Well, I got my first week in with Westar. They issued me a 2005 Volvo, with the Cummins ISX engine. Apologized for giving me such an "old and junky" truck. Note that I have been out of trucking about 15 years, my last truck was a 69 KW oilfield winch truck. Sucks that they told me that since they had to stick me in the oldest truck in the fleet I would be in line for a new Pete in about 60 to 90 days . Got the truck last Thursday, took it and had a new windshield put in on Friday and spent the weekend stocking it with food, clothing and other necessary items (spent the rest of this week making a list of what I REALLY needed).

Monday morning I deadheaded about 125 miles to Duke Oklahoma and picked up drywall. The company hires people to tarp for you there. All we have to do is lay the tarps on the bed, throw the straps over (the loaders even strap it for you, and then put the bungee's on and tighten the straps. Headed down to Houston, unloaded Tuesday morning. Slipped across town and loaded a load of pipe, drove it up to Midland getting there late at night. Wednesday morning I woke up and got unloaded. Picked up a load of palletized drilling mud bags there in Midland and headed for Canadian Tx. Another late arrival, spent the night at the consignee's yard. Woke up to another wonderful morning, unfortunately the company I was delivering for's yard manager had quit and they had to do a full inventory before unloading anyone. Got unloaded about and headed for Duke Ok again. Loaded drywall again and headed for San Antonio this time. Hm, route is right through the home town. Stopped in, visited my girlfriend, ate a good hot meal and got a good nap. 10 hours later (hm, wonder why 10 hours) I headed for San Antonio. There is where things went slightly haywire. Weather was forecast for weekend, rain was looming as I arrived in San Antonio. The receiver was trying to get their product out of the warehouse before the rain hit. I was the 5th truck in line, arriving at about 8:30 am. I got unloaded at 3:30 PM. Figuring I was going to have to spend at least the night, if not the weekend in San Antonio I headed or TA, fueled up and got ready to settle in for what could have been a LONG weekend out of town.

About 5 pm I qualcomm'd dispatch and asked what the prognosis was, any probability of a load or was I going to be in SA for the weekend. His reply, hey dude, don't you know there is an ice storm moving it, head home, they would rather have us safe at home then sitting alone at a truck stop in weather. NOTE TO SELF: NEVER NEVER NEVER ask that question in San Antonio at rush hour when you are on the South side of town and have to drive North

On the way home it rained most of the way with the roads beginning to get icy about 100 miles from home. Found an interesting thing about the Volvo dash display, when sliding down the road sideways there is a picture of the rear axle with little squiggly lines indicating lost traction. NO KIDDING! As I approached the Clay County line I had decided it wasn't worth risking the rest of the drive, I was going to pull into the truck stop that was about 45 miles from home when my guardian angel (disguised as a TxDOT sand truck) made a U-Turn in front of me and two other truckers and escorted us to within 5 miles of home. Parked the truck with no problem, then found that there was about an inch of ice covering my car. Had to beat the ice away from the door lock and around the door to get it open but I did manage to get it started and defrosted enough to get home.

More updates to follow!

 

sounds like a very intersting time glad you made it safely

 

Glad you made it safely back... I think if it was me though, I would have stayed in south Texas where it's supposed to be mostly rain :wink:

 

Good to hear,baldeagle. You will probably run to Duke quite a bit. Westar is a good company to work for. I have a friend that has his truck leased to Westar.

 

Seems like your first trip out the gate is always one to remember....glad your home safe and sound and dry!!

 

Glad to see its going well for you and they work to get you home. Can I ask at least a ballpark of what they pay? Their website has no info for drivers that I could find, and we didn't dig far enough when we were looking at them to find out. Thanks.