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Phil Madsen's BlogLearning Something New Every Day |
Truck drivers Phil and Diane Madsen live, work and play on the road; transporting expedited and critical-shipment freight in their custom-built truck. Phil's blog is a blend of travelogue, brain dump and commentary on road-inspired topics.
Most Recent Blog Entry • Monthly Trip Maps
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Blog entries are made so as not to reveal customer specifics or the current location of the truck when we are under load. Entries are updated to include location information after we leave the area. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Tuesday, September 1, 2009 I learned today more about getting in and out of Boston with a truck. Learned by watching Diane do it.
We did exactly what we hoped to do. After picking up a load in Kansas yesterday, we got to Boston and were able to deliver late this afternoon, instead of tomorrow morning. We were amazed by the light rush-hour traffic. This photo is of I-90 heading into Boston, just three exits from downtown. Notice the light traffic coming out of town at 4:00 p.m. The city streets were more of a challenge.
When we planned the trip in, we used Google Maps street view to check out the neighborhood. The local directions routed us under a bridge that looked low on the photos so we avoided it. It would have been fine. Learning that, we sent the bridge clearance height to our carrier and asked that it be added to local directions to this customer's location. The next driver will then know for certain that the bridge can be cleared by truck.
Immediately after completing that delivery, we were dispatched on our next run. We worked our way back through town, onto I-90 westbound, and then to a service plaza where we settled in to spend the night. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Wednesday, September 2, 2009. I learned today the history of the Chapman Valve fire hydrant. Learned by reading it on the www.firehydrant.org web site.
The Chapman Valve fire hydrant is in my thoughts because I photographed one yesterday in Boston. Isn't it beautiful? Wanting to know more about it, I went to my favorite online fire hydrant resource: www.firehydrant.org.
This and two other hydrants were near our delivery. I was still in uniform when I hopped out of the truck to take this shot. As bumper-to-bumper traffic crept along this city street, many eyes were on me. I could almost hear the people wondering, "Why is that FedEx man taking pictures of fire hydrants?" Don't ask me. I don't know!
We woke up this morning at a Massachusetts service plaza and headed out to our pickup. On this run, there are more deadhead than loaded miles. We got to the pickup at 3:00 p.m., loaded easily and headed to the delivery. It is a reefer load but the customer has no cold storage facilities. They want the load delivered first thing in the morning, which is fine with us. We do not have to stay awake with this freight. We will spend the night at a rest area along the way.
Diane has been doing the driving today. I'm in the sleeper, puttering away on various existing projects. Not much new is going on.
We are pre-dispatched on our next load. After tomorrow's delivery, we will drive immediately to that pickup, load and head out on an overnight run. That run will deliver in the Midwest on Friday morning.
Business is picking up and I am finding no free time for trading. Diane is going home for a dental visit next week. We will see about working some trading time in then. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Thursday, September 3, 2009. I learned today nothing new. We drove and slept in shifts all day and night.
We woke up at 4:00 a.m. this morning in an I-80 rest area in New Jersey. Leaving soon after, to avoid the New York City rush hour, we drove to JFK Airport where we delivered freight at 7:00 a.m. We headed next to a New Jersey service plaza on I-95 to take a nap before going to a suburb west of Philadelphia to pick up our next load. That pickup went fine. It put us on an overnight run to Saint Louis.
The weather was near perfect and we very much enjoyed the drive once we got on the open road. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Friday, September 4, 2009. I learned today that a trucker friend is coming to dinner. Learned when the arrangements were made.
We delivered a load in Saint Louis early this morning. We have a good friend, Glen Rice, who I speak with by telephone almost every day. As with most truckers that talk to each other, the first words are, "Where 'ya at?" We will be in Troy, Illinois (across the river from Saint Louis), tonight and so will he. Dinner is set for 6:00 p.m.
Just before we delivered this morning, we accepted an offer that picks up on Tuesday, after the Labor Day weekend. It is a load that takes us toward home, which is good, since Diane needs to see the dentist on Wednesday.
It also gives us four full days to spend in the Saint Louis area. We spent most of today asleep. We have been running hard and it was nice to not only stop the truck for more than a few hours, but to do so knowing that we did not have to immediately move again when we woke up.
It also feels nice to have some decent money to add to the books. We have done a number of good runs in the last couple weeks, some of them back to back. Yesterday, we delivered one load and picked up another on the same day. It has been a long time since that has happened.
With the long weekend, the area RV parks are full. We will be spending the nights in parking lots, as usual. No plans have been made for the weekend. I am ready to take a break from trucking and trading — an actual day off!
We have already seen the famous Gateway Arch in Saint Louis. I would love to spend a full day in an art gallery. We know of a nice one and will likely go there tomorrow. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Saturday, September 5, 2009. I learned today that, "The mind is not a passive machine. Once you believe in something—once you expect something—it changes the way you perceive information and the way your memory recalls it.” Learned by reading this quote by a cognitive psychologist in a true-crime story online, in the New Yorker magazine.
The story is a stumbled-upon item that I clicked when checking the morning news on Google. It was just interesting enough to keep me reading. As I did, the quote appeared and strongly resonated. It resonated because I already believe it to be true.
I have long believed in something called cognitive bias. That is part of why I blog. When Diane and I look back on our truck driving career and remember what it was like on the road, I don't want to remember what I then think is true, I want to remember what was true in the day. This blog is written day-by-day and will provide a more accurate record of our activities, thoughts and feelings than memory will in the future.
Cognitive bias affects one's views of the future too. You may have noticed that Diane and I are having financially one of the best two-week periods we have had in this business, but I am not joyous about it like I have been in similar two-week periods in the past. The circumstances are identical — great freight, great pay, and lots of it — yet I am subdued now.
It is not my circumstances that are different but my view of the future. Now that I maintain a view that is less optimistic about the future of expediting, that cognitive bias acts as an information filter. I am skeptical of the increasingly positive economic indicators that are coming out and willing to assign greater weight to those that support, not the truth, but my skepticism.
