Hi guys,
So yesterday and today at work were okay, not to bad learned another valuable lesson today, but this pill was a tad easier to swallow then the yellow poll pill I swallowed on Wednesday ha-ha!
When I was hired on I was hired on as a CDL helper and was really just a glorified route helper. Well that lasted all of 7 weeks. The past 2 days the company was short drivers and had no choice, they put me out for 3 days running routes on my own, which was bound to happen sooner or later, it was just to tempting and juicy not to. So they put a CDL helper out on 3 routes. One was a real doosey to say the least the company knew it was a tough one, however they did say to me they knew that I would have delivered all the stops. I told them "Well yeah I had no choice." However they kind of felt bad and dispatched a cargo van to help.
Luckily, the past 2 routes were in neighbor hoods that I knew much much much better and along streets I knew much much much better and the stop count was less.
Any how when I was done at work they had me come into the bosses office the captain boss was on vacation this week, but the lieutenants have a lot of push pull so they sat me down and said "We like what we see, were pulling you off of helper status and putting you on the extra board. You'll get a pay raise, (I also think I am now after 90 days or so eligible for company benefits like real health insurance.) Any how I now have a real driver number, unlike today when I had to call into customer service and the woman goes "Who are you? I've never heard of you before do you have a driver number?" I said "No I'm just a helper with a CDL who just so happens to be driving a route today. I don't even know where I stand." She goes "Ha! well, were all in crazy town here I read you loud and clear on that one."
Another driver I had got to work with used to call customer service and tell them "We got big problems here, big big problems." Even if it was something real stupid like a miss pick or internal pallet damage or something that wasn't the end of the world.
Any how they promoted me to extra board and then gave me a $50.00 gift card to Outback Steak House. I guess that gift card came from upstairs. It was an award for going above and beyond. I literally said to them "I went above and beyond?" They said "Well your a helper and you took an A truck out into the city 3 days in a row running routes I would say that's above and beyond."
So I guess now I kind of made, it, but a good example of things. Today went pretty good, I'll tell you the lesson I learned in a minute, but as far as driving goes, all the stops I had I made sure to know exactly how I was going to get out and like I would pull into a stop and even if I had to walk a little further, trust me I'll take the extra few feet I can drive a two wheeler a lot quicker then screwing my self and having to wiggle the truck out of some disaster like I ran into on Wednesday, just easier, to walk the two wheeler and way faster to, the extra steps don't take as long compared to all the other ignorant things that can happen.
Plus the reason I do this job is for the exerciser, it really is. I mean if I wanted I could go drive a charter bus, but I like being able to drink the Coke that comes in a glass bottle and eating pizza and because work my @$$ off everyday handling cases of beer and fighting with beer kegs, the helper who was with me Wednesday and Thursday loved kegs he was like Oh a Keg I'll get it! He was all running around stacking kegs and taking kegs two at a time down the stairs. He was all excited about doing kegs. Today we had a fair amount of kegs they gave me a helper today too.
Some of the warehouse people work as helpers. The kid who was with me the past 2 days he was like an intern and also worked in the warehouse some and also worked as a helper. He was just 20 years old and I guess is in school to be a business logistics major, he was really a good worker and I was glad I had him.
He said the beer company I now work for as a driver was going to train him to get his CDL if he wanted it. He seemed pretty excited about getting a CDL through the company. Which is good if you have the opportunity, it's good that this company really has some training set up, obviously I was trained on my own, which in a way the one nice thing about truck driving school was I was able to control my whole fate so to say I paid the money was able to get all my endorsements and then made it through.
Like okay I told the kid the one thing I have that not a lot of people have is passenger bus. That was a big one. I also explained to the kid all the different endorsements that there are and how that whole situation works.
I also explained to him the difference between what we do in distribution and OTR truck load. Like he never really heard of log books and I said "Here at the beer company were within a 100 mile air radious of the terminal so we don't need to be on log books, but if you work OTR truck load you can't just drive till your hearts content. There's an 11 and 14 rule you have to follow and a 34 hour reset at the end of 8 working days. It's not like this, I think I said go to the truck stop and buy a log book and study the rules and play with it, you'll see how it works.
I said plus there's different logistics I said truck load carriers are companies like Swift, Werner, Schneider, US Xpress, Crete , Martin, Millis we get a lot of Millis where I work I didn't even get into flatbed carriers like Melton or TMC, but there truck load too or Intermodal like JB Hunt. He said in OTR truck load do you have to use a two wheeler and make deliveries and I said "Yes sometimes, but most of the time, you don't really touch the freight at all." Pretty much your going from manufacturing plant to warehouse to warehouse.
I said the big difference with OTR though is, you can be gone from home for 6 weeks at a time living in your truck the truck load companies are the trucks that have the sleeper cabs.
Any how to the lesson I learned today, that lesson is slow down and double check the bays when you are actually at your delivery. I delivered the wrong pallet to a store today and had to go back to collect the right pallet. I learned that sometimes it pays to pause take an extra second and double check. I hate moving slow it's partially because I am half German and like when they tell me 5:00am you should be at work that to me, means like at 5:00am I should be pulling out of the yard on my way to my first stop, but sometimes you have to take a deep breath and go were going to waste a whole lot more time, if we have to go back and reload. I mean I know there isn't a person out there who hasn't accidentally had a short or delivered the wrong thing somewhere it happens to everyone, I've done it I'm sure I'm not the only one who was. It's not the first time it happens and we'd be kidding our selves if we said it wouldn't be the last.
