Tonight I find myself in Hudson, WI. After delivering my load in Indiana on Monday I spent the night at a truck stop in Seymour.

Yesterday I went up to North Central Indiana and picked up a construction site forklift going to Minnesota which I delivered today. Despite my giving them three hours advance notice that I was coming to pick it up by the time I got there they hadn't taken the first step towards getting it ready to load. I sat around for two hours while they worked to get the thing started. The botter cold had frozen it up and it took quite a bit to finally get it running.

Afterward I stopped last night in Beloit, WI where I managed to find a parking spot in the little Pilot fuel stop and walked across the road for a couple of Guinness and to watch the game.

There was a fellow, a fellow trucker, there about my age who it would seem has never matured much beyond around the age of 20 or so. Loud talker, braggart, and seemed to have a compulsive need to impress everyone around him, much to the opposite effect (which is usually the case for that sort).

As I sat at the bar smoking my pipe, sipping my Guinness, and watching the game he intruded and introduced himself and offered his hand. As I try not to be rude I shook his hand and replied with my own name, but in an indifferent "not terribly interested" sort of way. Well, a gentleman should have a firm handshake, and I also do, but this cretin seemed to take a firm shake as some sort of personal challenge and squeezed my own hand for all he was worth(which actually wasn't overly much).

I could see his arm trembling a little which told me that was all he had. With a smile I increased my own grip just enough to offset his own with just a tad more to communicate to him "I really could break your hand about now if I wanted". I've always had a strong grip and my line of work chaining and strapping loads gives me a superb upper body workout.

As I tried to watch the game I half listened to his ramblings, nodding or making some noncommittal responses once in a while. For some reason the more I attempted to ignore the fellow the more he seemed to like me. Go figure.

I remained long enough to finish watching the game. As he had stepped out to the restroom I quickly downed the last of my beer, paid my tab, and beat it out of there before he returned. I didn't want to suffer any more of his babbling on the walk back to the truck stop.

Today I delivered the forklift in MN and am now on my way to one of our regular customers in WI to pick up a large snow removal truck bound for an Air Force base in Colorado. I don't know if I'll actually be hauling it there or just taking it back to the yard. I'll find out tomorrow.

I do need to stop by the yard to have the APU on my truck repaired as the heat/air blower has stopped working and I am rather fond of having heat in the truck this time of year.