The jump in revenue now showing on our books is a fact, but I don't believe it should be taken as a sign of better days ahead. The future is gloomy because I think it is, and no set of facts, no matter how up close and personal they may be (like our own revenue numbers), is going to change my mind.
People believe what they want to believe and then gather "facts" to support what they have come to think is true. This is a fact because it's true, and it's true because I believe it.
Knowing your biases enables you to rise above them. Whether the future is gloomy or bright, our present-day actions are the same, because our goals for the future remain unchanged. Our goals for the future guide our business decisions, not the mood of the day. We work as hard and smart as we can and manage our money to achieve our financial goals.
Truckers often make decisions without accounting for their cognitive biases. After months of recessionary revenue, I may feel and believe that the money has come out of expediting and the future is gloomy. A recent bump in revenue can be dismissed as an anomaly. A belief can be formed and the decision can be made to sell one's truck, and once the mind is so set, supporting evidence can be easily gathered.
Having a goal and knowing how one's thinking is affected by cognitive bias breaks up that flow. Yes, I believe in a gloomy future for expediting. Yes, evidence supporting that view can be easily gathered. But our financial goals require a positive outlook and the present-day numbers on our books cannot be ignored.
What's true about the future of expediting? In the end, it does not matter. What matters is the goals we have set. The goals determine our actions because they determine the way we perceive things and act. Like beliefs, goals also produce cognitive biases.
Because we have certain goals, we tend to think, see, feel and in ways that lead to their accomplishment. We keep our truck when others are selling theirs. We stay on the road when others come off. We save money for our next truck because our goals are such that we will still be in the business when our present truck wears out. Because we keep our truck, stay on the road and save money, the recession passes us over and takes out the non-goal-oriented players.
Such are my thoughts this rainy morning at the Flying J in Pontoon Beach, Illinois, where we woke up this morning. The rain eliminates community festivals as a tourist option, at least for today. Indoor fun at an art museum is on the agenda. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Sunday, September 6, 2009. I learned today more about trading. Learned by reading yet another book about it.
We are laid over in the Saint Louis area, waiting to pick up freight on Tuesday. I woke up this morning, a couple of hours before Diane, and read a book while waiting for her to wake.
Decompress. That's what an expediter once called it. She told us she goes home to decompress from the road and it takes two nights and two days. We did not do much of anything yesterday. Our intent to go to the art museum gave way to decompression time. We have been running hard and needed to do nothing more than we needed to do something. Realizing that today, takes the pressure off. Today will also be a nothing day, this one intended. We need to rest. At least I do.
I have said that expediting is the easiest, most lucrative and most fun job we have ever had. While that remains true, it does not mean that expediting is effortless. On our last few runs, we have driven from Connecticut to Alabama to New Mexico to Arizona, to Los Angles, to San Francisco, to Saint Louis to Kansas to Massachusetts to Upstate New York to New York City to Pennsylvania to Saint Louis. Rest is needed from time to time, and this is one of those times.
People recharge in different ways. Some do so by being around other people. Others do it by getting busy at home. Still others go golfing, dancing, to church or whatever. I do it best by doing nothing. Diane calls it my cave time or alone time. After doing nothing for a while, nothing becomes something as I will pick up a book, write, study something new, wash the truck, watch a movie, organize photos, exercise or whatever. Whatever it is, it is not something required or planned.
Trucking and trading have kept me busy for a while. Today is a day of rest.
Update: I wrote the above paragraphs early in the day. It is now sundown and we just moved back into the truck after spending several hours in lawn chairs in a quiet and pleasant city park. In that time, it occurred to me that taking a break can be one of the most productive things you ever do.
A week ago, I spoke of feeling trapped because our increased expediting activity and revenue was leaving little time to trade. I'm over that now, at least for the moment.
While resting, I got to reading, and one of the things I read was that in trading, you can't win if you have to win. In other words, don't trade with money you cannot afford to lose. Put in another way, scared money never wins. Or you can say, don't trade with emotionally-encumbered money. Saying it in still another way, if you fear losing the money you put into a trade, the fear will cloud your perceptions, judgment and will to act while you attempt to manage the trade. You cannot care about the money you put into a trade. If you do, you will lose it for sure.
Diane and I addressed this a long time ago when we took some money out of our real accounts and put it into a trading account. It would not hurt us to lose it...as long as we have revenue form sources other than trading; specifically, expedting. If our primary source of revenue were to dry up, the money we put aside to trade would become more significant.
Yes, expediting takes time away from trading. But as I rested today, it came to me that our expedting revenue also gives me the throw-away money I need to trade. Expediting does not keep me from trading, it frees me to trade.
As I rested today, my head cleared, and trading and expediting came back into balance. Resting truly is one of the most productive things you can ever do. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Monday, September 7, 2009. I learned today about the World's Largest Catsup Bottle (it even has a web site). Learned by driving by it after being directed to it by Frank, a reader of this blog.
If you wish, you too can become a member of the World's Largest Catsup Bottle fan club! Send in $25 and get a T-shirt, laminated membership card, and, and ... everything!
Do you remember Frank? He read in my blog that we were in the Saint Louis area and contacted us to meet for a visit. After Diane and I got the truck washed late in the day, Frank and I met at the Flying J truck stop in Pontoon Beach, Illinois while Diane did laundry. Tomorrow's pickup is early. We got everything ready to go and turned in for the night.
Other than that, today was a full trading day for me. While Diane slept in this morning, I set up the computer in the cab and got online at 6:00 a.m. I moved back into the sleeper after she got up. I got in a solid ten hours of screen time today — actual time in front of an open market — and was glad for it. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Tuesday, September 8, 2009. I learned today about a woman who collects pictures of tombstones. Learned by hearing about her from a customer.
The shipper saw me take a photo of a fire hydrant near this morning's pickup. Diane explained my fire hydrant interest to her and she told us of someone she knows who photographs tombstones. Fire hydrants, giant catsup bottles, tombstones; you name it, someone is interested in it.
