Thursday - afternoon

Just got back from Arkansas.  Pretty standard trip replete with idiots cutting trucks off to the point that you wonder how they got their license, how they aren't already dead from making such risky and stupid moves in traffic and what goes through their minds when they are engaging in such unbelievable driving stupor. 

But, that is a daily occurrence, albeit the fact that there are some instances that stick out where you think, I could have just killed that person for what they just did and they don't even realize it .  Not that I want to kill anyone, quite the opposite, it's why I stay hyper-focused on the road while driving the truck.  The instance 2 days ago was one of those times.

Coming into Atlanta, Texas from the south on highway 59, you approach a stop light and are forced to make a left turn, at least for trucks, for the through highway.  Probably half a mile before that light, there is a highway that dead ends at 59. In the mornings, it is super busy in that area and the speed limit is 50.  Those people coming up on that dead end are always wanting to make a left hand turn into the lane/s you are already in.

There is so much traffic wanting to make that turn, they installed a sort of on ramp lane that they can turn into to give them a chance to speed up and merge with prevailing traffic.  They aren't supposed to just jump right out in front of oncoming traffic and ignore that on ramp.  But, 2 days ago? That's exactly what a mini SUV driver did.  RIGHT in front of me.  I had a split second to look to my right and hope that there aren't any cars in the lane next to me..  Note that I have to be in the left lane there to continue on 59.  Trucks are not allowed to stay on the right through restricted areas of town. 

There was a pickup just behind where I would come over and I went for it.  The pickup driver was paying enough attention to slam on their brakes, throw up their hands at me - clearly didn't and couldn't see what has just happened and continued to give me glares and stares after the incident occurred. 

You see, I was going 50 mph and that car that inserted itself in front of me wasn't even done making the turn, they might have been half way through it I would have t boned them and it is likely going that speed that someone would have died.  That is why I took the chance of side swiping the pickup, otherwise I would have spared the innocent driver who had nothing to do with it and just smashed into the car, come what may. 

The amount of stupidity and distracted driving going on out there just makes me want to quit driving today. I wish I could afford to.  

Onto other things. The man that moved in, paid for a month and then moved back out 2 weeks later - which was a few days ago - and THEN contacted me about issues he was allegedly having in the park.  The people next door have a trashy setup, their dogs are out barking until 3 am and they -are crack heads.  I don't want to waste a lot of time with this, so short story: THEY decided to take that lot, not me, I told them they could have nay of the 3 available lots.  THEY stayed their 2 WEEKS before they left and they KNEW what the next door neighbors place looked liked WHEN they moved in there. 

They demanded their money back. Again, they move out, claim issues with the park after they moved out and then the same day want their money back, the unused portion of their month long stay.  They were allegedly going to be long term.  Oh, and I didn't even collect from them until two days after they moved in, if they didn't like it they could have easily left. I would have wanted 2 nights stay worth of money but not a whole month. 

So, he's texting me his demand and I texted back that I am investigating this situation with the people you are complaining about.  I was not going to take this dude's word for it simply because he said so. I don't know if the dogs are out there barking all night long.  He then texts back that he wants his money right now and that I have until 5 pm tonight (that night) to send it to him or he is going to post a bad review.  I replied that I don't tolerate people threatening me and he won't get anything if he continues.  HE says it's not a threat, it's a promise.  I said bye.  Yes, he left a stupid review on facebook of which I have already replied the details of the truth that he left out.  

There are NO crack heads in my park. I do not tolerate drug use, at all.

I've now got all 3 mowers I took into that guy's place fixed and running smoothly.  These are nice mowers, the carbs were gunked up I guess and he cleaned out 2 of them and replaced one.  Sharpened blades, oil changes, etc maintenance and repair and all of them are purring like kittens now. Money well spent versus buying brand new ones that are quite expensive in this hyper inflated market. 

