Scenery

I just finished spending half an hour watching the customers at a driving range. Golf, that is.

I know nothing about golf except what I've read, so I'm not really qualified to judge the quality. And that's just fine. A couple of the girls were pretty, and I got to watch a bunch of non-PGA types to compare the PGA types on TV to. Body mechanics is a pleasant enough diversion (even if the body isn't young, female and pretty).

This, and the sailboats I was watching earlier, are probably going to be the high point of my week, as far as scenery goes.

People are always saying "Be a trucker, see the USA." Maybe if I were a bachelor who never spent his breaks at home. As it is, I see a lot of truck stops and industrial districts. On good days I see neat new truck stops and industrial districts. On bad days I see grungy old truck stops and industrial districts.

This makes sense, I suppose. Why would you put a truck stop next to a tourist attraction? The place to park a truck is near where you'll be loading it. And who wants to put warehouses and factories next to a tourist attraction? Or even a nice neighborhood, with nice restaurants and stores?

A truck stop near a WalMart is a rare and precious thing.

This is not to say I don't see anything worth looking at. I do. Mostly when I'm in transit, so I can't properly appreciate it, but there's still a lot of pretty things to see. A few high points so far:
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Several tantalizing glimpses of the battleship Alabama, as I cross the bridge over Mobile Bay.
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The time I came around a curve in the Appalachians near Knoxville, and the whole world was white. Not snow. Frost. The heaviest frost I've ever seen. Like one of those "frosted" Christmas trees that used to be the fashion, but much more convincing--and going on for miles. It made snow look heavy and clunky. A whole new kind of winter wonderland.
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The biggest and most shameless tourist trap I've ever imagined, much less seen. I may talk about it in detail someday. For now--it's called "Pedro's, South of the Border." The North Carolina border, that is. There's a truck stop within walking distance for some reason, so I got to wander through it. Even in winter I had fun--the lack of pretension was so refreshing.

I want to go back when it's all open and see the tourists have fun getting fleeced. I have no doubt they do enjoy it...
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The beautiful and terrible drive up US15 over the Ozarks. Average speed limit about 25mph, and I think that's too high. The hairpin curves were scary enough, but the hairpin curves through the middle of the quaint-motel district were beyond horrific.

(Imagine. You're on a narrow two-lane road, taking a blind 160-degree downhill curve at 5-10mph. At the moment you're halfway through it. Your steering tires are skimming the shoulder of the opposite lane. Your rear tandems are doing the same thing some 60-80 feet behind you. Somewhere in between, the right side of your trailer is an inch or so from a sheer rock wall. Or a carefully built stone retaining wall. Or a highly-embellished motel-drive gatepost.

(And it occurs to you--if this were summer there would be oncoming traffic...)

Some of those motels cater exclusively to motorcycles (with two-wheeler garages, no less); and I can picture what riding those roads on a Harley would be like. Oh, glorious! In a semi with a 53-foot trailer, though...

And yet it was still at least as beautiful as it was terrible. I wish I'd dared look around...
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And on a more mundane note, a truck stop in Ohio where I've parked twice. Nothing special about it--it's part of a chain, and not the best or the worst example. A fairly nice family restaurant within walking distance (pleasant, but not unique. Merely rare.).

No, the reason I look for a chance to stop there again is in the parking lot. The back spaces are on the edge of a dropoff. If you drive into the space instead of backing into it (usually a BAD idea--another subject for another time), your back will be to the rest of the world. And in your windshield is a valley, green fields bordered with small trees and bushes, leading the eye to the little tree-covered mountain behind them.

If you arrange the curtains just right, you are alone. The trucks are all beside and behind you, and facing the other way. There are only two houses down there, a mile or more off. If you're lucky about your schedule, you can sit in your passenger seat and watch the day fade away. And wake up to watch the sky turn grey and then blue, while the dark emptiness below slowly remembers that it's full and green.

Maybe someday I'll have to restart my work week there.

Addendum: On sharing a street corner

As long as I'm thinking about it, a note. You know those signs you see on trailer doors--THIS VEHICLE MAKES WIDE RIGHT TURNS? They mean it.

The hardest thing about making a sharp corner is getting the trailer wheels past the curb (or shoulder, or building corner, or...). If you cut your wheels too soon, angry pedestrians and the policemen who work for them will be the least of your worries. So you try to get the back wheels as far forward, and as far to the center of the road, as you can--the better to get the back of that thing around.

Time was, drivers would swing HARD toward the center of the road, especially on right turns (the curb is closer then). Get the trailer wheels WELL clear of the curb before you (almost) swivel around them. (This is commonly called a "jug handle" turn. Imagine the path the steering wheels go and you'll know why.) But sooner or later, some clever soul behind him would save a little time by cutting inside the trailer. At which point one of two things would happen:

1. The driver would continue his turn and crush the clever soul between the trailer and the streetlight. This would make the driver unpopular.
2. The driver would see the danger and stop, blocking all traffic in both directions until the clever soul--and all the clever souls that followed him--were gone. This would make the driver unpopular.