We picked up freight in Saint Louis, Missouri this morning and delivered it to the cargo area at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport this afternoon. Diane was able to catch a ride to the passenger terminal and will catch a flight to Minneapolis. She has a dental appointment near home tomorrow. I am staying with the truck in the Chicago area.
We do not know yet when Diane will return, or to what city. We are still putting those plans together. I may move to Toledo to get some reefer maintenance done and she may fly there. She may need to see two dentists this trip home. It depends on what her orthodontist says when she sees her tomorrow. Details are still being researched and considered. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Wednesday, September 9, 2009. I learned today about double-sweet sweet corn. Learned by tasting it.
I woke up this morning in the truck in a retail area near Chicago. Diane woke up at home, where she is for a dental appointment. Shortly after I got up and about, I received and accepted a load offer. It picks up tomorrow in Minneapolis and delivers later in the day in Chicago.
It turned out to be a good thing that Diane bought a one-way airline ticket yesterday. I am now getting paid to go home and pick her up. We will be back on the road together and back in Chicago tomorrow afternoon.
Because it happens so seldom, it is a very strange thing to drive the truck without Diane in it. It was an enjoyable summer drive through Wisconsin. I started listening to business-topic podcasts but soon gave it up in favor of music. Today it was me and my truck cruising happily on the open road.
When I got home, Diane had supper waiting. One of Diane's sisters works in a genetics laboratory. She brought a new kind of sweet corn to share. It was developed by the company she works for. It is called double-sweet sweet corn and it is the best tasting sweet corn I have ever tasted. If we are home next year, this time of year, I will be looking to get ahold of that corn again. It was absolutely delicious.
There was no spare time at home. Tomorrow's load picks up at 4:00 a.m. local time. We got in a load of laundry and showers, got the truck ready to roll and then turned in early. The pickup is 30 minutes from home. We like to build in an hour of what we call sluff time when heading to a pickup. That meant 30 minutes of driving, an hour of sluff and 30 minutes to get up and ready to drive for a 2:00 a.m. departure from home. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Thursday, September 10, 2009. I learned today about something I would love to talk about here but is better to keep to myself.
We are not always at liberty to talk about the freight we haul and this is one of those times. We had a courier riding with us on this load. Shippers sometimes send couriers or escort vehicles with us to help keep an eye on the freight. This courier was from a foreign country. He talked at length about his work and employer. It was an interesting and entertaining visit.
Other than the early pickup time and the presence of a courier, today's run from Minneapolis to Chicago was routine. We made the delivery as scheduled and headed immediately toward Toledo, Ohio to get our reefer serviced.
The reefer is due for a PM (preventative maintenance) and equipment certification. Keeping these up means remaining eligible to haul particular kinds of temperature-controlled loads. The certification equipment the reefer dealers use is itself specialized. Only a few dealers provide the service. That is why we had to drive past several reefer dealers to get to the one that can do the work.
We arrived at that dealer just after sunset and they could get us right in to do the work. We decided instead to get in a full night's sleep and have the work done first thing in the morning. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Friday, September 11, 2009. I learned today how some people get defeated in the expediting business. Learned by seeing an idle expediter truck parked deep in a back lot and hearing the story about how it came to be there.
While our reefer was being serviced today, I visited at length with the service manager. One of my questions was about the perfectly-good expediter truck that was sitting in the mud on the far edge of his back lot. He told me the story. As I listened, I concluded — perhaps incorrectly — that while the owner could be running the truck or at least trying to sell it, he seemed to have given up and was content to let it sit.
Able to think of several things to do with the truck that would be better than letting it sit in the mud, it saddened me to see it there.
The recession has discouraged millions of people. In trucking, thousands of truckers have lost their fire, parked their trucks and let the weeds grow up around them. I am not discouraged but can understand how doing nothing can be easier than doing something.
While the pain of a sitting truck can be temporarily relieved by ignoring the truck, an idle asset is not a dead entity. Its condition evolves and its power to produce more pain grows.
The banker demands payment. The insurance company cuts coverage. The carrier terminates your contract. Customers you served with the truck find other trucks to meet their needs. The truck's declining value pulls your net worth down with it. Predators approach you with pain-reducing schemes that are designed to move the last bit of money you have from your pocket to theirs. Vandals may come by and use your truck to produce a few minutes of cheap thrills for them.
Eventually the pain of doing nothing exceeds the pain of doing something and the less-painful path of doing something is chosen. The delay produces deeper losses and greater pain than what would have been experienced if action had been taken earlier.
Someone whose fire has gone out may clearly see how an idle truck sucks the life out of its owner. He or she may even agree that it is better to act now than later. But the operative factor in this situation is not the logic of action. It is the absence of fire.
• Immediately after we pulled out of the shop, we received and accepted a load offer. It picked up today in Fort Wayne, Indiana and delivers early tomorrow near Detroit, Michigan. We found a quiet place to spend the night a few miles from the delivery location and settled in for a good night's sleep. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Saturday, September 12, 2009. I learned today about Horia, a man from Romania who drives an expediter van in America. Learned by meeting him.
After making an early morning delivery near Detroit, Michigan, we returned to the retail area, where we slept last night, to finish off a good night's sleep. After breakfast, we prepared to go to a park to spend the day and enjoy the great weather.
Just before we left, Diane pointed out a cargo van and driver to me. He had been under his van a few times checking his left-rear tire. I went over to see if he needed help. He said his right-rear wheel was red-hot last night and he had his brakes repaired the day before. To make a long story short, we checked things out and the van seemed fine. He took it for a test drive. When he returned, I used our infrared thermometer to check his wheel temperatures. They were fine.
A now relieved Horia told me a little about himself, his business and Romania, his home country. Regarding business, he said cargo van expediting is dead. He used to haul freight for $1.20 a mile and now hauls it for $0.80, and freight volume is much lower than it was when rates were higher.
Being in Toledo yesterday and Detroit today, we have seen the closed automotive plants that have been in the news and a far greater number of closed companies that used to supply the automotive industry. In today's local paper, we saw page after page of foreclosure notices. The crash of 2008 has been hard on people nationwide. It has devastated this area.
