Comments By Solo

Grats! I for one would appreciate the year in review.

Be careful with UPS as "real addresses". I tried that route and was denied in TN. They do not accept UPS "Real Addresses" for the purpose of residency, so make sure you find out what your state approves of or not.

I've been homeless for nearly a year now and set up a legal residence via a mail forwarding service in Sioux Falls, SD and it has been perfect for my needs. I have a " Real ID compliant" DL/CDL from SD and my W2 from TMC shows my "legal address" and thus I do not pay state income tax, since SD doesn't have any.

I feel guilty, but I left my moms a day early this weekend to get to my Tues am consignee.

I just couldn't get any sleep in that dark/cold, and for all intents and purposes COMFORTABLY soft bed. I just tossed and turned all night Friday and Sat.

Hit the NB 75 KY welcome center last night, and Slept my butt off! dang I had some catching up to do. Even fell BACK asleep for a few more hours after eating some cereal and having a cup of coffee. My truck just gives me the sleep I need.

TMC's FM's sent out a similar message as well.

I'm marked as a "Runner" and thankfully haven't been slowed down by anything real or perceived.

O/O can have whatever color truck they want.

If the "TMC" says Operated by above it and is in a flat matt gold, then that's an O/O truck.

Company Trucks have that multi-colored "TMC" on the door and does not say "Operated by" on it.

Also, Peterbilt...for whatever reason, can't get us black 579's fast enough, so they are shipping us white ones to hold us over. I'm not sure of the logistics of that, but it came up in TMC's pvt fb page as we thought we were having white trucks put into circulation, and that was the answer we received. That goes for dedicated Day Cabs as well as Dedicated and linehaul Sleepers.

We simply asked "Why not just paint the white ones black and ship them", but I'm guessing it's just not that easy.

I'm currently grossing 1800/wk as a company driver. I can't believe that there are O/O's making less.

That's criminal but reinforces where I'll be staying as it pertains to company vs O/O.

Great post / question.

That is my plan as well. Being single, no kids, put all my crap in storage and ready to live life on the go.

Good luck with your plans and remember, it's all what you put into it !

I had my truck in for its first service this past weekend and took the opportunity to clean out the rest of my storage unit and made 2 deliveries to the salvation army.

After being on the road I got to thinking about how each month I'm paying for something to store stuff I clearly don't need since it would be in my truck if I did. Then got to thinking about how I would be paying for stuff I'm not using, and should I need it down the road, I'll just replace it should that time come, versus spending money each month and ultimately buying the stuff over-and-over again each month by way of paying storage fees.

Now if I could only get rid of my car. It's a lease so the dealership won't take it back early. Even offered to pay them the balance in full. Nope. They want it back in March 2021.

Solo said: "I don't 1/2 ass anything."

Except your drivers seat!

Today wasn't SO bad.

I focused a lot on those above exercises more than just my usual subconscious act of doing them already, and it actually seemed to help.

But ya, I'm a small dude...something these seats weren't specifically designed to support, haha

When they remove Engineers from trains and pilots from planes, I'll start to be concerned. Until then, this is all left-wing BS, imo.

Will it happen? You bet.

In my life time? No chance.

Some companies pay a “clean inspection bonus”. The higher the inspection level, the more you make for no discrepancies.

TMC pays for clean inspections and $100 per clean Hazmat inspection.

One driver got his first inspection and happened to be under a HM load. After his clean inspection, he called Safety to inform, and Safety said if he got another clean inspection, he would double the bonus, so he pulled into another weigh station and asked for an inspection since "it's my first HM load, and I want to make sure everything is correct".

Needless to say, there's a cap now on a given day.

Was behind 1 today as well.

They also added their "Gold Membership" for truck-specific routing stating in the forum (within their app) that Silver Members only receive car specific navigation to which I asked why on earth would people PAY to use an app called TRUCKER Path for car specific directions when google maps work JUST fine for free.

