Kind of a rough day.

Fasting is never easy, at least not for me and for the fact I haven't done that much of it in recent times besides the 3 day fast I did two or so weeks ago.  But I don't see any reason not to fast - and pray for that matter - starting a diet that is pretty difficult to follow. After the last fast, it would have been easy to continue on with Keto. I didn't do that, sort of wish I did.  If you haven't been eating in many days, whatever you are going to eat? It's all like a prime rib dinner with all the fixings.  It's food and it doesn't really matter what that food is.

I could have sat around the house another couple of hours if I had known that the plant was going to keep me sitting around for 2 plus hours.  I got in there and the first driver was still there, not a good sign for he should have been loaded and gone by the time I got there.  He told me after the finally finished him he had gotten there on time for his appointment but they made him wait.

Turns out it's the new guy that was loading all by himself and he was complaining about allllll  the trucks he had to load that day.  Well of course, that's what they hired you to do. What, did you think you were going to be sitting around most of the time?

The thing that got me was after I finally got backed into the loading bay and sat there 45 more minutes waiting, he came up to me and told me I had to move, the pump is broken.  I suppose it's possible the pump is broken, but I have also seen them just move us out of the way to preload their trucks.  Well, that bay where they load those trucks half blocks the bay we back into.  I wondered what he was going to do about the "broken pump"?  Nothing.  Absolutely nothing. Another loader showed up for work not long after I pulled back out into the parking lot and approached my truck.  Well, do you think you can back around that truck? I dunno, has anyone else ever done it? Yes, a few have been able to.

Well, I would love to but the new dude said the pump is broken.  "Let me go find out".  Yes, please do, because it takes them hours to load those trucks in that bay to and in front of where we load our trucks. He came back, yea, it was just making a noise but I know what is wrong with it, it's just the filter sock needs to be changed.  Again wondering why this kid wouldn't do it, the answer was obvious.  He was going home and had made me wait 2 hours 30 minutes for - nothing.  

So, I said heck ya, I'll back this truck in there!  Sure enough, I nailed it the first time, didn't have to do a single pull up.  You have to back to the side of the parked truck getting loaded and then jackknife the truck so the trailer gets into position correctly.  He had that thing loaded in about 35 minutes.   That other truck had already been sitting there a long time and they were nowhere near done loading it when I was pulling out of there.  I was there a total of 3 hours and 15 minutes but it would have been more like 5 or more hours.  I commended the other loader, you are the best loader here! He really is, he can load 3 trucks at the same time and think nothing of it.  He kicks @$$, basically.

Coming back was also an interesting situation. On the final highway I have to drive one, it's 2 lanes with passing lanes here and there.  A pilot pickup for an oversized load came racing up to me, pulled over into the double yellow lines signaling me to move over.  Huh? I'm going 70 mph in a 70 mph zone and he wants me to pull over for him? Screw that, they can wait until we get to a passing lane. 

So we get to one, this pickup comes flying by me but the truck is back a ways.  It has a large steel structure on it sticking out at least 2 feet on either side, doesn't even fit into the lane.  Well, by the time he got maybe 150 feet behind me, the passing zone was ending, merge left. So, I put my signal on and was coming back over.  What did he do? He floored it, crossed over the double yellow lines, must have been going 80 mph in that thing.  It was pure insanity, going over the crest of a hill, no way he could see if any traffic was coming. 

I'm not going to cause a head on collision from some other truck driver's appalling stupidity so I let him back over, even tho the lane was ended right then.  I had half a mind to call state Troopers to come out and have a discussion with him, but I decided against it.  I don't know what his big hurry is, I never see oversized loads that big going that fast and taking that kind of risk with the motoring public.  I wondered if he would end up killing someone driving in that manner. 

Anyway, it's 5:30 pm and I just got home.  I should have been home 2-1/2 hours ago.  Whatever, it happens but obviously, anytime it gets busy at the loading plant and that new guy is the only loader there? It's going to be a long wait.  They have been having 2 loaders there and everything runs like smooth silk.  We get in and out of there.  I just had an issue with him saying a pump is broken and doing literally nothing about that, he didn't even have to load the other truck, some other driver backed it in there and a different loader who doesn't do our trucks was up there loading it.  It was just an excuse to do nothing else until he was going home. 

