Friday, September 6, 2019
Tuesday, June 25, 2019
Sunday, June 23, 2019
Camped on my 34 in WV
Hey everybody! I wanted to jump on here and do a blog post since I know it's been a few days. Hope everyone is doing well. This week I went from Tennessee to Uxbridge, Massachusetts. Then Massachusetts down to North Carolina, and then dead headed up to Virginia and picked up a load heading to Ohio. I went part way to Ohio and stopped over here in West Virginia for my 34 hour break. Reserved a space for 2 nights at this Pilot I'm at.
Hit the shower last night and tonight, grabbed arbys, did my laundry, did my paperwork for the week, and now just hanging out for a bit before I crash for the night.
Still working on the online/offline business, and working towards eventually being able to get off the road and be with the family full time. I'll admit, it's never easy emotionally out here. I'm always thinking about the fam and wishing that I was home with them.
I was telling the wife earlier that the best invention would be a real teleporter because I could go out on the road, do what I gotta do, get parked, teleport home for the night, then teleport back to the truck in the morning. That would be fucking amazing. But sadly, this is what life is like right now, at least until I accomplish the goals I am working towards.
On that note, gonna keep this entry short and sweet because my battery is getting low, and I'm not going to bother plugging it in tonight. I'll plug it in just before I log on next time. It's around 11:30 at night and I wanna lay down while I finish watching a Netflix episode. Then it'll be time for sleep!
Take care y'all and I'll chat with ya'll again next time!
C
Thursday, June 13, 2019
waiting (back like 7 years ago, a drafted post from when I was with crengland O_O Wow).
I can be very patient. Sometimes in life you really have to be, otherwise you will go mad. Sometimes though, it is very hard to be patient. Yesterday and today have been those types of days. Yesterday, I arrived here in Virginia, and found my way to the Walmart Distribution Center I was delivering to. My appointment time was 5pm, and I arrived at 2pm, and they were like "woh man, you're way too early." Usually with customers, if you're within a few hours, they check you in and you're usually ok. Some of them however, like wal mart, are extremely picky about you being there around your appointment time, and not really early, and especially not late. So I had to go a mile down the road to a truck stop, kill time for about 2.5 hours, and then they said come back around 4:30 and I should get right in. So I did, I was back by 4:30, I got checked in, they told me "drop your trailer in door 224, go ahead and break the seal and open the doors, and then go park in the bobtail area and come back in and tell us which bobtail space you are in so when you're trailer is unloaded, we can knock on your door and let you know."
So I did. I dropped my trailer in dock door 224, and then I went and parked in bobtail spot 17, then walked inside and told them where I was parked. Then I turned my truck on to idle so I could keep cool (since it was like 90+ degrees outside), and layed in my sleeperbunk and watched vampire diaries on HuluPlus. I signed up for huluplus at first yesterday after I had finished the last of the ones that were available on netflix, and then I didn't think they had all the season 3 episodes available yet that have played, so I canceled, but then seeing what they had available, I must have just been looking at it wrong, so I re-signed back up. Got on huluplus app on my phone and watched probably 2 of the 5 available episodes that are on there so far. Then last night I watched another one when I got back here to the truck stop, and then today I finished off the other two. So now I'm all caught up and can watch the episodes as they are aired, or just afterwards on hulu since I'll be on the road and not at home most weeks. So let me backtrack a bit.
So it took them a little over two hours to get my trailer unloaded and for me to get out of there. I had messaged my dm saying "hey, I have this many hours left on my time, I can reload asap." But, I never heard back from him, and so I got out of walmart, came over here, got parked, covered my windows up and did the hulu thing while waiting, still no messages throughout the rest of the night, and couldn't reach my dm on the phone because he had left for the day. So this morning I message my dm and say "hey mike, whats the plan?" Then I got this message from a load planner asking if I could swap my empty trailer with a team driver's loaded trailer delivering where I just delivered. I messaged back saying "well, its not that i'm not willing to help, but I need miles, and doing this local delivery wont do anything for me." Of course, he called me and offered to pay me $75, and honestly I have nothing better to do but sit here anyway, so I said "ok I'll do it." Plus he said that the reason they havent gotten me outa here yet is apparently in Virginia, or at least this part of virginia (not sure if they meant the whole state or not), freight wasn't really shipping out today. So I accepted that local load, and then later I received a load assignment 50 miles away picking up by 8am and delivering to ohio by friday morning. I'm supposed to technically be home "tomorrow" to start my home time, so I called my dm and asked "so what's the plan? Take this load to ohio, drop it off sometime tomorrow at a drop yard, pick up another load and keep rolling towards pa?" He was actually kinda surprised about the load, i guess it wasn't what he was thinking that the planner was going to do. So he said "let me get with the planner and see what we can work out for you, see if we can do a swap so we can get you home."