I'm still waiting for their reply.

For the predictive parking info, which is pretty much worthless.

More than just predictive parking.

You will get different navigation between free, Silver, and Gold.

Solo, when you do something you do it all the way. I like your style!

To a fault even, I don't 1/2 ass anything.

All or nothing.

They also added their "Gold Membership" for truck-specific routing stating in the forum (within their app) that Silver Members only receive car specific navigation to which I asked why on earth would people PAY to use an app called TRUCKER Path for car specific directions when google maps work JUST fine for free.

I'm still waiting for their reply.

I donated all of my belongings to Goodwill and Salvation Army, and have been living out of my truck full time for nearly 4 months.

I have $917/month in recurring bills and currently avg gross $1800/wk.

The truck has satellite Radio as well as Satellite TV.

I have unlimited 4g internet for my laptop and tablet.

Purchased a dometic fridge to hold heavy whipping cream for my coffee and almond milk for my cereal.

Bought a sleep number mattress and pillow and literally look forward to sleeping in this thing every night and sleep very comfortably. I literally can't even fathom going out and buying a house or renting another apartment and pay for all that unused and wasted space.

The best financial decision I've made.

Another thing to keep in mind when sitting for long periods of time is the risk of blood clots. Blood that pools, as in the feet, has a tendency to clot. It's a good idea to do leg exercises while you are driving every once in awhile.

This is crazy. I already do each and every one of these subconsciously, and pretty much in the order, she showed. As I was watching this video I was like..wait, I do that...ok, cool. Then the next exercise and so forth...too funny.

I also kick my legs straight out under the dash and flex/stretch them and also stand up off the seat.

As for the butt issue, I'm in the same boat. I'm about 155-160lbs, and my butt has 2 pressure points w/ this Peterbilt seat. I purchased a seat cushion from Costco hoping it would alleviate the issue, but in fact, all it did was put pressure on my hamstrings, so I tried lowering the seat as mentioned a few times above, but to no avail.

I then purchased a double-sided purple seat cushion and it actually made things worse as it wasn't big enough to fit the dimensions of these large truck seats and rolled my legs inward and caused groin discomfort.

So THEN I purchased the super-duper-deluxe purple seat cushion as it was large enough to cover the entire truck seat....only to not provide any relief of 2 pressure points I get when just sitting in the seat w/ no cushion at all. All I can deduce as it pertains to the purple seat cushions is if you're a bigger person, then you might have enough weight to get proper support cushion...and that aside, it's so dang slippery that it slides all around the seat, especially as you exit the truck.

So $300 in seat cushions and I'm no closer to being comfortable than I was day one.

Back to the drawing board.

I have a mail forwarding service set-up out of South Dakota, and have both my moms and dads homes addresses set-up, so should I plan to take a 34 at either of their places, I have have the mail fwd'ing service send my mail there. If I know I'm going to either address and order something from amazon or the like, then I'll just have it shipped to my moms or dads.

I also set-up a PO Box right down the street from my main Termainl in Iowa. So for instance, I'm here now for service, and swung by my PO Box this morning and collected my Amazon (UPS), and FedEx pacakages, as well as regular first class mail.

Cost of course to have both a PO Box and Mail forwarding service, but well worth my time in exchange of the cost incurred.

My results for both my TWIC and HM took ~2 hours.

I opted to call the 800#, instead of waiting ~1-2 weeks for the paper notification, and the lady was really nice and informed me that both had been reviewed and granted and that the following day my DMV would have the results transmitted.

Years past you would have to wait for the letter to arrive in the mail and then deliver that letter in person to your DMV to obtain the HM endorsement on your CDL.

This is about the ONLY thing I like about my auto-shift...it's smooth backing.

It backs just fine in normal operation, but there are times that I will turn the Hill Assist feature off, and I can feather the truck back as needed.

But lurching (in rev) is something it has never done loaded, empty, or bobtail.

Another 3 loads, another $2k.