Thursday - afternoon

Odd day.  

Started out normal enough, was in a deep sleep when the alarm went off. That was unfortunate, I probably would have slept another 2 or 3 hours otherwise.  Got up, got my coffee, yada yada yada, samo samo, same routine every day I have to get up trucking.  Which reminds me and I need to do this now: I ran out of coffee grounds. Had to use K cups - I FAR prefer a fresh brewed pot of coffee over those, but in a pinch? It'll do. Ordering that now, no way I'm going to Walmart today, I get free delivery so that will be that and doing it right now so it will arrive today.  

Yes, coming tonight, now that that's done...

So I start driving down 43.  Southbound, I go over the Interstate and drive about 7 miles before I come around a curve and see tail lights.  It's dark, it's on a curve and just past the crest of a hill, I thought someone pulled over on the side of the road.

NOT!

Traffic stopped. Boy did I push down on that brake pedal pretty hard!  I turned my flashers on, there was another truck behind me - a portable parking lot - and he was heavy, I wanted to make sure he saw me for I didn't need a truck rear ending me at 70  mph - the posted speed limit there.  

We sat there for a long time before anything moved and when it did, it was 50 feet and then we sat again.  Then we moved maybe 200 feet and sat again.  This went on for an hour. I finally got up to a curve and there was a person holding up a stop sign on the curve.  I didn't even know they were metering traffic, I just saw a semi-constant flow of traffic coming from the other direction.

Why were they making us wait so long and the other direction just going through? Well, finally getting past that stop sign there was no good reason at all. I mean, yes, there was an absolutely HORRIBLE looking accident there, but if one way can go, the other can too.  Made no sense to me. 

The accident?  A semi truck rolled over.  When I saw rolled over, I mean the entire trailer was upside down blocking the north bound lane.  This is a 2 lane highway with some passing lanes, this area wasn't that at all.  To further shock and awe you, the tractor (semi tractor, the front part that does all the pulling with the engine in it) was detached from the trailer and smashed up against pine trees well off the highway!

Why is that shock and awe? You never see a 5th wheel and kingpin departing ways from each other. I have seen trucks with most of the tractor hanging off the side of a cliff and the 5th wheel and kingpin never gave up, never backed down, never surrendered. They both held on and the truck was eventually pulled out.  Or the infamous NYC bridge accident where the truck goes smashing off the side of the bridge, the trailer holding it from falling completely down into the water.

And what was holding the tractor on there without ever letting go?  The mighty kingpin and the 5th wheel plate. I have seen so many accidents personally where the combo refused to separate that I thought it impossible or at least near impossible for them to detach from each other simply because a giant amount of force was thrust upon them forcing them to let loose.

Today was the first time I had ever seen that. 

To add to this morning's chaos, it was quite foggy out, extremely limited visibility.  I had to drive much slower than normal just to be safe that some nitwit didn't stop their car in the middle of the blooming highway because they couldn't see. It happens ALL the time.  Not to me, people just do stupid stuff in poor weather conditions.  

Never-the-less, I arrived at the washout around 8:50 am, a full 50 minutes later than normal, but they got me in and out of there and amazingly enough, the plant also immediately started loading me and I got in and out of there in near record time!

I did not go back my normal route for 2 reasons. First, the accident, even many hours later it was still showing yellow on the GPS. That means traffic is slowing but not horrible. Doesn't matter, I am not going to test fate on that one. Second? My heater is fixed! I stopped at a shop on the outskirts of my town, the guy went through stuff and then had a thought: do you have shutoff valves on your heater hoses? Huh? I don't know.  Never gave that any thought.  

He had seen it many times over, we opened the hood and low and behold! Peterbilt in Bossier City had them shut off for some reason and that's why there was no heat! I never even thought about that. I don't think they even put such things in newer trucks now, this is not a newer truck. Back in the day, trucks had shut off valves for literally everything. Drivers were assumed to have to deal with a certain amount of bs out on the road in doing some things themselves.  

This was a 20 minute deal here and when it came time to pay? You can leave.  Huh? Yup, we aren't charging you for that. Are you sure? Yes, you can go. The guy was really cool, we had hit it off right off the bat.  I pulled out a stack of cash and handed him a $20 and a $5.  I'm not going to just leave there without at least leaving a tip and he was agreeable to that.  I informed my manager - tho I didn't ask for the cash back I did inform him I had paid it and he immediately fired back he would include it in my shop pay.  Yes, I get paid for going to repair shops. Most company drivers if not all do.

The real nice part about today? I still got back at 2:00 pm after all of that!  And I don't have to worry about the cold tomorrow and next week, I will not freeze me ass off driving in a cold truck.  The main page of the forecast says it's going to get down in the 40's tomorrow, but going through the hourly even well into tomorrow? It says in the 60's?  Weird. Well, it's fixed regardless and cold weather is definitely coming so I am glad it is done and over with.

Last I heard about the generator repair is that the parts were coming in yesterday.  Haven't heard from him since, but, I didn't necessarily expect to. Parts may not have arrived, he may not have been feeling well, who knows.  

The mower guy finally contacted me back and said he had been going through some stuff and it's also been hard since his car died that his family only has one running vehicle.  I wasn't mad at him, but I had wondered what happened to him. I had messaged him several times asking him to come out if he was available and he never responded.  

I have to deliver tomorrow and then I'm off until Monday.  I basically demanded it.  I am not going to miss church forever for any job.  

And as for now? Well, dinner is in the oven and I have things to get done.