1 tree truck to Olathe KS

... spending the night at Lebanon TN

Breakfast - for me. The rest of the ice cream and the rest of the cookies :)

I thought we might get going earlier today by not going down to get breakfast but that really didn't save any time.

1st stop was for fuel in Spartansburg at a QT/Quik Trip.

Somewhere this AM BB and I got to talking about loosing it, our minds. Being forgetful. Then she tells me that yesterday I went into a closed scale. I can't place it or know how I did it. I try to be 100% focused when I get close to a scale. Maybe it said OPEN when I could see it and not when she could? I did follow another truck in ???

2nd stop was the shipper in Shelby. The lot is almost empty today, other days we have to move trucks to get at ours. Today they are are all single deep with open spots.

All checks good, and today we have a locked area to put our luggage.

3rd stop is the Murphy gas station two blocks away. Some days these trucks are on fumes. Today I have a range of 57 miles but the cheapest fuel is right here. BB heads to the airport as soon as I am ready to leave the shipper.

At the station all islands are full with people backing in and out of spots because of the crowd. I have a big truck so I sit by the end and wait ... After a while the person gets out of their car and starts to pump fuel. ??? But all I can do is wait. When I do get to the pump I have to pay inside before fueling. Lucky for me this person will turn the pump on without me telling them how much fuel I want. I have no idea, the tank does not say and I just picked the truck up two blocks ago.

$130 of fuel my first fill. 42 gallons.

Lots of road construction in SC. About 20 miles between here and Greer. But first I have 10 miles of narrow roads to get to the freeway, my 'lane assist' was on almost constantly. Just before I got to the freeway I caught up to a semi, then I followed him onto the freeway. When that semi got close to the 55 mph speed limit through road construction he was hitting the breaks. So me and another truck followed him for 20 miles. Concrete median barriers on both sides for most of the way. I was just fine.

BB had returned the rental car and was waiting by the time I got to the airport.

4th stop is back to Schlotzsky's. Today the drive through was not backed up onto the street. Not quite. Not when we were in line. But we did have to wait in the drive through line to get to where there was one open spot that we could park. A line both inside and out. They did something wrong with my sandwich today. Too much meat and it didn't taste right. Good, but not right. We sat outside, alone. The inside was packed.

Forgot to mention. Last night when I went to BJ's. I could only see one empty table and at least two groups were waiting. Packed. Not too much concern for Covid anymore.

Coming through road construction we see a cop with a truck pulled over right before the scale. Neither of us saw any sign that said the scale was open or closed, but it was open so we went in. Had we not been following another truck we might not have noticed it.

5th stop is the NC rest area near Waynesville. While we were there my current dispatcher called. They were asking about damage I did to someone else's truck. No. I don't think so. The customer now claims, a week later, that I hit someone else's truck in the lot and are filing a claim.

We will see where this goes. I sent them pictures later tonight of what my truck looked like. No damage to my truck, not sure how I damaged the other one ???

I did have one drive that we were coming up on that was all over the road before we got up to them. Then when we were almost ready to pass he came over with all left tires in our lane so I blew the horn. He drifted back in his lane but I didn't have a good feeling. But then the 3rd left lane opened up and I was able to get around him. Still all over the road as far as I could see him.

The only other driver of note was the one who wouldn't let me pass. He'd be riding his breaks at 60 mph and when I tried to pass at 65 mph going up a hill, he'd pace me and then get ahead of me. Finally there were trucks needing to merge in and I was blocking him from getting in the left lane so he had to back off. After that he passed me and I never saw him again.

6th stop is the Loves near Lenoir TN for cheaper fuel.

7th and final stop is the Comfort Inn in Lebanon.

O'Charley's is just across the parking lot so we got food from there. I got a French Dip and Potato soup. Good, more than I needed.

Load board

US - 503

IA - 236/235

Tomorrow - The weather channel is saying 8-12 inches of snow on Wednesday night into Thursday in Kansas City. We can't make delivery (unless we leave tomorrow at 4 AM) before that. So BB is looking at a whole bunch of what if's. Then she looks at the national weather forecast. They say they don't know how much or where the storm is going to track. So we will wait and see.

No plan for a next trip yet. Once we drop, it will take us almost 24 hours to get back to MN and drop the rental and then back to IA. Lots of work and the total numbers will keep going up until the end of the month.

LOG

7:00 - Leave Comfort Inn - Irmo SC

8:00 - Spartansburg SC - Quik Trip - fuel

9:00 - Shelby NC - shipper

9:45 - Shelby NC - Murphy Gas

11:00 - GSP Airport SC - pick up BB

11:15 - Greer SC - Schlotzsky's Deli

1:30 - Waynesville NC - rest area

3:30 - Lenoir TN - Loves

5:45 - Lebanon TN - Comfort Inn

6:30 - Lebanon TN - O'Charley's