headed to utah with BEER! :P

LOL! Yup, that's right folks, 20 tons (or 40,000 lbs worth) of bud light is what I'm currently hauling. Hauling it from St Louis, MO, to Utah. Right now I'm at a truck parking area here in Wyoming. I was planning on going maybe another 60 miles, but I'm at a pretty good stopping point, and it was at sunset so literally i was driving west, looking right into the sun, which even with me wearing sun glasses, I was blinded. I couldn't see a damn thing! Signs were blurred until right as I was passing them, and I was holding a small book I have that shows where truck stops and rest areas are in the different states on the different highways in front of my face to try to block out the sun a bit. Basically last night I started with 1300 miles to go, and it was roughly about 4pm when I left the Annheiser Bush location with my load. I drove about 8 hours and started looking for a good place to stop. I tried stopping at a rest area but it was too small and so it was too packed and I don't like the idea of using my long truck and taking up regular car parking spaces, so I kept going and found this large gas station that serviced cars and rv's and in my book it said it was also a truck stop. As I got off the highway and pulled in, i noticed they had a huuuuuuuuge open lot connected to their lot and it said "truck parking only!" on it, and there was already another semi parked there with their windows covered, so I swung around and parked beside them and before an hour went by, there were two other trucks that swung around and parked beside me. None of them stayed long, I think I was the main one that stayed through the night *mainly because it was midnight when I parked and I have to take 10 hours off in order for my driving time to reset back to 11 hours. (deals with the department of transportation and their rules). So, I set my alarm for the 10 hour mark, which because I had gone to central time, I set my alarm for 9:15, and then literally I got up earlier than that, and hit the rest rooms, grabbed my package of pop tarts and hit the road as soon as my time was back to 11. came up from missouri, into iowa literally for about 20 minutes, and then across the state line into Nebraska. I was like "damn that was a quick trip through Iowa!" So I came up a little bit into nebraska, connected with Interstate 80 west, and was on that for the past 6 hours or so. I had scheduled a sleep stop about 4 hours back at a flying j, but with how late i left yesterday, I basically ended up going about an hour or so past where i had planned to stop yesterday, and so today I needed to get a little bit farther than my scheduled sleep stop. It would have left me with over 600 miles still left to go, and although it could have been done because this load isnt due in till tuesday morning, my plan when I left with it saturday was to get to the drop by late monday morning, and right now Im on track for that. here's hoping they will take me when I get there. Otherwise guess what! I get to sit around and wait till they will take me. I could have been there already, but when I tried to leave to pick up my tennessee load early, and get it to illinois by friday night, they said "oh, your appointment isn't until from 10:30 am saturday to 10:30 am sunday, so the soonest we can take you is tomorrow morning." So I left, went to the closest rest stop and found a space, used the bathroom, did my homework really quick, and went to bed. I was so tired that night because I had really had quite a long day. Not to mention, with different stresses in life right now, especially financial although erin and I are working on it and things are improving and will continue to get better, but that day was a low day for me. I just felt like complete and utter crap,and I couldn't pin point the specific reason for it. But once I got to tennessee, got my load and headed back up, I felt a little better. Maybe part of my stress is the "getting lost" part of the job, and ending up in parts of towns where i really shouldn't be because of how long of a truck i am. I have had quite a few close calls, but thankfully after that minor accident I had before going home for home time, I have managed to avoid having anything else happen, so for those of you reading *however many there are. ;)* please keep me in your prayers. The Lord has indeed watched out for me since I have been back out on the road, and as long as I take my time, plan my trip, and just don't be in too big of a hurry, I have been doing fine. I honestly right now, with being parked in a huge empty lot that has spaces for trucks and nothing else, I honestly don't mind lots like this. As long as I have stopped recently to take care of business, which I did when I stopped at flying j, I hit the showers and restroom, and used the money I had left on me to get two large slices of pizza for $5, and another gallon of water, and some tea and 2 packages of poptarts to hopefully get me through till a paycheck hits on thursday. But back to me not being able to see because of the sun! I kept driving down the road thinking "i will keep a look out and not push too far" I had 2 hours left of time, so I wasn't dangerously close, and then through the haze and sun I spotted a sign that said "truck parking 3/4 mile" So I got off on that exit, and literally at the bottom of this exit, it's right by a bridge, and I look around and I'm like "ok where is it?" And I notice there's this huge lot. Probably about the size of 3/4 of a football field, and there were about 3 trucks already parked there. It had lines for spaces already on the pavement and everything, but no facilities obviously, so I circled around and parked. Did a quick walk around my truck, utilized a bush near by if you know what I mean, and covered my windows up to darken the inside of my truck and got ready for bed and here i am! Had to do my class stuff first, and read erin's blog. If there are any new readers out there, definitely check out Erin's blog! ;) So other than that, i have my alarm set for around 5:30 am, which is when I should be good to drive again. I learned the hard way a few times already where I tried to go my full 11 hours and when I got to about 40 minutes left, I then started looking for a place to stop. A few times when I did this, i got hit with heavy traffic, or there were no places to stop, and I got a log violation. So now I use that book, and I try to plan my stops and usually it works out. If it doesnt, then I use that book to see what places are coming up and i pick the one that looks like it might be the largest and most accessible. I avoid backing whenever possible. Always pull through if you can! What can I say! I figure, I want to be out here doing my job and not having any incidents. If I have an incident, get lost, whatever, the stress level literally blows the top off my roof and it sucks. Then I kick myself for the entire day. So, better I do what I can to avoid it and not stress myself out. Why do I stress myself out so easily in the first place? I honestly have no idea. Im just a worry wort! Erin knows how I am. ;) So on that note, talk to you all next time!

