Cheniere - has gotten even worse.  I didn't think that was possible, but how I was wrong.  Now, I get interrogated at the entrance by the security officer there. He demands to see your credentials and then wants credentials I don't have (and won't be getting).  You have your TWIC card? I show that to him.  You have your safety course card? Nope.  You don't have that? Nope. Do you have your LNG railroad commissioner card? Nope.  Why not? I felt like telling him to read the words on the side of the trailer: ETHYLENE. I'm NOT HAULING LNG.  I just shrugged my shoulders. Don't really care.

In reality, I could have just said okay, you aren't going to let me in? Let me in to turn around and I will leave. I really should have called his bluff on that, now that I think of it.  They aren't going to send away a load, they'd still get charged for the shipping and get nothing out of it. He frowned at me, well I have to make a phone call. Great, call the President, I thought, I don't care.  I'll gladly take this loaded trailer somewhere else in America where they actually want the product without all the bs. His posturing did not, of course, stop me from entering the plant.   After 10 minutes of his bs, then I'm to go to the canopy and wait for another security officer to do what? Search the truck. 

He shows up 5 minutes later and then spends another 5 minutes doing whatever in his pickup. Finally comes out and demands to see my TWIC card. I didn't bother to tell him I just showed it to the security officer, not trying to cause trouble here, but if I get sent down there again and they start all of that with me again? I'm just going to tell them if they are refusing to allow me in to deliver the load, I'll call my manager, let him know and he can hash that out with the plant managers who will very likely be giving you  a phone call : )

So, 20 minutes wasted at the second checkpoint with an authoritarian and then had to follow him to the next checkpoint.  Now I have several security officers at a guard shack asking me to do this, that and the other thing, including showing my TWIC card a THIRD TIME.  Then off into a small cubicle where there is a guy stationed to take your temperature. Back to the truck, they come out, we were wrong, you need to come in here to get your visitor pass. Yes, I knew that.  Again, didn't say that, just trying to get through all of this garbage.  In the shack, he looks me up, oh yes you've been here before. Yes, like 100 times.  I didn't try to blow up your plant those times, why on earth do you people make it so difficult for us to get in here?  

He just laughed.  I then sat at that place for over 2 hours waiting for the plant workers to come get me.  All kinds of excuses were offered why they didn't come sooner, I was getting annoyed by that time, lets' get this over with.  But I already knew that all of this bs I went through just to get into the plant would cost me getting home yesterday.  After I got out of there, I knew I was about 40 minutes short of enough on duty hours to make it back. So, I spent the night at a truckstop some 67 miles out for no more reason than these people causing all kinds of grief because - they can. 

Time to push back on that bs.  Likely plant managers don't have any real idea how they are treating truck drivers, I'd like to change that.  I told my manager today all of the bs they put you through to get in there, plus all the waiting.  He got a hold of the plant manager yesterday after I texted him again, saying I've been sitting here for hours.  It was maybe 10 or 15 minutes later that plant workers showed up - with all of their accompanying excuses.

I also told my manager that not a single driver likes this run, it drags out into 2 days, we aren't hardly paid anything for it, there needs to be some adjustments made here in the pay to at least make the time wasted more bearable.  

I have no idea when I'm going out again, but I want my truck fixed before that happens.  It's got a coolant leak somewhere and I'm tired of dealing with it.  

Home early at least. Got into the yard around 9:30 am.  Vacuuming floors currently and going to do some other stuff. I'm hoping to have tomorrow off so I can get that pond up and running.  Like, start early and have it done by mid afternoon.  I need to have the transition completely done in one day, I can't have it half and half.  It's noon now I just don't feel comfortable starting that project without an entire day to ensure that if there are any glitches I will have time to rectify them.

And Addler washed.  He smelled horrid. I have no idea what that dog got into, but it was repulsive in smelling it.  He smelled like it the other day, just got a chance to thoroughly wash the dog down. A dog that size is no small undertaking. He's a good boy tho, he just stood there and took it the whole time - he hates the water hose but he knows he has no choice when I'm telling him to stay, he gonna stay.  Lmao

Requested to wash the other dogs. Not today, thanks, that giant dog was enough.  The other dogs don't smell like he did,, either. However, Aspyn could use a thorough washing to get excess hair off of her.  Maybe use some conditioner for the lady dogs of course want to smell good lol.  

 Headache. 

Other than that not much aftermath from driving all night long. Haven't done that in a while and actually not regretting it since I'm home 10 plus hours earlier than I would have been otherwise.  Whether that becomes a habit for future runs where driving all night would actually get me home faster remains to be seen.\

Tomorrow's run will make no difference. Instead of the Brownsville run I was initially given, i was relegated to a rather worthless Oklahoma run - now that our manager is dispatching again I suspect I will see a lot more of this garbage while witnessing at the same time certain individuals who will get one gravy run after another after another.  Oh, well it won't make any difference for it is impossible to do that run in one day.  I actually wouldn't care about that garbage if it also means getting a decent run afterwards and counting on this pay period's paycheck.

It's already noon-thirty, the day wasting away, tho I just got up a while ago so I at least have an excuse lol.  

Well, let's see here. Jaxon apparently fell off the bunk bed and hit his head on the floor. Docs said no need to bring him in unless he shows specific signs - what those were I wasn't party to. He seems to be doing okay besides throwing up at breakfast.  

James I just found out is going up to Missouri for 10 days.  Temporary job from the uncle who needs some sort of fencing work, I believe he said, done.  James is unemployed at the moment and failed the welding test, unfortunately, so this will be a boost for his income while he figures out what's next.  Of course, that leaves the family here without him, I'll certainly help out in his absence on whichever days I may happen to be home.  Taylor will want the help I'm sure lol.  I wouldn't be surprised if she finds a friend to come stay for at least part of the time James is gone to help out with the kids.  I can't be here every day, obviously.  

Umm, I'm only doing some laundry today and I guess I'll go out in a minute to drain out the horse trough so it doesn't turn into an algae infested, mosquito larvea filled cesspool, tho I suspect it's already headed that way.  Easy enough to drain it out with the pump and clean it out with the power washer.  

_________________

Sunday morning. My original load that was going to Brownsville, ditched and given an Oklahoma run? Yeah, that changed as well. I've been downgraded to the worst run we have: Cheniere.  I thoroughly and absolutely despise that place. Last of our drivers that was there said he was stuck there for 2 solid days.  They wouldn't let him leave but they couldn't take the product either.  A one day run - sometimes, usually not because they drag their feet and don't care how long you are stuck there - usually drags out to a second day.  I have not been there in at least a year, probably much longer. Like a faded memory, another company took over that account and none of us drivers cared.  Please take over that account and never give it away! It's not even 500 miles round trip of driving ,which adds to the nausea that this particular trip is. 

 At 5:30 am, I'm home.

No one actually asked me to drive all night long. My manager texted me a run for - today - yesterday afternoon - before I even had an empty.  It was 4:00 pm, he only replied "seriously".  Yes and I said a few things - that he never responded to.  He's a lousy communicator and I really don't think this job is a good fit for him.  He doesn't reply to texts and he doesn't answer his phone.  

Anyway, a trailer finally came in a 6:00 pm - I was thinking if one didn't come in before 8, I'm closing the curtain on my sleeper and I will get up early in the morning and see if one is there.  That way, I can legitimately claim more detention pay (it's not cheating, they actually tell you to do that).  

I sort of had it in my head to drive through the night and get this over with - after the manager texted 3 of us in a group text and said we would be working Sunday, details coming tomorrow - which is now today - at noon.  If I drive 300 miles and stop for the night, I thought, I won't get home until afternoon.  

I made it to Rosenberg - started yawning - decided to take a 40 minute nap.  It was midnight, still a lot of driving left to go.  If, after the nap is done, I wake up feeling good, I'm driving. If I feel groggy and out of it - I'm going back to sleep. Driving won.  I only stopped once the rest of the 260 miles to get fuel. It was the fastest trip I have ever made from Brownsville to Longview.  

But, that didn't mean the clock stopped.  It's now 5:45 am, I just got in here 15 minutes ago, just trying to wind down so I can get whatever sleep I'm getting before either a 3 and 5 year old making noise wakes me up or daylight says no thanks, time to get up.  And since I'm going back out tomorrow, plus I still have to get some sleep, I have no aspirations of doing much of anything today.  

The exception is if I'm being sent on a longer trip - I'll be going to the store and getting some supplies. 

Oh, and Addler stinks to high heaven.  I have no idea what that dog got himself into, but when I walked into this bedroom a force of nature assaulted my nostrils that was overwhelming.  He was on my bed of which I threw him off of and yes, later on today, I will have to wash all my bedding again AND wash that smelly dog. So I guess I should change that, I do have some aspirations, but only by virtue of force of needing to be done.  I was happy to spray air freshener - half a bottle of it - all over the place which made the atmosphere more acceptable.  He'll be getting thrown outside as soon as anyone wakes up.  

I really can't believe I just drove that route all night long, lol.  

And it's hitting me, time to go to bed.  

 4 hours of sleep is all i could manage. Woks up at 8:15 am and that was that.  That is the main reason I don't like doing night driving, it totally messes up the next day for me.  And sometimes it literally takes days to recover and feel right again.  Not something I would want to do on a regular basis, I am definitely not a night owl by the standard definition of the term.  

