Merry Christmas!
It's -ummm - 5:15 AM Christmas Day, had my Christmas yesterday cause' today? I'll be driving all day long getting down to Brownsville.
My manager actually wanted to send me out yesterday, the next day after getting back from PA lmao. I had to laugh. Dude, I have like 45 MINUTES left on my 70 hour clock. I was sweating getting back without a 34 hour reset.
Allegedly everyone that didn't ask for time off is working today. Figures, these plants don't care if you have to work on major, national holidays.
__________________________
Started that post - several days ago and got distracted.
Driving down to Brownsville wasn't without problems, the rubber came off of a retread on the trailer and of course destroyed the fender. They didn't used to use retreads and they have been paying the price ever since in huge bills having both tire repair trucks coming out and mechanics to fix the damage. Or piece together the damage, I should say, they certainly don't just carry fenders like that around with them.;
That took 3-1/2 hours and I ended up using a 16 hour extension, which adds 2 hours to your 14 hour clock, to get to the yard down there and have exactly zero minutes left when I got to the gate. I had to do my post trip on the street and then go in the yard on personal conveyance.
No empty trailers for once. The next day, they brought one in around noon. The driver was going to drop it in the middle of the yard, as is their want, to let me hook up to it and leave. Versus backing it into a spot. Well, I watched him back the trailer up, crank down the landing gear which is when I got out - and saw the back of our trailer smashed into the front of another trailer.
After a long ordeal of them taking it off and trying to fix the damage, I hooked up to the trailer and then - heard air hissing. A large hole in a brake airline, they had brought it in that way. Those drivers don't care about stuff like that, they are driving the trucks into Mexico and back, Mexico doesn't care about stuff like that, either. The only stop gap is if the truck is inspected at the border. They would have put that trailer out of service for a problem like that.
Another several hour wait and the ordeal was finally over. Odd trip, all of those problems.
Got back yesterday, leaving the yard, my manager of course asks me if I'll take someone else's load because they are stuck in Brownsville. That driver is getting 2 days down there. Doesn't matter, I guess, with all the breakdown pay and overnight detention pay I'll still be making more than he will for 2 days of sitting - but I"d far rather sit around down there getting paid for doing nothing than driving all over the place.
But, this trip isn't so bad, it's just up to Oklahoma and back, and overnight trip that should have me back tomorrow morning sometime.
My package finally showed up after 11 days to my mom. I'll never use USPS again if it's for an important delivery that you want to a destination by a specific time. It's not like that package was free to send, it cost $44 and I'm not real happy about the fact that USPS took so long to deliver it. My letter to my son - I sent on the 15th - is still lost somewhere. A toy I bought for one of the kids, same thing and a book I bought for Taylor - tracking says it's sitting in Brooklyn - yes, since the 15th. It's now the 28th.
Rumor has it that a lot of postal workers are out sick with Covid, I don't know, I haven't seen any news about it and I certainly haven't received any apologies from them concerning items shipped with guarantees to be at destinations by X date.
Well enough of that. My deeds still haven't shown up, lol. I've found several properties that fit the bill for an RV park. I have to make a decision on the Prudential retirement 401k. It's sitting at 66k, I'd lose 20% hit for cashing it out, I think, so that would erase over 13 grand right off the bat but there would still be plenty left to use as up front money for a loan to get the property, get a septic system install, run the water and power lines from the road, put up one of those portable buildings for an office, have a driveway and pads done. One property is huge, it could house the RV park and have a lot of land left over for personal use. Just out in the county, the ad says it's only a few minutes away from the Interstate. That would make it a near perfect location, people can both live in their RV's and travelers can pull in overnight. Just have to check the road/s going in and out to see if they are good enough.
Well, my time is up, gotta get moving.
G'day.
