1 trash truck to Summit IL

... spending the night at Rockford IL

Alarm at our usual 6 AM, ready to leave the hotel at 7:30. We did grab two more yogurts for the road again today.

8 AM we are at the shipper. The large shuttle van from my local company is there, that usually means there were more than five drivers coming here today. I didn't count. I did see a few drivers, two headed to the shop with their trucks. One truck had already left when we were arriving but he may not have been one of us.

I waved at a few of them as I walked by and they were in their trucks but didn't talk to any of them. No one I knew so they likely did not know me. I didn't think about it at the time but BB said she hadn't seen any drivers with their reflector vests on. We are supposed to and the shipper's employee's do when they are out of the buildings.

No issues.

2nd stop is the Kwik Trip in Kasson for fuel and scale. No one else in line so two cashiers waited on me. One of them was asking questions more or less about why we scale the trucks here when they never see the DOT scales open. I didn't think about it until later that most people only travel on the weekends when most scales are closed.

Just before I get to the DOT scale near La Crosse, I catch up to another of our drivers. I might have been able to pass him but didn't. Scale was open so I followed him in. He got the by-pass lane and I had to weigh. I sat on the scale a couple of minutes but then I go the OK to go sign. I was 1,000# under on the scale ticket so I should have been good.

Within a mile or so I have caught up to the other trash truck again. I'm guessing he was going 55 mph and I was doing 65.

3rd stop is the Double Nickels Deli in Camp Douglas. BB just realized a week or so ago that this place may have gotten it's name from being at exit 55. :) We have eaten at the Log Cabin Deli so often lately that we were ready for a change. Good food. We each at half our sandwich.

... my paperwork says the drop is open until 11 PM, but it also says that there is only one person who can sign for new trucks. So I made sure to call. I had tried a few times from Kasson this AM but all lines were busy. So I called when I got here and got through. The only person who can sign leaves at 3:30. IF I don't stop again for any reason or have any traffic slow downs I would make it right at 3:30. So we decide not to try.

20 miles down the road, I notice my check engine light is on. I pull over at the next exit.

4th stop is near Wisconsin Dells, on the exit ramp. BB is ahead of me so I first leave her a message to get her stopped in case this is a bigger issue.

Then I call dispatch. He's new to this account so he has me stay put until diagnostics can be run on my truck. When dispatch calls back, they want me to try a couple of things to get the light to go out but the computer will not respond. There is a closer shop behind me but they allow me to go forward for another hour to the next shop.

5th stop is the shop in Madison. They say they will be able to look at it as soon as a shop bay opens up. Then it will be an hour or so IF they have the parts to fix it. By the time the get a bay open, it is shift change and then before they are done they get a break. So we were there four plus hours but they did get it fixed and it was under warranty.

At first when we got there, we sat in the car. Then we decided to go sit in the drivers lounge. They had told me where it was when I got there ... across the shop, third door on the right, upstairs. We pass two doors and then it was a parts area, so we went back to the first door and up the stairs. A few tables, a place to wait, big TV. Finally a shop person came up and I asked ... no, this is the drivers lunch room :) there is a third door a ways further down with a big sign that says 'drivers lounge.'

Once they tell me it is done and I get paperwork to show dispatch that I was at the shop and not a casino :) I'm waiting for my truck. The guy at the service desk doesn't know why it hasn't been backed out ... that mechanic can't pull his next truck in without getting mine out first. But that is what the mechanic had done, gone to get the next truck. By then the service manager has backed it out and brought it up for me.

Once we realized we couldn't deliver yet today, we had decided to stay in Schumberg. Instead, now we will stay in Rockford. So we will be an hour behind in the AM but (hopefully) get paid for four hours downtime.

6th and final stop is the Sleep Inn in Rockford. It is a known. We could have gotten off the road at Madison or Janesville but we don't have 'our' hotels in those town. We do often stick to what we know.

Once we check in, we head to Jason's Deli for food.

Sometime at the end of the day, after we got our truck so it was the last few minutes of the day ... IA puts out five RV's to our favorite place in NC. But we still have the rest of this week that we planned on working local.

Load board

US - 179

IA - 6

MN - 14

WI - 4

Leave out tomorrow AM as usual, fuel in about 20 miles and then another hour to the drop. Should be dropped by 10 AM. By then local dispatch should know if they have anything else for us. It will likely be too late to leave out of Dodge Center again so we may be back to Rochester for the night.

... or there is still a tanker a few miles from the drop heading to MO.