Swimming!

The parking lot in front of this loading dock was merely damp when I pulled in to load peanut butter ... 2 hours later it was axle deep in water, from the rain.

The next driver who showed up refused to use dock 3 ... said he had no intention of taking off his pants and wading out from his truck ...

You will be pleased to notice that there is no more road salt on the truck ... and I didn't even have to pay to have it washed!

It's back to shorts, t-shirt, and sandals in the rain ... what a pleasant contrast to Wisconsin right now. :0)

I Ran Away !!

This is the parking lot of the Motel 6 where I spent the night ... they have so much snow this year and no place to put it ... so they just shove it to one side ... and it's piled as high as the building next door. I saw front-end loaders filling dump trucks with "frozen water."

The weather people talked about this freezing rain, snow, and ice storm coming to places like Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee ...

$1807.83 to replace the compressor and by-pass the dryer ... afterwards, grab my loaded trailer and run South just as fast as I could reasonably go, to Oak Grove, KY last night (Ft Campbell area) ... and this morning head out early and run East on I-24 over Monteagle mountain ... before the freezing rain arrived. I don't like sliding down icy mountains!

The reefer trailer fuel lines finally un-froze this morning ... but the starter really meant it this time when it said "Low Battery": rrrrh-rrrh-rrh ... rrrh-rrh ... rh ... So, I left it alone for 5 hours ... then said a prayer for it ... and went looking for jumper cables (didn't find any) ... went back and tried it once more to see if the battery was still dead ... and the darn thing started. Don't look at me! ... It wasn't my brilliance ...

All I met was regular rain down the length of GA and the top of FL ... but the truck REALLY needed a bath to get rid of all the white salt splattered on it. So this was good. :0)

Still in Wisconsin

The foto is of the pattern left on my front fender from the the ice crystals and road salt.

I'm still in Wisconsin ... It was -5 degrees this morning ... I stood outside for a few minutes and my face turned beet red ... I was afraid my ears would break off if I touched them.

Drove over to pick up my load ... backed into the door ... was waiting for the trailer to be loaded ... when the air compressor, near the left front of the engine, started making a horrible LOUD noise. And my air pressure was dropping ... with the engine running. I decided that I'd better drop the landing gear under the trailer and unhook the tractor from the trailer ... before all the brakes locked up. Called the office ... called a wrecker ... got towed to Mid-State Truck Service (International/Cummins) ... sat all afternoon in their lounge with those judge shows running on the TV while I napped. Seems the air compressor was blowing oil into the air dryer unit ... which was adversely affecting the system air pressure. The office finally decided to only replace the compressor and by-pass the dryer ... maybe replace the dryer when it gets back home ... provided it doesn't freeze up before I get far enough South.

The truck should be ready about mid-day tomorrow ... I'm spending the night at Motel 6 ... air temp dropping to -20 outside tonight. :-p

Iceskating to Wisconsin

I hear they got some sunshine in Chicago this morning ... it was still kind of gray with a dash of snow when I left there. My destination for today was Plover, Wisconsin ... a ways north of Madison ...

It was really an ice skating contest to get to here ... the police and the towing services were having a wonderful day with all of the drivers that tried to stop suddenly ... or quickly avoid something ... or accelerate too quickly ... change lanes ... anything "quick" seemed to be sending people into the ditch or median. I tried to stay in whichever lane seemed to have the most dry ruts ... because the roadway was just as slick as they come. Something as simple as going up the rise of an overpass ... I could hear my engine RPM accelerate rapidly as the tires started spinning ... at which point I'd pray that I had enough momentum to get me over the top ... instead of ending my trip trying to get over a "mole-hill." When you get that slipping sensation ... I spread my feet wide, hang onto the steering wheel fiercely with both hands, and hope the wind doesn't blow me off the road ...

I did make it here ... It consistently & lightly snowed all day ... You can see the snow and snowflakes in the foto of my truck ... pickup isn't until tomorrow morning.

I'm looking forward to a snow-less and warmer Jacksonville ... :0)

Sunny Day

I loved the different blue colors of the mountains when I took this foto ...

Got up at 4:00 a.m. ... ran down to Grand Ridge, FL to pick up the trailer (that was supposed to have been fixed) and drove to Blakely, GA to pick up another load of blanched peanuts. Seven times (7x), they had to reload the truck next to me because the bags were tall and heavy ... and he ended up with too much weight on his drive axles. It started out with 5,000 lbs too much on the drives ... they reloaded and he was down to 2,000 lbs too much ... so the 7th time was the charm. (He said that after the 6th time, he wanted them to pull the load off, leave the load on the dock and he'd just drive away.) Fortunately mine worked out the first time ... a double stack of empty pallets in the front ,,, followed by a single pallet of peanuts in the center ... then another single pallet of peanuts in the center ... then 5 rows of 2 ... one single ... and 2 side-by-side ... about 42,000 lbs worth. It came out with 33280 lbs on the drives and 32100(?) on the trailer tandems with only 11100 lbs on the steers with almost a full tank of fuel. EXCELLENT! You say, "Huh?" The maximum limits are 12,000 on the steers, 34,000 on the drives and 34,000 on the trailer tandems ... total gross weight of 80,000 lbs.

I was back home at noon ... it's a sunny warm day ... wearing a t-shirt and pants (see foto below right) I went out for a little 16 mile ride on my recumbent bicycle. A lovely day here in "L.A." ... and they are talking about more snow sunday when I get to Chicago. Ugh! :0)