Horia and I exchanged names and phone numbers and went our separate ways. For for Diane and me, that was to a regional park where we spent the day waiting for freight. No offers worth accepting came. Diane took a walk with the camera and got a cute shot of a deer. We plan to attend church and a home show tomorrow. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Sunday, September 13, 2009. I learned today the Detroit mayor's vision for the city. Learned by reading it in the local newspaper.
I commented yesterday about how this area is economically devastated. As I read today's Detroit Free Press, it occurred to me that Detroit may become one of the most exciting and transformational cities in the United States. Detroit is looked upon as a dying and hopeless city by many American's, myself included. Mayor Dave Bing's proposals have me reconsidering that opinion.
Desperate times call for desperate measures. It might just be that the people of Detroit actually elected someone with the political vision and courage the city needs to live again. The city's unionized workers have pulled their support from the new mayor and he seems to be OK with that. "I didn't come in here as a politician and I won't leave as a politician,...." he said in a Detroit Free Press interview.
Union opposition will be fierce. Will the people of Detroit support this new mayor enough to push his proposed changes through? Time will tell. If they do, it will signal me — a Detroit outsider — that the city may be worth saving after all. If not, my view of Detroit as a dying city to be avoided will persist.
Bing was elected to office earlier this year to complete the term of a mayor who vacated the office as part of a plea bargain agreement. That term ends on December 31, 2009. Bing is campaigning for re-election. His major opponent is Tom Barrow, who enjoys union support. The election is in November. This will be a very interesting race to watch.
Most interesting to me will be the choices the people of Detroit make. So much of what is wrong in government could be quickly fixed if people at the grass roots level would simply rise up and say "enough!" I will be watching with great interest to see if the people of Detroit do just that. Will they vote for the reforms that are needed to save the city? Or will they vote with the unions to preserve city worker jobs?
Unions did not help bring U.S. automotive companies to their knees. Union excesses did. So too with Detroit (in my outsider's view). I see no one trying to break the union in Detroit. I see Bing trying to put the city's greater good ahead of the union's self-serving ways.
• Oh my goodness, look at me. I went and got political. Well, enough of that. We woke up this morning near Detroit and continue to wait for freight. Feeling well rested, we saw no need to set alarms last night. To our surprise this morning, we woke up much later than we thought we would. As a result, we missed both church and the home show we had planned to attend. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Monday, September 14, 2009. No blog entry today.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009. No blog entry today.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009. I learned today more about the expediting industry. Learned by writing about it.
I apologize for the lagging blog entries. We have been running and I have bit off a very big piece in an article I am working on for ExpeditersOnline.
The article is a follow-up piece on the departure of custom sleeper manufacturer Bentz Transport Products from the business (See: Bentz Transport Products Closes its Doors). As time permits, I am interviewing Bentz himself, Bentz customers (end users), dealers, competitors and others. Bentz was a leading supplier to expediters. His departure is news and an opportunity for all of the above mentioned people to reflect and comment on the state of expediting today. This is a very interesting piece to write but it is taking a ton of time. I am enjoying the work but regret that my trading and blogging time have suffered.
• On Monday, we picked up a load in Ohio that went to Massachusetts. On Tuesday, we picked up a load in New Hampshire that went to Alabama. After making the Alabama delivery on Wednesday, we went to bed early and slept the night through in a non-moving truck. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Thursday, September 17, 2009. I learned today about the TED talks. Learned by stumbling onto them while surfing the internet.
What a delightful discovery! I don't know anything about who sponsors these talks or how they came to be, but am loving them. Great thinkers are asked to give brief talks to audiences of other great thinkers on a wide range of topics. The talks are less than 20 minutes long and fascinating to view online. Listening to a TED talk is a great way to take a coffee or tea break and feed your mind.
• We woke up this morning at a rest area on I-85 in Alabama. We are dispatched to pick up a load tomorrow afternoon in Atlanta. Today was spent mostly in the truck. I spent several hours writing a piece for ExpeditersOnline. Diane did some business paperwork. Before sunset, we moved closer to Atlanta to spend the night. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Friday, September 18, 2009. I learned today that the Federal Housing Administration is losing so much money on delinquent mortgage loans that its reserves will drop below the required 2% of loans, and that this government agency is now guaranteeing about 23% of new mortgages, up from around 3% in 2006. Learned from news reports.
Back when bailout fever was at its worst, I advocated no bailouts and suggested that people and companies should take the pain they created with their irresponsible credit actions. That did not happen. Instead, much of the debt was shifted onto the government. As we see in today's news, nothing was solved. We just kicked the can further down the road and the still-unresolved credit issues are raising their ugly head again.
If not for the huge increase in government-guaranteed mortgages, housing sales would not be what they are today. In other words, the recent improvement in housing sales numbers are not real. They are artificially stimulated by the government and at a price that must be paid at some point.
I do not believe the present talk that the recession is over. Most of the indicators that have improved have government stimulus money behind them. We may see positive growth in the third quarter of 2009, but that will mean nothing to me. I want to get past the fourth quarter to see if it shows positive growth. For now, I am expecting a "double-dip" recession, as some call it; meaning that the third quarter may show growth but the fourth quarter GNP will decline.
While Diane and I have experienced a revenue increase in recent weeks, we continue to live within our means and save money. We did the same thing before the recession began, which is why we are still standing in the expediting business today.
• Today's load picked up in a residential area. With the pickup being late in the day, we drove by several hours ahead of time to get the lay of the land. It was not good. Low tree branches and tight turns made it impossible to to get a truck into where the freight was to be picked up. Parking on the street and carrying the freight to the truck was impossible too. It was a busy street in a congested area with no legal parking provided. The police would have tagged us for sure and run us off.
