[catalinaflyer]

Well I guess I'll let the cat out of the bag.

For eveyone who has been reading my other thread you all know I left Lonestar Transportation after only 45 days because of thier total lack of care for the driver. Anyhow, the day after I accepted the offer from Lonestar I was also offered a position with another company in the specialized/heavy haul line but I stuck with LST. Well 30 days into I started to rethink my decision because of all the bad publicity I was hearing from the "more seasoned" drivers. But, I stuck with it because for me it was still going well and the pay was good. Jump to Christmas Eve when I headed home for Christmas as promised and the proverbial crap hit the fan. I quit on Wednesday then on Friday my DM talked me into staying promising to make it right only to have it hit the fan again on Monday. Well I left LST once and for all.

Throughout this time frame carrier A had been keeping in contact with me and with the wind projects getting ready to start back up they were starting to call every day instead of every other and offering more and more money. Well as it would happen they called Christmas Eve morning right between the phone call with LST that pissed me off and the call back to them where I offered the keys to the truck to the a-hole that drives a desk and knows everything there is about trucking (but has never seen the inside of a cab and has no clue that a real live human drives it).

Well on Sunday 04-Jan I boarded a plane in Wichita, KS where it was 50 degrees and 7 hours later walked out the front door of the airport in Fargo, ND where it was a balmy -14 degrees. So the cats out, carrier A is EW Wylie of Fargo, ND.

We started orientation yesterday (Monday) with a cl@ss of 6, 4 for heavy/specialized and 2 for flatbed. This is the largest orientation cl@ss they have ever had. We started off with the pee and cough test's which we all p@ssed (I p@ssed the cough test but barely, I have a m@ssive head cold and had been drinking Theraflu like water and as a result my blood pressure was off the chart. I didn't think the poor little nurse was going to be able to pump the cuff up tight enough to measure it) Once back at the yard, the head of safety took the flatbedders out 1 at a time for the driving test and the head of the wind projects took the rest of us out 1 at a time for our road tests. I p@ssed with flying colors and was even sent back out to the yard (where it was now a sweltering +2 degrees) to @ssist one of the other drivers with an RGN and show him how to operate it. The head of the wind projects gave me a very high recommendation and want's me on the 13 Axle Schnable trailers hauling bases right away. In my book thats the top of the food chain in specialized/heavy haul. So I was walking pretty tall last night.

Two of the other three specialized drivers were also asked to be in wind division pulling blade trailers and number 4 didn't fair so well. I think he was offered a position in flatbeds. Not sure what happened but there was a lot of whispering among the orientation people and he was really quite last night on the way back to the motel.

Those of us going to wind have 2 more days of orientation and the flatbedders will finish today and have thier trucks @ssigned this afternoon. The rest of us have spend another day in the yard learning to operate the wind specialty trailers.

The gentleman who gave us our road tests want's to put me into one of the new 4 axle Pete's right away but I might have to take a three axle for a couple of weeks till they get another one ready. I will hopefully find out more about that today.

We have some outside stuff to do so hopefully they will do that today since it's supposed to be a blistering +14 today then back to a balmy +8 tomorrow.

Anyhow, enough rattling on, I have to get ready for the van and another day of orientation. So far these guys seem to have it together, the heavy/specialized/wind division here is just 1 year old so they are enduring some trial's but they are not blowing smoke up our arses, they told us straight out there will be some bumps in the road. The up side, Wylie's parent company Ottertail also owns BMI which manufacturers wind towers in Fargo, Tulsa, OK (170 miles from my house) and Ft. Erie, Ontario. (The down side, the local news here just announced at 10:00 last night that BMI is laying off 20% of it's workforce due to the downturn in the economy and the resulting downturn in wind farm developement)

We'll see how it goes, stay tuned if you want for further updates.

PS Excuse the @ss everywhere, seems as the Rev. has the filter putting *** in place of all a-s-s

[chris1]

Does this mean i can stop by your housewhile you're away?

[catalinaflyer]

Yup CE, you know Miss Jenny would always welcome you there, she needs somebody to have a good argument with....

Got our truck assignments today, I got a 2008 Freightliner Columbia (yes CE I'm actually going to drive a Freightliner ha ha ) 4 axle heavy hauler with a 2008 Trail King 3 axle 45 ton extendable RGN. The truck is pretty well decked out, Espar heater, Nite Air a/c, inverter and a fridge. Has every single gauge you can get and is equipped with an 18 speed and 2 speed rears with 3 way lockers so when I do get it stuck I can burry it to the frame.

They pulled my truck in the shop tonight to thaw it out then tomorrow morning they're taking it to have it detailed. Didn't look to me like it needed much, only has 40,000 miles but they said it had to be detailed before I got into it so I'm not going to argue. I will have to use one of the yard trucks tomorrow morning to get my trailer out of the snow bank and check it over plus 2 of us still have another day of wind specialized training.

We also went over the full pay plan today and most of the time while I'm under a non-wind load I will be getting between .51 and .69 cpm and .41 when running empty, on the wind side however it's a totally different pay scale and it's paid on a minimum per day plus mileage but we will get more information on that over the next few weeks as the wind projects start back up. The paperwork portion is pretty straight forward, they are moving towards all paperless including logs and real soon we will be going to a scanner system so the instant we unload we can scan our paperwork then we won't be running around trying to find a yellow box.

There's definately going to be some bumps in the road while going through the growing pains with the heavy/specialized division but they so far they seem real receptive to input from the drivers and the company is small enough it won't take an act of congress (board of directors) to make changes. That and all the HH/Spec. equipment is 2008 and newer. They are also adding company owned pilot cars/drivers and steering drivers which will make it easier than hoping that Billy Bob from Billy Bobs Pilot Car Service knows how to operate your equipment.

CE - If your going to stop by the house, call ahead and make sure Big Johnson isn't hanging around there

[chris1]

Don't know who is hauling them but 2-3 times a week when i come in there are 3 blades heading south.

[catalinaflyer]

I don't know who's hauling those, are's all come out of Grand Forks, ND, Duluth, MN or Corpus Christi, TX. I guess I won't be hauling blades since they skipped my right past the three axle trucks hauling the blades and right to the 4 axle hauling towers.

I'm on the phone with Miss Jenny right now and she said to come on down.

[chris1]

Tell her the seat heaters on the new pu will really heat her up. Might have to wait for july to be really effective.