A "Female Driver's" Perspective on Public Relief

This post is a special guest appearance by Beth Jensen

I love the average driver's nomenclature of the woman truck driver noted above. 

As most of you females know, the worst thing about a public bathroom is sitting down and discovering the seat is wet.  The saying "If you sprinkle when you tinkle, please be neat and wipe the seat" is so apropos, but like any other attempt to curb human behavior, you just can't be successful all of the time.  I have never used those seat papers.  I once read somewhere that you cannot get any diseases from sitting on a public toilet seat so what's the point?  However, I have not sat on a wet seat in a long time.  I have developed an eagle eye for droplets.

Now, the question is, which stall.  The first because most females will figure it's the most used and not use it?  Or the last, or the handicapped or somewhere in between?  I usually opt for the philosophy behind the first, but move down the line if it's not up to snuff.

I think we gals have an advantage when it comes to #1.  We have privacy for that.  We even have an edge on #2.  If a guy is in a stall, I guess they know what he's doing.  Of course we can give it away with noises and odors.  Frankly, I don't care about that unless there's a line.

My beef is about what happens after.  Rest areas seldom have paper towels.   I need these for brushing my teeth and washing my face.  So I now take a hand towel with me.  When working in nursing homes for 3 years, I became well acquainted with effective hand washing.  Well, some idiotic state, I will not mention here, got sold on a system that's totally ineffective.  You put your hands in the trough.  First comes soap, then comes water, then comes your boyfriend with your daughter.  Just kidding...then comes hot air.  The time you have to lather is no where near the 30 seconds required to remove germs.

Now it's time to exit the rest area...or truck stop or customer's lavatory and you use the handles the same people before you have.  Some didn't bother to wash their hands, most didn't lather for 30 seconds.  How I've not been sick or hospitalized regularly this past year is a mystery.

One last observation.  Texas has the prettiest rest areas overall.  They tend to be mosaics in tile but also tend to be open air between wall and ceilings so are buggy, hot or cold.  The one in Laredo is awesome.  I understand you can catch a ride in Laredo to Mexico in a limo for only $20 round trip.  I hope to do that sometime. The "male drivers" tend to do this for cheap sex.  I'm thinking shopping. I doubt it would be a good idea to do it for the tequila.  

Public Relief

Truck Stop stall - Tacoma, WA

I'm not sure you ever quite get used to always having to use public bathrooms when you live in a truck. I'm guessing there are those out here that don't give it much thought, but I'm certainly not one of them.

It's also pretty strange to think that we are becoming experts at knowing where the rest stop locations are, and where each respective stop rates on a scale of one to ten - with ten being about as good as a private bathroom, and one being the kind of place where once you enter your internal organs stop working completely and you have to leave before accomplishing anything of value. 

For the most part, rest areas along the interstates are not too bad. This is particularly true along the major ones, I-80-70-10-75-35, etc. However, there are some glaring exceptions. California comes to mind, especially I-5. In the North, there is a rest area in Weed, CA., that smells a little funky and sometimes is pretty cold, but it sits almost directly across from Mt. Shasta - so it does have that going for it.

California Rest Area - Midnight

On the other hand, there is one rest area in the middle of the state that plays home to so many flies (hundreds is my best guess - I tried counting them, but it's difficult 'cause they move pretty fast and so many of them look exactly alike), that the men's room rates as close to zero on the 1-10 scale as it gets. And, there is another rest area not far from Sacramento that is well guarded by a family of four (over-weight mom and dad and two 3-5 year-old boys) with signs that tell you exactly how poor they are and how the California welfare system has been extremely unkind to them. However, they do seem to always be drinking from store-bought water bottles, and the boys always seem to be munching on some sort of candy - the kindness of strangers, perhaps?

Public Relief can sometime be daunting here in Nebraska

Rest areas in Nebraska along I-80 are some of the nicer ones, however in February is gets brutally cold, and the trucks sometimes have to park 75-100 yards away from the buildings. One really has to be dedicated about needing to find a restroom when it's 8 degrees outside and the windchill contributes to another -20 degrees. On the other hand, we once stopped at at rest area in the Mojave Desert when it was 113 degrees. Even the water from the drinking fountain was hot.

Truck Stops vary just about as wildly as the rest areas. The larger Truck Stops are usually at least clean, but are often a serious assault on one's olfactory sensibilities. And, at certain times of the day, say right after breakfast, there can be lines. Women, so I'm told, are used to seeing the occasional line in the restroom, but men are not. So, we all just stand around shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other, trying not to make eye contact, and wondering why the hell it is taking people so long - and all the while trying to look manly-man about it.


Ultimately, we do have some control over where we stop, and to the best of our ability we do try to plan ahead. But, well, the bottom line here is that sometimes when ya gotta go ya gotta go...

What The Hell Is That? Part 2

As I mentioned in an earlier "What the Hell is That" rambling, we get to see a lot of really strange things - some are subtle, and some just smack you in the face. I'm not going to try to explain all of the things shown here - I'll just throw in a little commentary, and at least tell you where we found these curiosities. 

