Comments By mikemotorbike

Getting comfortable. too comfortable, starting to enjoy it too much. We can't have fun now, can we!

So I stopped the truck while shifting on three different hills. When that happens we sit laughing and enjoying the valley view from the middle of the highway, and talk about the pretty ICBC road tester. Everyone was happy, waving and blowing kisses at their happy and handsome men eating donuts in the middle of the freeway.

I was going splitting from 4 into 5, and I couldn't find the gear. Speed limit 70 km/h. I was going 30 km/h (i think). I have a habit of riding the clutch during delayed shiftting as it finds the gear. I also like to hit the gas right after shifting in a panic. All the while, the transmission is stopping, as the clutch disengages it. High range requires a higher progressive shifting pattern RPM than the lower gears, and even morso on a hill, up to 1800 RPM.

So now I stop on hills when I get a chance. Just for the kisses.

re: mirrors: buck it up, butter cup–and clean them!

We have flat and convex mirrors. Convex for cornering, flat shows a bit of the sides of the truck. Get used to using the spot or convex mirrors. Also, there is no ICBC regulations about mirror adjustment. So it's the wild west of mirrors out there.

Single trucker likes to have coffee and treats while viewing he valley from the mountain top, seeks A&W worker with ample discounts.

I have reached a milestone. Learning to go slow. A slow student driver. Now I intend to pay attention, and think, before acting. I’m not studying anymore. Except the pre-trip routine, and this blog. And for the first time since I got here. Its not all about grades. The important things you have to learn from your mistakes.

My Instructor has been telling me to slow down, and to let him teach me. For instance, lat week. I overshot the white stop line by 5 feet in the industrial park. All the other boys were looking. I later contemplated very, very seriously about this, I need to slow way down. I finally stopped when I felt something in me moved and I had a relization that ‘I am safe’. I had done my spiritual/introspective homework.

Today, I din't notice or din't remember, an exit my Instructor told me to take, had two lanes. A car startled me zooming on my right. I started to bail left and hit my brakes. A semi was behind me. A fuel truck. I din't notice him behind me. He went around, I drove over the while shaded area back onto the offramp. It was then my instructor had a heart attack. He said, I said he panicked. The proof of the pudding is, if I was driving safely, I should have been in a calmer, happier and non-anxious mood. I would had I been paying attention. My reaction could have cost several lives. I told him to tell me stuff earlier. The truth is, I should have been paying attention, and remembering, and planning, way earlier. Pay attention, remember, plan. act, see, think, do. Think. Plan. Act.

I shared with my instructor my philosophy that we are here to learn lessons. I notice certain traffic problems follow certain drivers. It depends on what your lesson is. I must believe that that I am meant to live, life has meaning, so stay with the plan, and trust The Big Instructor.

I complained to my (real) Instructor about the misaligned mirrors. OK , I flipped out again. I’m a real "tuff guy". I wondered if this were a test to see if I would demonstrate pro-active assertiveness by wrenching on them myself. With his ashen face inches from mine at the partially rolled down window, he solemnly and repeatedly endorsed the advice to talk to Ray.

Hi Ray,

I’m learning a lot in the course. Thanks for putting me with the observant, attentive and experienced Instructor BIg Wayne. I loved learning with Mike’s calm teaching style, and Kurt offered valuable experience from an alternative viewpoint.

By week three, I am finally slowing down a bit. Now I am learning to pay attention to what's going on around me to keep myself, other road users and my equipment safe.

To remain safe, it is essential that I effectively use the mirrors. I notice all the mirrors on tractor #110 offer different views from each other.

May I know please if/when I will be recieving instruction on mirror adjustment?

And if it’s no extra trouble, I’d really appreciate it if you could let BIg Wayne know when to train me in it.

Thank you, best wishes,

Mike

So I think its a test. I retrospect, don’t think it would have been wise for me to wrench them. My Instructor gave me good advice. Becasue, it’s not my property, and I don’t know the approved method, and other people lives are potentially involved. Also, did you see that I was polite? Am can be a hothead. Remember, I flipped out earlier over backing. My nerves are shot after a period of sensory overload.

Think about what happens to you In a day. You are effectively being tested. Maybe for real, maybe just because you are becoming aware of what you need to change about yourself.

Tuckers see everything, and its changing all the time. They are trained to reduce all of it into a simple plan of action.

Truckers can speak with brutal simplicity. throw out the fifty dollar words, and talk with: humility, respect, friendliness, and pride.

To: Butch’s Trucking

Hey Butch, Mike here, the trucking student. I am now halfway trough school (Kamloops - TRU Greenhorn Program), and getting a better handle on driving rigs. I’m really excited about driving a truck! I’ll be taking the test for my Class 1 at the end of march. I hope to have the chance to talk with you about training opportunities and/or potential work.

Wed mar 14 2018

A few days off from the journal to recalibrate. Less hype, mo money.

Study less…except for the pre-trip inspection. Its your mistakes that reveal where you need to focus, not perfect marks. That has almost nothing to do with real life. My deficit is awareness. Using Mirrors, watching and considering Pedestrians. Looking ahead.

Seeing road signs. Its mostly remembering them a moment or minute later. And listening to my instructor.

I am finally slowing down after 2 and a half weeks. I must see what is happening, and learn to think and plan. I cant go faster, its not a contest. I have to think of all the things, and more: plan escape route, if people change their plans.I gotta relax in order to be able to mange shifting focus, to include shifting the gears. And share that focus by distributing my attention around and back and out around again, the mirrors, tach, traffic, conversation. I find when I get flustered, I go faster and race through the gears.