Way too late to stop at the tractor dealership. 

I remembered today that there is no toilet paper in the shed, but I also thought: why am I going to go out and spend $30 on paper that is going to be stolen by someone or more than someone?  I have decided I am just going to buy a 30 pack or whatever and just keep a couple of rolls in there at a time, the rest can stay in my vehicle. They do make locking toilet paper dispensers, but that's not what's happening. Someone is grabbing  15-20 rolls of it and walking out with it. So many people go into the bathroom with large bags it is impossible to tell who is doing it.  

I built that bathroom for myself initially, it morphed into a bathroom/shower room after I did some research on RV'ers habits.  

Anyway, another 4 hours and I can go to bed and not think about food. I am awfully hungry right now, but I'm going to forge ahead with this fasting for it is extremely beneficial for not only kick starting keto, but also for health benefits.  I'm going to at least make it through tomorrow afternoon.  I'll have to decide then if I can make it another day plus.  I"m going to try, that's all I can promise.

Kids are coming home and grandma is leaving right away on Friday, I asked them to change my schedule.  I kind of didn't give an option, it needs to be changed.  So, she changed it, but the aftermath is 4 days in a row now of late load/unloading.  It's just that no one is going to be here, apparently.   So grandma would show up and can't leave until someone comes home.  Well, I should be there long before they get there now and frankly, I certainly don't mind being home early on a Friday going into Saturday.

I'm hoping loading will be better on Wednesday - it will be late load as well but if they can get their act together down there I can be out of there early enough to stop at the tractor dealership.  

Well, I'm getting off of here. I can't get my mind off of food and I need to do something to distract my attention.

 Monday - not particularly early, not late either.  

There is no reason to leave early for today's work, it will just have me sitting in a truck for hours waiting to get loaded.  I'd rather wait at home.  

I have no idea what would possess birds to start chirping at 2:30 am, but they did and it was a lot of them, waking me up out of a deep sleep.  The sleep tracker verified that, showed in deep sleep and then a straight line goes all the way up to the top - awake.  I put in my ear plugs to block out the noise, but damage done.  Didn't matter too much, I was in bed 10 hours and slept 8 of them...

And TBH, I don't really mind a bit later run on a Monday morning after a weekend off.  The day will drag out longer but I won't be so tired as I normally am on a Monday, early, getting up and dragging my @$$ to work.  I'm leaving a bit earlier today than I normally would because the trailer has been sitting 2-3/4's days out in the heat.  The glue starts to dry up and it takes them longer to get it off the walls of the trailer. 

Anyway, it was a nice weekend, didn't do much and don't regret that decision. My only desire was to go talk about a tractor but that fell through, I want to see what TYM has in person first before going to the Kubota dealer. The other person in Fort Worth went to the disrespectful mode Saturday when he was offering a "free implement" and I said thanks, but I can't sign anything until I get a feel for the tractor.  

He then brought up that I was willing to buy it sight unseen. No sir, I still have all the texts....so, he brings up a text (which was amazing that a salesperson would call out a potential customer to begin with regardless of whether he was "right or wrong"), shows that I "want to get a feel for it first".  Yes, that's exactly what I mean, but we had discussed on the phone about seeing one of the units in person before I would sign on the dotted line.

Who in their right mind is going to sign for 35k worth of machinery without even seeing it first? Pictures are great, they don't tell the whole story, they never do.  But, the guy dug in further wondering what he had just wasted 2 months of discussing this tractor situation with him if I had wanted to see it in the first place?  I had had enough, instead of dishing it back out to him, I simply said "Have a nice day" and that was the end of texting.  If he texts me again?  It probably won't be so pleasant.  I don't care what he has to offer, he isn't local, Fort Worth is 3 hours from here.  At least the place in Carthage is relatively close at 25-30 miles, the same with the dealer in Longview. 

