I sat around all day waiting for a call from dispatch so I could get back on the road and make a few bucks. I wasn't too surprised that I hadn't heard from them with this being the holiday season and all that. Late today I decided to go ahead and buy some groceries to make dinner tonight. Around 4:00 I picked up some beer as I figured if I hadn't heard from them by then I wasn't going anywhere today. Right. I got the call a few minutes ago, about 3/4 of the way through my second brewski...

Ok, Christmas is all over and done with now. For the most part it's time for life to return to normal once again. I spent today waiting for a call from dispatch that never came, catching up the last of the laundry and doing the ironing, and basically getting things ready for the road once again. I'm not overly surprised that dispatch didn't find a load today. Many places shut down by noon last Friday so it's no mystery as to why they wouldn't have anything ready to ship today. I'm act...

When I left out on the road a couple of weeks ago I knew that the current property managers were leaving and new managers would be coming in. When I got home Friday I found that they had indeed hired new managers. Yesterday while I was sitting in my recliner and working to finish up my Christmas knitting I heard a small commotion outside so I checked to see what what going on. I saw a woman whom I recognized as one half of the new management team standing on my carport, phone in hand, hav...

I made it home today and will be here until at least the day after Christmas. It was a pretty good run down here from WI. I finished loading around 3:00 on Tuesday afternoon. I then set out for Florida. I knew the traffic around the Chicago area would be pure hell so I cut across WI so as to drop down I-39 on the western side of Illinois to avoid that mess. While it added a few more miles to the trip it avoided the Chicago and Gary, IN traffic nightmare and actually saved me time. I de...

I wandered over to Applebee's for a few brews and dinner. Naturally I took my knitting pack with me. I trudged through the several inches of crappy, cold, bullshit snow and had a few beers and some dinner. I hadn't been there more than 10 minutes before a couple of women expressed an interest in my knitting and I was engaged in some lengthy conversation. It carried on over to a couple of guys who chimed in with their own interest and questions, as well as a couple of other people who were...

Brrrrrr. I am now back in WI once again. It's cold and it's snowing. Yuck. I'm laid over until Monday so I checked into the hotel where it's nice and warm. I'll spend the remainder of the weekend doing some knitting and just hanging out. Could be worse I suppose, but I really would rather be out there making some cash. Oh well, it's that time of year and freight is pretty slow. I did knit up a beanie cap for myself to try out some different stitch patterns. I wanted to create a pattern ...

I'm still sitting at home waiting for the call from dispatch that will send me back out on the road. So far nothing. Freight does get slow this time of year so I am not really too surprised. Last week I order a couple of 16" circular needles from Knit Picks to use for knitting hats. The shortest I had was 24" and they are really too long for doing hats so my hats came out a little too big. The mail just ran and when I checked the box there was the package from Knit Picks. Yippee! I am n...

When I came home last Friday I told dispatch that I would be ready to go again this Friday (today). After more than six weeks out I am still not feeling quite ready to go but dutifully called in to dispatch to get my load information. I was really hoping she would tell me that she didn't have anything for me yet. I lucked out and she did indeed say that she hadn't yet found a decent paying load for me. Yippee! I didn't want to hit the road yet anyway. I told her that was just ducky for me ...

I've been putting off going to the laundrymat all week. I hate those places. But, after over six weeks on the road I have way too much laundry to be able to get it done in my little machine here at home. The laundrymat is the only reasonable option and I have to get it done as I'll probably be leaving back out again on Friday. I sorted out all the warm weather clothing and will do that here at home as I won't really be needing much of it on the road now. That still leaves a helluva lot of ...

Now this is the kind of story I enjoy seeing on the local news channels. There is a BBQ place in Carrolwood, FL (Tampa suburb) called Alex's Southern Style Bar-B-Q. It seems the owner of the place, oddly enough named Alex, has his own special Christmas season tradition. He explained that when he was a kid his parents were poor and they could never afford to get him a bicycle for Christmas. Now that he has a successful business he does a collection drive every year to purchase bicycles to d...

Saturday morning I noticed that the rear tire on my bent was flat as a pancake. I know it wasn't flat when I moved it out of the house when I got home on Friday, but I figured after sitting for more than six weeks the air may have simply seeped out and a night outside on the carport finished the process. Saturday afternoon I carried my pump outside to air up the tires to go for a ride. The rear tire wouldn't take air at all and the air came out as fast as I pumped it in. Great. I thought p...

I finally rolled into home about an hour or so ago. I kicked off my shoes, put on a pair of shorts, opened a cold one, and put my feet up. Ahhhhhhhh, heaven. Shortly after I got comfortable my mother walked over and told me they were heading for Wal Mart to do some shopping and asked if I wanted to go along. "Yeah Mom, I just walked in the door after more than six weeks on the road and I want to go to Wally World. Thanks, but I think I'll pass." Inertia has hit me like a ton of bricks. ...

I made a delivery in Northern Indiana yesterday, one in Georgia today, and am now spending the night in Florida. I'll make my final stop here in Florida tomorrow before noon and then make the 90 minute drive from there to home. I've been out around six weeks this time and am looking forward to getting home for a few days. I have an amazing amount of laundry to do. I might just take one day and go to the laundrymat to do it instead of spending my entire home time doing it a little at a time...

Last night I spent a little time over at Applebee's having a few adult beverages, some dinner, and knitting a bit at the bar. I guess the bartender likes the hat that I made for her. She said that she had shown it to her mother who complimented the work. While there a few of her friends wandered in and she introduced me as "The guy who made me the cool hat I showed you". I guess it's a hit with her. One of the young guys even asked me if knitting was hard to learn. I told him that learnin...

It's kind of a strange feeling for someone who is normally on the go. I have nothing at all to do today. Nothing. At some point I will probably run down to the truckstop and put a little fuel into the truck, but even that isn't really a pressing need unless I decide that I need to go some place but honestly, there really isn't any place I can think of that I need to go. Everything that I need is within easy walking distance. There's Applebee's next door, a grocery store, a liquor store (if...