a road good enough to where the truck can get down it on its own they i aint going there. But since you dont own the truck and if the boss said it was ok. Then more power to him. But that how you tear stuff up.

 

Yup - the boss knew ahead of time. Nice of him to let me know about it when he asked if I wanted the load.

I'm done with that work. I took my fuel card and safety equipment in today. He definitely understood. He said an average of maybe 1 out of 10 drivers that come direct from OTR driving stick with the job for more than a couple of days. The ones that do are the ones that already say "hell with a logbook".

I also went and did my drug test for a small regional carrier that will get me home weekends (dry-van freight) - GNH Trucking out of Markleysburg, PA. The owner had already approved me and wanted me to come do my drug test the same day the local work (the one I just quit) called me. I kept him informed of why I didn't come to work for him in the first place and he definitely understood why I quit. Results should be back on Friday, so I should be back out on the road no later than Monday. This company has a very small turnover and he said that the majority of his drivers have been there for quite awhile.

It may be mileage pay again, but at least I don't have to destroy my body making money.

 

Back in the 80's.....when I was your age....and a little younger......It was a common occurrence to be pulled into a well site by a dozer or a couple road-graders. Especially in Wyoming, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico. I remember it taking us a full week to get an entire crew hauled into location because of the mud and the mountains we had to climb. There were a lot of times it took just as long to get back to pavement too. A couple times in New Mexico I can remember where the trucks had to be pulled DOWN the hills because the mud was so bad.


*sigh*


The good ole days!!