another day, another trip to run

Good day to you all. I hope everyone is doing well. I would have posted last night. God knows with the level of stress I have been under at times, I needed to if only for the reason of venting. But on my priority list last night, well I had to turn in an assignment for my class with phoenix, and had to post a few times, and once I got done with those, I was so tired and decided to go to bed. So I got from philly to new jersey, from new jersey to Illinois, and then they sent me down to Tennessee to pick up, back up to Illinois to drop off, and I surprised myself, I made it to Tennessee and back up in the same day. When I arrived late last night, they wouldn't take me till 10:30 this morning, so I went to a rest stop to park and sleep. Then I went right in to the customer and this time the fuel in the trailer was too low. So I came to a truck stop to fill up, and I'm taking my sweet time grabbing something to eat b4 going back. When I drop off this trailer there, I'm going to st Louis to pick up a load and take off for Utah. Fun times. So I will let that be it for this time around. Talk more layer! Thank you for reading.

march 25, 2012 A week till i go home for home time, YAY!

So here we are, march 25th, 2012, sunday evening around 7:45 pm.  I am currently in lebanon, Indiana.  The weekend has been very busy after a very slow week.  I was in south texas I beleieve the last time that I posted.  From south texas, I got a load going to PA, but it was supposed to pick up on monday.  Well, the load didnt arrive from mexico until wednesday, so I got the load, I took off with it, and then about 300 miles in, I got a message that they were swapping my load with a team because it was already going to be late and they wanted a team to get it there on time.  I can honestly say, I hate swapping.  Basically i went from a load that had 1800 miles, to a load that had 800 miles.  I finished off the small amount of the 1800 mile trip that I was able to do, which was 300 miles, so basically between that trip, and running the next load out to where it needed to go, I got roughly about 1,000 miles total.  Instead of going to pa, I went to houston to swap this load with the team.  I hate big cities especially driving a 60 foot truck because there are so many possibilities of hitting something, or running something over, etc.  Too many small tight turns.  In a car, no problem.  In this truck, it sucks.  So the location they wanted me to meet this guy at, was this grocery warehouse in the middle of houston, where the directions were completely wrong, and the turns were too small for me to maneuver around in. So after driving around the city till i could turn around, and then I went back to the highway, found the nearest loves travel stop truck stop, found a space, parked, and messaged customer service saying "look, I don't want to have an accident, and I can not find my way to where this guy is waiting at.  Here is the address for the truck stop I am at.  Tell him he should come over here to meet me and we will switch trailers because I'm not willing to risk myself anymore tonight."  I was under the impression that out of the two drops, the one coming to houston, and the one going to georgia that I was taking over for him, that he was delivering the one to the grocery place in houston.  Well when he woke me up a few hours later by banging on the side of my truck, he told me that I still had to deliver the one to houston.  I was not happy about that at all, but I figured whatever, oh well.  So we disconnected from our current loads, and connected to our new loads, he took off, I went back to sleep, and in the morning I took off to head back to houston.  It still took me over an hour to find where I needed to get to, and finally after taking lots of small ass streets and being surprised I managed to avoid hitting anything, but managed to get honked at dozens of times because with a truck this size, to make a tighter turn you end up having to take half of the next lane just so you don't clip the pole or curb or whatever.  The guy i swapped with told me the guards told him he couldn't stay on the lot.  So my plan was to get there, get unloaded *i would still have half a trailer full because this was a 2 drop load, and i was only dropping off the first load*, but then leaving right away to head to georgia.  this was thursday by this point.  I arrived at the shipper around 10AM, and I went over to the security shack and they told me that because my appointment was originally at 4 am, they moved it to the following day at 4 am.  She was like "the other guy was here, where'd he go?"  I was like "well, we swapped loads and I didnt have hours to bring it this way until this morning.  you're saying he should have just stayed?"  She was like "yeah, they would have gotten him in today, but now they wont take you till 4am tomorrow." 