When I had called him, that was the 2nd time I had called him today. I talked to him around noon, and asked what the plan was, and he said he would get with me later today, but then when I called him again, it was 4pm, and then an hour later after still no word, i messaged on the qualcom computer basically saying "hey, I know you guys are working on it, but fyi, it's hard to wait around and not know what you guys are planning or what is going on, so please keep me in the loop. I'm willing to take this load first thing and take it to ohio and drop it at a yard tomorrow and keep rolling if that is what you decide is the best course of action. My daughter's 11th birthday party is saturday and I need to be there for that. Also, it's very important to my wife that I get home preferably tomorrow, but definitely saturday will not work, so please do what you can and keep me informed." He just messaged me a minute ago saying "i'm still looking into what options we have available, I will call you before I leave today." That brings me to another point. Saying you're going to do something and following through. One problem I have with CR England is, at least in my experience, they say "if you help us with this local load, we will get you a good load out!" So I say "sure, I'll help," and then I come back and it's "can you take this other local delivery for us?" If you give someone your word that you are going to do something, then follow through. That's all I expect. If you don't mean it, don't say it, is that so hard? Being that I try to think of myself as an honest guy, and a man of my word, if I don't know if I can pull something off, or do something that someone wants me to do, I usually say "i will see what I can do," or "i will do my best, but I can't promise anything." At least in my opinion, and as my dad likes to say "oppinions are like a-holes, everybody's got one," at least I'm being honest about it and not making promises that I don't know if I can keep. However, if I say i will, then I try to do it.
When I spoke to the planner though, he asked me "how vital is it for you to get home by thursday?" And I said "it's very important to get home on thursday, because a) my wife needs me and has plans, and B) it's my daughter's birthday party." Also I was like "even if I get home later than I want to, I'm still taking the full number of days." he was like "of course! even if we couldnt get you home till monday, you could still take the full 4 days that you requested." Not that I want it to be delayed like that, because that would suck! So I'm pushing as hard as I can for them to get their heads on straight and figure out what to do. Definitely really frustrating, but there is only so much that I can do about it. But, on the plus side, these issues with cr england have me looking into possible other types of driving stuff, like dedicated CRE routes that originate on the east coast. Dedicated routes basically mean you run the same route each week, and get the same miles, and you get home every week (depends on the route). It might be a route where you drive 6 or 7 days and then home 3, and then out 6 or 7 days again. That's not too bad at all. I especially like the part about teh miles being the same. I hate going through the crap i've gone through last week and this week where I tell them "i need this many miles" and they give me something with half that or even less, and then they want me to help them with local deliveries, which I don't make hardly a dime on because there's no miles, and yet i'm still paying out a truck payment and insurance and my benefits and all that fun stuff each week, so any weeks I lack in miles, my paycheck is less, and worst case scenario, I end up negative one week. So, we'll see what happens, but I messaged the lady that is in charge of putting drivers on dedicated routes, and asked her if I qualify for one on the east coast, and if so, what would I have to do to get on the list to be considered for one, etc, etc.
The other thing I might look into is while I was just hanging out here at the truck stop after I swapped trailers with the other driver, I saw there was a truck parked that said "AAFES" on it. Aafes is basically the military store, like the BX and stuff like that on any military base. I mentioned it to Erin and we both agreed maybe it's worth looking into. Maybe I can drive for them, be considered a civilian government employee or something, and after 20 years, retire and collect a government retirement check each month. I'm not sure if it works like that, butt like I said, it might be worth looking into. Other than all that, I have basically been killing time hanging around watching episodes on my phone, or chatting on facebook, or as you see now, writing my blog, because the load I now have isnt due at walmart dc until 8:30 tonight, but I figure I'm going to go over there around 7:30 to get in there. Then after that, obviosuly I'm going to go to where I'm picking up from at 0800 and see if they will load me much earlier, and if not, I will simply park whereever I can and wait till they will, and then leave asap to drive to ohio. I figure, the sooner I get to ohio, the sooner they hopefully get me something else towards home.
