That wasn't anything what I expected. 
When I arrived at the new company today, I was handed another stack of papers to fill out and given instructions to go get a TWIC card and then, asked if I could attend a safety course tomorrow morning at another location in Longview - but not directly related to this company. 

Oh.  Ok.  I was thinking I would go there, drop off my paperwork, leave and get other things done today.  Instead, I stayed there for 2 hours, filled out the paperwork, headed home, got my birth certificate, went over to Shreveport, went through the process to get a TWIC card - which includes fingerprinted and numerous photos taken.  And a rather hefty fee, tho I am promised that I will be repaid for that.

After that, I decided since I was in Shreveport, I might as well get the oil changed on my old car for the upcoming trip to Amarillo. After that, back to my town, bought some brake pads for the car.  Headed over to the fire department office, got a fresh burn permit.  The leaves are falling.  I'm only clearing them off the concrete, I'm not raking those things up off the yard until it is pretty much over with. Then I will see if I can find someone on Craigslist to come over and help me rake the stuff up and burn it.  It's all too wet right now to burn anyway.  Not on the top of my priority list.  I have all this job stuff going on.

But, their hours are ridiculous.  Bankers hours at best.  It's a 3 month permit, I'll get this all done before it expires, I just wanted to get the thing. 

Oh, over to the bank to deposit rent money into owner's account.

After that, I came home, took a nap and then went outside and built yet another fire on my new fire pit and have been sitting out there for a couple of hours.  But, I haven't watched any news on tv lately, so I am writing this and then heading into the living room to watch some news and get up to date.  I like reading the news on the internet, sure, but it's not the same as seeing live interviews. They both have their merits.

I guess the point is, I didn't know I was going to be dumped with all this stuff at new work today.  Not getting paid for any of it.  I have to be AT the meeting at 6:30 am tomorrow.  They tell me if you're even a minute late?  Forget it, they won't let you in.  The first course is - I have no clue what it's for. The second course is for a company somewhere out west that requires you to go through their specialized course before you can enter their property.  A driver that went through it says it last 9 hours.

He was kidding around with other people, I hope he was joking.  I don't want to spend tomorrow at a safety meeting.  9 hours of what? Things that I have already learned about in my trucking career.  If these people think they have safety issues, they should try the mines.  Their safety programs are so excessive, but so many people get killed at mines that it's necessary and even with all that training on safety, people still get killed. 

The funny part, is that truck drivers don't really do much of anything in those plants.  They take the tank in, drop it and they are required to leave while it is being drained of it's contents.  You come back in when they call you and tell you it's done.  Doesn't bother me, those people doing that work undoubtedly have serious training to ensure that there are no accidents. I would have to guess multiple layers of supervision as well during the unloading process. 

Well whatever.  I'm done with this for today.  This being thinking about this job and trying to fulfill all of their requirements.  Much more than I had even thought there would be, certainly the most demanding trucking company in terms of documents to present, paperwork to fill out and requirements to be met that I have ever attempted to get into. Yet...one cannot complain that they are doing their duty to weed out any bad apples in thinking about pulling a trailer filled with this kind of product.