He told me to bring in the one that has been sitting there so long, it has weeds growing through it.  I said I'm not sure it's worth it? He said well even if I can't get it running the parts off of it are worth something. Yes, I would just give it to him if he can't get it going so I will be taking that one in as well.  We've gone through a lot of mower at the house and the property.  They stop running, we buiy new ones and I thought, this is insanity, let's try to get these things working!

Unfortunately, I have procrastinated this long and still haven't started on taxes. I have tomorrow and Monday off, I'm going to devote many hours on those days to getting it dealt with.  It's going to be exasperating and I'm not looking forward to it.  No idea whether I will get money back, break even or owe the government.  I'm good with it if I don't owe them anything. 

They are going to build a massive AI date center in a town 83 miles from here. It is causing quite a lot of stir in the local communities for people are fearing a lot of noise, power drain and most importantly: contaminated water.  I dunno, just sort of sitting back and watching this all unfold.  It will bring a lot of temporary construction jobs but not a lot of permanent positions so I am not all that excited either way about it.  

__________________

Night time.  We made dinner, watched one of the kids pouting, crying, fussing, throwing tantrums because he didn't want to eat the vegetables and then after all was said and done, he finally ate it all long after we left the table.  It's amazing how utterly difficult a child will make their life for want of having their own way, not listening and defying parents and generally attempting to make everyone else's lives miserable since they are going to sit and sulk in their own pudding bowl of misery. 

I've grown used to it.. They have tried everything and I do mean everything including psychological counseling. 

But, whatever.  It's getting late, I have been playing some games and it's time to go to bed. I hope to get a large chunk of mowing done over there tomorrow.  I have to work the entire weekend, I won't want to do any of that after having to get up early on both a Saturday and a Sunday plus missing church, gag.

If I get that mowing done in a reasonable amount of time, I might even jump down into the ditch and start putting pipe together again.  Except I think I need more primer and glue.  I won't make any promises in that department, there is a lot of grass out there and even with that huge mower, it's going to take a while to cut it down.  

Making no huge plans about that, I'll get done what I get done and that will be that. I need to spend time on taxes anyway, but, I can find time for the park and taxes, I think anyway.  

 Monday - night

Slept quite miserably last night. Slept like a baby the night before. 

It's 9:25 pm and after this, I'm going to bed. Whether I sleep or not remains to be seen, I don't much care for laying in bed and not sleeping. It's not going to sleep that gets me, it's waking up in the middle of the night and then not being able to get back to sleep. Well, except for last night, I couldn't even go to sleep to start with. That almost never happens.

Anyway, work today uneventful.  The washout took longer than usual and the loading took longer than it should but I still got home at a decent hour.  Kids were off school - have been off school since Thursday. I've never heard of the amount of days off kids get during the school year.  We never got half the stuff they get off now. 

Trump is threatening to destroy the entire power network and all the bridges in Iran if they don't make a deal.  I have no doubt that Trump will follow through with that threat.  The talking heads are saying it would be a war crime, that's total bunk. These people make up the script as they go along, as long as it condemns Trumps, it's all good whether true or false, usually completely made up gibberish.  Not always, but 95% of  the time it is.  

Now, is it a good ending? NO. The people of Iran - citizens that is - will be living in what Trump described as the stone ages. Pretty good description.  Better get some books written by the Amish, they could teach all of us a thing or two about living without electricity - tho they don't have to live without bridges. 

My other two mowers are repaired, just have to go get them.  The man is an expert, he's just working out of his house for now after taking a bad fall and even losing his memory for an extended period of time.  The things life delivers to you sometimes out of the blue....

I don't really have a lot today.  Kids acting up, delicious dinner tonight, the lady of the house made it and it was wonderful.  I figure it's the food around here making me fat and I'm going to have to lay down the gauntlet at some point, toughen up and start a ridiculous keto diet all over again.  The gauntlet challenge is to simply laugh in the face of food and eat what I need to eat to get rid of the weight.  Low carb and low total daily calories. 

It's much harder than people think if they've never done keto. I did it for years and it gave me high cholesterol.  But, I realized after the fact that I didn't have to eat all of that fat that gave me that condition. I was using ample amounts of heavy whipping cream in my coffee - i don't use it at all now.  I use fat free creamer. 

