Change of pace...

It seems that this week calls for a change. Being a truck driver my life revolves around time. Do I have enough time to get where I need to be? Do I have enough time off in the sleeper before the folks at whatever business I happen to be sleeping at come knocking on the door? Does the time on the toll receipt match the time on my log book? Do I have enough time to fill out the necessary accident paperwork after running over that idiot that just cut me off for the fourth time and still make it to my next stop before they close? It's all about time.

Time shot my weekend.

I usually leave for this Chicago run Sunday evening, get a few hours down the road, get up Monday, deliver all day and sleep in West Allis, WI. Then I unload in West Allis at the last stop, drive an hour or so down the road, go back to bed and pick up my back haul of magazines on Tuesday evening, then run through the night, delivering in Dayton and Columbus on Wednesday morning.


Ain't happening this week. It's 930 pm eastern time Sunday evening and I'm already sitting in the dock of my first Monday drop in Chicago. Why so early, you say. Never mind the fact that you're interrupting again like you did during the last post. I shall tell you anyway.

Kenny, my ever so friendly back haul broker, told me last trip that the times for my back haul were going to change but he didn't know what the new time would be yet. Last week I called him to confirm the load and he faxed me the paperwork. I just happened to glance at the sheet and noticed that the time looked different. Instead of 2200 hours as the loading time it said 0700. This means that I need to load Tuesday morning at 7 am instead of at 10 Tuesday night. This means that I need to be empty Monday afternoon. Which means I need all day Monday to get everything off my truck and then get back down to Woodstock, IL and go to bed by 9pm Monday evening so I can get this load Tuesday morning.

The nice thing is that I'll be driving through the day instead of all night but the bad thing is that I had to leave home by 130pm today in order to get to the shop, get my truck and get on the road so I could be here in Chicago by 9pm so that... See what I mean? It's all about time.

Anyway, it made for a short weekend.

I downloaded Itunes on Friday afternoon at home and spent a couple hours playing with that. I sure have been wanting to get me an Ipod but Not sure if that'll happen anytime soon. Father's Day is coming up though. Maybe if I'm real good the kids will buy me one.

Here's hoping.

Preston had his last soccer game on Saturday morning and he scored two goals and assisted another one. Not bad for a 7 year old. Then Sammy, an 8 year old girl we're fostering had a game as well. She did great too. Spent the rest of the day fiddling around the house, bought some solar powered garden lights for my wife since she was out working in the garden.

"What's this for?" she asks.

"So you can garden at night of course." I answer. "Duh. It needs a lot of work and I don't think you can get it all done during the day. And I don't want you stabbing yourself in the foot with a shovel just because it's dark out."

Some times my own thoughtfulness frightens me.