And already, the manager has texted 3 of us informing us we have work tomorrow.  Do I have a problem with that? Nope.  I don't have enough hours available to go on a long run.  I could do a 2 day run max before having to do a 34 hour reset.  I dunno why he feels the need to group text the individuals that are working the next day, it's kind of weird.

He then group texted everyone and informed all of us the dispatcher has moved on to a different position within the company and he will be doing our dispatching from now on.  I doubt she was moved to another position, she was probably let go.  They have been systematically getting rid of all of the employees from our previous company over the last - however long a year plus at least now since the merger took place and they got rid of our company's name and most of the management.  I dunno if they intend on getting rid of drivers as well from that company, if that happens I"m screwed.  I have leads on other jobs - been looking just in case that happens.  

None of them pay anything near what I'm making now.  It's still decent money, a couple of these other jobs but I'm fairly happy what I'm doing now.  I'm just hoping they don't decide to dump the rest of us and be done with JBK employees altogether.  

________________

Another Brownsville run. Apparently telling them I hadn't been on one in almost 8 weeks? Or driving half the night? Or both.  Or, just out of need and getting that position by sheer luck? I dunno but I'll take it.  That's will give me a net paycheck of 2 grand minimum.  Taxes eat me alive the bigger the paychecks go - and the amount being deposited into 401k.  I've got a chunk of change going into savings, but I'm thinking upping savings and decreasing 401k a few percentage points.  It's prudent IMO in this pandemic situation to have plenty of cash available.  I do have that, lol, but I want more - it's mostly trying to get money saved up for business investment.  My retirement would be better funded by a constant, monthly income than what I'll be able to save in the next - however many years before I retire. 

It's something I want to get done sooner rather than later.  The older I get the less motivation lol.  A lot of mental and physical energy needed to get something like that going.  Once it's going and everything fluid, less trouble and hand the management of it off to someone else and reap the benefits. I already have someone in mind. Just got to get there.

And there it is, Thursday morning.  About to leave for the yard to go to the plant.  The first load is the driver that boasts they will never train him to unload the trailers, he literally gets nothing but Brownsville run unless the plant shuts down then they reroute him. Does that sound fair to you?  I could make 6 figures per year doing just brownsville.  Never-the-less, after he complained about a text I sent to the group I have no further dealings with him. Privileged, entitled person that is highly likely getting all of this because of his skin color.

The real minorities - politically wise  not the numbers of people in each race - that are being marginalized, shamed, shunned and called all kinds of names are white people. You have to be guilty of nothing to earn the title of being racist if your skin is white.  Far more so if you happen to be a Trump supporter, then a whole book of stupid names and adjectives are hurled at you.  Happens to me all the time on Facebook. A small grouping of people are radically changing the way this nation operates, how it looks at "social justice" and attempting to rewrite the history books.  The Constitution is trampled on when it's convenient for them to attempt to quell the 1st Amendment rights of average citizens.

We are living in different times. I have no predictions of what will happen in November if Trump wins.  Beyond chaos and heterdyne, more violence in the streets, more buildings being burned down, more citizens and cops assaulted and the left blaming it on Trump. I do predict the crash of the stock market if Biden wins.  Probably the economy will go to burnt toast again as well, as his intended taxation policiies will affect far more than just the upper income earners, contrary to his claim that those are the only ones that will be affected.

Just look at New York City right now - people are fleeing the place in droves, the news stories are abundant with it.  Much of this is because of shuttered business and the "mayor" wanting to raise taxes on everything, the streets aren't safe, covid 19 is still an issue and nobody wants to live there now. AS far as I can see it, Biden wants to do this to the entire nation. 

NFL starts tonight - I won't be watching it.  I gave up on it last season.  It's now even worse than last year with the politizication of a game that used to be about people coming together for a social event regardless of your political views, putting that behind you for a few moments in time and cheering on your team.  Now? It's players preaching to you the gospel of BLM, an "organization" loosely conceived that I consider to be a terrorist organization at this point.  Players will allegedly have names of police 'victims' on their helmets and apparently words - not sure what - are going to be painted onto the field. 

The name Blake should not be heralded all over the place as some victim of police brutality, neither should several of the others shot and/or killed by police.  I'm not going into that right now for i have to leave and it's an argument that's been hashed out to the nth degree. Sure, there needs to be some type of police reform, but nothing like wanting to defund police departments and get rid of cops. That was and is the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard.

With that, I'm out to get the day started.  

G'day.  

 It's almost 3 am.  Why did I know, when a trailer finally showed up around 3:00 pm, that the dispatcher would text me, ask me if the trailer had come in and had I left yet - that trailer is scheduled to be used tomorrow.  I in no wise wanted to drive half the night getting that thing back there, but I had no choice.  Want to get on a s*** list? Just decide you are going to stop for the night somewhere instead of driving it out and see what happens.  

So I did it.  Drove the route out, dropped the trailer, did my paperwork and came home.  I was  half tempted to spend the night in the truck and skip going home, but then I thought, it's this late already, what's another 35 minutes?  What am I doing on here?  I"m all wired out.  There's something about night driving that gets me going, especially under force of having to drive well into the night to get the job done.   So, I have to wind down or I will just lay in bed for hours and not be able to go to sleep.  

I was amazed pulling into the yard, only a few trucks and trailers. We must have gotten busy cause not only that but a lot of personal vehicles parked all over the place.  I actually wouldn't mind going out tomorrow - Thursday that is - on a 2 day run and get a very healthy paycheck next week.  

Changing the subject, every time I get on Facebook, my lefty friends on there who hate (not just dislike) Trump have posts that are stupid, ridiculous and unbelievable show up first thing. Every single day. As if Facebook wants me to see this s*** first.  I told one of them a few days ago if I couldn't find a way to hide her posts I was going to unfriend her for the seething hate and stupid memes gets old.  Another person I've known since the 80's I told him I would no longer be commenting on his account - more Trump hate and inability to have a civil conversation with him about said President. He erupts into personal attacks and name calling.  It's unbelievable.  Yet another one - also posts stupid garbage about Trump ALL day long - these people, how do they survive in the real world?

I thoroughly despised most of Obama's policies but I wasn't so obsessed with him that all I did, all day long, was post stupid crap about him.  Memes are not a valid form of debate, btw.  I can make a meme and say anything I want to in it, anyone can make a meme and lots of people distort the truth through them, especially that Riden' With Biden' meme garbage.  The current craze is the "losers and suckers" statement that Trump made.

Except there isn't a shred, not a scintilla of evidence he ever said that and plenty of evidence that he would never say such a thing.  I had yet another "friend" call Trump supporters stupid  and morons with one of the freshly minted sucker memes that have poured out all over the internet.  I called her out on that.  Where is the video that shows him saying that? "Google it".  She didn't even know that this accusation is coming from an unnamed source through the Atlantic.  She literally thought there was video of him saying it.  This is how deceived people are, they don't care if it's true or not, if it's about Trump and casts a shadow of negativity on him, it MUST be TRUE! 

 It's disgusting and revolting what's going on with the media.  And the utterly hypocritical politicians such as Pelosi and her hair salon debacle.  Portland's "peaceful protests".  Blake being called a hero and Kamala Harris telling him "I'm proud of you".  I'm truly sickened by what's going on in America right now.  The nation has become godless, immoral, immature, hateful, divisive and angry. Hint: Trump is NOT the cause of all of this.  You people that think this violence and rioting is good for the country are disgusting.  There isn't any virtue in assaulting cops, innocent civilians, looting private businesses and burning down buildings in the name of = what?

What are we protesting now? Cops?  Buildings?  People with differing opinions?  I could go on all night long, but good Lord, it's 3:30 am - watching a bit of news, just a bit.  Lol.  

But wait until November comes.  If Trump wins?   I find it hard to believer that democrats would take it graciously.  I dunno, but I have been slowly stocking up on ammo.  

I'm not getting anything done in the back yard today.  I won't be out of bed before noon lmao.  Or if I can't sleep because it's daytime, then I'll just be miserably tired and won't want to do anything.  The only thing pressing is get the water out of the horse trough - it's going to start growing algae and probably full of mosquito larvae.  No thanks to either.  I'll get that done tomorrow regardless of how I feel.  I'm saying tomorrow, lol, it's today.  I'm betting this late night venture will mess with me for 2 days.  

With that, although I'm still not sleepy, I'm getting offa here.  

 So - sitting and waiting. 

The group that undertakes finding a local mechanic to come out and repair trailers didn't have them come until this morning.  Cost controls I'm sure, not to mention they wouldn't have been able to find the parts in the middle of the night anyway.  Well the mechanic showed up around 8:00 am, was here an hour and left.  That was 4-1/2 hours ago.  

But I'm not waiting on them to fix that trailer, that is out of my hands for once it's fixed, it goes down into Mexico.  I'm waiting on empties.  The yard people here told me "midday" today - whatever that means to them. To me it means noon, I'm guessing to them it means 3:00 pm or later.  Whatever the case, it's getting too late to make it back today - which doesn't bother me at all but if they think I"m driving all night long to get that trailer back in the yard by morning? 