So I went back to the truck saying "ok, i will make some calls."  I was thinking "shit shit shit...... i dont want to drive back to the truck stop and have to make my way back here again. this sucks.."  Eventually the guard walked over to the truck.  here i was bracing myself thinking they were going to tell me i can't stay where I was parked.  I mentioned to her that i was hesitant to head to the truck stop because getting to that business was such a pain in the ass that I didn't want to do it again.  She was like "why would you have to go to the truck stop?  to get food or something?"  I was like "no, the other driver said you told him he couldn't stay parked here like th is."  She was like "oh no no no, he tried to unhook his trailer and we told him he couldn't leave his trailer here alone, but as long as you are parked here like you are with your trailer attached, you can sleep here if you want."  I was like "awesome!  that makes me so happy because I really did not want to make that drive again."  So I put the curtains over all the windows, and idled my engine to keep the ac going for most the day because it was 90+ degrees, and I watched several episodes of doctor who.  I went to sleep and woke up around 3:30 to make sure I was ready for when the guard would come at 4 am and tell me what door to dock at, and literally 4:05, she came over and said "door 7!"  i was like "yes maam!"  So I found the door, got docked, and within an hour or so I felt them in my trailer unloading stuff.  Then several hours went by.  by the time I went in or called the last time, it was noon by that point.  I kept getting told "someone will come get you when your paperwork is ready."  So Finally at noon i called and they were like "yeah, your paperwork has been here for a few hours now."  I grumbled and thought "mother-frakers............................."   because I was going to have to leave and try to get as close to 500 miles driven towards georgia that night.  I prefer to leave early in the day and be done by 4 or 5 because usually it's a lot easier to find a truck stop parking space available that I don't have to do a fancy backing into.  When I'm tired, I refuse to back between two trucks in a tight space because it's too risky. 

So I left there, stopped at a flying j truck stop around 1, sent a fax, used the bathroom, and hit Denny's to get a good meal.  I hadn't eaten much since the previous day when I parked at the customer's lot.  After getting quite full, i left.  I got about 9 hours in, with still about 5 hours to go, but it was roughly about midnight by that point and I looked at a few truck stops.  The first two were too full, so I kept driving, and i found one that had a set of 3 empty spaces together, and so I backed into the middle one.  I hadn't been hungry since my massive meal at dennys, and i had recently fueled and used the bathroom, so literally I backed into the space, did a quick walk around the truck, and then climbed in the back and went right to bed.  The next morning I got up, ate my pop tarts for breakfast, used the bathroom and took off.  The load I was delivering was delayed till monday, so I asked my dm if i could drop the load anywhere and keep going since i lost half my miles.  He was like "yeah, we are going to have you drop the load in the CRE yard in Atlanta and keep you rollling."  So by friday night when I had found the place to stop, I already had a new route assignment going from atlanta, ga, to illinois.  About an 800 mile trip.  So even though my dm and I hoped I would deliver in atlanta by noon, because of how late the houston people got me out of there, I didn't get to atlanta till around 5:30pm saturday, I found my loaded trailer, made up my trip plan for the new trip, and by 7 I was on the road again, with a stop for fuel and sleep at a loves about an hour and a half away.  When I pulled in i told myself I would try to grab a spot first and just worry about fueling when I get ready to leave.  Thankfully i found a spot.  I went in, grabbed some chicken strips from mcdonalds, and used the bathroom and then came out and went to sleep.  Didn't get to go to bed as quickly as I wanted because i had to get online to deal with school work.  So, the way I planned it, I would stop there, do my 10 hour reset, and then take off by 6:30 or 7 am.  I overslept slightly, so it was actually 7:45 when I finally left, and i put in over 500 miles and am stopped currently at a flying j here in lebanon, indiana.  It surprised me though, because all flying j's I have stopped at have had a dennys in them.  This one has a different restaurant and i found out after I parked, went in and used the shower, bathroom, etc, that the restaurant isnt open.  I asked the cashier when I bought other food stuffs, and she was like "yup, it's closed till the end of the year."  I was like "damn that sucks. I wish i knew that before I stopped...  "  But it's all good.  Instead for dinner tonight after only having pop tarts, gatorade, and tea today, I grabbed two large slices of pizza.  Then i covered all the windows up in the truck, ate my pizza, changed into my windpants without a shirt since it's not horribly hot but it is warmer than when I left georgia with it being 40 degrees this morning, and got online to do my homework, research some other ideas for something, and wanted to come on here and post too. 

it's interesting how much more stuff there is to talk about just with driving all over the country.  To think thursday I was in houston texas, friday night I was in Alabama, saturday I was in Georgia, today I'm in Indiana, and tomorrow morning I will be in illinois.  Since home time is scheduled for the end of the week for me, i'm sure my next load will probably take me back towards the east to get me closer to where I gotta go.  I'm hoping something not too large but not too small so that I can get the trip done by wednesday, turn it in, and get paid for it with my other two trips by next tuesday.  I anticipate that with me taking the 4 days off, that the next paycheck will be smaller or 0 entirely because of the truck payment, and the following one might by light because of a negative balance, but then I will be on track again.  I guess until you have a "home time fund" set aside, when you go home, you lose money because you're not running.  but I've been gone from home for 5 weeks now and it's time.  Granted its only 4 days, which sucks, but gotta be strong. 

on that note, I will talk to you guys more next time!