Our instructions said to call the shipper for directions. When I did, it turned out that the shipper was in her car, almost in the same parking lot where we were parked. She came by the truck, I got in her car and we went to the freight. After seeing our truck and with me pointing out the hazards (car drivers do not look up like truck drivers do), she agreed that there was no way to safely bring the truck in. Arrangements were made for a smaller truck to take the freight to a location where we could load it onto our truck.
Our original pickup time was 5:00 p.m. We finally got rolling with the freight on board around 8:30 p.m. There was nothing wrong with that. We totally missed the Atlanta rush hour. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Saturday, September 19, 2009. I learned today about the book, The Visual Arts: A History by Hugh Honour & John Fleming. Learned by finding a copy sitting on our windshield after waking from a nap.
The book is billed on its back cover as, "...the most compelling total history of art ever written." It includes 1,459 illustrations, 714 in full color. Printed on glossy paper, it is not an inexpensive book. It came to us today as a surprise and most-welcome gift from someone we interacted with on the load we delivered in Maryland this morning.
In our chat, he became aware of our previous careers, educations and interest in the arts, uninformed as that interest is. He was delighted with the care we showed for the freight as we delivered it. This inside delivery was nothing out of the ordinary for us but he thought it was something special.
After this overnight run, we were looking for a place to park and sleep. Our consignee said it would be fine to park near the loading dock and sleep there. After giving truck tours to five people at this delivery who were interested in the truck, we said goodbye and our standard "Thank you for using FedEx." We next parked the truck and went to sleep. Two hours later, we woke to find the book on our windshield with a nice note from a grateful consignee.
I have been smiling about it ever since. The gift was a total surprise and could not be more appropriate and appreciated. Diane and I really are interested in the arts but know so little about them. This college-level art history book is exactly what we need to develop a better understanding. The book will provide many hours of pleasure reading and education for both of us. We cannot believe the consignee took the time, trouble and expense to give us this gift. All day long, I have been saying to Diane, I can't believe he did that!
As if the day was not pleasant enough, we drove next toward our next pickup. The route took us north on MD-213. The lighting was perfect. It was a pleasant and scenic drive on a road we had not driven before. Two of the many photos we took are shown here. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Sunday, September 20, 2009. I learned today far more about computer network connections than I wanted to know. Learned by troubleshooting the FTP connection issue that has kept me from posting my blog entries for a week.
I have been writing daily blog posts but am unable to upload them to the web server from which they are downloaded to your computer. I found some time today to work on this but remain unsuccessful. At times like these, I swear that computers are one of the biggest drags on human productivity and creativity ever invented. Others will say they boost productivity and creativity. Which is true? It depends if your computer is working or not.
We spent most of today in truck stops. Diane did laundry. We got the truck greased. I did not do it myself this time because I wanted to work on the computer issue instead.
Most anyone with a little computer sense would think an FTP issue is easy to troubleshoot and resolve. I thought so too but my particular issue is not common. It is not addressed by the support documentation and what very few people can be found talking about it online have different computers or different particulars. I'll be going to bed soon. After immersing myself in this for a day, perhaps the solution will come to me overnight.
• We are parked at a truck stop for the night. Tomorrow, we will drive about 80 miles to our early-afternoon pickup, run that load all day and night, and deliver it Tuesday morning. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Today's Topics: Truck Build Article • Hershey, Pennsylvania • Today's Activities
I learned today that an article written by Jeff Jensen in 2006, about our truck build has re-appeared on the ExpeditersOnline web site. Learned by seeing it. I also learned about Hershey, Pennsylvania. Learned by driving through it.
• Just as we were putting our custom-built truck on the road in 2006, Jeff Jensen, then Editor at ExpeditersOnline, wrote a nice triumph-over-adversity story about what we went through to get the truck. The story was published on the EO web site but disappeared shortly thereafter. I only now learned that it was taken down because it seriously ruffled the feathers of the vendors involved, though the vendors were not named. If you read the piece you will see why. I was quite surprised and pleased to learn that the story has been put back up. You can read it here.
I am pleased because I want people to know who the vendors are that served us well. They are named in the story. With the passage of time, it is very interesting to note that the vendors that failed us have either changed jobs, been fired or gone out of business; while the companies that served us well remain in business, and with one exception, the individuals remain at their desks.
• We drove through Hershey, Pennsylvania this morning on the way to today's pickup. What a delightful town! We did not have time to stop and take in any of the town's many attractions but Hershey, PA is on our to-do list for the future.
The Hershey Company is located there. Known for its chocolate products, its influence is seen throughout the town. We were amused by street names like Cocoa Avenue and Chocolate Avenue, and by street light poles made to look like Hershey's Kisses. One does not see these sights for long without a chocolate craving kick in.
• Freight-wise, it is a routine day. We picked up a load at 1:00 p.m. and are now driving overnight to deliver it tomorrow. I interviewed another truck dealer for the story I am writing.
I continue to troubleshoot my FTP connect problem that is keeping me from posting these blog entries. I have e-mailed details to the appropriate support people and expect to hear back from them in the next 24 hours. Sadly, while my web host company is very good in most respects, telephone support is a thing of the past. Of course, you won't know any of this until the problem is solved. Until it is, I am writing blog entries to myself. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Tuesday, September 22, 2009. I learned today about the flood damage in the Atlanta, Georgia area. Learned by attempting to drive to our Atlanta-area pickup.
I say attempting to drive because while we have been trying for several hours to complete what would normally be an easy 100 mile drive.
Atlanta was hit with 15 to 20 inches of rain in the last 72 hours. The latest list shows 78 roads and bridges closed due to flooding. It is evening rush hour now and it is a mess!
We delivered early this morning in Alabama and settled in for a morning nap. A couple hours later, we accepted a load offer. The load picks up tomorrow morning and delivers later in the day. Piece of cake, we thought.
We thought wrong. Our first try was to take I-20 toward Atlanta and cut off onto side roads that would take us to the south end of town, where our pickup is. We have a favorite parking space near the pickup. That is our destination for tonight.
Long before we reached our exit on I-20, the freeway was at a dead stop. I-20 is one of the interstates closed by flooding. We knew that. We did not know the backup before the detour would be miles long.
