I don't want to dig into the new manager too much right off the bat - but...

Today, stopping at a Rest Area near Victoria, Texas, I took my 30 minute break. Got up, went to the back of the trailer, took pressure and fill reading and then inspected the trailer itself.  Took 2 seconds to see a flat tire.  Gag.

So, I call the tire hotline, they get a truck set up to come out.  I then tell the new manager about the ordeal, letting him know I wasn't sure if I would make it to Brownsville today or not - just depends on how long they take to get to the rest area and replace the tires.  I ordered 2. The tire beside the blown tire was bald on one section of the tire, something I had missed in my pretrip inspection.

I"m not perfect, lol.  That portion of the tire was probably on the ground and not view-able at the time, for I inspect the tread as well. I don't run bald tires.  It's dangerous, it usually leads to a blowout and it always costs time.  The reason you want excellent tires on that trailer is because of the product you are hauling.  It doesn't play well with fire.  A blown tire can catch on fire if it's driven down the road long enough, I've seen it too many times.  In fact, I've seen entire trailers burned down because of it.  Yea, we aren't going there. 

I then asked the manager who was already down in Brownsville and were there any other trucks coming down today?  "I don't know yet".  Huh? How do you not know who is waiting in Brownsville? I started thinking. And more to the point, how in the heck do you not know who is going where today?  I said nothing of the sort to him, probably not a good idea to start trouble with a new manager, who knows what he might do.  So I texted Clarice, see if she knew.  I haven't been doing dispatch for you guys for over a week now, you need to ask  your manager.  Oh, I replied, well I asked him and he didn't know.

LOL! she replied and geeze after that.  She's worried about her job.  Now that she isn't doing ethylene, she isn't doing much. Her division has been very slow. Whatever the case, the tire guy showed up, took a bunch of pics of the tires - they have to do that to prove that the tires actually needed replaced.  The one that blew out? It was on the inside.  That side of the tire, of which you cannot see unless you get down in the dirt and crawl up under there, was dry rotted. It just caved to the tire pressure. 

Well, after that a driver in Brownsville called me and told me Ricky had just left and he was still waiting on another trailer - and how much he'd love to stay another night. Well I ain't giving up an empty, I had to do that last time with that driver that was sleeping all day long and didn't leave when she was supposed to. No idea  what became of that.  Well I know she isn't getting the second day of detention pay - she didn't deserve it, it wasn't hers to get. 

I finally made it down here almost 3 hours later than I should have.  So I'm going to get an overnight detention pay at least.

Meanwhile, one of the tenants at the other house texted me today - Hi Ben, I'm moving out next week.

Lovely. 

Just, awesome! One more headache to deal with in that situation on top of the already present problem of having to find a new place.  Maria is, at least, trying to find another place.  She texted me a link to a 2 story house type thing, but split up into 3 apartments.  They wanted 7k plus for the entire property, including 2 alleged rental units in the back.  The pics, however, told the story. Bad roof, no AC, caved in ceilings - because of the bad roof. House a total disaster. It's completely worthless.  Sorry, I thought, I ain't getting into that disaster.  Wouldn't be shocking if the place is condemned by the city. 

Maria literally has no place to go. If she loses that place, which she is cause' the owner isn't going to budge on it, I tried, she's homeless. See I can't do that to people. I don't want to spend ALL of my money helping people but at the same time, I can't just see people ending up without a place to live that I could have helped and more importantly to me, the Lord would say I should have helped since I had the wherewithal to do so.

I'm far more concerned with eternity than what my little earthly existence eeks out here.

Whatever the case, I am completely stuffed. And I didn't eat that much. Last night's dinner.  WE ate last night feeling like stuffed turkeys, it was tri tips on mashed potatoes.  The stuff filled us up.  I just ate another medium sized serving of it, feels like I've been eating for hours.

Time to kick back and let this stuff digest.