March 20th, 2012 11:42 AM

Hello one and all.  I know that it has been at least a few weeks since my last post.  At least it hasn't been a few months.  I know the last time I posted, I was not far from the end of my over the road training with my trainer.  Now, I have been out on the road in my own truck since roughly about march 1st.  So, been at it 3 weeks now.  The funny thing is, I haven't made a dime yet.  Yup, thats right, not a single dime.  My first week because it took them about 3 days to get me out of indians from the school on a load, I only had like 2 loads that I hauled that week for roughly about 1500 miles.  My first paycheck was $400 only because we received a $400.00 lease signing bonus.  Other than that, because of having to buy chains and stuff like that, i owed crengland more than what I brought in, and so my first week I was till negative $400.00, and that was just taken out this pay period.  I think after making payments to pay off my chains, I have about $150 left to pay, but other than that, I'm hoping that I will see something on the pay check next week, even if it's still not 'great'.  Something would be better than nothing.  The real goal for me is to just hang in there, at least 2 years, and then I would 1) my truck payments each week would continue for a year and then I would own my truck, 2) i would no longer be paying 14 cents out of my 90 cents per mile to crengland towards variable mileage charge.  Just that extra 14 cents per mile is the difference of a few hundred dollars that would come to me instead of needing to be paid out.  Plus, once I own the truck, i would make an additional $800 per week plus the few hundred additional dollars from not having to pay the variable mileage, so those will be the golden times right there.  I'm trying to shoot for 3,000 miles but it just hasnt happened yet.  This week, I finished a trip on the very first day of the pay period.  It was from virginia to ill, and was about 850 miles.  I messaged my dm and said if he could get me at least 2 more trips like that before the end of the pay period week that would be awesome.  Well, I got assigned a trip bringing me down to south texas right near mexico, was about 1200 miles, so all in all, still about 2,000 miles total.  I was scheduled to get in there on monday morning around 5AM and I got in there at 9AM sunday morning instead.  I hoped to get assigned and out quick, and I did get assigned quick for a pick up monday morning, but when I showed up to this banana company, she told me that the load hadn't arrived yet and that she would call me.  She told me i could just park on their lot and wait, so I did, thinking I would not go anywhere till i got the load (less fuel cost for me if I didn't have to drive the 20 miles back to the flying j truck stop). 

So that night as they were closing up for the night, one of their night workers banged on my door.  (i was laying down in bed in the back) and so I rolled down the window and all this mexican dude said was "leave, we are closing the gates.  So, I found a place to park over here at flying j, and then this morning figuring I wasn't going to drive over there again till i had to, i called and asked if she could call me when the load arrives so I will know to come down.  She was like "absolutely, when load get here i call you."  So, here i am at the flying j in edington, tx i believe the town is called.  Now that you know my current deal, let me back track and tell you all of where I have been since I last posted.

I believe I was on my way with my trainer to ohio or something like that when I last posted.  When I got on the truck, like I said it took almost 3 days of sitting at a truck stop in my truck before they got me a load out of there.  I picked up this load for 200 miles going to michigan.  It was a swap because the current driver couldn't make it there, and so I swapped my empty trailer for his loaded one and took off.  It needed to get there by 8 am, and i picked it up around 11PM.  So I got out there roughly by 4:30 in the morning, and then it took me an hour or so to find the location because I wasn't able to see the landmarks mentioned in the directions because of the darkness.  I finally found it, got the load delivered,  picked up an empty trailer, and then drove 30 miles to the nearest pilot truck stop to crash.  I think i arrived at the pilot about 7:45 in the morning after being up all night. I was so tired!  I went inside where there was an arbys *i was starving too*, and got the large roast beef, curly fries, and a turnover and went back to the truck, ate, laid down and crashed.  I think about 3 or 4 that afternoon I got a call from Erin wondering why i hadn't responded, I told her how I had delivered, been up all night and just woke up and she was like "ah, ok.."  So from there, there was a load from chicago that dropped off in ohio that was supposed to go to bethlehem, pa, so I went to ohio to pick it up, and made it all the way to within 12 miles of the delivery spot in pa and got a call saying that the customer changed their mind, didn't want the order, and so cre was re-routing me back to indiana.  I was like "are you kidding?  I just brought this load 'from' the midwest all the ay out here.  now you ant me to take it all the way back?  Am i getting paid mileage both directions?" and my dm was like "yup, of course."  So I was like "alright then.  As long as i'm paid both directions, I will take it where-ever you want me to get it to." 

