Monday morning.
Preparing - mentally - to go out on the road. I'm just happy it's about a 24 hour trip. I mean, it would be optimal if you could leave in the morning and get back late that night, but it's just a bit too far to make it. I've made it within 25 miles of the yard before I had to stop. In the good ole' days, I could just finish the run with no problem regardless of hours. No one would say anything and nothing would become of it.
But now, with ELD's - electronic logging devices - there is no leeway. It's kind of dumb to have to stop 25 miles from your destination for 10 hours. In fact, it's extremely stupid. Truckers are getting pissed about the stringency of these elogs and are actually striking for a day here and there over it. I find a one day strike useless tho. If we all shut down for a week, the economy would come grinding to a halt and we could pretty much get whatever we wanted.
It may happen someday, but it wouldn't include the mega carrier drivers who are too afraid of losing their jobs - tho I don't see why, it's a driver's market now, not the other way around. Anyway, until this situation is dealt with, I just tolerate it. On paper logs I could just cheat, frankly. And I don't care about excessive government regulations made by people who are clueless about the driving culture and how it works. They think they know better so the make one-size-fits-all rules that are outrageous and ridiculous.
It's a lot of kneejerk reaction to that actions of a few drivers that get into horrible accidents. But, cars get into a lot more accidents than trucks, they don't think to put a lot of this nonsense onto drivers of cars. Accidents are going to happen regardless of the untold amounts of excessive regulations they put on truckers, period, end of story. Your 30 minute rest rule has done far more damage to getting freight to locations on time than any good it has done and that has been statistically proven. They are now considering getting rid of the rule. I don't need the government tell me when to take a break. If I get really tired, I'll pull over without their coercion and take a nap of my own accord. If I'm near a delivery or end point, I shouldn't have to pull over because my hours ran out - yet I'm only 20 miles out. Or even 30 or 40 miles out.
Whatever the case, I think I'm probably lucky to be getting any kind of run with only a day off since the last one considering the slow down. drivers are complaining and the manager is getting an earful on a daily basis. I simply made my case without cutting her down or trying to make her feel bad. This new company takeover is what's at fault here, not her. I'm not, however, going to go broke and start using credit cards again to survive. If it comes to that, bye! And I can say that another 3 or 4 paychecks like what I've been getting and I'll be at that bridge.
Meanwhile.....time to get ready to leave. But, perusing some jobs that are local or regional. Cause I have the feeling that I'm going to have to move on.