The first photo is of the Wild Horses Monument in Washington State. Beth is standing by the lead horse with the Columbia river Gorge far below. And, just as an early experiment, below is a brief video we shot after climbing a fairly steep hill to get a better look at the artwork.

Photo taken at a rest area in New Mexico. At the time I was in desperate need of a rest stop, so I heartily approved of this location. I'm sure the good citizens of New Mexico were greatly relieved upon hearing of my approval.

The designers of signs in Massachusetts have been getting really creative lately - they also apparently have inordinately long left arms.

Not quite sure what to make of this sign we found in Portland, Oregon. I've never seen a detour for bicycles before.

We saw this "thing" on the Beltway around Washington D.C. - we're pretty sure it has something to do with Martian weapons systems and Dick Cheney.

This one doesn't need much explanation. It's a billboard near Clinton, Montana.

Proof there are still dinosaurs living on a defunct Miniature Golf Course in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

Spotted at a Service Plaza along the Ohio Turnpike. Your guess is as good as anyone's.

Also proof there are over-sized sculptures of oriental figures with targets on the backs of their heads near a U.S. Xpress drop yard in Stockton, California.

Always good words to live by.

A real buffalo chip on the floor of Painted Canyon in North Dakota (note the clip-on sunglasses nearby to give you a reference for size). Another good reason why not to approach wildlife.

 

This was also taken through the fence at our company's drop yard in Stockton, California. It's really quite a place - you should plan a visit or two.

Well kids, that's all the time we have for head-scratching fun today. See you next time with more "Places You Can Actually Visit, But Don't Really Want To."

What The Hell is That? Part 1

There are a lot of strange things in this country - and they're out there on public display. Some of the things we've run across over the past 20 months ultimately have sane and plausible explanations; actually most of them do, but they still leave you scratching your head and thinking, "Seriously, is that what you really meant to do?"

Take for example this monstrosity we found being used as an entryway art piece to a warehouse and distribution complex in Paris, Texas. We both both walked around it once or twice and tried to guess as to its purpose. Then, we started asking employees around the area if they knew what it was - and they all had to scratch their heads, too. Eventually we found a guy who said, "Yeah, I think it's some sort cotton press." Ah, but of course! How could we have missed that?

How could we have been so stupid? Just look at the size of the thing compared to the cars and buildings in the background. I'll bet the whole thing has to weigh 100,000 pounds. But, it is indeed a cotton press - Google would never lie to us. My guess is that some of the old Southerners had some German engineering in their blood. You could probably melt this thing down and build a bridge across a small river with the all the metal they used.

I'm not too sure exactly why they needed this much engineering to bale cotton (and, I can't help but wonder how many of these things were actually built - maybe it's just one of those "Texas" things). There is actually a wooden beam missing from this device; it sat across the top post, much like the blade of a helicopter. Apparently some horses, maybe three or four, were somehow hooked up to the top part of the contraption and they circled around it, turning the center post, which lowered the top "jaw" of the press and formed tightly packed bales suitable for shipping. I guess it took a zillion pound machine to do this properly.

Anymore, cotton baling machines are made offshore - mostly in China - and are powered by hydraulics and pneumatics. They still weigh more than a fully loaded tractor/trailer rig, but they are not nearly as interesting looking. And, somehow I have to believe that in 150 years, no one will be using one of the new machines as a piece of outdoor art to decorate their distribution center complex.

Ten Wheels

All big trucks have at least ten wheels, many have 14 and most still have 18. That's where the whole idea for the title of this ongoing series of ramblings came from. We never have more than 14 and occasionally we only have ten. So, sometimes ten wheels is all you need.

Over the past several years, the concept of Super Single tires has started to make its way into the trucking industry. Super Single tires are almost twice as wide as traditional tires (the normal drive tires on the tractor and the tandems on the trailer) and are designed to replace the eight sets of dual tires on a typical big rig. They are still getting mixed reviews by a lot of the long-time truckers. There are pros and cons to the new wider design. Personally, I think the pros outweigh the cons, but then again, I've only been driving for a year and a half, and have only driven a tractor with Super Singles.

Our company uses the new tires exclusively on tractors and trailers purchased in '08 and later. They do save money. The footprint they create is slightly smaller than the dual tires they replace, and this makes for better fuel mileage. Big trucks have traditionally averaged around 5.5 miles per gallon. Right now out truck averages closer to 6.5 to 7 MPG - which doesn't really sound like all that much until you consider that U.S. Xpress has literally thousands of tractors running around the country, and each one is averaging between 10,000 and 25,000 miles each month (depending on whether there are one or two drivers). The other major upside is when you have to "chain-up," and we had to do that twice this past winter, there are fewer chains to mess with. Also, these tires are supposed to last longer, which is a good thing because they are horrendously expensive.

The biggest downside is that when you blow a tire and you only have four drive tires or four trailer tires, you are losing 25% of the rubber you have on the road instead of the 12.5% you'd lose if you had the more traditional tire configuration. That hasn't happen to us, or anyone I've met, but it's bound to happen someday. On the other hand, the Super Singles do have their own monitoring system, and are tied into the truck's air compressors. So, if one starts losing pressure, the systems recognizes the problem and starts pumping replacement air into the tire, and lets you know what is happening so you can make a more permanent fix as soon as possible.