So I came out to lebanon, indiana to drop it off.  Then from there they gave me a load from lebanon to schodark lndg, new york.  When I was about half way there, I had to pull over at a weigh/inspection station/rest area, and I really had to use the bathroom so I thought "i will take advantage of this mandatory stop and use the bathroom.  I shut the door, went in, did my stuff, came out, got to the door and thought "oh shit where's my spare key I normally have in my pocket?"  I still to this day don't know what happened to it, if i dropped it, if i set it down...what, i dont know.  So basically, i was locked out of my truck, my phone and everything i own was locked in the truck as well.  i was like "frrrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaakkkk!!!!!!!!"  (yes i said frak.  watch battlestar galactica or caprica and you will hear them say that instead of the usual f word, i think it's pretty cool.!)  So after borrowing a phone, and calling my verizon roadside assistance, they couldn't unlock vehicles this big (my truck is a 2012 cascadia freightliner), but they connected me with this locksmith that said he probably could but it'd cost me $100.00.  I just got a check in the bank and really didn't want to but what choice did I have?  It was pay the money and get back into my truck and continue my trip, or be stuck outside with nothing i could do about it.  So I told him to come on down.  It only took him about a half hour to get the door unlocked.  Thankfully I didn't just have 1 spare when I started my lease, but 2, so i grabbed the other spare, and when I stopped next about 4 hours south of my destination in new york, I bought this clip that I put my spare key on and i always have it clipped to my belt loops on my pants.  That way, i let myself in, and then immediately clip it back to my loop so i can get out of the truck, lock and shut the door and i never have to think "do i have my key?" because i always do.

So after delivering in ny, they loaded me from there to virginia.  Went over to salem virginia to pick up my next load and took that to wal mart distribution center in illinoise, and then from there they initially loaded me to go from there to nj, but it was canceled and instead they loaded me coming down to harlingon, tx to conway.  Then i came over here and i have been sitting just waiting on when i can pick up my next load.  This one is supposed to go from here all the way to PA, which will be about 30 minutes from where we live according to what erin tells me.  Was supposed to get to the drop by thursday night at midnight but i think it's been changed with this delay i have had while waiting for the load to arrive at the customer. 

so other than that, my lease is a 26 month lease, and then i make the same payments for a year and then I own the truck and instead of having the potential to make 300-600 per week, i could make 1200 to 1800 per week, so i have expressed to erin how ideally, that is the goal, to just do the best i can until i own the truck and we are doing really well financially.

On that note, I will go ahead and bring this entry to an end.  Talk to you guys again soon!