So yesterday and today at work were okay, not to bad learned another valuable lesson today, but this pill was a tad easier to swallow then the yellow poll pill I swallowed on Wednesday ha-ha!
When I was hired on I was hired on as a CDL helper and was really just a glorified route helper. Well that lasted all of 7 weeks. The past 2 days the company was short drivers and had no choice, they put me out for 3 days running routes on my own, which was bound to happen sooner or later, it was just to tempting and juicy not to. So they put a CDL helper out on 3 routes. One was a real doosey to say the least the company knew it was a tough one, however they did say to me they knew that I would have delivered all the stops. I told them "Well yeah I had no choice." However they kind of felt bad and dispatched a cargo van to help.
Luckily, the past 2 routes were in neighbor hoods that I knew much much much better and along streets I knew much much much better and the stop count was less.
Any how when I was done at work they had me come into the bosses office the captain boss was on vacation this week, but the lieutenants have a lot of push pull so they sat me down and said "We like what we see, were pulling you off of helper status and putting you on the extra board. You'll get a pay raise, (I also think I am now after 90 days or so eligible for company benefits like real health insurance.) Any how I now have a real driver number, unlike today when I had to call into customer service and the woman goes "Who are you? I've never heard of you before do you have a driver number?" I said "No I'm just a helper with a CDL who just so happens to be driving a route today. I don't even know where I stand." She goes "Ha! well, were all in crazy town here I read you loud and clear on that one."
Another driver I had got to work with used to call customer service and tell them "We got big problems here, big big problems." Even if it was something real stupid like a miss pick or internal pallet damage or something that wasn't the end of the world.
Any how they promoted me to extra board and then gave me a $50.00 gift card to Outback Steak House. I guess that gift card came from upstairs. It was an award for going above and beyond. I literally said to them "I went above and beyond?" They said "Well your a helper and you took an A truck out into the city 3 days in a row running routes I would say that's above and beyond."
So I guess now I kind of made, it, but a good example of things. Today went pretty good, I'll tell you the lesson I learned in a minute, but as far as driving goes, all the stops I had I made sure to know exactly how I was going to get out and like I would pull into a stop and even if I had to walk a little further, trust me I'll take the extra few feet I can drive a two wheeler a lot quicker then screwing my self and having to wiggle the truck out of some disaster like I ran into on Wednesday, just easier, to walk the two wheeler and way faster to, the extra steps don't take as long compared to all the other ignorant things that can happen.
Plus the reason I do this job is for the exerciser, it really is. I mean if I wanted I could go drive a charter bus, but I like being able to drink the Coke that comes in a glass bottle and eating pizza and because work my @$$ off everyday handling cases of beer and fighting with beer kegs, the helper who was with me Wednesday and Thursday loved kegs he was like Oh a Keg I'll get it! He was all running around stacking kegs and taking kegs two at a time down the stairs. He was all excited about doing kegs. Today we had a fair amount of kegs they gave me a helper today too.
Some of the warehouse people work as helpers. The kid who was with me the past 2 days he was like an intern and also worked in the warehouse some and also worked as a helper. He was just 20 years old and I guess is in school to be a business logistics major, he was really a good worker and I was glad I had him.
He said the beer company I now work for as a driver was going to train him to get his CDL if he wanted it. He seemed pretty excited about getting a CDL through the company. Which is good if you have the opportunity, it's good that this company really has some training set up, obviously I was trained on my own, which in a way the one nice thing about truck driving school was I was able to control my whole fate so to say I paid the money was able to get all my endorsements and then made it through.
Like okay I told the kid the one thing I have that not a lot of people have is passenger bus. That was a big one. I also explained to the kid all the different endorsements that there are and how that whole situation works.
I also explained to him the difference between what we do in distribution and OTR truck load. Like he never really heard of log books and I said "Here at the beer company were within a 100 mile air radious of the terminal so we don't need to be on log books, but if you work OTR truck load you can't just drive till your hearts content. There's an 11 and 14 rule you have to follow and a 34 hour reset at the end of 8 working days. It's not like this, I think I said go to the truck stop and buy a log book and study the rules and play with it, you'll see how it works.
I said plus there's different logistics I said truck load carriers are companies like Swift, Werner, Schneider, US Xpress, Crete , Martin, Millis we get a lot of Millis where I work I didn't even get into flatbed carriers like Melton or TMC, but there truck load too or Intermodal like JB Hunt. He said in OTR truck load do you have to use a two wheeler and make deliveries and I said "Yes sometimes, but most of the time, you don't really touch the freight at all." Pretty much your going from manufacturing plant to warehouse to warehouse.
I said the big difference with OTR though is, you can be gone from home for 6 weeks at a time living in your truck the truck load companies are the trucks that have the sleeper cabs.
Any how to the lesson I learned today, that lesson is slow down and double check the bays when you are actually at your delivery. I delivered the wrong pallet to a store today and had to go back to collect the right pallet. I learned that sometimes it pays to pause take an extra second and double check. I hate moving slow it's partially because I am half German and like when they tell me 5:00am you should be at work that to me, means like at 5:00am I should be pulling out of the yard on my way to my first stop, but sometimes you have to take a deep breath and go were going to waste a whole lot more time, if we have to go back and reload. I mean I know there isn't a person out there who hasn't accidentally had a short or delivered the wrong thing somewhere it happens to everyone, I've done it I'm sure I'm not the only one who was. It's not the first time it happens and we'd be kidding our selves if we said it wouldn't be the last.