Oh, Saturday! It rained the entire day. It was POURING rain up there in Gurdon and my pants were soaked, my upper body was wet but not soaked, I had a wind breaker on that was also keeping the rain off of me.  Miserable, driving home in that no fun either.  After that, we went to an Easter Egg hunt at the church.  Even the pastor was remarking about how heavy the down pour was. When the kids and I got out of the SUV to go inside the church, we ran as fast as we could, it was raining that hard.  They did the "hunt" indoors.

After that, we went to a family friend's son's birthday party at Chili's. That was his choice. That particular Chili's usually gives me excellent service, but not that day.  I ended up writing a bad review for the waiter who has also given me the stiff arm in the past regarding any kind of service at all.  We went home after that for a few minutes and then went and saw some kids cartoon movie at the local theater.  That took us to 8:00 pm, Saturday was a very long day for me.  

Sunday was church, Applebee's home and hanging out the rest of the day.  

There it is in a nutshell.  

I'm quite fatigued from lack of sleep and I'm going to bed.  

 Ssaturday - early

I've got to take this load to Arkansas, offload it and then I'm off until at least monday.  A lot of jacking around with the schedule has occurred and a lot  of nothingness in the communication department has also occurred to the point I had to force the issue. 

Basically, I could have taken the early load today because I forced the issue. What I didn't know about the early load is that the manager changed it  from having to arrive at 8 am to having to arrive at 7 am.  He caters to this new driver, gives him priority and preferential treatment.  I most certainly got into it with the manager about this s*** yesterday and I didn't care the outcome at that point.  The manager didn't communicate with his dispatcher of whom he had directed days earlier to give me the option to either load on Thursday or load on Friday.

Because of the way I felt - physically not emotional - I do not regret loading yesterday but the whole thing blew up in my face because of the ridiculous way they run this company.  

I get these glimpses of what another job would be like, I just feel like it's so much energy and time and starting at the bottom all over again that I don't want to do it.  And yet, at some point, they will probably push me too far and I'll just show up with the truck in their yard, park it and leave. Permanently.  

To help the poor or not, that isn't really a question. Jesus wants us to help the poor but the question is, how far do you go with it? When the poor are living at your RV park and they are lying to you about paying rent and dragging and stretching it out month  after month, where do you draw the line?  When do you say ENOUGH WITH THE LIES< GET YOU AND THAT THING OUT OF MY PARK!  

I knew getting into this that the mentality of people who do not prioritize rent will be the same whether it's renting rooms in a house or renting a spot in an rv park.  If you give them an inch, they'll take far more than a mile.  To the point that I'm really struggling with this issue of how to treat the poor respectfully and still run a business.  After all the bs and the person telling me she would pay yesterday? I was driving into my park in the truck yesterday and they were dragging that thing out of there.  

And they left an absolute mess. They had installed a sand box for the grandchild that was visiting fairly frequently - they took the sand box but they spread the sand over a 20 foot section.  Instead of removing it like they said they would, the spread it out. I have about a 6 inch thick covering of sand now.  I was looking at the blocks, the wood and all of the sand and got fairly angry.  Help people out and they screw you up the @$$.  

I'm still a but peeved but I've had to let the anger go.  It's not helping me and they don't care. I tried to contact them and text them and received nothing back, of course.  If I were to see that lady right now, it would not go over well, I would say things I would later regret saying. She goes to the same church I go to.  They claimed all this bs about getting caught up on the rent, I had my reservations but I gave them 3 more days.  Was it a mistake? In the sense of money, no, I had already shut off the electricity to the thing since they weren't staying there and were allegedly moving back in;. I didn't want to pay to cool a trailer that isn't being used. 

I've BEEN paying for that trailer to be cooled and heated for quite a while.  That's what led this situation to a head: pay me money.  