C

the dawn of a new age

My how times have changed. I know not everybody likes that word. "Change". But it has indeed proven itself to be a very big part of my life. I'm blogging this from my thunderbolt so I will do my best to hit every point I'm trying to make so please bear with me. Way back about 10 years ago (wow, has it really been that long? I guess it has, I am about to turn 29 so that'd put me around 19 back then). Well anyway, about 10 years ago was when my ex Lori and I got married. The whole marriage was not bad. I believe it was at the tail end. Dealing with money issues since neither of us had a real job and my parents never approved of her and she always knew it whether she wanted to admit it or not.Well, then after moving to Montana and things really getting much more distant between us, I left to go join the air force and by that point she had already decided she wanted a divorce and so life as I knew it was in for a change. There's that word again, change. So its been about 5 years since that all took place, and so much has happened. First, I was a fire fighter in the air force and I got remarried. Erin and I have two beautiful little girls together and although we have hit rough patches especially with finances, we have been doing pretty good. Do after getting honorably discharged from the military, we moved to Clinton, IA into the house my mom grew up in that my grandparents left to her. We lived there for about 3 years, during which, Erin worked at this local restaurant and I was a driver for schwans for about a year, then when I had to resign because of a surgery, I was then a security g Guard for a hospital for the next two years. I was layed off from there in may of 2011 and on unemployment until recently when I just officially attended a truck driving school and got my class A cdl license and have been out on the road t past few weeks training with a guy younger that me by about 5 years who has been driving for the company we work for (cr England) for over 2 years. It was pretty scary at first because there is a lot to the job when you're not driving 11 hours a day. Like hooking your truck to the trailer you are picking up, learning how to drive the truck, which I am now pretty good at, but at first it was rough. But even though the school has an extremely high wash out percentage, and id give an actual percentage, but I'm not sure what it is and I don't want to guess. But to give you an example, my class coming in had 140 students. After the first week we had to take 4 tests to get our cdl permit. Tons of information crammed down our throats, with the threat that although we each could retake the tests 3 times if needed, if we didn't pass them that day we were back on the greyhound going home. Well after the written test day, half our class was gone. That's 140 now down to 70. We practiced backing maneuvers and then went on the road the last week with an instructor to learn the basics of how to drive a semi and by the end of the 3rd week when we were getting ready to go take our inspection and road test with the state of Indiana, we were down to 30 students. All 30 of us went to the testing site at the same time. One guy went, then they called this guy named branding, then they called me. I knew I could do it. I was terrified but I knew that if I just relaxed and took it slow, I could do it. So I did. Started with being tested on the pre inspection of the truck. I went from part to part. Properly mounted and secure, not cracked, bent, or broken, no leaks, and for lights, clean and working. For hoses, not cut, gouged, or bulging and no leaks. Got through the exterior inspection and the examiner said "ready to do in cab?" To which I responded "yes sir" and climbed in. Started with the obvious, seatbelt not cut or torn, latched properly. Mirrors properly adjusted, city horn and air horn both work. Oil pressure between 100 and 140 psi, water temp between 170 and 200 degrees, volt meter between 12 and 14 volts. Wind shield not cracked, no illegal stickers and nothing obstructing my view. Heater and defroster work and all my light indicators work. Then I did the four point brake check and the parking brake check, was told good job you passed, let's move on to the backing maneuvers. Straight line backed really easily. Next was off set which basically is you pull the semi out of the lane about 100feet and then you back at an angle to park in the lane right next to the lane you were in. Then I had to pull forward 100 feet and parrallel park the semi and trailer in a spot next to that space I just parked in. After passing those, it was time for the drive test. There are auto failures like shifting while crossing rail road tracks, killing the engine in the middle of an intersection and impeding traffic and a few other things. I remained calm minus the fact that I was sweating my butt off because I came down here to get my cdl and get hired and did not want to fail. Well, I did pretty good through out all the turns and got to the last turn just before turning back into the test site and I then struggled to downshift before the turn. I did get it in gear and complete the turn, pulling into the test site, but was thinking "shit, I hope I didn't just fail'. The examiner sat there writing for a good 5 minutes. I was like "im usually really good with shifting. That was the first time all week I wriggled with it'. He was like "technically I could fail you for that, but your backing and the rest of you driving through the city was spot on, so I'm passing you". I nearly fainted. So, when I got done, me and branding passed, there was one failure and a bunch still to test. I heard over the next two days that the rest of the 30 failed. I was like "holy Crap!". So Tuesday the 17th, me, brandon, and a few others went to pick up our cdl temporaries