Eventually the maneuver itself became unpopular.

Nowadays, we're taught to go straight out into the intersection as far as we can, and then turn even sharper to swivel around the curb. (This is commonly called a "buttonhook" turn. See above for the reason.) By keeping the trailer wheels in the right lane, it cuts down on the number of clever souls. Instead, as often as not, it forces the driver to pass through the space occupied by the car to his right--the one waiting to turn left when the light changes. This innocent bystander now has to back up. Along with everyone behind her. Thus those entire lanes of stopped traffic that suddenly back up a car length--I know you've been in one.

This makes the driver unpopular, but the alternative seems to be worse. So I sit in my cab stare down upon little old ladies until they back up and let me by. It requires a certain mindset to be really comfortable with this job, I guess...

Watch yer tail

Sitting across from a warehouse next to the sea, watching sailboats go by. They seem to be crewed by people who know just a little more about sailing than I do--but since I know next to nothing about sailing, maybe I'd better shut up.

Maneuvering one of these monsters is strange enough. There's something about driving a vehicle that feels as if it's thirty or forty feet long and is actually more like eighty or ninety. My company trainer spent the whole time we were together waiting for me to hook something with the back of the trailer, or crush something with the side of it. It's a common problem, he said. Anybody who's used to four wheels forgets to watch the back corners. But he sure looked nervous (or got loud) every time we were in close quarters.

In a way, it's worse than driving a bus or a big truck. With those, you at least FEEL the length of your vehicle. A semi bends in the middle. You feel as if you're just steering the tractor, and the trailer's following along. But it isn't, exactly.

Imagine if you swiveled with the front tires in your van. It wouldn't be obvious where the back tires were, would it?

If you crank it over hard enough, you can end up with the cab at ninety degrees (or more) to the trailer, and the whole thing swivelling around the back wheels. Handy in a tight space. But stop and think about that. It's quite possible to drive in a complete circle without moving the back of the trailer at all. So what happens if you take a tight corner that way?

Can you say "Crunch," boys and girls? I knew you could.

In parking lots and warehouse areas I tend to go slow. When I turn I go slower. And I look in the mirrors at least as much as I do in front of me, seeing where the back of the trailer is. Finally. My trainer would be relieved.

TYTFG * #2: Internet

*Things you took for granted

A short one this time, since I need to get to sleep pretty soon. And the first in several days. Sorry 'bout that. We've discussed the time thing, though.

What I haven't mentioned is the reason this piece is backdated. I'm parked at a truck stop typing. I will have a post in a moment. But I won't be able to put it up. That would require a connection.

Finding a way onto the Internet out here is either expensive or amazingly spotty. "Expensive" involves a wireless card and a contract with Verizon or Sprint or the like. The cheapest I've seen that didn't look truly fly-by-night was $100 for the card and about $70/month for the contract.

Dirty secret: I started driving because I was (and am) broke. If I had that kind of money I wouldn't be out here.

So that leaves "amazingly spotty." Some truck stops have wi-fi, even in their parking lots. The problem is paying for it. By the day, it moves back into the "expensive" class. Monthly, it's a little more bearable, but then you're stuck going to that truck stop, or (more likely) that chain. So if you park for the night anywhere but Flying J (for example), you're all alone.

My solution, such as it is, involves monthly payments to IdleAire. What's that, you say? I'll describe it later, when I have some time, I answer. Short form, it's a nice solution to the truck comfort problem I mentioned earlier--at a price. The important thing right now is, they also run a wi-fi hotspot at any truck stop that hosts their other services. I don't know that I find more places to hook up, this way, but there's a little more variety.

But it ain't here. So I'm just typing. And when my little icon has the right magic words pop up I will post it. In the meantime, I prepare to shut down and sweat myself to sleep. Night, all.

Outta my way!

One of the harder things I've had to learn is to be as "rude" as a trucker is supposed to be.

Have you ever tried to merge onto an interstate and discovered that the truck in the right lane just ignored you? Sure you have. And what did you say about him? Probably the same things I did, with certain embellishments I usually don't use.

Well, one of the first things I was taught once they let me actually drive a truck was NEVER to slow down and let someone in. It makes more sense than you might think.

Here are two of the basic facts about eighteen-wheelers that everyone who drives them--or drives around them--needs to remember*:

1. They take forever to slow down.

2. They take even longer to speed up again.

So anything that makes you slow down is a Bad Thing. If the traffic's heavy, you've just slowed down your entire lane for the foreseeable future. If not, you've still created a hazard that lasts until you get back up to speed.