Well they best ask and ask nicely cause' it's not on my list of things I want to do right now.  I don't mind sleeping in the truck another night versus driving all night long.  Well, unless it's one of those rare times where I feel like I can drive as long as needed to get it over with - doesn't happen often but it does happen.  

Anyway, it was what I thought it was - burned up bearings.  The actual damage isn't that bad.  The wheels and tires are good, the spindle is good, they are just going to have to replace bearings, the hub, the brake drum and the wheel lug studs.  Sounds like a lot and it will cost them, but it would have cost a lot more if the spindle had been damaged or the wheels lost.

Amazingly, the lead mechanic said this same thing happened to this trailer a few weeks ago on the other side - and the never were able to find the wheels.  They probably didn't look far enough.  I've seen truck wheels rolling off of trucks that will go for half a mile before it finally stops.  

Anyway, the next door neighbor spent $450 for a crew of 3 people that spent 18 hours working on the property to clean it up.  It looks really nice.  They raked the entire back yard and carried out bags and bags and bags of leaves, branches and other stuff.  Now that they finally got that done, I feel motivated to go ahead and try cleaning the entire back yard again.  It's just been a waste of time up until now.  I also thought about digging a small canal between their property and ours - have it drain out into the creek in the back.  And the pond. I was hoping to make it back home today so I could get that pond stuff going tomorrow. 

That is highly likely not going to happen.  

Anyway, I guess I'll just sit here and wait patiently, lol.  

 First time I've ever seen them do it that way, they brought in empty trailers before taking out the loaded ones. Dunno, but they came in at noon, the first taken by the dude ahead of me and then 15 minutes later the second one came in.  

I fought heavy thunderstorms all the way back up.  Literally, get out of one, drive a few miles and right back into another one.  Houston being the worst because everyone turns on their flashers and then slows down to 1/3 of the speed limit.  Great, get OUT of my way.  Don't load up all 3 lanes with this nonsense, if you are too afraid to go the speed limit, move over out of the inside lane.  I don't understand why people don't get this.  

But they don't - or more likely don't care and everything gets blocked and you're sitting there just trying to remain calm and not let this stuff get to you.  I drove almost 8 hours without stopping except a couple of minutes at a rest area and 15 minutes at a store to get a bit to eat.  When my 8 hours was almost up, I stopped at a place I normally do on the way back up to take the mandatory 30 minute rest break.  The other truck was sitting there as well. 

After that, into Lufkin, fuel up and then......a few miles down the road... at 9:00 pm..........the lights flashing.  What lights? The lights for the inspection station. I couldn't believe they were pulling trucks in there on a Saturday night, 9 pm, at that place. Sure, there are weigh stations open on Interstates 24 hours a day - not all of them, just saying some are open all the time - but this place? 

The first trooper I came across said go ahead, you can leave. Pulling up 100 feet and about to leave, another trooper said stop. And so it went. A level 2 inspection.  The trooper was n't being polite, to put it mildly - first one in quite a long time that I have encountered that was acting that way.  Especially Texas, they are usually quite cordial and easy to deal with.  I dunno, I wasn't in the mood for foul treatment but I also wasn't in the mood for getting tickets.  I'm like 75 miles out from the yard - I want to go home. I don't want to deal with this nonsense at this hour of the night.  

Bring in your paperwork.  I brought it in. I need this that, the other thing, the other other thing and trailer registration.  They don't normally ask for trailer registration so I went back out to get it. What I thought was the trailer registration turned out to be the trailer annual inspection certificate.  I took that back in. Well I need the registration!  OK, I'll look again, I couldn't find it. Back outside, I searched the entire interior of the rear cabinet - nothing.  I texted my manager - I think I'm about to get a ticket judging from the way this guy is acting - there is no registration paper in this trailer.  

Well, this trooper apparently didn't want to wait for me so he came out and took a pic of the license and went back in.  I went around the entire trailer, looking for a container with the registration in it.  I threw my hands up, I can't find it, walked back inside. I dunno, sir, I thought the registration was the paper I brought into you when I did my pretrip, I had no idea it wasn't the registration.  I gave up on ttempting to appease the dude, I just treated him respectfully but gave up on it, figured I was getting a ticket and that was that.

Sat there forever.  I mean, other drivers came and went with their inspections while I was sitting there waiting on this dude to finish typing up his report.  Worried? Nope, it is what it is. I don't want scars on my record but most truckers have something on there, I figured it was my turn.  You can only get inspected and get a "no violations found" so many times before they - find something wrong.  Attitude means something, if you can get your head into the right mind frame and talk to them in a way that isn't in anger, impatience, stupid - you can get away with stuff.  If it's just paperwork or minor. If you have bad tires, brakes, air leaks, etc, you aren't getting away with that.  

His attitude mellowed out, at least, after sitting there a while.  I learned long ago however messed up they are, however foul, curt, short tempered, if you throw gas on their internal fires, it's going to turn out far worse for you than if you had just kept your mouth shut, forced a fake smile on your face and grin and bear it.  Truckers love to argue with CV inspection officers, they don't do themselves any favors and that's all on them.

So, after all of that time and he finally printed out his report, I was rather shocked to hear him say everything looked A okay, no problems. Please sign this either of these and keep one for yourself.  Say what? You've got to be joking me, I thought but didn't say out loud.   This dude was having a literal cow over the trailer registration.  He was impatient, petulant and bossy.  WHATEVER.  I just smiled, said thank you sir, he said thank you sir back and I hightailed it out  of there.  

That's a face palm moment with accompanying emoji that this thing isn't offering.  🤦🤦🤦🤦🤦

Ahh, there it is, just do a search in the emoji field.  

Ohhh! and this Ohio run? nixed. I texted Sheila - she's the dispatcher in Amarillo - there is no way I'm making it back in time to get a 10 hour break and then make it to the plant.  Skipping a lot of small talk - I like to find out about the people I'm talking to if they are open to it and I have my ways of getting to that place where they want  to discuss their personal dealings - she gave the Ohio run to someone else and then gave me another run to Brownsville on Monday!  So,  get to stay home tomorrow - well it's today now, 1 am, I didn't get home til after midnight - and then down there and back. They are so obsessed now with no detention pay after they got rid of my previous manager, I don't really expect it anymore.  So this trip was a pleasant surprise and a chunk of Benjamins to add to the trip.  

Umm, yeah, the dude that got dumped with the Ohio trip? VERY unhappy. He didn't know the whole story, but he got onto the group text and exclaimed that this driver from Louisiana - who refuses to learn how to unload trucks - got his Brownsville run and he has to go to Ohio.

I'm going to skip a lot of stuff and just say that these drivers love to complain about things that should be changed - but are too afraid to bring it up to management. If you just want to complain but do nothing about it, SHUT UP, thank you.  That's putting it nicely : )  It became evident they are all talk and no walk. I have no qualms speaking up about things that are obviously wrong and need fixing - just have to be nice about it, be less than direct and appeal to their authority.  Throw the ball into their court - but do it in a way they didn't even know the ball had been thrown.  It's called tact and I have it when I want to. It's not kissing ass - I don't do that well for I wasn't brought up that way.  

Well whatever. Dogs extremely happy to see me home lol.  One of the cats had been yelling for so long it was hoarse. Poor little kitty.  But it can stay in the pantry with the other cat, I'll let it out in the morning.  The other cat isn't allowed out - some problem with it. I'm not a cat person, don't ask me lol.

My UV sterilizer arrived - well ahead of their stated arrival date.  Taylor intoned where she wants the pond, not where I thought.  Much closer to the house and removing a brick structure she apparently doesn't like and put the pond where that structure exist.  I dunno if I'll start on that tomorrow or not, lots of physical labor involved with that.  I wish I had a brisket, if I'm going to be out there I might as well smoke something in the smoker.  I'm good with the location, lol.  I'll probably start on it, I'd really like to get this thing up and running. Motivation, in other words.  She wants a full tilt waterfall - she didn't demand that or anything, but it became obvious that is something she would love to see - so I'm going to have to think that one through a bit, how far I want to go with that.  I could build a very entailed thing that looks natural. Lots of work, but I could do it.  Doesn't mean I couldn't get the pond going before it's built, that doable.  

Umm, so. Sunday off. Whatever the holiday is Monday I'm working.  No biggies, they won't be home until late afternoon or evening anyways.  Labor Day, that's it.  Well I'll be celebrating Labor Day by laboring lmao.  

And with that, it's probably time to go to bed. I'm just a bit hyped out with that inspection and that officer, trying to wind down. 

 9:11 AM Saturday morning.

Trip down here - I'm in Brownsville - not terribly bad considering I didn't sleep worth a crap.  

This will mark the first time in 4 trips down here that I finally get some holdover-detention pay.  No trailers here last night, another driver ahead of me will get whatever comes in here first - tho normally they come in with 2 trailers almost at the same time whenever they do come in here.  Like, 10 minutes after the first one comes in, the second one shows up.  

All fine and dandy, my manager contacted me at 11:00pm - last night - asking "did you pick up an empty?".  Why is he contacting me that late at night? No idea, I had already gone to sleep and had forgotten to turn off my ringer.  Won't be making that mistake again for a while.  I have no obligation to be answering non-essential questions at near midnight.  

If you've read this blog for any length of time you know that I am a very light sleeper and once I wake up, it takes a while or a long time to get back to sleep.  

