Fails and Tales

Tuesday, November 22^nd, 2011

“Storms out here in the Northwest.”

“Yep.”

“It gets like this every November. Clouds dump a couple feet of snow in the pass and people drive like they're in a hurry.”

“Yep.”

“Glad we don't live up there. I don't think these tired old bones could handle it.”

“Yep.”

“Pass that bottle of whiskey, will you Ma?”

“Yep.”

      Ah Snoqualmie Pass. The stuff of legends it is. Why, I heard one day that it dumped 48 inches of snow. People trapped in their cars for weeks. They were living off peanut shells and toenail clippings. Luckily they had enough gas to keep warm, else they would have froze to death and ended up like the Donner party a while back. I even heard that one of the truck drivers got so cold he done turned himself blue, then ran around pretending to be a yeti. How he didn't freeze his tonker off in that cold is beyond me, but Ma said he drank himself some of that orange “extended life” antifreeze. He must've been one tough guy. Some say he never went back to his truck. They even say he preys on hapless skiers, eating their ChapStick^®. My cousin up on the mountain told me that some times, in the dead of night, you can hear him... “Breaker 1-9'er.” Chills me to the bone.

      So today I got to deliver a local run. Not quite on purpose, but it seemed to be the thing to do at the time. The idea was that I was going to pick up a load here at the yard, then drive it all of 5 miles, and baby sit it while it unloaded. Cool. So I wake up at 0500, getting ready to start my day. Instead of starting my clock, I decide to take a constitutional and walk around the lot, in the rain and look for my trailer. I will never again complain about the wet winters here after a few days of -22° F. So I'm walking, and not finding my trailer. My DM is still not here yet, so I wait a bit longer, hoping it will show up soon and half dozing off.

      Seeing as this load is set to deliver at 0800, I try to be proactive about it. Maybe I'm a bit twisted, or sick in the head, but I get a certain happy feeling about doing something on time. I wonder if it releases some endorphin for me or something. I detest being late, especially when it is within my control. If it isn't then so it goes. I've learned to cope with that. If it is someone else being late, I don't mind so long as I know. That helps me cope as well. So I call my DM at 0645. I learn that the load is expected to arrive at 0800.

      If I am to deliver that load, the other driver has to drop the trailer and unhook (about 10 minutes if you're not in a hurry). I then have to hook to the trailer and drive down there (again about 10 minutes to hook). Given the drive time of 0820, or rush hour in Seattle, I rightly conclude that this load will not deliver on time.

      Then there comes a scheme. My DM writes to me, “the other driver will meet you at the Safeway DC and you can relay it from there.” I was a bit confused and, honestly, upset about that. I wondered what the point of it all was if we were just going to switch right outside of the gate, on the property. My DM continued, “He's a day cab driver and I don't know what his hours are.” Ok fine. That makes sense. Day cab people get paid by the hour, so sitting is not something the company likes to have them do. Which has JUST made me wonder how much I'm getting paid to burn my clock. We'll see if I get an answer soon.

      The upside of this is that I did not have to go up and over the pass. It has been snowing like all get out up there, and it is all they can do to keep the pass open. Chains have been required for the last 48 hours going east bound. Not a big fan of chains. Whips, maybe, but gotta draw the lines at chains and snow. Cold metal just doesn't do it for me. The opposite in fact. When it comes down to it, I'll do it if I feel like I want to, but today I didn't have to test myself. I got to go to Portland instead and drive through rain. Word. A simple 6 hour run there and back. Ideally, I would have delivered 9.5 tons of toilet paper to a couple of Costco's, but I was dispatched too late to get a 10 hour break in before I had to deliver. So I've dropped it here in Pacific, where I get to do the same thing tomorrow morning that I did today, although the trailer should be here well before delivery. Good to check these things you know.