So I did. I dropped my trailer in dock door 224, and then I went and parked in bobtail spot 17, then walked inside and told them where I was parked. Then I turned my truck on to idle so I could keep cool (since it was like 90+ degrees outside), and layed in my sleeperbunk and watched vampire diaries on HuluPlus. I signed up for huluplus at first yesterday after I had finished the last of the ones that were available on netflix, and then I didn't think they had all the season 3 episodes available yet that have played, so I canceled, but then seeing what they had available, I must have just been looking at it wrong, so I re-signed back up. Got on huluplus app on my phone and watched probably 2 of the 5 available episodes that are on there so far. Then last night I watched another one when I got back here to the truck stop, and then today I finished off the other two. So now I'm all caught up and can watch the episodes as they are aired, or just afterwards on hulu since I'll be on the road and not at home most weeks. So let me backtrack a bit.
So it took them a little over two hours to get my trailer unloaded and for me to get out of there. I had messaged my dm saying "hey, I have this many hours left on my time, I can reload asap." But, I never heard back from him, and so I got out of walmart, came over here, got parked, covered my windows up and did the hulu thing while waiting, still no messages throughout the rest of the night, and couldn't reach my dm on the phone because he had left for the day. So this morning I message my dm and say "hey mike, whats the plan?" Then I got this message from a load planner asking if I could swap my empty trailer with a team driver's loaded trailer delivering where I just delivered. I messaged back saying "well, its not that i'm not willing to help, but I need miles, and doing this local delivery wont do anything for me." Of course, he called me and offered to pay me $75, and honestly I have nothing better to do but sit here anyway, so I said "ok I'll do it." Plus he said that the reason they havent gotten me outa here yet is apparently in Virginia, or at least this part of virginia (not sure if they meant the whole state or not), freight wasn't really shipping out today. So I accepted that local load, and then later I received a load assignment 50 miles away picking up by 8am and delivering to ohio by friday morning. I'm supposed to technically be home "tomorrow" to start my home time, so I called my dm and asked "so what's the plan? Take this load to ohio, drop it off sometime tomorrow at a drop yard, pick up another load and keep rolling towards pa?" He was actually kinda surprised about the load, i guess it wasn't what he was thinking that the planner was going to do. So he said "let me get with the planner and see what we can work out for you, see if we can do a swap so we can get you home."
When I had called him, that was the 2nd time I had called him today. I talked to him around noon, and asked what the plan was, and he said he would get with me later today, but then when I called him again, it was 4pm, and then an hour later after still no word, i messaged on the qualcom computer basically saying "hey, I know you guys are working on it, but fyi, it's hard to wait around and not know what you guys are planning or what is going on, so please keep me in the loop. I'm willing to take this load first thing and take it to ohio and drop it at a yard tomorrow and keep rolling if that is what you decide is the best course of action. My daughter's 11th birthday party is saturday and I need to be there for that. Also, it's very important to my wife that I get home preferably tomorrow, but definitely saturday will not work, so please do what you can and keep me informed." He just messaged me a minute ago saying "i'm still looking into what options we have available, I will call you before I leave today." That brings me to another point. Saying you're going to do something and following through. One problem I have with CR England is, at least in my experience, they say "if you help us with this local load, we will get you a good load out!" So I say "sure, I'll help," and then I come back and it's "can you take this other local delivery for us?" If you give someone your word that you are going to do something, then follow through. That's all I expect. If you don't mean it, don't say it, is that so hard? Being that I try to think of myself as an honest guy, and a man of my word, if I don't know if I can pull something off, or do something that someone wants me to do, I usually say "i will see what I can do," or "i will do my best, but I can't promise anything." At least in my opinion, and as my dad likes to say "oppinions are like a-holes, everybody's got one," at least I'm being honest about it and not making promises that I don't know if I can keep. However, if I say i will, then I try to do it.
