[BuddhaTim]

I was brand new outta school, just out with a trainer a couple of weeks. We'd picked up a load of beef parts from Storm Lake, IA and delivered it to a small processing plant in Baton Rouge, LA. We got to the consignee around midnight and parked down the street a little ways till our appointment time at 6am. We walked down to the guard and he suggested we nose into the small spot across the street so that they could keep an eye on us. The gates would be opened and we could back in when the first shift arrived. My trainer started to balk at it because we would be hanging out in the street. The guard told us not to worry about it they owned the street in from of the dock. As we were walking back down to the truck my trainer is saying that we not gonna do it, it's not safe blah blah blah. About that time, from just a block over we hear gun fire. Not just a couple of cracks, I'm talking 3 good controlled bursts of full automatic. Needless to say we moved to where the guards could watch over us. I didn't sleep 10 minutes that night.

The first shift that came in around 5AM, they were in cuffs and leg irons. They were criminals from the local jail, the packing plant was contracted to the state and had to use convict labor.

After we were unloaded one of the convicts, a little punk, came out and asked what the "white boys" (those are his words) was gonna pay to wash out the trailer. My trainer, kindly told him we weren't paying, washouts are free, part of the contract. The little punk spun around, f-this and f-that and went back into the plant. I'd never seen a look like that on anyone face, I thought my trainer was gonna murder the punk kid. The guard said that he'd have the kid fired and the trailer washed out. My trainer just finished his cigarette and asked the guard if he could go inside and talk to the kid and the supervisor. A little while later the kid was scrubbing out the trailer on his own and then when he finished he was handcuffed and taken back to jail, no more work detail for him. HA!

[Rev.Vassago]

Originally Posted by Scoe

Why is it even relevant to mention the college kids color at all? :shock:

Why was it even relevant to mention the college kid?

[lucky13]

One of worst was getting loaded in the caves in Kansas City, I had to hire a lumper to load my trailer for me it was about $150 to load me,well I sat there for over eight hours getting loaded now it was winter time and because you are in a cave you cant idle your truck and anybody who has ever been in the caves in the winter knows how damp,musy and cold it can be in there in the winter impossible to sleep! Well I finally got loaded drove up to the guard shack to check out and my paper work didnt match up to make a long story short he put the wrong load on my truck,now I had to go back to the dock unload then reload with the correct load,by this point I want to kill somebody and the moron lumper had the nerve to ask for another $150 to unload and another $150 to reload ,well many choice words were said to the lumper. After all was said and done I sent 14 hours in that cave,cold hungry and tired,the one and only good thing about going to the caves is no qualcom and endless messages from dispatch asking "whats your eta" :evil:

[silvan]

Originally Posted by Scoe

Why is it even relevant to mention the college kids color at all? :shock:

Funny you mention that. I just re-read that post, and I was about to edit it to supply why that was relevant.

Shane was a HUGE loud-mouthed racist biggot. When black customers came into his store, he used to run them out with all kinds of ranting hate speech. (That was back when he was still lucid enough to actually have customers.)

That's why the fact that it was a black guy stuck in my head. What the hell was that poor kid doing working for that sorry racist sack of shit?

I took care of the kid though, and got him paid, and the hell away from that place ASAP.

[got mud?]

I have had a couple lol

1. I picked up a load of bulk mailers from quad grafix in wi and took it to a post office in Atlanta ga it took 12 hours to get unloaded.

2. I grabbed a trailer in trenton OH in the middle of an ice storm. i dragged it to eden NC and dropped it then hooked to another trailer headed for MA. I made it about a hundred miles when dispatch told me I had grabbed the wrong trailer in Trenton OH!!!!! I had switched two of the numbers!!!they made take that trailer to piora IL where it was supposed to go. IT was a long drive staring at that trailer in my mirrors

3. after I dropped the wrong trailer in the right spot i was dispatched to john deer in Wi and had a 6 stop load. I made it to the fist stop in MI and it was in the middle of a snow and freezing rain storm. the place unloaded the gator and realized it was the wrong one. theirs was in the nose of the trailer. after long phone conversations it was decided that we would unload the entire load and then reload it properly. we did this in freezing rain with only a small tow motor. we had to balance the gators on the forks with blocks.