Apparently grandma has to drop the kids off and go straight back to Arkansas for whatever reason on Friday.  So, I am going to ask them to change my schedule so that I have first load, I am already doing a second load this week anyway, not particularly happy that they dumped with 2 of them in the same week.  I wasn't going to say anything about it, not this week anyway, if she (dispatcher) tries that again next week? I'll tell them to dump the second one on someone else or I'll refuse the load.  It's that simple: this company allegedly does not have forced dispatch. Meaning, if they give you a load, you can tell them no.  I don't want to do that, of course, it doesn't go over too well for any favors in the future.  

Our internet still isn't working properly. They got it up and running, but it zones out a lot. Meaning: it just stops working.  So you try to post something and nothing happens. Exactly what's going on now, tried to post a comment to a friend's Facebook and it said "unable to post".  Looking at the bottom row on the screen, I'm not even on the internet right now.  Sometimes, restarting the computer works but if I do that?  I'll lose everything I have written on here since it hasn't been able to save it. 

So, I'll hope it either comes back on before I leave or I'll put the computer to sleep and try again when I get home later.  

Basically, I'm on the verge of having to go out and buy the next size fatter waist size pants.  Just no.  This is one of the reasons we're doing a 30 day challenge.  Can I make 30 days? Certainly.  I've done far more than that on the Keto diet, going 4 or 5 months without backing down.  Now, can I just start out from scratch and do it? Remains to be seen.  But I'm going to try, this is getting ridiculous.

The driver trainer is having prostate problems. To the point he is going to have to go through low level radiation. He said he has to do it every day for 2 months and will be scaling back his driving to weekends only. Why he chose weekends I have no idea, I guess to accommodate work and put it in a more favorable light for him.  He spoke with the manager about it, I guess that means that's a go for him.  

I dunno if I'd want to work at all going through something like that tbh.  Especially considering I have the insurance to cover such things.  You don't get a full paycheck, but that's ok. You scale back on any recreational spending and saving and just pay your bills.  I'm not judging him at all, it just may be that he rethinks that stand once he's into it and realizing the effects that kind of treatment may have on the body.  I mean, it might be a bit difficult if it were me to walk away from this job than it was before the pay raise, but who can work going through such things?

Did I say my paycheck was $400 more than the last one?  I mean, it's going up not down.  I hate working every day for 2 weeks in a row, for now it's just a necessary thing I have to do to pay the bills and hopefully get ahead, at least on the business account.  

Well, there we go. Electric bill paid.  I dunno, I was just holding on to all of that money to see a flourishing business bank account, lol. Next bill will be much higher I am sure with the day time temps up in the mid to high 90's.....June is always hot along with July and August, still quite warm in September, October it will start coming down.  I dunno about grass, I am having different thoughts about it.

The problems is rocks. There are endless rocks and if you go down even a few inches into the soil, there are even more rocks.  I'm wondering if I should change the whole thing to a landscaping rock setup and have maybe a small patch of grass in there somewhere and call it good.  I am not interested in fighting with the natural rocks that are everywhere forever.  If you get one thrown out by a mower, you are screwed.  The only other alternative I've seen is artificial grass, which in my view looks tacky and gaudy.  And I can't imagine it lasting very long before getting dirty.

Another option would be to mix landscaping rock with a cement area for chairs and such.  I'm just not going to sit around wondering if another vehicle is going to be hit with an errant rock and end up doing more damage that is costly.  People won't like a non-grass set up and it doesn't really identify with the name of the business, I have some thinking to do about it.  I don't even know what kind of landscaping rock is available in this area.  

Whatever the case, it's almost time to leave.  Not a big hurry, but in case something is going on over at th park and people see me and start asking questions or bringing up complaints, I like to take extra minutes with me as well.  This because it's later in the day, not 6:20 am when I am usually arriving there to get the truck fired up, get a pre-trip inspection done and get on the road. 

Oh, I reset the router, internet is back up....

G'day.