What I find amazing is the priorities people set. They would rather prioritize anything else over having a place to have a roof over their heads?  This is very strange thinking to me. IT used to be people would put their living arrangement first and then pay everything else as they could. Now? 

It's not been bad with some other people who needed time to get caught up. One retired couple needed help and I helped them and now they are paying back an extra $100 per month.  My rates are far from exorbitant by the way.

Well, enough of this for now.  It's time to go to work but I had to write something to get it off of my chest.  It's going to rain today and I want to get this stuff over with.

G'day

 Thursday mid-morning

Absolutely correct decision to not load today and do it tomorrow instead.  The lack of sleep the night before and then working all day long - literally all day long from before sunup to after sundown - just put me in an almost catatonic state of existence last night where I couldn't focus on anything and was good to just get myself into bed, lay down and yes, I slept very well last night. Not saying I didn't wake up, but I went right back to sleep after.  

It would have been very difficult to work today.  Another factor that for me was and still is amazing: It's raining! POURING rain at that, the street looks like a river. Just makes me want to sit in my bedroom and do nothing but think about things, maybe watch a little tv and generally enjoy a day off.  

I do have plenty of stuff I could do, but who cares. Lol.  It's going to be wet at  the park so mowing grass is off the table.  Actually, the kid did quite a bit a few nights ago so it's not looking too bad. Just the front portion of the property needs mowed down, just not gonna happen today.  

418 miles driven yesterday. That's quite a lot for this job.  OTR drivers would laugh at that, but I'd laugh back at them considering the amount of things I had to do beyond driving a truck, which is far more than they would ever have to consider in any single, given day. The logs tell the story with stop after stop...after stop....I don't normally do that much, probably another reason I'm just not feeling it today.

As it stands, they completely changed my tablet loads, took out the one loading Saturday - I'll be delivering Saturday now so obviously I can't do both - meaning I currently don't have to work Easter Sunday. I was going to ask for it off, I'm glad I didn't.  It just ended up that way with the plant telling us they don't need that much product.  Makes sense, they were shut down, we had the tank filled up and as far as I know it, they still have the other tank shut down.  

The reason I'm glad I didn't have to ask for it off is that they make you pay for such requests. Ohh, but they do. They'll load you up with 3 loads, 2 of them will be the second/late/afternoon load which I despise. If I don't do that, I get  mostly morning loads with an occasional late load thrown in there.  I don't understand their mindset but I'm not getting into it with them about it. I'm trying to lay low as far as complaints go - tho my complaints are not just whimsical nothingness. They aren't petty and I don't say anything until the issue is forced on me.

But, if I don't say anything at all, I get better treatment. Yeah, if only I could just eat everything that comes my way with this job.  There are times when I have to say something, especially about other drivers cutting in line. I can't deal with that, I don't do that to them.  

And the mechanics were wrong. I knew they were but they insisted so I just shut my mouth. There is a quite audible air leak coming out underneath the cab of the truck. I pointed to the general area. They said no, it's the air bag for the sleeper. Yes, sleepers have air bags on them, actually it's the entire cab.  Makes for a much smoother ride and they also have shock absorbers on them.  They replaced the air bag yesterday and lo and behold when I got back to the yard and started checking everything? Same leak hissing from same general area - nowhere near that air bag.  

I guess I'm rambling, it's because I keep getting distracted with texts and other things going on.  The rain stopped but the forecast says potential for more rain until 1 pm. The mechanic is still arguing with me about that air leak saying it's "he might not have tightened down the fitting enough on the air bag". IT'S NOT THE AIR BAG!@!!

I'm getting offa here. I am doing laundry so I can say I did something today and it needed to be done. 

 Wednesday - late

7:30 pm last night.  The phone starts ringing. It's work, why are they calling me this late? But I quickly concluded they had some mission they wanted me to do and the manager would be all apologetic and blah blah blah. In other words, Wednesday - which is today - would no longer be a day off. I hit the nail directly on the head with that guess.