When I spoke to the planner though, he asked me "how vital is it for you to get home by thursday?" And I said "it's very important to get home on thursday, because a) my wife needs me and has plans, and B) it's my daughter's birthday party." Also I was like "even if I get home later than I want to, I'm still taking the full number of days." he was like "of course! even if we couldnt get you home till monday, you could still take the full 4 days that you requested." Not that I want it to be delayed like that, because that would suck! So I'm pushing as hard as I can for them to get their heads on straight and figure out what to do. Definitely really frustrating, but there is only so much that I can do about it. But, on the plus side, these issues with cr england have me looking into possible other types of driving stuff, like dedicated CRE routes that originate on the east coast. Dedicated routes basically mean you run the same route each week, and get the same miles, and you get home every week (depends on the route). It might be a route where you drive 6 or 7 days and then home 3, and then out 6 or 7 days again. That's not too bad at all. I especially like the part about teh miles being the same. I hate going through the crap i've gone through last week and this week where I tell them "i need this many miles" and they give me something with half that or even less, and then they want me to help them with local deliveries, which I don't make hardly a dime on because there's no miles, and yet i'm still paying out a truck payment and insurance and my benefits and all that fun stuff each week, so any weeks I lack in miles, my paycheck is less, and worst case scenario, I end up negative one week. So, we'll see what happens, but I messaged the lady that is in charge of putting drivers on dedicated routes, and asked her if I qualify for one on the east coast, and if so, what would I have to do to get on the list to be considered for one, etc, etc.
The other thing I might look into is while I was just hanging out here at the truck stop after I swapped trailers with the other driver, I saw there was a truck parked that said "AAFES" on it. Aafes is basically the military store, like the BX and stuff like that on any military base. I mentioned it to Erin and we both agreed maybe it's worth looking into. Maybe I can drive for them, be considered a civilian government employee or something, and after 20 years, retire and collect a government retirement check each month. I'm not sure if it works like that, butt like I said, it might be worth looking into. Other than all that, I have basically been killing time hanging around watching episodes on my phone, or chatting on facebook, or as you see now, writing my blog, because the load I now have isnt due at walmart dc until 8:30 tonight, but I figure I'm going to go over there around 7:30 to get in there. Then after that, obviosuly I'm going to go to where I'm picking up from at 0800 and see if they will load me much earlier, and if not, I will simply park whereever I can and wait till they will, and then leave asap to drive to ohio. I figure, the sooner I get to ohio, the sooner they hopefully get me something else towards home.
Almost time for my biweekly time at home
As always, its been a long 2 weeks. Tomorrow I go 240 miles from where I'm parked, and deliver up in Kentucky, and I assume they are basically sending me back down from there to come straight home for home time.
Good pay checks this week and last week. I'm grateful but Im also bummed in a way because there's always things that I want to do with the check to help further my 30 day success business along, but haven't been able to. Oh well, I figure I will keep reinvesting what I make in the business and putting that right back in so that I can upgrade through the levels as quickly as possible.
Without being able to use the paycheck to help speed that along a bit, I guess it might just take me a little while to get where I'm trying to go. Oh well! Shit happens!
So we will see what happens. All I can do is keep doing what I'm doing. Keep working on the business. Keep trying to do what I can to officially get off the road. If it happens, great, if it doesn't, then oh well.
Least I know where I'll be either way. If I succeed at what I'm working towards, I'll be home with the fam. If I don't, I'll basically end up owning this truck and being out here on the road.
So either way, I'll keep fighting. I'll succeed, or I'll die trying.
Gonna cut this blog entry a little shorter. I have to look into what I might have to do to get a site up for my 30 day business. Gotta love the double grind! Always thinking about stuff! Always trying to figure something out!
The one thing I would love to have aside from financial freedom is TIME freedom. So many people say they just don't have time for this or time for that. And I LITERALLY do not have the time. 16 hour days, 70 to 80 hours for the week each week. Then only home 2 days every 2 weeks. I feel like I never have time for anything! Heck when I park for the night, if I do like what I'm doing tonight, I'm cutting into the time I could be using to sleep and prepare for the long ass day the next day!
But hey, it is what it is. It sucks that I feel like I'm trying to figure all this out by myself tho. Just means it might take me longer because I don't have the extra time to commit to the things I need to do to really kick the business into gear. But I'll keep working at it until I get there somehow.
Y'all have a wonderful night. ;)
C
Wednesday, June 12, 2019
Time to get back to updating these blog posts :)
Hey all! Well it took me a bit to figure out how to regain access to my blogger account. It kept wanting to have me log in with one email account and when I did, it showed no blog. I thought I lost everything! However when I went to my blog url, it still came up. Baffled me for a bit because I didn't know what the hell was going on!
I tried another email address and had to reset my password but apparently that was it, so I'm back! Not gonna do too long of a blog entry right now, because I just spent like 45 minutes trying to figure out how to get connected to this wifi at this petro I'm parked at in Kenly NC. I even paid $2.00 for an hour on their wifi, but then it still wouldn't load on the browser. Then I found one that said Petro free wifi, I tried that, it wing DING! And connected. Suddenly pages were loading without any delay. I was like "well fuck!"
