What did you do at work today?
- Thread starter Streetbu
- Start date
Accepted a call in notice earlier in the week for tomorrow so it will be a case of me versus the long weekend warriors trying to get out of town and out to their camps and cottages on the lake or river. No bounty on them, so no point in taking scalps.
Nick
Nick
Delivered my last load this AM and turned the truck in. Fck this OTR sh*t. Pay isn't great when you consider the hours worked and the lifestyle is miserable. Fighting to park, fighting your clock, running 14 hours on 6 hours of lousy sleep, showering two or three times a week, eating overpriced truckstop garbage.
You're entirely at the mercy of a dispatcher who works in an air conditioned office 5 miles from his house from 9-5 Monday to Friday. The closest he's ever come to driving a truck is that one time he rented a u-haul to pickup a foosball table he bought on Craigslist. They are so displaced from reality it's a joke.
It was a good learning experience, glad I did it. Got to see some cool things and haul some interesting stuff. No way I could do it for any length of time though. I'll find some local stuff to haul and get paid by the hour.
You're entirely at the mercy of a dispatcher who works in an air conditioned office 5 miles from his house from 9-5 Monday to Friday. The closest he's ever come to driving a truck is that one time he rented a u-haul to pickup a foosball table he bought on Craigslist. They are so displaced from reality it's a joke.
It was a good learning experience, glad I did it. Got to see some cool things and haul some interesting stuff. No way I could do it for any length of time though. I'll find some local stuff to haul and get paid by the hour.
Ah, you are coming to the "yellow" side...
Yea, OTR isn't for everyone (really not with what you delt with) & there's no shame jumping from it. Don't forget to check out Fuhrer to become the beer man.
No, no I think he intends to stay on the side tossing pee bottles, not the ones picking them up.Ah, you are coming to the "yellow" side...
Does anybody in the burg distribute small engine products? Thinking Stihl, cub cadet, and mtd.Ah, you are coming to the "yellow" side...
Yea, OTR isn't for everyone (really not with what you delt with) & there's no shame jumping from it. Don't forget to check out Fuhrer to become the beer man.
Ah, you are coming to the "yellow" side...
Yea, OTR isn't for everyone (really not with what you delt with) & there's no shame jumping from it. Don't forget to check out Fuhrer to become the beer man.
There were some fun things about it, it was undoubtedly a great learning experience. I love driving a truck and it was really cool to see the inside of some of these massive steel mills and factories. I got really good at chaining and really good at tarping. Spread axles are still a beotch to back, but I can do it.
Even doing flatbed- chaining, strapping and tarping- it was far more mentally exhausting than physically exhausting. Remembering addresses, directions, pickup numbers, dock numbers, appointment times, BOLs, logging and sending all of your paperwork, trying to plan a route so that you miss traffic and wind up somewhere reasonably safe when you run out of hours, arguing with your fleet manager/safety manager on the phone because he's a MFer, doing your pre and post trips and logging them, stopping for load checks, constantly watching your clock, trying to eat 3 meals, sleep well and practice somewhat acceptable hygiene, and then safely secure your load and drive an 80k pound truck on top of all of that.
I don't think the company I was with was any worse than most medium to large OTR carriers, I think they all operate this way. Most, if not all of them have massive turnover too, usually 90% or more in the first year and it's no wonder why. They have no interest in retaining drivers, it's far cheaper for them to train and hire new ones, pay them dirt, run them ragged until they quit, rinse and repeat.
I could go on ad astra about all of the BS of being OTR as a company driver- nanny cams, sketchy equipment, e-logs, company rats, pencil pushers who think they can drive the truck better than you, etc. If anyone cares to hear specifics, I'll elaborate. Being an owner op could eliminate a lot of those issues but creates a lot more.
You can never take the road out of the driver.
Having read your missive and the comments it generated, I am truly glad that I am well beyond the point of where that kind of work would interest me.. Apart from all the BS, which is no different from what occurs up here except that our "interstates" aren't inter anything, most concentrated around the principal state capitals and not much farther out ant beyond them, the paperwork sounds about the same and the weighscales and OTR DMV safety inspectors are all over the place and no real ways to end run them.
With all the internal damage and repairs that i possess, I could never pass the physical anyway.
Nick
With all the internal damage and repairs that i possess, I could never pass the physical anyway.
Nick
Having read your missive and the comments it generated, I am truly glad that I am well beyond the point of where that kind of work would interest me.. Apart from all the BS, which is no different from what occurs up here except that our "interstates" aren't inter anything, most concentrated around the principal state capitals and not much farther out ant beyond them, the paperwork sounds about the same and the weighscales and OTR DMV safety inspectors are all over the place and no real ways to end run them.
With all the internal damage and repairs that i possess, I could never pass the physical anyway.
Nick
With all the internal damage and repairs that i possess, I could never pass the physical anyway.
Nick