Again, at 8:00 am, the dispatcher this time, contacts me and asks about picking up an empty?  Umm, no, I"m sure she already knew that, not like they can't see exactly where I am at with GPS - and, I continued, the other driver is also waiting.  

I'm seeing if this drags out long enough that I can't make a 7:30 am load appointment tomorrow morning.  The saga of two "privileged" drivers who get nothing but Brownsville runs continues to drag on, as I was contacted yesterday with a run, told to cancel that, then another run, told to cancel that because there are "issues".  

The issue? The dude that boasts how the company will never train me how to unload trucks refused to take the load to Ohio on Sunday for "I don't know how to unload the trucks" - which is a lie from the pit of hell for I talked to a highly experienced driver a while back who said he had taken this dude to one of the trailers and showed him how everything works and how to unload.  In the case of what we deliver, it's not rocket science, nothing near as entailed as the Nitrogen and Oxygen I was learning over in Connecticut.  

So, I got bumped for what would have been a second Brownsville run in a row - after having not had any of them for almost 2 solid months - because of this dude.  Pissed me off, to be frank about it. This guy has been around for almost 6 months now and they aren't forcing him to learn. 

So yes, I did say something to the dispatcher about it, this stuff grows old.  "Uhh, btw, Edgar showed him how to unload a while back".  This dispatcher apparently isn't happy about this situation either, but only because other drivers continue to complain about it.  Literally, if we don't say anything, they'll just let it ride indefinitely.  These two drivers that are literally getting nothing but gravy runs have been her for something like 6 to 8 months now, transferred over from other divisions where I'm sure they would have had to have known/learned how to unload whatever they were hauling before.  That's the way it works in this company.

She texted back that she is tempted to start sending them on Oklahoma runs only and let them stew until they decide it's rather important to know how to do every aspect of this job.  Yes please.  Not that that will happen, but getting bumped by another driver who has far less seniority because of this endless excuse is irritating to say the least.  I might have had yet another chance at detention pay for it would have had me down here on Sunday and that's one of the best days to get here in terms of no trailers available. 

The whole deal with Brownsville run is you get a 2 day run that pays for 3 days of driving when you get overnight detention.  That's the deal.  Less miles, more money, easy peasy.  Of course everyone likes and yes, of  course it should be evenly distributed to everyone, not just 2 people that come up and down here all the freaking time. I flatly stated to the dispatcher that this was the first time in almost two MONTHS that I have had one of these runs. She said she would keep that in mind.

Yes, please and thank you.  "Yes sir".  So at least if nothing else - I was polite to her - a bit straightforward about it but that is the way I do most things, nothing new there - but firm enough to get my point across.  So I'll take the Ohio run and put this nonsense out of my mind at least temporarily.  I mean, it's 2,000 miles round trip so if nothing else, it's a good paying run but you're running hard to try and get it done in 3 days, if at all possible.

Leave the yard and the first goal is to get to Farina, Illinois.  That's 710 miles up the road.  You can't have any lengthy delays, if you do, you can cancel that idea.  After that, you drive the 300 plus miles up to the plant, hopefully get offloaded as soon as you get there - you call ahead and let them know you're coming and is it possible to unload me today? type of thing - then you try to make it back to Farina.  If you look at GPS at Farina on satellite view - really small town - there is a huge truckstop right off of I-57 there. It's never filled up because it's not a major brand name truckstop, always a parking spot there, which makes it an even more desirable destination, you don't have to worry about parking.  

If you don't make it back at least that far, good luck in making it a 3 day run.  Is it mandatory to do it in 3 days? No, it's desirable to get any of these runs over and done with as fast as possible, go home, spend time with dogs/kids/surrogate family before having to go back out again.  

But, here's the deal: If they don't get a trailer in here for me before, umm, well about now - 9:30 am - which is almost impossible, there is no way I will make it back to the yard in time to get a 10 hour break in time to get to the plant to get loaded.  Impossible.  Now, this new manager has attempted to rid us of all  detention pay, a thing all of us said something about, something of which I stated in person, to his face that we like and the company should like since they are making a large amount of money off of it as well - well he's obviously trying to get the plant in Mexico to get two trailers up here in time to get us on the road to get back to the yard in Longview.  

But I know how this works.  The local drivers hook up to the loaded trailers we pull in here, take them across the border and bring empties back over. That's usually a 2 hour process. I don't even think they're in the yard yet.  If they are, they haven't hooked up to those trailers and so I'm not getting out of here before noon at the earliest.  See, they take the loaded ones to their yard across the border which is where their OTR Mexico drivers hook up and take them to the plant in Altamira.  

That's the way it's gone down here for the almost 3 years I've been coming down here, I doubt the new manager has been able to change that, it wouldn't make any sense for them to cross the border with tractors only.  I'm just thinking out loud here, I may get off of the Ohio load and someone else can take it up there.  My objection to it is that they don't unload you until the next day after you arrive - meaning you're sitting there for up to 18 hours. Last time I went up there, they changed everything and had a night worker there unloading. Which was great, I got up there, got unloaded and get the Hercules out of there.  Back to Farina and it was a 3 day trip - it was the only time I've ever been able to do that run in 3 days.  But now, some other driver disputed that and said that they had reverted back to their normal shifts, but he as "not sure" about that.

I am not in love with sitting around a plant for 18 hours doing nothing and not getting paid a dime to sit there and wait - it's the not getting paid part that is baloney to me.  If they want this stuff up there, then get someone there at the plant to unload it. Otherwise, pay us.  We are on time, they should  have to deal with it one way or the other.  

Whatever the case, James/Taylor/kids went to Missouri yesterday.  She wasn't going to go because of the Corona virus scare, but since she tested negative, they decided to go anyway.  It was preplanned a while back until she got that fever and came down sick.  I do have a problem with them going up there: untold number of stories saying people have tested negative only to get another test - and even show negative then and then yet another test after they remain sick and find out they do, indeed have the virus. They're going to visit another grandma up there in her 80's I do believe. If she gets that virus, that's almost like a death sentence.  I hope Taylor doesn't have it, her fever has been gone a couple of days at least.  

Regardless, the 5 year old 2 nights ago was almost in tears because I told him I had to go to work the next day - which he knows means I'll be gone for several days usually.  I dunno why that boy is attached to me so much, but he is. I mean, we horse play alot lol.  He's almost grown up with me - sans the 2 years they were in Georgia.  I was around when he was a baby, missed the 2 to 3 year old stage and then caught the 4 and now 5 year old stage. He started kindergarten last week, he's a "big boy" now lol.  Anyway, he took his wristband off - it says "I can read, I rock!" and put it on my wrist. Declared I can have that until I get back and then he gets the wristband back.  Oh yes, you'll get it back!  

Good that they can go visit that particular grandma. She's only been down once to visit and she's getting up there in age.  

The dispatcher just texted.  I told her that they haven't even moved the empty trailers out of the yard, much less thinking about bringing in empty ones, I'd suggest you start working on plan B for getting that load up to Ohio.  They know that there are 2 trailers coming up today - they don't know when they're arriving.  Well, nothing against Mexicans, but their culture is a "take your time" culture.  They're not in a big hurry.  Especially with the rain, it rained all night long. Looks like it's clearing out here, but looks like it's raining almost the entire road up here from Altamira. Dunno how that affects them, but Mexico isn't known for it's great roads to begin with. 

Welp, that's enough for this one. I think I"ll go to Wing Stop when they open in 45 minutes and get some of their delicious wings to go.  

 Down 7 pounds since I started on Sunday.  6 days, 7 pounds.  That's not bad.  Motivation to keep going strict with carbs.  That's eating no sugar, potatoes, spaghetti, rice, beans, bread, milk, etc etc etc.  Taylor asking me what I want for dinner last night, I said how about some goulash with the ground beef I bought? Well you can't have the noodles tho.  No, I can take a portion of the sauce and put cooked cabbage in with it, it will be delicious.  So that's what we had.

I'm dreading whatever route I'll get tomorrow.  I haven't done nay serious driving since before I left for Vermont.  Vermont was a more attentive type of driving on narrow 2 lane highways, but the distances were short.  Most routes we have here are long and you're driving 600 to 700 miles a day to get them done.  That's quite the difference.  

Rained all night long and slated to rain all day today.  So my plans to start situating the pond still on hold.  

Forgot to take out the drain plug on the boat, I'll have to go do that this morning, that boat's hull fills up quickly, much faster than I ever would have expected, when it's raining.  Well I'm going to try to wait until I get tomorrow's work assignment so I can figure out if I need to make a bunch of food in advance - and subsequent visit to Kroger's or not.  I suspect I will be in limbo until this afternoon - which means I might as well bite the bullet and get over there and get that drain plug out.  Not good for the wiring being submerged in water, the hull will completely fill up, no joke. When I first got that boat and saw that after it rained I was a bit shocked, actually.  Like, how did it fill up that fast?!!

They have, apparently, fixed this week's paycheck to reflect monies left out last week. Plus all of the expenses with the receipts I turned in, if I'm reading it correctly, plus the minimum daily wage.  It's around a 4 grand paycheck - before taxes of course tho the expenses won't be taxed.  That will replenish my rather deleted checking account after spending all of that money on baggage fees and eating plus not getting paid everything that i was supposed to last week.  I'm going to have to print the last 2 weeks pay out with the itemizations  and ensure that I am being paid for all of it, for tomorrow's paycheck will - should - reflect the full amount of what I am owed for that trip.  