We exited quickly to avoid being trapped on the freeway and planned an alternate route. Three miles into it, we encountered the washed out road shown here. We then decided creeping along the freeway would be our best bet, but by the time we got back to it, the on ramp had been closed by the police.
We next tried another alternative route on secondary roads. Same story. After a couple of miles, we ran into another washed out road.
Plan D would be to add 70 miles to our route and take a long way around traffic. We decided instead to park at a mall and wait out the freeway traffic jam. The washed out roads we encountered were not listed on the traffic web sites. The river crossing further away may be washed out too.
Settling into a four hour wait, Diane went inside to use the bathroom. The rest rooms were closed because, she was told, the city water plant had failed. She returned to the truck and used our bathroom instead. She pointed out the truck now in the lot that was delivering portable toilets for mall patrons to use.
Notice the eager customers waiting for the toilets to be unloaded. Once again, truck drivers come to the rescue of a demanding public that does not give the drivers a second thought. So too with the truck drivers that, as I write this, are trucking in the heavy equipment and building materials needed to repair the roads and bridges.
There are going to be a lot of crabby people in Atlanta tonight. I'm not crabby but am irritated over the loss of time. After waking from our morning nap, our whole day has gone into flood news monitoring, route planning and snaking the truck through heavy traffic to get exactly nowhere.
Of course, as is commonly done by people in disaster areas, the natural thing to do is count your blessings. Diane needed to go no further than the truck to use a bathroom. We are waiting out traffic in air conditioned comfort while some people grieve the loss of their loved ones, others wonder about recovering their flooded homes, and hundreds of thousands of others grind their teeth in traffic that prevents them from getting home from work. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Wednesday, September 23, 2009. I learned today that the Georgia Department of Transportation and state emergency officials have done a pathetic job in dealing with the traffic challenges caused by recent flooding in the Atlanta area. Learned by driving 33 miles in 4.5 hours in the area.
I said yesterday that there were going to be a lot of crabby people in Atlanta. I had no idea how right I would be. You would not believe the traffic we and thousands of others encountered late last night and early this morning.
After parking for four hours yesterday afternoon in Douglasville, Georgia, and waiting rush hour traffic to clear, we rolled again at 8:15 p.m. to get near this morning's pickup and spend the night. Thirty-three miles and 4.5 hours later, we arrived. This was the worst traffic jam we have experienced in over six years of driving. Making it worse still, it did not have to be that way.
Except for orange cones that blocked freeway access and one state trooper parked with his lights on where cones routed traffic off I-20 onto secondary roads, no detour information was provided. Online, cell phone, satellite radio and G-Dot-provided traffic information was inaccurate, dated or omitted from the reports.
Thousands of cars and trucks crept along the presumed detour on local roads. Again and again, a single car or a few cars on a cross street would trigger the traffic lights. Thousands of people were stopped so one, two or a few could cross. No attempt was made to direct traffic, adjust the lights or otherwise move thousands upon thousands of cars and trucks along.
There would have been plenty of time to do so. The rains fell over a 24 hour period from Sunday to Monday. The governor found time to cry out for federal assistance but we saw little effort by state, county or local authorities to move traffic along. Their first instinct was to close roads that should have been closed, of course. But they stopped there. I don't know where they went to or what they were doing. I do know they did absolutely nothing to help people find their way and move traffic along.
With portable toilets being brought in to replace non-functioning bathrooms, impassable roads frustrating our attempts to get someplace and a pathetic emergency response, it was shades of Katrina all over again.
In fact, the Atlanta flood is nothing compared to Katrina. We spent three weeks doing disaster relief expediter work in Gulf Coast states after Katrina. That's what makes this Atlanta thing so maddening. The flood damage was localized and nothing like what Katrina did. Why emergency responders could not be brought in to direct traffic, I don't know. It's not like they had other things to do. Outside of the flood area, everything was normal.
I went to bed long before Diane. She had the pleasure of driving last night. Finally, at 1:15 a.m. she parked the truck in a familiar parking place and joined me between the sheets.
This Atlanta experience brings home an important but sad point for you to consider. When disaster strikes, you may not be able to count on the government to come to your aid. There was a time when that may have been true. It is not true any more. Think about what your life will be like without power, food and water for a week and prepare ahead of time.
• Today's run was a short one from Atlanta to Nashville. After the delivery, we went out of service to get some things done that we have fallen behind on. We will go back into service Sunday night, possibly sooner if we get our work done. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Today's Topics: Memphis Space Alien • Web Hosting • Transformational Rage
• I learned today about Robert Hodges, a self-identified alien from the planet Zambodia, who is running for mayor of Memphis, Tennessee. Learned by reading about him online (story here).
Diane and I were deeply involved in state and national politics from 1992 to 2002. We remain in touch with some of the friends we then made. One of them is now involved in the Memphis mayoral race. Reading a bit about it, we learned of the alien. It gave us a chuckle.
• I also learned today about a new web hosting service. My present service has provided inadequate technical support and I remain unable to post these blog entries. There are ways to work around it but I don't want work-arounds. I want my software and my web host to work as it is supposed to. Giving up on my present web host, I opened an account at a new one and am now in the process of transferring this web site to that company's servers. Readers will notice no difference, except that my web site is working again.
• Now, on to the important stuff. I hit my limit yesterday and told Diane that I am not going to touch another piece of freight until we get caught up on business paperwork, writing articles that I have promised to write, getting my blog working, bringing our emergency plan up to date, truck maintenance, and a number of other things on our too old and increasingly long to-do list.
Getting caught in the aftermath of the Atlanta floods set off an emotional response in me about preparedness and self reliance. We are falling too far behind to be free. We risk finding ourselves in a worse situation because we are not as prepared as we should be.
Our past behavior patterns — especially procrastination — have us stuck in the same loop. Time and time again, we put off things we should do in favor of things we would rather do. Time and time again, it results in us getting down on ourselves for letting the work pile up and getting angry about the hours of unpleasant work that must then be done to get caught up.