TBT -Alone

Trampled by Turtles - Midnight on the Interstate

If you are ever asked how you did on an air brakes test, never say you made 100%. Say you passed.

Ask me how I know.

We are supposed to make mistakes, and balance our training consistently. The point of an exam is not to make 100% in an all out free for all, no holds barred peak experience, but to learn.

For instance,I was given misleading directions to the Air Brakes knowledge test location. Actually, I couldn’t remember a key piece of info, the street, even tho I confirmed the rest of the directions, twice asking and receiving verbal confirmation on a key intersection. I still got to the wrong place.

Lesson: I should confirm directions with an official map.

I ended up at the ICBC Injury Claims office. I studied for an hour in the parking lot. After being seated for a while, I was politely corrected and graciously offered the correct address.

As I left, I noticed my phone inexplicably engaged in a live call to my buddy back west! Presciently, I looked up, and confirming the glass door was open, answered the phone, and precedded to walk directly into the glass wall!

I was rattled. I was calm before. So, recognizing my bodily anxiety, I calmed myself down. Then I took the test. Be prepared for anything! Its the road, anything can happen! Deal with it! Your brain cannot process information if you are in fight or flight response! Learn to be chill, laid back, unpretentious, amused with your own plans. Look up 'laid back'.

Identifying and dealing effectively with feelings in your body of anxiety and stress is a skill required by truckers, called Stress Management. You will find many opportunities offered in daily life to learn the demanded character attributes which are a precondition for professional driving. I theorize the psychological conditioning of training pts one into state which perceives mundane occurrences as meaningful, to the point of seeming paranormal. A consensus reality manifestation of probabilities, to which our heightened mental state attunes us.

I wondered if my subconscious was sabotaging my goal. Perhaps, it is preparing me for it! I am taking mine, and others, lives in a trust as I accept the responsibility to drive commercially.

You’ve gambled everything on this, and people are gambling their safety with you on the road. They want and demand competence in their truckers.

Humility Assertiveness Confidence Respect Discipline Consideration skill

Wow. Is there a group of strategical pychoanylyst PHDs at work intervening directly in our lives?

ARE YOU A ***** OR A STEER SOLDIER ?!?!

Thank You

After uncoupling, my Instructor glances resignedly at me as he gets in the cab to park across the lot.

Reading his mood, and extending to him an olive branch, I say, “A Son has a conflicted relationship with his father. He chafes at his Dad's authority, while simultaneously needing his approval."

Across the Lot...

A female student, The Young Natural, and I are comparing notes. We are a week old, yet the newer Young Natural has already driven the tractor downtown, something we have yet to learn!

The instructors nearby are huddled peacefully, facing each other in silence. She observes this remarkable stance, so I advise her on male behaviour, "Men do that."

I follow as she gambles over, to stand opposite, equal and yet in relation to our contrasting roles as student to Instructor. Feeling the peace of the group, I shyly smile.

Thank you!

Thank You

After uncoupling, my Instructor resignedly gets in the cab with me to park across the lot.

Reading his mood, and extending to him an olive branch, I offer, “A Son has a conflicted relationship with his father. He chafes at his Dad's authority, while simultaneously needing his approval."

Across the Lot...

A female student, the Newbie Natural, and I compare notes. The instructors listening nearby are huddling peacefully, facing each other in silence. She observes this remarkable stance, and I advise her on male behaviour, "Men do that."

I follow as she gambles over, to stand opposite, equal and yet in relation to our contrasting roles as student to Instructor. Feeling the peace of the group, I shyly smile.

Thank you.

I feel like Chicken Tonight!

Facing off with the well-meaning, well-seasoned Biker I mean Instructor, I threw my hat down, cursing passionately at the illogic of following his backing directions, when I can’t even see the parking spot for the snow.

The men next lot over, casually pretending to do work, clandestinely sauntered over to to investigate the drama unfolding.

He rolls his eyes, “I don’t see what the problem is, I could do it with my eyes shut!,” laying down his frustration with my going AWOL.

“If I had 50 years experience like you, maybe I could do it! But its an articulating hitch, going backwards, through mirrors, with the pylons buried in snow! Let me get a feel for backing, I have to learn it for myself! I am not a Don Juan like you, I am a student Romeo”. Let me play!”

Slamming the door after hailing ass my back into the cab, I aced the back up. I loudly celebrated, hi fiving, “Hot stuff! I am getting laid tonight! heck, I’m sampling to the whole seafood buffet!”

I happily went around the truck and enthusiastically pulled the handle decoupling the fifth wheel jaws, happy thoughts of good times dancing in my head.

meanwhile…

Across the lot, a student honks his horn twice prior to backing. Unexpected, a person appears in his mirror. Forced to abort his maneuver, he waits idling. The person finishes his task and departs.

The others student’s Instructor comes over. “Mike! You didn’t see my truck backing up! Didn’t you hear the horn?”

“Well, I thought I heard a couple of calves mewling in the next county, but not quite the herald of trumpets from God you’re talking about. Perhaps your student could give the horn a manlier punch?

“You could have been run over. You have to be aware of your surroundings.”

“I am learning situational awareness, I’ll admit.” I shoulder checked surreptitiously to ensure privacy, “To be honest,” I intoned conspiratorially with my hand cupped over the side of my mouth, “My Instructor John says he is going to ruin my car driving, and turn me into a truck driver!”

I’m John too. He’s big John, I’m little John, but I rule the lot!

I bent over and had to put glove under my nose evacuating my nose from suddenly laughing out loud.

So, Robin Hood, The Merry Minstrels John, and I are friends.