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Coronavirus certainly hasn't made land owners who are attempting to sell their land in this area desperate.  Land going for extremely exorbitant price per acre for undeveloped land. As much as 10k per acre.  I dunno why they think it's worth that much money, but it's nothing I'm going to get involved with.  I've been looking.  Today I spent more time perusing lots for sale, just unbelievable.  It bascically forces the issue that if i want land, I'll have to buy elsewhere, pay a very steep price for it or get it at one of the tax lien auctions.  I've been watching for the next one coming up, but since they had one at the beginning of July, I don't really expect to see another one until probably September.

I would like to hope whatever the next one is, it will have few people there.  The virus has hit enough people's personal finances, perhaps that's favorable for a tax lien sale.  I dunno but I intend on being at the next one if at all possible.  They always have at least a couple of 30 plus acre properties for sale, tho usually the amount of minimum bid is more than I have.  Whatever the case, the fund for that ventures grows monthly, but at the rate it is going, it will be a couple of years before there is enough to stand a legitimate chance at any decent amount of acreage.  But, it's a goal and I have a chunk of change going into Autosave every month. 

Whatever the case, the boat was almost full of water.  Good thing I went over there when I did.  More rain today. Plus I forgot to put the hitch lock on it. It may be a secure lot, but that doesn't make it theft proof.  I keep putting off getting insurance on it, but I guess I best do it in case I get into an accident or in case it's stolen.  

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$309 for a full year's worth of full coverage insurance on the boat if paid up front.  That's everything including towing and bringing fuel out to you up to 3 grand.  That's pretty small price to pay to have the assurance that if I wreck the thing, if someone else runs into it, if I run into anyone, if it's in a car accident being towed, if it's stolen, I will be covered or reimbursed.  I think that kind of money spent on that thing warrants having some insurance on it.  That's less than $30 per month (monthly payments ratchet it up to double that price, I'll be paying it up front).  

And I'm going to Brownsville tomorrow morning. She sent a 10:30 load time which would have been great for starting back out again. But 5 minutes later she said it was moved up to 7:30 am.  I'm not sure what to think about that. If I'm getting bumped for someone else getting the 2cd or 3rd load spot for that run, then I'm going to be unhappy.  It removes the chance - or greatly lessons it anyway - of getting any detention pay.  She said they bumped her up on it, we'll see. I've noticed a penchant for management and dispatchers to make up (false) stories in this company.  As always, if I weren't making as much money as I am on a yearly basis, I would seriously be thinking about finding a new place to work - tho that alone wouldn't do it. Just the combination of things.  

As the old saying goes, money talks, bs walks.  It's been almost 2 months since I've been to Brownsville, it will be nice to do a familiar route that I don't have to even think about how to get down there, just automatic in my brain lol.  Note that the last 3 times I've been down there I have gotten no detention pay.  And note that the story is coming out that the new manager has basically tried to get rid of it completely.  I figured that from the beginning tho it made zero since since it decreases the amount of money the company gets for that account - substantially decreases it.  

And the Dow Jones - after going to record highs, dived 810.87 points today.  I was so close to 100k in my 401k's. Yes, that isn't very much money but for me, it really is.  Couldn't retire on that but I feel like I'm really getting somewhere finally with it. I'm not concerned about a huge drop, we've seen that over and over this year and yet it keeps coming back up. 

Well enough. The mechanics left early, they seem to do that alot.  I contacted them to start up the truck, it hasn't been run in weeks that I know of and it probably is going to have dead batteries. He said he'd show up early tomorrow in case it won't. Tomorrow is Friday, that's a good excuse for him to get to work early and get off early so that works for me.  

As for the entry, I"m done.  I don't need to make too much food for the road since there are dining options on the way down to Brownsville and in Brownsville itself.  My favorite is the baked chicken at a gas station that is popular in both Refugio and Riviera.  

 So the dispatcher - a different person in a different location than my manager - finally contacted me and asked me when i was I going to be ready to go back to work? I replied I had only asked for a couple of days off, I have been ready to go back to work.  But since I've had almost a week off, I'm going to use vacation hours to make up for it.  

The reality is that on the driver text list that informs other drivers about loading and whether it's on time or not? Hasn't been updated in days, that means we are extremely slow and that is 99% chance likely the reason they haven't contacted me before today.  

The dispatcher must have asked my manager about m availability for she replied she didn't know I was available until today.  When I contacted my manager to ask to put 40 vacation hours on my next paycheck, I only got a 10-4 and subsequent text "done".  This is how I know that they weren't exactly chomping at the bit to get me back to work along with the driver texting group.  

It further became evident that we must be really slow when she finally got back to me and said I'll send you out Friday - tomorrow is Thursday.  It's whatever to me.  I could have forced the issue, I just decided I will take the time off without saying anything, I just didn't think it would take them this long to actually contact me about going back to work.  I still have 45 hours of vacation available and a whole year's worth of vacation hours will be dumped into my account in November, which isn't all that far off. 

Now, I could have used some of this time to fly back to Arizona, yes.  But I wouldn't have been able to see my mother - unless they have the quick tests at the very least to ensure I don't have the virus.  I would have been able to stay at my son's new house of course and swim in his awesome looking swimming pool. No biggies.  I dunno when I'm going back tbh.  Maybe sometime this year, but it's really dependent on this virus nonsense.  It may be that I won't travel home until after they get their vaccine - not that I want to take it. I personally wouldn't suggest anyone that I know taking that vaccine until a large enough portion of the population takes it first and determine that it's actually safe to have injected into your veins.  

Or into your flesh, or however that works, I haven't had a vaccine shot in so long. 

Today - I cleaned the kitchen lol.  Everyone but the boys are home. Taylor went to work, only to be sent back after a manager questioned the time after a fever for being "allowed" to come back to work per the state's rules. It's 3 days, not the 24 hours the owner of the company said. So we have all been home today, not necessarily accomplishing anything but then again, it's been raining so my pond aspirations were put off. 

Perhaps tomorrow. I need to get Taylor out there first anyway and discuss the placement of the pond. She wanted the in-ground pond move to the rear of the property as it stood.  I have a place for it out of the way and where no grass ever grows.  But, it's not my house and I want to make sure there aren't  any objections to it.  I have the materials to build a stand for the waterfall filter and Taylor was suggesting building a full fledged waterfall - that might come in time it would make it a really nice place to sit and chat with people.  

Another nice thing about where I want to put it is there is only one tree over top of it and it's not one of the trees that dumps garbage year round. Sure some leaves fall off of it, but not dead branches, acorns, these giant seed balls that fall off and of course tons of leaves.  I could really turn the area into a "destination" area with enough work on it.  But, building that up like that definitely would need to have a consensus on where it goes first.  

Well, with that I'm going to watch reruns of Star Trek Generations lol.  

 This isn't the first time that they have somehow forgotten that I am - not working but should be.  Pretty much every time I come back from vacation this happens.  And other situations where they don't even realize that I am available - but that's their job.  I was going to text the dispatcher today and ask about getting back on the road - but I didn't lol.

But tomorrow I'll have to get back in the system.  My manager definitely knows I'm back, we might be slow but we aren't that slow.  I'll ask for 20 or 30 hours of vacation time put on next week's check and go back to work.  Whatever work they have, I assume I'm not getting sent to Brownsville and I assume I'll get sent to Alabama or Illinois.  Guess, I should say.

Anyway, I just checked and I am back in ketosis.  Like I said, I'm following the diet strict for the next month or so and lose a bunch of this fat and get it over with.  Drinking nothing but water all day long and a few cups of coffee in the morning.  No diet sodas, no low carb beers.  I might get some tea for a change up, stuff that helps with this diet actually.  I'm down 4 pounds as it is without ketosis, this should really start coming off quick.

What I was doing for the last  - 8 months or longer was eating more carbs than I should and not really following the diet that strict, maintaining my weight but at too high of a level. After this trip, however, gaining 10, well actually I was down to 209 so 11 pounds now that I think about it?  Time to get serious again.  

I will have to be prepared to leave tomorrow. A lot of times I contact them after this stuff happens being on hold and they come up with something and ask if I can "leave today?".  I never say no, but I will be putting my mind into that zone in case they do that.  It's funny my manager isn't keeping up with this stuff.  I wasn't fired or let go, lol, just got done taking a random drug test, so I know they aren't getting rid of me. 

I won't fail a random lol. I don't take drugs and no alcohol in my system.  

But, if they don't happen to send me off tomorrow I'll be working on building a platform for the pond waterfall filter, get the water treatment chemicals to condition the water.  

 Sunday.

Rebooted the diet.  Gained 10 pounds on the road.  I'm going to be strict about the carbs for the next few weeks and keep it under 20 per day and lose the weight I gained back and then some.  

Found a galvanized 6 foot stock tank 2 towns over. I don't think I"m working tomorrow - well I'm pretty sure about that since it's 3:00 pm and no word from anyone about it - so I'll go get it tomorrow.  I have to wait for a new UV sterilizer to come in before I will fill it up with water, but I can figure out what I'm going to do for a "lid" for it in the meantime.  

