Thursday, April 21, 2011

Mulch, Manners and Mayhem

Wednesday afternoon we were dispatched to Waverly, VA to pick up a load of mulch destined to Pennsylvania. For the second time they over loaded us and needed to take a pallet off.  Even with that weight issue we still needed to slide tandems and the fifth wheel on the tractor.  The fifth wheel is the big round plate with a U shaped area cut out on the tractor.  On the trailer a king pin comes down and must be aligned to met up with the fifth wheel.  If done correctly (and yes I can do this very well now) the sound that you hear is a big thunk of sorts.  Once you hear that you put the truck  back in first gear and with the brakes off try and pull the trailer - this is also called a tug test.  You're checking to make sure the fifth wheel and the king pin are locked.  Rarely the fifth wheel needs to be moved.  On those occasions you pull a lever and pull forward or back as needed.  All this is done to help get your weight even throughout the truck.   We needed to do this Wednesday since no amount of moving the tandems would help.  After sliding the fifth wheel we scaled and Ed was very pleased with himself. 
We headed out to Pennsylvania from Waverly with the ever popular fuel stop at the terminal. It was a quiet ride back up to PA from this point. 
We arrived at a service plaza just outside of Allentown, PA around midnight had a short 7 hour rest and made our way to our appointment.  Home Depot, we'd never delivered here before our first retail store delivery! Well it didn't get off to a great start they had several trucks to unload and since they don't have signs up as to where trucks come in from you just take your  best guess. That being said the space you have to pass each other is extremely small.  With some fancy wiggling from Eddie we got through with mere breaths between trucks.  Meeting other drivers with the same confused look is as always a wonderful way to find comfort, I'm guessing the trucks following us met the same looks. 
What I can not seem to understand is the inability to reason with men when it comes to asking questions. Directional questions must be the worse questions in the world to men. Okay, so sometimes girl questions are dumb but occasionally we have a realistic question too!  Sometimes the question we ask, when answered correctly, can provide much needed information that could help.  Take for instance this morning while we waited for a trucker to get his load tied down Ed noticed he was having trouble getting one of his straps to stay hooked to his trailer bed.  I suggested Ed go help him, I got a glance of indignant disbelief. Eddie said "I didn't sign up for flat beds he did; and why should I go make him feel bad just because we're in a hurry?"  I have no idea how offering to help is going to make the guy feel bad but 'ok'.  
Once we got backed into our door at Home Depot they began unloading us as shocking as that is the normal wait can go from 10 minutes to 4 hours. We listen and can feel the fork lift on our trailer when they unload us, Ed noticed a lack of heavy movement on the trailer and walked into the building to get our paper work and found one of the pallets of mulch on our trailer had toppled over.  Ed helped the forklift driver stack the bags of mulch back on a pallet and away we went!
Next stop Nestle' for more water. The south must be parched again. When we got our paper work from the office they gave us a directions sheet to a new truck stop!  This means we don't need to go to New Jersey for scales!  Trexler Plaza in Allentown, PA newly opened and has scales, decent parking and within walking distance to a real drug store.  We got the weight for the truck and went inside.  A nice enough place clean food well they will improve with time I'm sure.  Ed went back to the truck for a nap before heading on our way back to Virginia. I decided to stroll over to the drug store and 'shop' a bit.  I found Mikey a baseball bat and wandered back to the truck. After Ed's nap we went back to the truck stop for food, like I said hopefully this aspect will get better with time or the next time we visit.  The young lady working the food area seemed really nice but when I inquired about a sandwich from one of her co-workers the manners stopped. Rude people should not work in or with the public, the results can be financially painful in the long run. After telling Ed that I no longer wanted anything, due to the rude young lady, he asked why I told him what she'd said and that I would wait for him in the truck.  Sadly the young girl waiting on Ed had only to say "Well she's got a lot on her mind right now."  She was calculating and  making sandwiches to refill the sandwich case... ok still no sale, I will be hoping they will have less on their minds the next time we visit.    
How is it that people seem to miss seeing a big truck baring down on them? (Blind spot?) Why is it that people in cars think they are getting so much further ahead by constantly switching lanes? (They can't see the lane they just had to get into stopped completely 10 cars ahead of them) Is it really that much closer to your destination by cutting in front of a big truck? (Not if said big truck plows into the side of your car, it could take a life time to get where your going.) Is there a school for merging? (Please make it mandatory  for EVERYONE! making special effort to teach; this scenario  the lane ends and a truck is in front of you, this does not mean its a great idea to wait for the truck to merge then rush in front of the truck after the lane ends to break into traffic.) Also when a big truck needs to merge its really not a question of "Can I please?" its more or less "Move I'm, coming over no more of your shenanigans." By the way merging means to allow people to enter or leave the roadway.  Its really not a request or 'at your leisure' situation people. I need to include this too just to set the record straight on the whole stopping ability of trucks; truck brakes work very well. We can stop these monsters yes indeed we can.  If you read your DMV handbook you'll see that it takes a considerable distance to stop your cars in say rain or snow.  Just because we have more wheels does not mean we can stop faster. At 65 mph the stopping distance for an automobile is 162 feet in dry conditions. At 65 mph the stopping distance for a semi tractor trailer is 420 feet in dry conditions. Think about that the next time you think you should pull out in front of or cut off a truck.  You may get lucky and that truck may be empty or just hauling a light load or you may die because that truck is heavy hauling its maximum weight of 80,000 lbs.  
I so wish I could have a way to let people know that the roads are not just for cars, trucks are people working hard to bring everything you use to you the consumer.  Consider your life without the things trucks bring literally 99.8% of everything you use has been on a truck at some point.  
We've had a beautiful day on our return to Virginia.  Traffic only clogged up in Pennsylvania in the work zones for 6 miles.  We've gotten wise enough to stay away from I95 and the beltway due to traffic we're traveling the more scenic routes and only adding 15-30 minutes to our trip (without consideration of the traffic delays in DC which have run up to 4 hours).  Just as I wrote that traffic came to a stop at the Potomac River Bridge, ugh, we're actually in the toll booth and traffic stopped. Of course Eddie takes these opportunities to have me fix him a cup of noodles from Maruchan.  
Have a Blessed Good Friday as we remember the sacrifice Christ made for us. 
Pam and Ed




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