NO MORE!!!
I am so angry about this I can't even think straight. Rage rises from within that does not go away by taking a walk, puttering with the truck or doing pleasure reading. It kept me awake last night.
I don't care if we have to park the truck for a month. If we must, we will park the truck for the rest of the year. I am not going to touch another piece of freight freight until we are not just caught up, but also newly streamlined and disciplined in our business practices.
Yes, freight has picked up a bit. Yes we are making better money now than we have all year. Yes, September and October are prime freight-hauling times. Yes, we will soon be going out of service to get the reefer and ourselves re-certified for lucrative reefer work. And, no, I don't care about any of that. I have had it up to here with our procrastinating ways. It stops NOW!
I HATE it! The bag of old mail to go through, the cosmetic item on the truck that needs attention but has been neglected, unread magazines that remain in place while we pick up new ones to also read, an e-mail backlog that never goes away, the business database I have been meaning to design to streamline our operation and produce reports but remains undeveloped. The list goes on and on. Every unfinished item is a drag on us. It affects how I feel. It affects how I think. It affects how I move. It plain sucks and it is time to end this once and for all.
Looking back, this is about changing the negative behavior patterns that produce negative feelings about unfinished tasks and result in procrastination. Looking forward, it is about clearing the decks and streamlining our expedite business to make room for trading.
Trading requires a clear head. I can no longer afford the luxury of procrastination. If I am going to succeed as a trader (and I am going to do exactly that), our behavior must change. I cannot drag the ball and chain of unfinished tasks along. I cannot continue to mismanage my time as I have.
As I talk to industry players about the Bentz shutdown and ask them about the future of expediting, it is becoming more and more urgent for Diane and me to enjoy expediting as a second income. Expediting is no longer the business it once was. It is no longer a business in which Diane and I can feel confident about producing the financial future we seek.
The economy may recover but expediting will not be the same as it once was. The future of expediting is not what it used to be. While we are making good money in expediting now, and may continue to do so for a while, the long-term prospects of this business have permanently declined.
I have a piece in mind to write called "The perpetual poverty of expediters." It is an essay that lays out why I believe the money is coming out of the business and talks about how even expediters who earn good money in good times almost always seem to piss it away. Without knowing it, they manage their money is a way that results in them essentially donating their time and trucks to the shippers they serve. They finance their trucks in a way that puts their banker's kids through college while their own kids remain uneducated because there is no money to send them to school. There are expediters out there that have grossed over two million dollars in their careers. Yet most of them have little money or equity to show for the trouble. The piece is in my mind but I am not going to write it.
Talking to the many vendors I have in writing the Bentz piece, another interesting piece to write has come to mind. It is a custom-sleeper buyer's guide that would detail the histories and distinguishing characteristics of all the custom-sleeper companies. It would include insightful quotes from the sleeper builders that have decades of experience to share, terminology, a description of the various construction and design techniques and the pros and cons of each. The piece is in my mind but I am not going to write it.
Starting new and interesting projects like these is part of what got us into the dark hole we are in today. As I said above, NO MORE!!! I hate the spot we are in at the moment, and I hate even more that this is a spot we find ourselves in time and time again.
This is the spot where a stream of loud profanity would come if you and I were talking face to face. This ______ _______ ____ is ___ ___! I can't believe I am so ______ _______ stupid to let this _______ ________ happen time and time again! I hate it! This is loser behavior and I am playing the game like a ____ _____ champ!
NO MORE!!!
Starting now, we are restructuring our lives to make trading our first income. Expediting will be our second income and provide the lifestyle on the road that we will continue to enjoy. To that end, we are out of service for as long as it takes to clear out the crap out of our lives and streamline our expedite business.
This rage about unfinished tasks is more than strong feelings about past actions and inactions. It is familiar ground that I have experienced before. About a year ago, I set a goal to become a successful trader. In the following months, the goal became more than a simple thought about a desired outcome. It became part of who I am.
Confronted now with the fact that I am a successful trader in my mind, body and soul, but not yet one out in the world, I am furious about it. The conflict between who I see myself to be and who I am out in the world has me enraged to the point that I cannot function well.
I have been in this place before. It generally happens just before I break through to a new and better way of being.
I do not need to become a successful trader to calm down. Indeed, the people at the RV park who visited with us this evening about our truck and expediting work would be surprised to read of my rage. They saw Diane and me sitting in our lawn chairs reading books. They did not see us sitting in the sleeper all day, working hard on clearing the crap out of our lives.
I felt better later in the day. While being far from done, we made good progress. But if we started hauling freight again, I would become upset again. I have absolutely had it with our non-productive ways, to the point that I can do nothing else but change them. Nothing happens until that is done.
To that end, we settled into an RV park in Tennessee Wednesday night and began our work. Having seen the amount of work that lies ahead, we reserved a two-room suite at an extended-stay hotel. We will move in tomorrow and stay through September 30.
An extended-stay hotel is a better environment in which to work, eat, sleep, shower, exercise and take breaks. My rage is keeping me awake at night. In a two-room suite, I can get up and work without disturbing Diane. If our work is not done by September 30, we will stay for another week and as many weeks after that as it takes to clear the crap our of our lives.
We are not going home to do this work. There are too many distractions there. An RV park would be OK, but not as good as an extended-stay hotel. We have a week of work ahead of us and that is a long time to spend in the sleeper without moving the truck.
This sucks and feels good at the same time. As I said, this is familiar ground. It is breakthrough territory. It is the process of making the transition from who I am to the successful trader I have declared myself to be. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Friday, September 25, 2009. I learned today a bit about the history of the Hilton hotel company. Learned by watching it on a TV in one of their hotels.
As planned, we checked into an two-room suite in an extended-stay hotel today. TV was watched very little, just during the occasional break from the work we came here to do.
The room is very nice. While the furniture is not as nice as it could be, it does not look and feel cheap like it does in some hotels. We were careful about that when we selected a place to stay. Internet photos of hotel rooms make it easy to find what you want. We checked in for five days and will stay longer if needed. We wanted a room that we could feel comfortable in for that period of time. This one does the trick.