Birds ate most of my fish, I figure to use PVC piping and create a cover that birds cannot get through. Something light and easily removed yet good enough to keep these giant fishing birds from taking my rather expensive fish out of there.  Kind of defeats the purpose of a Koi pond when birds of prey are eating them up.  

I think I will also get another kind of setup where I can order 300 2 inch Koi and grow them in the tank and sell them.  I was going to have Maria do it and earn some money, but she didn't want anything to do with it.  Fine.  It's not gong to make me rich but if I keep them in there until they're 4 or 5 inches long I can snag a good price for them. They're hard to find in this region and there is a market for them.

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Monday.  Day 4 from being back, no work sent to me.  I haven't exactly been asking, but it's time to go back to work.  I'll probably use some vacation time to cover these days off.  I only asked for a couple of days off after getting back.  

My manager texted me this morning asking me to come to work and get this paperwork stuff done. Yes, well to get paid I had to do that. So, I hooked up the trailer fully expecting to go pickup a galvanized stock tank, went to work and turned in all of my receipts.  Almost $700 worth.  He also gave me a generous amount of travel time - apparently that's not paid out the $300 per day, but I came out ahead on that situation by $70 so I was okay with that.

And then i was handed a random drug test.  He said he'd actually received it for me while I was in Vermont, but decided to make me wait until I got back.  He looked at me and asked if I even could pass one right now?  Lol, yes, I don't take drugs and I haven't had any alcohol, I'm good.  It's the first random they have given me since I started working there, which is getting close to 3 years.  So, you go straight to the drug testing place once they give that to you, if you don't they - get upset.  It didn't take long and then over to Home Depot.

Where I saw the stock tank on sale.  But, of course, they don't even sell stock tanks.  Lol.  Okayyyyy. I searched the entire store, I had looked these tanks up online and it showed that the Longview location had one.  Whatever.  Over to Tractor Supply, who did, indeed have one and at a better price than the one listed at Home Depot.

And after paying for the tank and waiting in the parking lot, a rather odd event occurred with an older lady driving a giant, brand new ford F250 pickup attempting to back out of her parking space.  I posted all of that on my Facebook, don't really want to go into all of that again, but she got out of the truck, acted like I was blocking her - which i wasn't, demanded I move (instead of simply asking nicely) - I said sure - IF you ask nicely - she refused, called the cops and...whatever. Cops never showed, I just sat there and waited to get into the tractor supply yard in order to get my tank.  She easily  could have maneuvered her truck out of there.  She was a real piece of work.  Annnnnddddd. this woman just had to come into the yard and tell me "I won, you lost!". Juvenile, erratic, stupid behavior by an at least mid 60's individual. 

Home after that.  Not any hurry to set it up, I have a UV sterilizer coming, I won't fill the tank up until I have that sterilizer set up, otherwise the pond will turn bright green and algae everywhere.  I also want to fashion some sort of screened top for it.  I'll get the thing in place at least tomorrow.  And figure out how to set up the waterfall filter. It's going to have to be a couple of feet off the ground.  I'm not really sure about the screen covering yet, I'd really like some pond plants in there which would mean a bit different setup than what I had originally thought of doing.  

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Tuesday.

Play time over. I'm going to contact the disptacher today and ask when she intends on sending me back out on a run and inform her I've been sitting 5 days as of today. I really didn't mind this unasked for time off, to be honest so no biggies.  Just emailed the payroll department to see how many vacation hours I have left this year, going to take some of it to buffer these days off and not just lose that money in not working.

In looking up the yellow bellied water snakes, yes they do like to fish and yes they will clean out a Koi pond. I feel like I have no choice but to either catch and release them somewhere else or kill them.  I'll start out with cheap goldfish when I get the new pond setup going - if they eat those no great loss. Koi, even small ones, are like $10 a piece.  And then when they grow a few inches they're worth even more. The larger they get, the more they're worth.  I ordered a fake Blue Heron to set up next to the pond to deter those birds at least. They do work, I have one at the house in Phoenix and the herons stay away from the house.

But snakes post a different problem and they already live on the property. They sell snake traps, Im not sure I want to go to any expense in dealing with creatures that I very much dislike.  There are things I can do to try to keep them away from the pond, there is a stream that goes through the back yard which is what attracted them here in the first place. But, shedded snake skins on the pond I have now show they love the in ground pond and they may actually be the culprits that were eating my fish. A pond cover might keep out birds, it won't keep out snakes.  

The problem is these snakes set up shop underneath the concrete slap on the rear carport long ago.  There are urine smells from certain animals you can buy that allegedly scare them away.  I dunno.  Others say they will not necessarily eat your fish. Well something ate most of them.  There are things you can put on the bottom of your pond that the fish can hide in.  I might go that route, just try to keep count of the numbers of fish in there and see if they start disappearing.  

Anyway, I'll get out back and get the thing in place today and do some cleanup out  there - we did get storms coming through with the remnants of the hurricane and of course the yard is messy.  One good thing I can say is the neighbors next to us on the uphill side finally had a crew of people come out and clean the yard up.  There is still a lot of debris on the ground over there, but it's better than the nothing they had going before.  It's very disconcerting to spend hours cleaning up a yard, have  a storm come through the next day and have the yard look exactly the same as it did before you cleaned it up. It happens so often I finally gave up on it.  

I've lost 4 pounds since I started back on the diet 3 days ago.  I've been watching the carbs and keeping it down, the diet doesn't work unless you keep the carbs way down.  Keeping your carb intake under 20 per day may sound easy to some people, but go ahead and try it for a few weeks and then you'll get an idea how difficult it is to keep up with.  

Meanwhile, I'm watching democrats blame Trump for the violence. These are the same people that proclaimed the rioting that has been going on is actually peaceful protesting. Then some of these idiots said that there is nothing wrong with violence and where does the right come up with this narrative?

Well, that "narrative" come from the Constitution of the United States.  They obviously haven't read it or don't care what it says.  Trump proclaimed himself the candidate of law and order and that stand is resonating with most Americans.  Nobody wants to wake up in the morning to find rioters in their city has burned down even more buildings, killed more people and assaulted more cops and citizens.  

And I believe swing voters aren't near as dumb as these democrats such as Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi think they are. They have completely flip-flopped in their statements.  Their true colors are flying for everyone to see. You also have Pelosi attempting to blame Republicans for the impasse on another stimulus bill, when it's clearly Pelosi who is refusing to negotiate, at all.  "We came down". Well your initial and secondary "offers" are mind blowing amounts of money. Even the 1.3 trillion the right has moved it up to is a ridiculous, unfathomable amount of money.  

I personally don't care if they can't pass any new stimulus bill.  I also wish Trump would start talking about reducing the deficit and actually starting to pay off the national debt.  That apparently isn't popular with Americans? I dunno, but Biden is promising more taxes and contrary to what he states, it will affect middle class and even some lower class income earners.  

I guess in the end, it's going to be who do you believe?  

Anyways, with Taylor's negative outcome of virus test, the kids went back to school today.  She did not go back to work.  It's been stated that some people get a test, it comes back negative, another one, another negative and then a third that shows positive.  I guess these tests aren't very reliable.  In any case, having to wait 3 days for a result is a bit much knowing that they have tests that take less than 30 minutes out there.  

It's really one of the reasons I didn't go back to work or ask to. Come home from Vermont, find a person that just got sick with a fever and has had that fever ever since.  When that happened I thought, geeze, i should have just stayed up there another week or two.  I'm glad to be home but yeah, I'd rather just stay away from it if possible. 

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ABout time to end this one lol.  Still not dispatched and just decided to take vacation hours to compensate.  I'll definitely ask tomorrow cause' it should mean get dispatched and be home for part of the weekend maybe.  I dunno. 

 All the symptoms of COVID-19!

Not me, someone else here. Low grade fever, coughing, fatigue, hard to breath, coughing, nausea.  

_______

I think it's day 3 of that for her, going on day 4. I haven't seen her today so I dunno how she's doing but considering she's still in bed I assume she's still not feeling well.  She gets the results of COVID test either today or tomorrow.  If she has it, we're all allegedly supposed to isolate for 14 days or whatever it is now?

No clue, haven't paid any attention to that nonsense lately.  

Finally found a storage place for my boat - too much stuff around here, I wanted to find a cheap place to store it out of the way. At $50 per month in a fenced, gated location with 24 hour access, I found the perfect place and it's only a few miles away.  Getting that taken care of this morning, my attention diverts to setting up a new pond.  Instead of in ground, it's going to be a galvanized horse trough. The only ones I've found around here are 8 footers which is larger than I wanted and also much more expensive.  

I'm still looking. A 6 foot version is perfect and less than $300. No one sells used ones around here, I've been looking in several different forums. Even a rusted one would be fine since I have a pond liner I can put into it.  I have everything else I need for it. 

Farmer's Almanac is predicting a much colder winter this year than last year.  The area I just came back from has already been recruiting 100 drivers to go up there and haul LNG for the winter. I do not want to be one of those people or the other gig for the college or apparently even more gigs to handle the overload of business needing the gas for heating purposes.  I'm rather curious why all of these places don't have pipelines running the stuff to them.  Especially a giant college - it's literally a city of its own.