If you can, you move over. It's easier to change lanes than it is to change speeds. But if you can't change lanes, your best bet is to stay exactly where you are. The four-wheeler has better brakes and a bigger engine (compared to its weight, anyhow). It can slow down better and speed up better. So just sit there and be predictable. Don't mess up his plans by changing something at the last minute.

That's what they taught me. It didn't really stick, I'm afraid. I still try to politely slow down sometimes, as if I were still in something that could get back up to sixty in four seconds. But twice in the last two days, I tried to slow down and let someone by. And both times the poor driver was busy slowing down to keep from getting run over. And since I was slowing down too, he couldn't get behind me.

By the time I had a rush of brains to the head and put the hammer down again, he was almost out of entrance ramp and we were both below forty.

So I guess I'll try to be rude again. Sigh.

*I don't know yet how many there are. I suspect it's gonna be a long list...

TYTFG* #1: Warm in the winter, cool in the summer

*Things You Took For Granted

I'm writing this in the corner of a truck stop's foyer, next to the Subway (there are many Subway's in truck stops). It's noisy and distracting. I don't mind. It's also air conditioned.

When I first tried to describe a sleeper truck, (in a post I never put up here) I compared it to one of those cabins you sometimes find at a state park. You know--the ones where you freeze to death in the winter because they didn't put in a heater, a fireplace, or any insulation? Well I wrote that in the early spring. In the last few days one big difference has come to my notice:

Those cabins usually have sizable windows. You freeze to death in the winter so you won't melt in the summer.

In the sleeper, you can do both.

The windows in a sleeper are about the size of your head. If you're lucky, you can open them enough to flap a hand through. The windows in the cab proper are much bigger, of course--like the ones in your car. On a cool night, you can be fairly comfortable--as long as you don't mind sharing your rest with every passing bug. The windows in your car don't have bug screens either, do they? Didn't think so.

I am old enough to remember lying awake on a summer night, feeling the sheets soak up my sweat. I wasn't expecting to do it on 70-degree nights.

So I'm hiding in the a/c until the outside air cools down. That won't help the truck much, of course--maybe I can run the fans a little while before I go to bed. As long as I don't run the battery down I might be all right (I did that once--fell asleep before I could cut the fans off for the night. Fortunately another driver had semi-size jumper cables...)

Or I could start the truck and run the a/c for a while. In Louisiana I can. There are several states where I could be severely fined for that. But that's another post.

Meanwhile, I wait for the cool. No point in taking a shower until the truck's cool enough that I won't get all sweaty again. Showers are a precious thing, now. (Another TYTFG there. Maybe tomorrow...)

Safety equipment: Windshield washer fluid

Yeah, I didn't think so either. Not until yesterday, when my washer ran dry as I drove through a Texas summer night, listening to the bugs on the windshield go pitter-pat, like a gentle rain. It's hard to steer when you're constantly moving your head looking for a clear spot...

(Mind you, it's important stuff in the winter, too. Nothing like dirty road water freezing on the glass to reduce your appreciation for the scenery. But I hadn't really thought through the summer need.)

(And yes, I kept writing when I should have been getting ready for bed. This putting-stuff-down stuff is addictive. Of course I knew that...)

Time

You may have noticed a lapse between when I started this blog (see intro) and my first "real" entry (today). I guess that will do for a first topic: Spare time. Less of it.

At first it didn't seem that way. I spent at least a few hours a week looking around online, or typing (I don't know if I was writing or not...) or wandering around looking at things. But maybe age is catching up to me. In the last two or three weeks, I've slept more. My last week on the road I didn't take the laptop out of its case once. And it took three days this time. Scary.

Part of it, of course, is something I should have expected--this is a job. You're supposed to work. You get paid by the mile, so if you're doing something other than driving, it's a bad thing. And on a good day, you're spending at least nine hours behind the wheel--ten or eleven if you can do it. And nine or ten or eleven hours of driving is work.

I'm told it used to be work the way most people think of work. Truck drivers got their "I'm tough" rep honestly, wrestling their trucks and the roads into submission. In the age of power steering, air conditioning, GPS, satcoms, &c, it's not as physical. But you're still driving down the road at sixty-plus, in a huge clumsy vehicle than turns into a forty-ton missile if your attention wanders, surrounded by people who aren't paying nearly as much attention to their jobs as you are. It's wearing.

At the end of the day, I often find myself in an odd state: physically fresh but mentally wiped. Keyed up but sleepy. Restless but wanting to lie down. And I have ten hours to unwind and sleep it all off. Sometimes that leaves time for thought. Sometimes it doesn't.

Tonight I have time for thought. That may be a bad thing. Y'see, I didn't get much driving in today. I spent most of the day tangled in several varieties of red tape, so I didn't wear myself out on the road. So I didn't make much money. I can write because I couldn't work. See how that goes? Sigh.

But I still need to sleep. So I guess I'll finish this up and take a quick walk around before bedding down. It's so much cooler outside. (Comfort and weather is a topic for another day.) G'night.