the last two all happend in a four day stretch. got to love it!!!!

my trainer told me to double and tripple check my numbers but in an ice storm in the middle of feb I was socking wet and all I wanted to do was get ahead of that storm!!! I laugh now but man that was a long ride to IL ops: ops: ops: ops: ops: ops: ops:

[golfhobo]

I broke a nail once pushing that little release button on my load lock!! :shock: :lol:

[One]

whats a load lock? I rarely get to see the load b4 its sealed, so I can only guess how its loaded, LOL

[Skywalker]

I used to find that food warehouses were the worst in general....though over the years that had improved.

Just remember....never lose your cool. Never argue with the idiots you encounter. Its a no-win situation. Best to stay calm, and if there is a problem....let your company handle it.

If someone gives you a bad time,....they may have dealt with a driver who was a yutz to them...before you got there, and they may be taking it out on you....or they are just boneheads to begin with. Don't give them the satisfaction of upsetting you....just call your dispatcher or fleet manager and let them take care of the situation. It may turn out that you are at a "problem customer" and they are better suited to handle the situation than you.

Years ago I dealt with a customer or two like that, and called my fleet manager...and the result was that I was told to get my bills, close the doors, reseal the trailer and leave. Customer was real unhappy then, but I just said: "I just follow orders". Didn't far away before I got turned around and the customer unloaded me quickly and it was done. 8)

But generally speaking....over the years I had very few problems with shippers or receivers. Be polite, dress decent, act friendly.....and never let anyone get to you. It'll all work out. Not worth getting in a lather over anyway. 8)

[silvan]

Originally Posted by golfhobo

I broke a nail once pushing that little release button on my load lock!! :shock: :lol:

If that's the worst thing that ever happened to you with a load lock, count yourself lucky. I've almost knocked out teeth with those things.

I guess if you want to get inside the trailer, another worst experience was the time I was dragging a mixed pallet of furniture to the back. I knew it wasn't going to make it all the way to the end without falling over, and I was aiming for a controlled collapse as close to the ass end of the truck as possible.

I wound up getting caught under the collapse, and pinned to the wall of the trailer, with both arms up at an awkward angle. The weight of the furniture cut off my circulation so severely that both arms went numb, and I couldn't make them move.

The customer had to dig me out. That was embarrassing. ops:

Or better, back when we used to have a lot of waterbed frames, I used to lift one end, and push them at an angle, with one corner sliding on the floor. I caught a splinter in the trailer floor, and the frame came to a dead stop. I didn't. So I rammed my nuts into this suddenly immovable ponderosa pine behemoth full steam ahead.

Ouch.

Yes, the yellowjackets, the bedframe, and a few other things. My poor nuts have had a rough time of it in the trucking biz.

I'm really enjoying this no touch drop and hook freight. I haven't been inside a trailer since I started the new job.

[silvan]

Originally Posted by Skywalker

Years ago I dealt with a customer or two like that, and called my fleet manager...and the result was that I was told to get my bills, close the doors, reseal the trailer and leave.

That's a great feeling, isn't it? My old fleet manager was really good for sticking up for the driver, and I very rarely lost a battle like that.

We had one customer who was a serious dick about holding me up and holding me up some more. I would eventually cajole him into letting me carry the crap from the truck, across the parking lot, up the ramp, and into the back of the warehouse, piece by piece, just to get the hell out of there and go home. He always had problems getting a dock open for me, and I only had one crappy ~18-piece stop to get rid of between me and hometime.

This one time, he wouldn't even let me do that, and told me he wasn't going to be able to get me in until after noon.

We'll see about that!

So after they went around on the phone, my boss told me to bring it back, and we'd deliver it the next round. When I got back to that place two weeks later, they were much more accommodating.

Bullard Furniture in Fayetteville, NC. One thing I will never miss about my old life as a stick hauler.