I have no idea when I'm starting work again, but I'll assume Tuesday for lack of a better guess since it's likely all the weekend and Monday assignments have already been handed out.  Other drivers are still fuming about the 2 new drivers getting the gravy runs.  To the point one of them sent a text to the manager about it. He never got back to us of what the manager said - tho in my limited experience with him he probably didn't reply at all.

Tonight at 6:00 pm there is going to be a protest in the city square here.  Yes, these people are here.  Whether they are locals, outsiders or a mixture of the two, I do intend on driving up there and watching for a bit to see what happens. They are still complaining about that Confederate statue that's been there 115 years, I would be surprised if there weren't armed citizens standing around it tonight.  I'm not going up there to start or look for trouble - tho rest assured I will be armed, concealed carry tho - I want to see what happens. If it's truly a peaceful protest then more power to them.  That's their right. They don't, however, have the right to tear down the statue, assault police officers and attempt to burn down buildings.

Guaranteed the county Sheriff Deputies would put an immediate stop to any of that nonsense. This isn't the big city and they aren't going to tolerate that s*** here.  I've been speaking my opinion of it for a while now and that if any of it came here I would be there in the midst of it, time to put my money where my mouth is.  Again, I am not going there to start any trouble, whatsoever, no MAGA hat or shirt, just an interested citizen. 

I'm kind of in a holding pattern here waiting to find out if the lady of the house has the virus.  It will definitely make life interesting if she does, for that likely means we'll all get it.  I'm not at the age where it's of particular concern but I'm close enough to it.  Worried? No.  But, there is a certain element of concern when facing something that could potentially take your life.  I'm not being dramatic, lol, it is what it is.

Well I guess I best get outside, get my SUV hooked up to the boat and get it ready to go.  I doubt the neighbor is liking where I parked it tho she has said nothing about it.  It's on our property but it's between our houses where the lawn is actually quite nice.  

 Home Sweet Home

After the ordeal trying to actually get here, I'm very happy to actually be back, even if the kids were up at 6:00 am making all KINDS of noise, which I eventually got up and told them to quiet down in no uncertain terms : )

Oh, my luggage is - somewhere 😂😂😂

I spent a long time yesterday on hold and attempting to find out where, exactly my luggage is.  One person told me it was in Longview, another told me it was still in Dallas.  Now, if I had known my luggage was in Dallas 2 nights ago - and yes I asked and yes the man at the counter told me it was on the plane and flying to Longview- I would have grabbed it and taken it with me.  

American Airlines doesn't exactly have good customer service.  If you want to file a complaint with them, they don't have a phone number for that. You have to email them, lmao.  I'm sure those emails are read as soon as they come in!  I spent time with a woman from India - clearly know that accent for you cannot understand half of what they are saying and Direct TV used outsourcing to India for at least 10 years, probably a lot longer.  I hung up on here and called again, waiting for 25 minutes to nothing but we're sorry, someone will be with you shortly.

Long story short, I finally called and demanded a supervisor on the reservation line since they were the only ones answering the phone.  The man demanded to know my name,  I repeatedly told him no, I'll tell the supervisor that.  After at least 5 minutes of this bs, he put me on hold and walaah, a supervisor came on, couldn't  understand why other agents on the reservation line wouldn't deal with it for they can find where your luggage is and take care of it no problem.....!.....: ).......oh really?

The lady said the luggage is in Longview and will be arriving tonight (this was yesterday).  Oh, forgot the man at the longview terminal who didn't care where my luggage was and dismissed my requests and disappeared into his office.  I told the lady fine, you will send my luggage to me, I am not driving clear back here for it after all the bs your company has put me through.  It's 30 plus miles, please ensure you get it here tomorrow.  She told me 8:00 up to 6 hours for it to arrive. Fine! Just get it here, thanks.  

I'd say I won't fly American again, but that would be false.  The only other flights out of this immediate area is out of Shreveport and I am not sure I would want to leave my vehicle unattended over there for extended period of time, not to mention I see much higher airfare coming out of there consistently.  Regardless, the only regional airline out of Longview is contracted to American,  at least if you want to fly an entire trip out of DFW on one ticket. I guess there are other airlines, but if there are you aren't going to get any deals.  

if i were to ever take a trip overseas, I'd just drive to Houston, Dallas Love Field or DFW and park my vehicle there if American didn't have the best deal - which I doubt they would.  They charge for luggage, I spent $70 each way for 2 checked bags.  I'll be getting that money back eventually.  I need to get all of my receipts together and my manager just said dump them on his desk lol.  

Anyway, Taylor went to work and came home. After inquiry, she has an almost 100 degree fever. Of course, the first think you think: COVID-19.  Yea, we'll see.  

Oh, and I was already shorted on my paycheck, lol.  I knew it would be a battle to get all of my pay for this trip for their entire pay system is convoluted and it's not cohesive. One division is separate from another and for whatever reason,  they don't share information easily.  So, I was shorted $190 which I will, of course, be discussing with payroll post haste via email about.  

Other than that, just another day in paradise.  Very little storm damage here, the hurricane remnants took a right turn and really spared us the worst of the storm, thankfully.  A bunch of branches on the ground from the big tree out front, but small ones.  I saw dozens and dozens of power line crews traveling east on I-20 yesterday while we were driving back from Dallas - undoubtedly going to Louisiana to help restore power. 800,000 people without electricity was the last estimate I saw. That's a lot of outed power and it's why I have a generator. It did go out briefly here, but less than 2 hours.  `

James set up the generator before he and Taylor came to get me yesterday.  I mean, the freezers will be fine for quite a while without power, I wasn't really concerned about it but hey, better safe than sorry.

Get a haircut, go  to the grocery store and get some things I ran out of, hope my luggage shows up and get some other stuff done.  

 The never ending day.

Got to Charlotte, walked the 17 minutes it takes you to get there from where we got off, waited waited waited.

They started boarding late and we got out of there late.  Sat on the tarmac for 20 minutes and finally, 50 minutes late, took off.

\They blamed it on weather. There was no weather going on there and there wasn't any weather all the way to Dallas, that was just a bald faced lie to keep them from having to pay for hotel rooms.  Arriving at the jetway, 15 minute wait just to get out of the plane. 6:45, flight leaves at 7:00.

Teminal E at one end of the airport, teminal a is where I was, I had no doubts, whatsoever, that the airplane would be gone by the time I got there, but I tried anyway. People were frantically running through the airport, most of the people on the flight had connecting flights going elsewhere.  One dude was literally sprinting. We got on the Skylink, it was 7:00 pm getting off at terminal e, I just watched, amused at people attempting to catch flights that were already gone.

I walked at that point, and when I got there, they said the plane departed 10 minutes ago. Oh well.  When's the next flight?

Lol. 9:00 pm tomorrow night.  

The dude claims he fixed my ticket so that I can go tomorrow.

But it didn't end there. I was half decided to just rent my own car and drive home, but decided against it and called the company for a hotel. They got me a room, when I got there there were 4 people in line.  I heard the lady at the desk telling people that they were receiving reservations for rooms they didn't have.  

My turn, I already knew what she was going to tell me but I had to ask for I was tired and wanted to go to sleep. Nope, no rooms.  So I sat down in the lobby and watched 20 plus people walking in, all of them had reservations, some of them reservations they had made long ago.  I was waiting on whatever hotel, I told them I dont care, just call them first and make sure they have a room.  

The lobby was literally full of people by the time I left, more people standing outside and even more people showing up.  I've never seen anything like it. People getting pissed because yes, they even paid in advance and now being told there are no rooms.

Over to Candlewood Suites. Not my most favorite but it's whatever.  I get there and the lady said the company didn't send clc by fax. So I sit down, start calling them back yet again.  But, the lady found the fax and said here it is and here we go.  Thank God.  The only reason I"m on here typing this is because I am starving. The airport restaurants were closed and I was told due to covid19.

That virus can go back to the hell it came from.

The hotel has frozen food, lean cuisine to be precise and that is what I'm eating for dinner and lunch.  

Tomorrow, I'll give myself a 90% chance that I will drive a rental car back to Longview and eat the cost myself. I have zero desire to be sitting here til 9:00 pm tomorrow night. I truly thought I was going to be home tonight.

And I will get another $300 for an extra day, that can pay for the car. The only thing I may have to consider is weather.  If it's a downpour it's kind of hard to see when driving.  But if I decide to drive home, weather isn't going to stop me lol.  With that, eat this slop and go to bed.  Oh, and my luggage is in Longview, I have no clean clothes or toiletries lololol. 

 I'm almost regretting I didn't just say yes, I'll stay another week.  This is easy work for the money.  But, today/tonight was my last hoorah here.

Well, it's easy work but it's junk equipment, not something I would want to do forever. But really nice people running the plant where you pick up the loaded trailers and you contact them when you get to the paper mill as well. They control the entire operation remotely.  

But I'd like to be home in time for this hurricane. We are a few hundred miles north of it, but that funnel graph they do? We are directly in it's path.  I"m expecting the power to go out and I want to be home if that happens to get the generator out, running and providing electricity to the freezers, refrigerator, my window AC unit lol and whatever they need for the rest of the house.  

"East Texas gets the most of it" the dude is saying right now on whatever this weather channel is showing a graph of red directly over our town.  So yeah, I"m glad to go home and help out and be with my doggies : ). 

