Well lets see. I showed up with my crane parts at the customer site around 5am in Kansas and untarped and unstrapped. They said they would unload me at 8am so this was good. I get settled in, make coffee and get online then someone knocks at the door. It's the field crane install guys and they are ready to unload me.
I thought they would unload me in the parking lot but the place has a big bay door for trucks to drive into. This is a brand new building being built and the loading bay is in the front of the building. I take one look and say who the hell designed this, it's only big enough for a pickup truck. They agree and I say there's no way I can even come close to getting in there without driving onto the lawn then onto the road. They say, we know, go ahead. So I do and chew the crap out of the lawn. The owner is there now and I can see he's kicking himself for putting the door there.
The guy unloading me is a zipper head with glasses 4" thick. Both these guys are real winners. One is stupid and the other is even dumber. They dropped many beams on the ground. I pretty much stood there with my fingers in my ears.
So I get unloaded, over the lawn and on my way. This time though, I don't drive 75 miles to a truckstop just to find out my next load was 50 miles the other way. I pull into a fair ground parking lot down the road and setup camp. I'm close to Wichita so there is 165 loads within 75 miles of me. The phone starts to ring and all are offering good rates right off the bat but I'm like, nope, too short, nope, no tarping today and so on.
Then CRST calls with a load of CASE tractors for $2.00 per mile and I take it. They did require $200,000 in cargo insurance which I do have so I was all set. I drive about 30 miles to pick up the load and pretty much sat there for 5 hours waiting my turn to pull inside to get loaded. One truck after another. Really nice place, lots to see and it was wicked nice out. It looks like CRTS Malone has this place locked up with the business as I was the only independent truck there.
Another truck from CRST was already there but off to the side. I pulled into line and someone came on the CB and told me I just cut off another truck. I said where? There isn't anyone in line in front of me. They said the guy over there has been here for a while. Well, the other guy got on the CB and said he wasn't in line, he just showed up hoping there would be a load for him. He was from CRST also. Looks like I got the load he may have got and he sat for 4 hours then left.
So I finally got loaded up, chained up then hit the road. Drove about 50 miles to the service center, had a Big Mac then died. Not like you can take a snooze while waiting to pull in. Each truck takes a different amount of time and they have 4 bays and 2 lines. Every time a truck pulls out, everyone moves up in line.
I have 5 drops but all of them are close to one another in the last 200 miles of my trip. These things are easy to unload and pretty much just drive them off. I have a feeling I'm going to get stuck for the weekend or at least a Sunday before I can finish. Oh well.
|
