ROUTE: Burton, MI to Charlotte, NC: 737 miles (671 loaded + 66 deadhead)
Monday March 9th was a long day, and that is more often than not in the life of the trucker. It ended up being a sixteen-hour workday. I managed to legally overcome the fourteen-hour workday DOT Regulation because I had a Split somewhere during the day.
I started the day at 9:30am, drove 45 minutes and delivered the load I had picked up on Friday. I left the consignee at noon at drove two hours to the next shipper in Elkhart, IN and where I did the split expecting to have lunch at a nearby steakhouse. I left there at 4:30pm, drove three-and-half hours to the consignee of that assignment and arrived at 8:00pm. The unload process took an hour-and-half so I left there at 9:30pm, drove an hour-and-half to this shipper and arrived at 11:00pm. This is a 24/5 facility and it was a drop-and-hook but it still takes time. I left the facility at midnight, drove an hour-and-half to our terminal where I would spend the night. I arrived at 1:30am and finally called it a day, but it’s not like we jump out of the driver’s seat and into bed. It takes time to unwind, so I went to bed somewhere between 3:00-4:00am.
Tuesday March 10th, legally we need to do a minimum of a ten-hour break to comply with DOT Regulations, so I could not start my day before 11:30am. However, I needed to rest then take a shower, do laundry and go food shopping at Walmart. When I’m short on time I have figured how to multitask while I’m still Off-Duty. I can manage the shower during the wash cycle, put the clothes in the dryer and go food shopping during that cycle. So I started my workday officially at 3:00pm with a pre-trip then I fueled the truck and hit the road at 4:00pm. I drove straight for six hours to Charleston, WV where there’s an IHOP next to the truck stop. It was 10:00pm and the lot was full so I had to do Creative Parking, where truckers try to squeeze a 74 foot vehicle anywhere it fits! It was too late for dinner at the restaurants in the area so I got a couple of slices of pizza at the truck stop vendor, a bag of pork grinds and watched a movie on my Iphone. I don’t have a TV in my truck, some truckers do. I could use my laptop but then need to use my Personal Hotspot and my mobile plan only has a limited number of minutes per month while my phone has unlimited use of data. I’ve gotten used to the small screen, it’s mostly background noise to unwind after a day of driving.
Wednesday March 11th, I went for breakfast at IHOP with their combo platter of scrambled eggs, sausage links, bacon and I upgraded to the strawberry-banana pancakes. I officially started my day at 11:30am and drove four-hours to the consignee where I arrived at 5:30pm. The appointment was for 10:00am but this is a 24/5 facility so I just needed to arrive on the day of the appointment.
BOOK REVIEW (1): The Guest List by Lucy Foley (2020), FICTION – RATING (****)
Lucy Foley does a great job setting the table describing well all the main characters and the important secondary ones. There’s a murder for that we are certain and it happens during the wedding reception. Who is the victim is revealed later in the book. There’s a lot of drama and suspense building up to the moment of the revelation.
Jules Keegan is the bride. She’s a no-nonsense kind of gal. She built an online magazine by her own. Will Slater is the groom. He’s a man that has succeeded in life based on his charm and good looks. Olivia is Jules half-sister and a troubled nineteen year old. Charlie is Jules’s best friend and there are hints that he is more than that or wants to be. Hannah is Charlie’s wife and she hides her own secret. Jules’s dad is on his fifth wife and doesn’t have much time for Jules nor did he ever. Jules’s mom is lost in her memories of an acting career and has a clear preference for Olivia over Jules. Johnno is Will’s oldest friend, the best-man at the wedding but they’re not as close as he would like and knows secrets that bind them together. Aoife is the wedding planner and along her husband, the chef, own the remote island where the wedding is being held. There’s the producer of the show that Will is the protagonist and Will’s buddies from boarding school. Will’s father was the Head Master of that school.
Someone is the victim and someone at the party is the killer but who is who? There are many secrets that bind two or several of the guests together. Are any of those secrets the motif? So many questions!
Entertaining and suspenseful.
BOOK REVIEW (2): The Lost Colony by Irina Shapiro (2023), FICTION – RATING (****)
EXCELLENT. Fifteen people sign up for a reality show where they will spend six months on a remote island off the Virginia coast mimicking life in the times of Colonization. No frills or modern equipment of any sort. The reality is worse that they could have imagined and each questions their decision to have participated. Was the selection truly random or had they been picked because the dark secrets that each hold? Each participant will be paid $50,000 and the winner a cool $1,000,000!
The main character is Natalie, a school nurse with a keen interest in that period of history. Declan, a Chicago police officer. Tim, a deputy sheriff of an Indian Reservation. Brendan, a carpenter from Brooklyn, NY. Mark, a school teacher with sexual predatory behavior. Iris, a failed chef. Will, a retired judge with political ambitions and others. In total, ten men and five women living in three small homes with some chickens and a milk cow.
Right away things go awry and the conditions are not as they were led to believe. Suddenly one contestant is killed, then another and another. Is this another version of Agatha Christie’s Then There Were None or completely different? The final chapters put all the pieces together and incorporates some elements of real world events nicely.
Overall entertaining and suspenseful with touches of a romance novel.