Get 10 gallons of fuel as well.  I dunno how much fuel that generator uses. If the power goes out everywhere, the gas stations aren't going to be able to pump fuel. I asked them to get some fuel today but I didn't get a response.  Which doesn't mean anything bad, lol, she gets busy at work and sometimes I don't hear back until the next day.  She being Taylor and the house and yes, she can't deal with those wicked storms.  Extreme anxiety. I just worry about these giant trees coming down and killing all of us. They are huge  trees, I've seen the aftermath of them falling on houses and it ain't pretty. 

Good Lord, now they're saying it may hit a category 3 by the time it hits landfall and " could hit Texas with extreme winds". WTH. No thanks!  Of course, these forecasters/meteorologists could be completely wrong lol.  But this dude is convinced. Up to 14 FEET swelling going INLAND.  

And one of our accounts is directly in the path of this 9 to 14 foot surge, they are on the coast and I have no idea what they are doing, but I would suspect they are shutting the plant down and getting the hell out of there. 

There are other things going on that are high on the list of importance but - geeze. I don't want to go too deep into other people's lives - especially those I am living with and are friends - on the internet.  It's after midnight and I'm going to bed lol. A day of travel tomorrow tho when it's flying that's usually a nice day : )

 Good job Ben, really confused myself last night.  

I was up past midnight, which I normally am not. So looking at my phone last night, it said Tuesday, I thought it meant yesterday was Tuesday and today is Wednesday.  I was tired, lol.  Have a nice, lovely headache this morning from staying up too late. 

So today IS Tuesday and the flight leaves tomorrow.  I had my head wrapped around leaving this morning when I woke up, so now I have to get it back into work mode.  At least the first run is at noon instead of starting at 4:00 pm and keeping me out so late.  If I can get the plant to allow me to take the second load earlier, I can be done by probably around 8:00 pm.  9 at the latest.  If not, well, I'll still only be out til 10.  

Paperwork.  Ugh. Lots of it here.  I thought I had a lot of paperwork in Ethylene, both of these terminals and their rules I have been to up here far supersede by double at least the amount of paperwork I normally have to do.

So I sit here for 30 to 40 minutes getting that done, most of it advance work so I don't have to spend a bunch of time doing it on the road and wasting time.  

Anyway, there are some things going on at the house, but I find myself in need of going to find something to eat both for breakfast and for the road.

G'day.  

 I was dreading tonight's work. Start the second load at 9 pm?  Gag It's a 24 hour operation on both ends. International Paper never shuts down that I know of and this natural gas company doesn't either.  I got the first load done easily - by 6:30 pm. The second load still 2-1/2 hours off, I asked the plant operator if it would be possible to do it now? Lol.  

I'm only awake because there has to be a wind down period for me before transitioning to bed.

He said, well, if you can do us a favor and move some trailers around?  Sure!  He came out and pointed out what he wanted done and I got to it, got it done quickly and got under a loaded trailer - and got out of there.  I mean, it was still almost midnight before I got back to the hotel here, but it's better than what would have been almost 2 am.  

Not to mention they have me loading tomorrow at noon thirty, that was more reason to want to get back as early as possible.  

Oh by the way, I was informed today that I could stay up here indefinitely.  The other driver has been moaning, groaning, bit****, complaining endlessly about going home.  I'm not near as needy as he is.  Yes I'd like to go home, but not that bad.  He's made himself a nuisance to the boss and I made the disclaimer today that he doesn't necessarily speak for me.  That's when the boss said "you can stay up there as long as you like" - after having had sent us both texts with flight information back to Texas.  

After I told Taylor both that I'm coming home and that I could stay up here as long as I wanted, she said "you could stay another week and make another $2,000!".  Well that threw me for a loop.  I miss my doggies, buy I doubt they are missing me lmao.  The lady that is visiting is staying in my bed and Addler has been sleeping with her every night, I found out today lol. I figured she was sleeping in my room, I didn't figure my dog was sleeping with her. 

I dunno how she can deal with it. He will literally push your ass right out of bed lol.  And he starts this shaking stuff - his whole body just starts moving and grooving while he's sleeping, constant, non-stop once it gets going.  Taylor reported to me that they have given him no human food and it finally appears that he is losing weight.  

Here's my question to myself: Do I stay up here another week, until next Friday?  I'm really thinking about this.  The flight back isn't until Wednesday noon thirty, I think.  Could I stand another week up here, well a little longer than that, but without this whining baby driver in the picture? That would certainly make it more palatable.  There are 2 caveats tho, that I must have: a kitchennette -move out of this hotel and into a kitchenette and go grocery shopping - and not lose my truck that is - I hope - sitting there in the yard in Texas.  

I'm going to make up my mind tomorrow one way or the other and then ask Taylor about the dogs - tho she doesn't really care if I'm there or not, James has been taking care of them - and if it sounds good, I may just ask the manager to cancel the flight and let me stay up here another  - 10 days actually starting tomorrow.  

Wait! This IS Tuesday! Tomorrow the flight leaves at 12:25! What the Hercules was I thinking? It's easy to lost track of time up here.  

Okay I'm getting off of here. I don't even know if they can bow out this close to a flight. 

But I have to think anyway and make a decision.

 Monday morning. I waited until well after the manager's arrival time to work before contacting him. I figured the other driver would have already blown up his phone.  Texted him the question about having to fill out a TDS sheet - Tour Data Sheet, it's a sheet that has spaces for all kinds of information we have to fill out for every trip we take - for every day we have been up here?  

He called back - no, you just need to fill out one TDS for all the days you didn't work or train. I've driven 5 days up here, trained 2 and didn't actually do anything for 3 days.  So, I got that done quickly and sent it back to him. 10 days worth of work in one paycheck will be quite nice.  And then there will be today after that and however many more days we are here. He said "Tuesday or Wednesday" return date, of which I didn't ask he volunteered. Well he best be getting with it if he wants us coming back tomorrow, it's gonna take a minute to get all of my stuff repacked and ready to go.

I have work at 3:00 and that will take me up to 8:00 pm or so.  That's why I'd like to know - now - if we are leaving out tomorrow. But for the sake of a partial nother' paycheck, I wouldn't mind coming back on Wednesday just to get something going for next week.  

Meanwhile, on the group driver's texting, they were all complaining about the 2 drivers that are being constantly sent down to Brownsville.  Those are the 2 newbies.  They aren't that new at this point, it's been 4 or 5 months anyway since they both showed up.  Why they get preferential treatment is unknown, especially considering it appears they are going to be permanent drivers in our system.  They not only need to learn how to unload, they also need to get their share of lower paying runs.  It's almost guaranteed to be a huge mistake in trying to discuss it with the manager, he'll just get mad and dismiss you out of the office.  I haven't done that but others have tried.  

They don't want to address why they are doing that stuff and they won't discuss it with any drivers.  But, you make other drivers upset because they don't get any of the gravy runs. It may be that we will all need to agree to go in separately all within a few day's time or so and speak our grievances.  He can dismiss one person, he can't quite dismiss 8 of us.  Well, he can, but he'll get the message.  We see what's going on, we don't understand why it's going on and we want the story, please.  

The same s*** went on with the previous manager with a couple of preferential treatment of drivers. ATM I'm not planning on saying anything. Perhaps when I get back and if my paychecks suffer from it I'll be tempted to, but even then with extreme reservation.  I've had it pretty easy up here, to be honest.  I just don't like being away from home too long.  After 10 days - I'm on the 11th - I'm getting bored, restless and have plenty of stuff to do at the house.  

I am going to take the pond out of the ground and get rid of it. It rains, the junk from the neighbor's yard uphill of us flows into our yard and fills the pond up with that garbage.  It's never ending and I just can't deal with it. I'm going to get a 6 or 8 foot round stock tank - horse trough - and do the same as I had at my house in Phoenix.  It was a great little pond.  It's 2 feet above ground so I don't have to worry about the rain. Stuff will fall into it from trees but that's easier to clean up.  I'll have to put a screen over it to keep birds from eating the fish, I think I can get James to manufacture something for me.  

They have plans for the back yard - but I know from experience that it requires daily maintenance if you really want something nice back there. That or cut down the trees that dump junk everywhere. That's costs thousands of dollars per tree, pretty sure that's not in the cards.  It's truly a mess back there right now, I clean it up here and there but not enough to keep it looking constantly nice.  Every single time it rains, it needs a mass cleaning.  

Roxie, the skinny little shepherd mix they have tore a raccoon to shreds, as the story was relayed to me, this morning. They let her out, roxie found the thing on the porch and killed it. And James said he found bones from another one in the back yard, apparently that little dog has taken a liking to killing raccoons.  They get into everything and eat the dog food up, good riddance to them.  

But, without major improvements that back yard is doomed to be messy.  The neighbor's yard would have to be blocked off somehow - like diverting the rain water and all the junk in it towards the stream out back.  That would entail having to build a block wall about 75 feet long. Gag.  

I didn't want to poopoo on their party, tho.  If they have the desire to do the upkeep I'll certainly help. But I won't take that burden alone, it's too much work.  

And with that I'm heading out to get lunch, bring it back, eat, take a nap and then get ready for work. 3:00 pm start time today.