Comments By Tinker

I am team driving. We run to California alot as well as Oregon, Utah, Arizona, and Colorado. There are some solo runs to Colorado and Arizona but the senior drivers keep those locked down.

It has been a while since I posted so I thought I would provide a quick update on my journey. After I left the job I posted about earlier in this thread, I took a job driving a school bus just to get some income flowing. It wasn't much, but it was an easy job with lots of time at home. It also convinced my wife to try it out. She loves the job and is one of their top drivers now with no plans to leave. With summer coming up, I knew I had to find a full time job or we would be in a tight spot quickly. I landed a job with a local building supply company driving a flatbed with a piggyback forklift. The work was good, though labor intensive at times. I was home daily and each weekend. The pay was really low by industry standards. It was enough to keep us afloat though, and I gained more experience. This last month (September) I was able to land a job with YRC Freight. I am coming up on one month there. I am not home every night, sometimes out for days at a time. Just days, not weeks. The pay is really good and the benefits are top notch. I think this will be a good fit for my family and me for years to come. It is a good balance between work and home. It is still a bit of an adjustment. This is a union job, there are pros and cons to that which I am not going to get in to here.

I paid for my schooling in hopes of finding a local job. It can be done, but you have to go in to this with your eyes wide open. Local jobs usually require at least one year experience. Those that don't can present some difficult challenges for a new driver. There are companies that will try to take advantage of the lack of experience and do their best to get that new driver to drive illegally and/or unsafe. Not all companies are like that, but some do exist. Those that do not fit in that category will still have a new driver running out their clock more often than not. Daily home time may be just your 10 hour break, eat sleep repeat. Not to mention that you will always be dealing with heavy city traffic. That in itself can frazzled a veteran driver, for a new driver it can be a nightmare. You may be lucky enough to find a company that fits in its own category, Monday through Friday 8-5. Very rare, but they do exist! The trade off there is usually in pay, as in much lower pay than you would expect.

That was a great read! Thank you for sharing your experience with us. My wife and I both got our cdl earlier this year. We plan on going team later on, but our two boys need us for a few more years. I am looking forward to reading your future updates. Stay safe out there.

I know that I shouldn't have driven that truck, and the constant 16-18 hour days put my logs in violation. To put the "home daily" in to perspective for other rookie drivers, let me explain how my home time went. I usually had to be up at 2 am to make it to work on time. Often, I would get home well after a reasonable bed time. This meant that I had time to eat, smile at my kids, kiss the wife, then off to bed. I would have had more time with them had I gone OTR! higher quality time at that. I knew that I had made a bad choice when on one run I actually fell asleep at the wheel. Then all the other things happened. I didn't crash luckily. One of the other rookie drivers did, the same day that I left the company. Now, since he let them push him beyond his physical limits, he has a crash on his record. As much as we would like to blame the company, he made the choice to get behind the wheel. You have to look out for yourself out there, no one else will.

My job search is going well. I have been on a few road tests where I impressed the person testing me. All those miles and excessive hours did hone my skills. At least I got that out of it. I am hoping that by the end of the week I will have a job. Swift doesn't sound too bad and their terminal is close to my home. I am looking at a couple of other options as well. I don't want to say where for fear of jinxing it.

Ok, so some of you may remember my training diary. I graduated from CNM truck driving and started looking for work. My wife and I talked it over and decided that it would be best to find a home daily job, but not an absolute must. As a rookie driver, I can't be too picky about the job. I ended up finding a company that was willing to hire inexperienced drivers for a home daily position. Fuel transport. I accepted the job and began training. At first it seemed like a good fit, but it did not stay that way. I was told that it would be 14 hours a day, 5 days a week. That became 16 hour days 6 days a week pretty quickly. Talk about being way over on HOS! I learned how to "doctor" my logs to appear legal. I though, ok this isn't right but I need to stick this out a while. Then one day when reporting in for work, the night driver showed me what he found on his post trip. One of the brake chambers on the trailer tandems was completely broken off and being held on by wire. I called my dispatcher/manager to let him know. He asked me to try to get the first run done since it was already scheduled and we could get it in to the shop then. Again, red flags going up. Ok, I'll get this first run done. Then he calls me and says, bad news you need to keep driving. Just go easy on the brakes. I drove over 400 miles that day with that chamber dangling from the bottom running mostly mountain passes. What really got my attention was on my way back. I saw a sign on the freeway that scared me. Inspection station ahead. All commercial vehicles must exit. Luckily, the inspection station was closed. I knew that if it had been open, I would have been fined for taking that trailer on the road in that condition knowingly. I made up my mind then, next time I was asked to do something that put me, my license, or my safety at risk would be the end of my employment there. I did not have to wait long. The next day I quit.

So, I am looking for work again. I have a few interviews and a driving test lined up. Hopefully I can find a good company to work for.

18 years in the plumbing trade. I never wanted to be a plumber. I used to fix heavy equipment and autos. Way back in the 90's work became hard to come by, I worked some manufacturer in jobs, tried sales, then kind of fell in to a job as a plumber helper. I realized the money was pretty good, and there was plenty of work. I stuck with it. Worked up to foreman running 4 different job sites around the state. From there I became the supervisor for the plumbing department in the local school district. I was not happy there, so after 8 years of that, I left and started my own business. That just ended up taking even more of my time and creating friction between my wife and I. I took some of my own advice and decided to stop investing my life in work that was not making me happy. Went to school, got my cdl, and now drive fuel transport. I am happy, my wife is happy, and life is good.

Hang in there. What helped me with the parallel was the realization that it is just an offset in to a box. Once I stopped freaking myself out about it and just offset the vehicle, it dropped in every time. One student in my class had trouble with every maneuver until an instructor told her, "stop thinking so much and drive the truck! Just put it where you want it!" She got mad, climbed in the truck and nailed the blindside parallel with no points.

My wife and I are both on the Keto diet. She has lost a lot of weight, as have I. She recently got her medical card, there were no signs of any troubles there. My cholesterol is in the normal range . Honestly, it is probably the best diet we have ever done.

This will be my final update on this thread. I have accepted a job offer from a local fuel transport company. The job is home daily, 5 days a week, and paid by the loaded mile. It almost seems too perfect. I start on May 22, 2017. Once I get through training and start driving professionally I will start a new thread in the general discussion forum to let you all know how it is going.