Some OTR driver is sitting in the yard in El Dorado, he has a load going to North Carolina but he's out of hours. I've tried everyone, I'm told.  I didn't want to be an @$$ at the same time I was looking forward to today off. I begrudgingly said yes.  It's just that it takes ALL DAY LONG to do those runs. There is no fast way into Eldo.  There are no Interstates, just 55 mph highways and going to Crossett to load, another highway that is 55 mph with towns at 35 mph thrown in for good measure.  

Did it take all day long? Why yes, yes it did! I put in a 14 hour day today. I was so close to being out of hours, my tablet was throwing warnings and about "warning, you are going to be in violation in x amount of time" etc so on and so forth.

But, the truck has issues and I figured it was time to get them squared away. Air leaks, brake issue and some tires needed to be replaced.  Plus they said it needed B service - which apparently is greasing everything. I got  up there, parked in the shop over the pit, went into the office and was informed I would need to take a gas mask test. It's where they light up this tubular thing that puts off this smoke that can raise the dead and then kill them again after they are raised. It is THAT bad. They light it up, it puts off the smoke and then they flash it all around the gas mask over your face.  

Can you smell anything? A little. Pass.  I never have to use it.  I don't haul stuff that needs such devices and I don't want to haul stuff that needs such things.  

After that, I went into the driver's lounge and literally passed out on the couch. You see, I couldn't sleep last night,. I have no idea why, but I tossed and turned all night long. I figured I might have gotten 2 hours of sleep out of the 8 I spent in bed.  

I've been sleepy all day long.  Anyway, I got the truck back, hooked up to a trailer, drove over to Crossett, loaded, drove back to Eldo, dropped the trailer and left.  I couldn't make it back. Maybe half way back, fatigue hit me so hard that I ended up getting off an exit in the middle of nowhere in a forest, pulling over to the side of the exit ramp and sleeping for 21 minutes.  I felt better, much better, good enough to finish out the drive. In time to collect money from an overnighter and see that a long term had also pulled in as they said they were.  Collected  money and then went to church to pick up one of the kids.

The younger one got in trouble at school today so he wasn't allowed to go to church.  Got him, then realized I had left my walled in the truck, so back to the park to get that and then home, finally at 8:00 pm.  I left at 6. Okay, officially on the clock it was a 13 hour day. Not much difference between that and 14, it's a long @$$ day, that's what I can say about it.  

So much so, I don't even feel like playing my video game. Just get on here, write this post and then I'm going to lay down, watch some TV and go to sleep early..  

Tuesday - noon

I got up late today - on purpose for I went to bed late. Like 12:30 am which is very late for me. 

Got my butt out of bed, did some stuff around the house, went over to the park, installed the new battery on the riding mower and it fired right up.

Contacted the kid, asked him to sharpen the blades  on it then proceeded to hook up my trailer. It has 2 push mowers on it that don't work and the man that does the repairs said the one I took several days ago is done. 

I got over there, he fired it up, sounded good, I dropped the other two off and proceeded to take the mower home.  

Okay, the underline stuff I wasn't paying attention to lol.  Anyway we have a small jungle going out front of our house even tho it was mowed a week ago. The grass grew back very fast.  This mower is the park's mower, but we needed to have our grass mowed and I wanted to ensure it was going to work and that grass was the perfect candidate. 

Mowed everything without a  hiccup, without even slowing down at all.  

So that wore me out. I said awhile back I"m out of shape, walking around a giant yard like that proved it, to me if not anyone else. I doubt I will mow the dog park today, I have tomorrow off as well I will do it then and hopefully the kid will sharpen the blades today after school so I can also get some serious riding mower time in. 

btw, the truckload of gravel I had brought in last week is working far better than I imagined. It is holding with all of that traffic going over it and there is no longer any dust kicking up. 

On to other things.  NO KINGS! YES, the U.S. has no kings, never has and never will! Thank you all you protesters protesting against what? The fact that we have no kings? Do you want a king? What is it that you were thinking? Oh, that washed up propaganda that Trump is a "king".  One of the biggest wastes of time I have ever witnessed coming from the left and notably, the whole thing is a sham that is being financed by the likes of Soros and other giant corporations that stand to gain from gullible citizens just following orders. 