which are good for 90 days. Erin already received my actual license back home. I started school away from home on new years day, and after I got my license, I was officially hired with cr England and went on the road with a road trainer. I mentioned him earlier. We are on our 3rd week of the 30 day training requirement and things are going well. I have decided that because you make a significantly higher amount of money when you lease compared to being a company driver, I decided I am going to lease. I might even become an owner operator, which would increase the paycheck by about 800 a week. That'd be really awesome. Already this past few weeks, we went through Texas twice which I drove right past plano and the exits the ex and I would get off on to go see her family. I commented to my trainer "my ex would flip if she knew how close I was to her". Lol. But thankfully we kept going. All the way to loredo tx, right near the border of Mexico. We went from there out east to Atlanta, GS, and then to Tennessee, then from there we came north and passed from east to west through Nebraska, into Wyoming through yellow stone, and to Idaho to deliver and then pick up a heavy shipment of potatoes. I drove that night most of the way through the yellow stone mountain passes, which my trainer said he had never done but he thought it'd be shorter, but it was snowing and the roads were slick. I got most of the way through yellow stone, down shifting correctly and then climbing up a massive hill I completely lost momentum. Missed a gear when down shifting and literally just stopped. We had no traction and so we couldn't get moving. A cop showed up and was like "when I saw you pass me back there, I wondered if id find you on this hill. Everybody gets stuck here during the winter. You're going to have to put your chains on". So we did. Not only did I learn officially through hands on how to do it,but my trainer had never had to chain up before so it was a first time for both of us. So we chained up and got out of there. That load took us two full days, me driving 10 hours while he slept in the bunk, and him driving 10 hours while I slept in the bunk. We went all the way to Massachusetts, near Boston, and then went up through rode island and into Connecticut. From there back down to central PA which was about 5 hours from home, and then from there, back down to south Texas. This time we weren't there as long as the first, and we came in from the east and then went south, so I ended my drive that night at 10 hours and 58 minutes, about 30 miles north of loredo, and he woke up and took over. I crashed in the bunk while he was up in the drivers seat browsing on his computer or playing wow, and then the next day while waiting on our next load, we picked up food supplies at wal mart, I western unioned cash from my com data card to the joint checking so Erin could pay the rent and get some groceries for her and the girls. I hate com data. Some people out there might not know what it is. Well here you go. It's basically an atm card that some employers put your pay checks onto while you wait for direct deposit to kick in which in my case I'm told it takes like 4 to 6 weeks. So got that taken care of, Erin mailed off the veteran check to be deposited to the usaa joint account to cover the rest of rent, and all is good. I'm looking forward to getting done with training in about a week and a half, and getting on my own truck. I'm looking forward to starting a retirement fund with cre, because I'm told you put 17 cents a mile imho the ira or 401k. So if I average 3000 miles a week, that's over $500 a week into a retirement account. Times that by 52 weeks in a year and Erin and I after one year of my driving professionally would have $26,500 in a retirement account. That's freaking awesome. Obviously we would be trying to squirrel away money from each pay check through out the year. I never realized just how much stuff I can write about just after a short while on the road. Recently after having been away from home for 5 weeks, I had a few times where I'm driving and find myself thinking about the past. Things that I failed at, friends that I no longer have, etc and then I end up shaking my head and telling myself to snap out of it. Yes the past failures and mistakes suck. Can I change them? No, I can't. So I just have to do the best that I can in the now for my family. In a closing note, stopping at truck stops and using their showers is not bad. I wasn't sure what to expect but they literally have seperate shower rooms with a toilet and sink that you lock yourself in, there's no time limit, you shower and do anything else you gotta do, and then you leave. Simple as that. Some pilots or flying j truck stops even have a laundry area which is cool. I ended up doing my laundry at a big pilot, and they had this lounge area with a big screen tv and lots of chairs so since I drive during the day time, I gotta sleep during the night shift, so I was upstairs in the lounge area watching the mentalist and then the closer till about 11 pm and then I went back to the truck and went sleep. My trainer woke me up a few hours later when he was getting ready to drive so I could switch to the bottom bunk. Cre does not allow anyone on the top bunk while the truck is moving. Usually it just involves him throwing his sleeping bag up top, and I climb down and drag down my pillow and blanket. Then go back to sleep. So after leaving Texas last time, we are at a truck stop in Ohio, and will be heading to Maryland next. Who knows where to after that. I'm going to call that it for now but obviously there are always big adventures to be had while traveling the open road. I shall try to make it a point of posting on here about anything I deal with while driving all the many highways in all the different states.