Could have definitely saved myself an hour. Oh well! Hope everyone is doing well out there! I'm trying to get back in the habit of coming back on my Mac book fairly regularly, and also I'm going to be trying to get an official site up for the business I'm apart of. Well, 2 businesses actually.
One is a business called Heart and Body Naturals. All natural products including cbd oils. The link to sign up for a free account is listed below.
Heart and Body Naturals
************************************************************************
The other business, the one that I believe will actually get me either off the road full time, or at least give me the time and financial freedom to go out for a month on the road, then take a month off at home. That one is a business called the 30 Day Success Formula.
I don't have an official website set up yet, but I'm working on that. My goal is to figure out how I should go about having a cost friendly site that people can visit to get information about the business, and also have the ability to download the PDF so they can see how to get started for themselves.
Right now the business is only available in the USA, but I hear they are working on making it global. All commissions are done in the form of cash payments via packages through UPS, FEDEX, USPS, etc.
If you want more information in the mean time, comment on here with your email address and I'll email you the PDF so you can check it out.
Lots of scams out there sadly. Lots of people that are trying to build their businesses by lying to people. Telling them that they started making big money in days and they can too, when it's just not the right thing to do. The way I do business is, I'll never give people false hope. I'll never tell someone that they're gonna get rich overnight doing a business, or even that they'll make a lot of money in a short amount of time. The amount of money you will make depends solely on the amount of work you put into it.
The great part about the 30 day success formula business is it was set up about 4 or 5 years back as an offline business done solely through the mail. They've only gone online within the past 6 months and have taken off! With this business, I've been in it probably like 5 weeks or so, I've made about $500 so far. I came in at level 2 which is $250 to join, and to upgrade through the levels you only pay the difference. Level 3 is $1000 so I'll just be paying $750 to upgrade but then anyone that joins me at level 3 I'll make $400 per every direct and $200 for every indirect. I'll still make the direct sales on level 2 which is $100, and level 1 which is $30. You always get paid up to the level that you are at. I already had someone join at level 4, which is $2500 with a $1000 direct commission. I made $100 because I'm level 2, and the remaining $900 went up to my sponsor who is actually level 4, and she also made $500 indirect, so instead of $500 she made $1500 from my efforts.
It's all good! I figured coming in near the bottom that I'd lose out on some commission in the beginning, but I have set out to basically put everything back into the business to get me through the levels as quickly as I can. The higher up I go, the more I'll make, the easier its going to be to get to the next level.
The AWESOME part is, I heard recently that my first few directs have had their initial mailers sent out for them already. The company sends out your first 200 mailers for you for free to get you started. Then after that, you have the option to buy more mailers, or do it all yourself.
I could go on and on. However, I gotta get back on the road and complete this trip to Jacksonville. It is so nice tho, to be back on my Mac and logging online again. I've put it off for way too long but I know I have to utilize all resources available to me to get my businesses completely off the ground and running.
So to recap, if you're looking for all natural hemp based cbd products, or looking to build a really good business offering those types of products to others, click the link up above.
If you are looking for a way to do business offline and make some serious cash payments from a company that has been around 4 or 5 years, drop me your email and I'll send over the PDF so you can check out the 30 day success business info. The last page of the PDF shows how you go about getting started with the company. I wish I would have found out about them back when they started. I would probably not have been on the road these past few years!
It's like BitCoin, I only learned about it like 2 years back. If I learned of it back when it first started I'd probably have bought like 1,0000 of them or something and be set up pretty good in my bitcoin wallet now. LOL. Oh well, better late than never.
So anyway y'all, I appreciate you taking the time to read this. If you found value in this post, please feel free to share it.
Have a wonderful rest of your day, and I'll talk to you again soon!
C
Saturday, May 12, 2018
looks like I'm possibly going back over the road
So, Im gonna make this short. I'm writing this while buzzed on fireball/dt Dr Pepper, and beer. I've been putting out applications to different trucking carriers with the idea of going back over the road and making better money than I am now. Gotta get money saved and get our businesses going, and I can't do that with our current income. So, hopefully one of the next posts I do will be something about being financially successful and not having to worry about money any more. Can't wait till that day comes. I know it will soon. So anyway, thats all for now, take care y'all!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)