It is amusing and exasperating at the same time watching these people trip all over each other to be the first to follow the commands of the propaganda machinery. 

Ahh, and Applebee's.  I was over there yesterday eating a light lunch and witnessed the sending off of the GM.  They brought her a cake, she came in, nothing amazing, she just grabbed her cake and personal items and walked out with little fanfare - nobody likes her. 

It came to light from both ex and current employees - they'll talk to me - that she is a real piece of work. Shaming employees in front of other employees and even in front of customers!  One of the best workers there - I won't say their position in case for some sliver of chance they might be reading this - said they were stood up by this person in front of a group of customers who were demanding a reduction in the bill. They explained that everything on the bill was what they ordered and consumed and finally this GM came out, ridiculed him in front of them and then did whatever to "make it right". 

She tried her bullying approach on us one a couple of occasions, including once when the food we ordered was completely incorrect. She came out there and glared down at us and I glared back at her. Who did she think she was? I am a very long time, regular customer over there.  I rarely send things back or say this is wrong, please fix it, but when I do, I expect them to just fix it. I don't make unreasonable demands and I don't get nasty with the waiters.  

She walked out the door and I asked if they all wanted to party? But, there was still a yes man there, he does everything she says without question and believes she is a queen so they all kept their mouths shut. Fair enough, I said I'd have a party for them.

I'll be interested in seeing what they bring in next. 

In fact, it's lunch time, I'm on a day off, I can go over there and keep the tab small and be nosy, lol. 

Out the door for me!

 Friday into Saturday - midnight

Today was an uneventful day, at least trucking-wise, besides one surprise, tho it had nothing to do any driving nightmares such as yesterday. 

You see, yesterday, there was this load I was working on finishing today and then another load for Monday, they were giving me Sunday off and I didn't have to ask for it. If I ask for any day off, even if it's owed me, I end up getting a trash schedule after that for at least 1 or 2 runs worth of afternoon delivery garbage. If I can keep my mouth shut, I hardly get any afternoon runs at all.  

They make you pay for asking for time off.  If I need it off, I'm taking it regardless.  I won't tolerate them giving me 2 afternoon deliveries in a row and they very well know that.  

Well, I get up this morning all groggy. 2 nights in a row I've slept well, but that means feeling icky in the morning for I haven't slept well previous to that so -- they say you never catch up on your sleep, I dunno what happens but whatever it is, it takes a long time to actually feel fully awake.  

Anyway, I look at the tablet and lo and behold, the Monday run is gone.  They don't bother to tell you about it, they just do it and I guess hope you end up seeing it.

Upon arriving at the plant, I went looking for a manager to sign off on the paperwork, there was this dude I hadn't seen in a long time in the office. He's a veteran and really chill (cool) guy.  He's talking to his help and asking whether another load is coming in today, the other guy says yes, there's a 2 o'clock load. 

Oh, well that's it for a week then.  I looked at him, probably funny and interjected, what do you mean?  We are shutting down for a week. It is a scheduled maintenance thing we normally do in November but for whatever reason they are doing it next week.  I know my manager didn't know anything about it for he was handing out loads for Sunday and Monday!

I texted the other driver I'm basically friends with and told him what's going on for they probably didn't tell anyone we are off for a week. He said that makes sense, my load for Sunday (tomorrow) was cancelled.  

Communication is not a thing with this company and also with the plant we deliver to.  They make decisions that directly affect us but don't tell us until the last minute.

Of course, the guy that likes to try and cut me showed up 30 minutes after I did, 4-1/2 hours before his delivery time. I didn't know if he was trying to cut me or not, I don't really care, as long as I'm ahead of him. I have never talked to this person for in my view, he's a total @$$.  I've gone into the details of this driver enough times in this blog, I'm not doing it here. It's getting late.  