Hello everyone. I know it's been a little while since my last post. In fact, during the month and a half or so that it was just me and the girls in clinton, I did come on here and post, but mostly I took about 15 minutes every single day and used our digital video camera and did a video blog about how things were going, what was going on, etc. Well ever since being here in pa, I have recorded a video blog a few times but with the whole family being back together, I find it hard to remember to do it. So here's an update. We've been here in PA together for less than 2 months now. About 5 weeks in, which was about a week ago, I hadn't heard from my parents for a little while. I had spoken to my dad before I finally left clinton, and as we were on the road, but I hadn't heard from my mom in months. A lot went down between us and them recently. After not hearing anything from my mom for months, we went to church a week ago from this last sunday, which was like the 5th of november I believe. We went to church, and then afterwards we went to Panera Bread for lunch. While we were there, erin looked at her facebook account, and found out that my mom was logged onto facebook via my sister jessica's account, and was attacking erin publicly on her wall. There were 4 parts to her message, and each part was really long, and basically it was about things like how erin is supposedly ruining my life, how we are slobs, how erin will never be a chef, about how much they financially helped us when we first got out of the military and that we spat in their face. She went on and on even going as far to say that Zoe would be able to come live with them if she needed to but that they would never help us again. It just went on and on, and I finally responded to the post saying "mom, this is inappropriate! You should not be posting any of this publicly! This is something you need to take up with us over the phone or in person but THIS IS NOT RIGHT! You need to appologize to Erin!" Well, it didn't take me long before I noticed that my oldest brother josh, the asshole that he is, had read mom's post and had "liked" it. He then came on to respond to my response and was saying how we are free-loaders, that we should look in the mirror and tell ourselves that we are slobs, that we should be the ones to apologize to mom and dad, bla bla bla. I simply said "whatever josh. You are talking out of your ass." After this went on for a while, remember, it was on the public wall where employers and anybody else could see, I finally came on there and posted that I would not allow them to publicly attack us and say whatever they want about us no matter what they might be upset about. That this was something that should have been discussed between us privately. I said that I was going to block them all so they couldn't continue their rampage against us on a public social networking wall and that I expected an apology for going about things this way before I would ever consider unblocking them on facebook. I then blocked them, which included mom, jessica (since mom can obviously get on her facebook account), josh, and sonia since i wouldn't put it past josh to try to get on sonia's account to say something else. The best part about all this is that my family had my number and erin's number and they could have very easily called to yell at us about whatever they wanted to complain about. Yet, they thought it was ok to go on a public forum and post very hateful stuff about erin first and then me when I told them it was uncalled for. Here's the gist of what the hate was about. They said we left the house trashed. 1) erin wasn't there for the last 6 weeks to 2 months. It was me and the girls. I was having to deal with getting me and the girls moved out here, as well as moving our stuff since erin was out here working her job. It wasn't a small job, especially because dad also wanted me to clear out junk from the house. So here I was packing boxes, getting us all ready to move, doing what I could around the house, but at the same time, was still only on unemployment, and was having issues paying everything that needed to be paid. So, my options were a) not move for a little bit and try to put what money I could away to help, but at the same time I was having trouble paying mom and dad the rent and so I didn't think it was fair for us to stay in the house and keep not being able to pay them. We werent several months behind, I had to pay them september still when we moved out just after october 1st, but I thought that the longer I stayed there without being able to really pay much, it was just going to get worse. So, me and ally and zoe rented a penske truck, the biggest one we could, and I sold my ford truck to help pay for the gas on the trip, and we loaded the truck ourselves *which was mostly me loading it. Ally helped a little bit, but mostly it was her and zoe playing while I loaded the truck. which made the process of packing the truck and trying to get out of the house take what felt like forever*.. So, we started loading the truck up around noon on monday, which was October 1st, and we loaded until about 1AM that night, and we were so wiped out by that point and had so much left to do. I was trying to clean as I went, and was bagging up not just junk that was ours, but junk that was already in the house when we moved in that belonged to mom and dad, but dad had asked me to clear out places like the basement, garage, and attic, but i know he either didn't realize just how much stuff was in the house in those areas, or he just didn't care and thought that we should do it anyway. 1) it cost money to get rid of stuff like that, 2) we didn't have enough to get rid of everything they wanted...2) we had payed out of pocket for things at the house that technically weren't our job... for example, the sun porch when we moved in was jammed full of crap. We put a little bit out there, but mostly there were old beds, junk on the floor, tubs, plastic parts, etc, from one side of the room to the other. It cost us $500 to have 1800gotjunk come out and clear out that room for us, but we paid for it and got it done. And was there a thank you frmo dad whenever he came out and saw the room nice and open and no trash or junk out there? nope. Well while I was packing boxes from stuff we had stored with the stuff already in the basement, I went through stuff that was down there, both ours and theirs and bagged up a ton of stuff. By the time we moved out, I had bagged up a dozen contractor size trash bags and had them out in back of the houes. Because of the money issues, I had not been able to get trash stickers or to take all the bags to the city dump. Then when it was about 5 days before our move date, I sold my truck and so I didn't have the option to try to go to the dump anyway. When it was 1 am, we were all wiped out, and I finally said "ok girls lets just go to bed and get a few hours sleep and we will continue loading then." I had to get online and do school work anyway, and only had an hour to do so, and so I got online with my computer upstairs in our room and i did my post but didn't last much past that because after I got my posts submitted to my class, I crashed hard because i woke up at 6:30 AM, my light still on, and my computer open and I was asleep on the keyboard. I had never done that before. We resumed loading the truck, and I got the playroom/sunporch toys all boxed and into the truck, and cleaned up the sun porch, and then had the yellow room cleared and swept that floor as well, and got the kids beds in the truck as well, then got our bed and furniture in the truck and cleared out the bathroom and got the bathroom shower, tub, sink, toilet and floor cleaned. It came to a point where the truck was almost full and we still had quite a bit to go. I hadn't barely touched the kitchen and i still had boxes in the dining room and zoe's room had her tv and some stuffed animals and stuff, and so i ended up unpacking some of the boxes that were more important and throwing stuff into the back of the truck seperately so that we could at least get them here. When we left, there was a majority of pots and pans still in cabinets and dishes still in the cabinet in the kitchen, and boxes that I was not able to load in the truck that were in the dining room, in the kitchen i realized i still had the sleeve inserts from our dining table. There were some box fans and zoe's tv, plus little stuff here and there. In ally's room and zoe's room and our room, I had a lot to do yet, but we would have been there another day or two and we really had to go because i had money for the trip, but no more food in the house. And so I loaded us up as best I could and we left. The reason i didn't clean more is because dad had told me it didn't matter how much we cleaned, he figured it would be trashed and he was planning to have a cleaning crew come in anyway. So, no matter what I did, it was not going to be enough. So, after the huge argument on facebook and me and erin blocking them and getting rid of the post online, dad was texting me saying I was to unblock them or he was going to do this or that. It went as far as him saying he was going to file charges against me for how we left the house, and stuff like that, and that i would go to jail, bla bla. I told him no i would not, that I hadn't started this argument and that they would apologize first and then we would. Then the next day, again, more threats, and it came to the point where I looked at erin and said 'lets go ahead and change our numbers to local numbers. I don't want to keep getting these threatening texts." I texted dad before hand and told him "we're changing our numbers to a local number, I wont tell you the number just yet, but eventually we will when things calm down. tell mom i'm sorry about all this and that i hope that some day we can put this all in the past.love you dad.' And then we changed our numbers. So there you have it. That's what's going on currently. Till next time.

Home Based Business Opportunity and Video Phone Technology

Hello All! As you all know, I am currently in the ranks of the unemployed, but more importantly, while I apply for jobs and we work on our move to PA, I am what you would call self employed. So here's the web addresses of some stuff I'm doing. Please check it out and let me know what you think.

www.chrisblodgett.com

surripets.myworldpower.com

amazing-videophone.weebly.com

These are a few few of the sites that I have up currently. On top of that I am also putting up youtube videos in an attempt to direct more traffic to my sites and get more leads. I heard the other day that a great way to market yourself is to post videos on youtube and make sure you include key words in the video description. It was a rough start up but it's not seeming too bad now. They also recommended doing blog posts, but I'm not sure exactly what I would call the new blogs, and what I would say. After all, what exacly does one say in a blog to up their chances of geting traffic to visit their blog, and then to visit their web sies? I'm sure when I learn more about how to do this effectively, I will let you all know so that my readers can take advantage of these great opportunities as well. On that note, I'm going to call it a night. I will write more for you all again soon.

Respectfully,

Chris Blodgett