Being on the Alert for Potential Dangers

I'm in Dandridge, Tennessee tonight.  I left Cressona Pennsylvania about 3:30 this morning.  If you are asking yourself why did he leave so early in the morning when he didn't have an appointment to be somewhere the next day, I will answer that question for you.  There are basically two reasons.  One is that a truck driver always has to be thinking about his hours of service rules that he has to abide by.  And one of those is that after each days worth of driving (which can conceivably be a maximum of 11 hours of driving in a 14 hour period) I have to take a ten hour break before I can drive again.  So, if I need to be in Mount Juliet, Tennessee at 8:00 am Thursday (which I do) I need to leave in time to get my first day's driving time in plus the required ten hour break before I can leave early enough to get me to Mount Juliet by that time.  The other reason in this case was that I had planned out my trip to take my break time at the Pilot truck stop in Dandridge.  The parking at that particular truck stop usually fills up by about five o'clock in the afternoon (after you've done this long enough you start to figure all these important details out) so I needed to leave around 3:30 in the morning so that I could get here while I could still count on getting a parking spot.  Having a good understanding of these kind of details can make your life as a truck driver so much easier and more profitable.  These are the kind of things that trip people up repeatedly in this business.  While it is usually the rookies who get caught up with making mistakes and miscalculations on these details, I still run into people who have been doing this stuff for years that still don't get it.

Another thing that a truck driver must do is be on constant alert for dangers and problems along his chosen route that can not only mess up his day, but possibly end his/her career.  Pennsylvania is full of treacherous things that can cause all kinds of problems for you.  Anytime you get off the interstate system in Pennsylvania you need to be on "high alert."  Many of their roads are twisty mountain roads with very tight curves that are simply too tight to pull a 70 something foot long vehicle through.  Most of these roads are clearly marked, but in a big truck once you have entered a road that you shouldn't have gotten on in the first place it is next to impossible to get yourself turned around.  I have one of these "disasters waiting to happen" on my route coming out of the SAPA plant in Cressona, but I am fully aware of it so I know how to avoid it.  The highway that is my suggested route from my company to leave the plant on passes under a bridge that is too low for a big truck to get under.  My truck is thirteen feet tall - the bridge I'm speaking of is 11" - 8".  Not gonna happen!

Don't really know why I'm sharing all this, I'm sure it is of no interest to anyone, but I sit here all alone all day and sometimes I just feel like telling someone about some of the stuff I deal with everyday.  So, there you have it, a daily dilemma for the truck driver.

As soon as I can get this load of pipe delivered in Mount Juliet I am heading to Delhi to get a load that will take me to Texas so that I can pick up my youngest daughter Abigail - "her father's joy" - that's what here name means.  And so far she has done a good job of fulfilling that meaning.  I'm very excited to have her along with me, just as I was when I took her sisters on their grand adventures.