Tomorrow is nothing but church, finish laundry in the morning, go to Applebee's, then off to Walmart and then back home to laze around the rest of the afternoon.  Providing I actually have Monday off, I'm going to be working at the park.  I say this because the company will inevitably call me and ask me if I went an Ennis load? I'll say no unless you need me to. They'll say no, we already have a crew that works that load plus other drivers from this division, if you're ok not working, we won't send you anything.

I doubt they'll need me. The truck needs some work so I may go up to Eldo this coming week - get up super early so I can be there close to when the shop opens up and get it done in one day.  It shouldn't take a full day, even, I just know that our shop typically - not always  but typically does a far better job of repairs then regular shops and much faster.  The thing is, it's 2 hours and 45 minutes up there so it's 5-1/2 hours of driving.  I guess I could ask them if I can take it to a local shop. 

The guy at the local shop has working on my truck several times now.  He's not the greatest mechanic on earth, made a huge mistake on one what-should-have-been simple repair but everything else he's done has turned out ok.  That's 10 minutes away.  I could get a ride home if it had to sit there for quite a while. 

Actually hoping they can do without me for a week.  I can get a lot done over at the property.  I had a load of gravel brought out the other day, I need another one. It's $800 per load, btw, it's not cheap.  But, the driveway is mostly dirt covered now, the gravel is buried.  I need to get the portion of it that is next to the park covered up again so there is no more dust flying up every time someone drives up and down it. 

There's a lot of mowing that needs to be done and of course, the project. I'd like to at least get the sewer line done. That's probably a couple days worth of work.  

Ugh, it's 12:15 am, I'm going to sleep. 

Saturday - early

There is one thing that saved me: There was no oncoming traffic in the opposite heading lanes. 

Approaching a certain intersection that is usually never that busy and is a interchange between the Interstate and a state highway is something you take cautiously. There are a lot of accidents there for a few reasons. People in a hurry is one of them.

Turns some distance approaching the bridge makes it necessary for traffic coming off of the interstate to stop and really look both ways - which people apparently don't do often-time.

The bridge is also perched up high and you really can't see the other side of it until  you are up on it. 

The speed limit is 60 mph, there are no lights there, just stop signs for the Interstate traffic getting off of the Interstate.  

I am approaching this thing yesterday morning.  I'm watching - rather intently.  It's dark, good visibility tho, there's those lights on those very tall poles - like 150 feet high? on both sides.  

A vehicle pulls out as I'm approaching, I'm in the right lane, they get into the passing lane.  This happens alot, I don't like it but it's not inherently dangerous so long as that other driver STAYS in that lane.  

Then a Penske truck pulls up. I'm too close for it to pull out so, tho I'm watching it, I'm thinking: surely this person isn't that stupid as to pull out of there now. 

I thought wrong. This driver not only pulled out - the other side of the freeway turning left into my lanes - but he didn't turn, he was going straight across.

All I see was a big box, this was a 28 footer - with the words Penske on it. There's a lot of thoughts that go through your head when you think you're going to die.  

It goes through your head quickly, almost instantaneously.  Like a computer type of speed.  What a way to go out of this life. Can I somehow get out of this? What can I do?  The only option to salvage this was to dive that tractor trailer rig into oncoming traffic lanes and hope beyond all hope that he clears it fast enough.  

Yup, I was clear over the other side of the highway, this dumb@$$ realizes his stupidity and guns it and fortunately, that truck had enough get up and go to get  out of my way just in the nick of time. If there had been any traffic coming, I wouldn't be sitting here right now typing this. I would either be in a hospital or I would be dead.  I wouldn't have smashed head on into oncoming traffic, that's not fair to those people who have nothing to do with this and also, a T bone is bad but not as bad as a head on collision.

Although nothing that bad happened after that yesterday, driving was insanity.  I don't know if it's a Friday type of mentality or what, but there was so much risk tasking and ridiculous moves people were engaging in, I just wanted to go back to the yard park the truck and go home. 

I didn't, of course.  I loaded the truck and went back to the yard and right now, about to leave for work.

G'day