Another great feature is the view. We can look out the window and see our truck parked in the back lot. It is nice to be able to keep an eye on it and reassuring to glance at it every now and again. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Saturday, September 26, 2009. I learned today how to use the features of my new web hosting service. Learned by familiarizing myself with them and setting them up.
One of our projects is a vendor review. By changing web hosting companies I not only got this web site working again and improved the level of technical support I receive, I saved a few dollars in fees, reduced the number of vendor relationships we have and simplified the administration of this web site and the domain names I own.
It is things like that we came off the road to focus on and we made very good progress today. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Sunday, September 27, 2009. I learned today how to scan business cards into a database. Learned by doing it.
Contact management is one of many administrative tasks we have been wanting to improve upon. We are off the road and in a hotel for several days to take care of such things. Like yesterday, today is a work day. We worked until midnight last night. I was out of bed early this morning and back at it. We are not working ourselves into a lather and are taking reasonable breaks, but work is what we came here to do, and doing it we are.
In March of this year, blog reader Frank introduced himself to us and us to a company named JS Logistics Incorporated. I was inspired by the tour I received and resolved then to get the paper our of our lives; at least as much as possible.
A business has clearly-defined functions and processes can be designed to do them. As individuals, our functions and purposes are less defined. While we can't be as focused as a business can be, nor would we want want to be, we want to be less burdened and more streamlined than we are now. So, here we are, off the road for several days and working hard in a hotel to clear the crap our of our lives. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Monday, September 28, 2009. I learned today about the inventory and shipping processes of Carrier Transicold. Learned when I asked our dealer about having our reefer engine replaced.
We don't need a new reefer engine. The three-year-old engine have works just fine. But thanks to a government grant program, we can buy a brand new reefer engine for 25 percent of the cost with you and other taxpayers picking up the rest. The old, perfectly-good engine will be destroyed when it comes out of the reefer.
Not expecting to win the grant, we applied anyway. To our surprise, we were awarded just under $5,000 to replace our reefer engine. It is about air quality. The idea is the new engine burns cleaner than the old one. With the grant money inching its way toward us, I started looking into engine-swap logistics and timing.
While I don't agree with the public policy behind the grant, it is hard to say no to a brand new reefer engine at 25 percent of the cost. The engine will make our reefer compliant with California Air Resources Board rules in the years ahead and thereby extend the useful life of our reefer.
• We woke up this morning in the same hotel we have been at since Friday. We continue to make good progress on the administrative tasks I have discussed in recent days.
Diane has been hitting the fitness room every day. I found my way down there last night and will now use it every day we are here. I had the room to myself at first. While I was on the treadmill with my headphones on, rock music blasting in my ears, sweat running and a good breathing rhythm and pace going, a man entered the small room.
He was shorter than me, skinny as a rail and dark-skinned like a Pacific islander. We greeted each other with a nod and I refocused on my music, running and rhythm. He turned on the TV, moved through the channels and eventually selected one. That was fine with me. I could hear nothing with my music playing and I was into the run. He next took a seat on one of the exercycles and proceeded to watch TV. He did not pedal. He just sat there and watched TV.
I guess he figured changing TV channels without the remote was exercise enough. The funny thing is, an outside observer looking at the two of us would conclude that his fitness program works better than mine. I can see the book now, The South Pacific TV Watcher Diet. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Tuesday, September 29, 2009. I learned today why e-readers don't work for me. Learned by reading this report in The Daily Princetonian about Princeton University students who are dissatisfied with the Kindle e-readers that were given to them free of charge.
A student said it well. “Much of my learning comes from a physical interaction with the text: bookmarks, highlights, page-tearing, sticky notes and other marks representing the importance of certain passages — not to mention margin notes, where most of my paper ideas come from and interaction with the material occurs,” he explained. “All these things have been lost, and if not lost they’re too slow to keep up with my thinking, and the ‘features’ have been rendered useless.”
Reading this clarified why, for me, books work well and e-readers don't. I don't read books to read. I read books to think.
I interact with a book in ways computers, web pages, e-readers and other electronic devices do not allow. Like the student, I find e-reader features to be useless. To read a book, I use the book, not some cool high-tech device that strips away my ability to interact with the book and process my thoughts.
Pictured is an open book that I have read and re-read. I might spend an hour on a page thinking things through, going online to learn more about certain concepts, making notes and integrating my thoughts into my blog, private journal or other documents I have created for that purpose.
I need the internet for discovery and research. I need a computer and word processing program to organize my thoughts and write. I need books to read. I do not need an e-reader. It is an unnecessary device that just gets in the way.
• Diane and I woke up this morning in the same hotel we have been at since Friday. We continue to make good progress on the work we came here to do. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Wednesday, September 30, 2009. I learned today that the fewer good ideas and intentions I have, the more successful I am likely to be. Learned by reflecting on the habits that once again produced a paperwork pile we have been working to clear.
I have previously complained about my habit of procrastination and how it results in periodic piles of paperwork that are lengthy and unpleasant to clear. I am realizing now that is only part of the problem. The larger part is my natural inclination to dream up new projects, transform them into good intentions, gather information for later use and put the projects on the back burner.
Having numerous things in mind and bouncing between them like a ball in a pinball machine does not make me a better person or resource for others. It will make me crazy if I let it.
The paperwork is almost gone. We extended our hotel stay for a day to finish it up. This time is different than others when we have taken time off the road to work our way through the pile. This time, NO paperwork will follow us back into the truck. This time, we changed our ways.
If it was just about working our way through the pile, we could have been in and out of here in a couple of days. We are still here because it takes time to re-think our approach, develop new processes and make the transition to a permanently paper-free life. While costly in terms of freight not hauled and hotel fees paid, the last few days have been time well spent. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page
Blog entries are made so as not to reveal customer specifics or the current location of the truck when we are under load. Entries are updated to include location information after we leave the area. Blog author Top of page Bottom of page