The other significant downside, so I'm told, is that the tires simply aren't as good when the roads get slick. Again, so far we haven't seen this ourselves, but I hear a lot of grumbling from some of the other drivers using the wide tires.

Anyway: the whole point here is that our tractor only has six wheels, and sometimes our trailers only have four wheels. I really don't know if this Super Single concept is here to stay or not. It still boggles my mind a bit to think that you can put up to 80,000 lbs. on ten tires when it used to always take at least 18. And, I hope I never get to find out what happens if very suddenly we have only 9 tires to roll on.

Mountains

This post is a special guest appearance by Beth Jensen

Driving a semi up and down mountains is the most dangerous part of my job. Fortunately, you only needs to be aware of the dangers and make the necessary adjustments to avoid them. Then, the beauty of the mountainscapes can be enjoyed. Of course, the best way to enjoy them is while KC is driving and we have daylight.

Heading up a mountain is pretty easy. With a full load, the whole deal can weigh as much as 80,000 pounds. The only problem here is that our truck will likely go only 25 miles an hour with that much weight once momentum is lost. It's really not a problem and it's easier to look around. Add snow, however, and this can be a problem. My first time doing this was heading uphill in northern California on I-5 with my trainer. It wasn't snowing at the bottom and chains were not required. Well, it was snowing A LOT towards the top and the wheels started to spin. Having grown up on a hill, I knew what I needed to do...keep going. Unfortunately, about a quarter of a mile from the top, I let the RPMs get too high and the engine automatically shifted to the next gear (by the way our truck has an automatic transmission), causing a hesitation - then no more forward movement. My trainer got behind the wheel, but still no go. About five minutes later this contraption came up behind us. It looked like a tractor with HUGE wheels and two long vertical bars in the front. It simply pushed us up and over.

Now we're headed downhill with my trainer behind the wheel...OK by me! Downhill is the dangerous part, even without snow. Apparently brakes on the new trucks are much better than they used to be, but you still have to find a gear that's low enough where you don't have to brake, or at least not break very often. The brakes can overheat and lose air pressure if used too much and malfunction. The thought of using one of those runaway truck ramps is not appealing. I always wonder if I could keep the truck on the road and not hit someone in front of me and make it to the darn thing. I really don't understand why they are needed because trucks have Spring Breaks, a really clever devise.

You probably know that trucks have air brakes, so air pressure is used to make them work. The air pressure is always holding back the Spring Breaks, so if the air pressure fails, the Spring Breaks - which are mechanical - come on (no air to hold them back). I imagine it would be a rather violent stop, but I figure any stop at that point would be most welcome. I hope we never find out.

Now downhill in the snow just means go v-e-r-y slow, hopefully enough that you seldom need to break. With a steep grade and a full load I find I need to use the breaks often...a bit scary. Another thing to be careful of while heading down (you too) is to keep an eye out behind you for a vehicle who is having brake failure. 

This past winter (my third, KC's second) we put chains on the truck for the first time. Sometimes the DOT makes us put on chains before heading up a mountain. Or, we can sit at the bottom until the roads are clear and they're no longer required. This can cost us since we get paid by the mile. It was much easier than I thought it would be and we feel very "sure-footed” with them on. We don't go over 25 MPH or they can damage the tires. Truckers fondly refer to this practice as “slinging iron.”

The mountains out West are so beautiful. I think a lot has to do with their size. Many have towering pines, especially pretty with snow. Some have mountain lakes along the top ridges that look so clean and smooth. The feet of some mountains have canyons with streams running along the expressway, rushing around rocks and curved banks. I was able to enjoy the bright moon peeking in and out of the peaks while I drove the last two times it was full. And, I always try to stop at a rest area and get out to look at the stars with little or no light pollution. It's breathtaking, spiritual.

I enjoy all of the mountains, but my favorite "mountains" are still the ones in southwestern Pennsylvania - they will always feel like home.

Talkin' Truck - Part III: Rude Bob and Tin Lizzy

No kidding, the truck talks to us. Unfortunately, we talk back to it, or him or her - however you want to look at it.


We have two GPS systems on-board the truck - Tin Lizzy, a unit we bought ourselves, and Rude Bob (maybe) that was pre-installed in each truck we've had. I say "maybe" on Rude Bob because over time he has morphed, and now has a feminine voice that is actually very similar to Tin Lizzy's. That's not really surprising because both systems are driven by software made by the same company - Co-Pilot.

Rude Bob actually got his name when we were in the first of our three Freightliner Cascadias. The GPS system in the on-board unit worked pretty well in terms of showing us directions that actually worked most of the time. As with any of these systems, there would be times when we would get close to a destination and Bob would become confused and start issuing directions that made no sense at all. But, that wasn't how he got his name. You see, the old Bob units (up until this latest truck) didn't talk too much. About two or three times a week, especially right after you rebooted the unit, Bob would chime in with a vocal direction....

"IN .3 MILES, TAKE RAMP TO I-95 NORTH," Bob would yell in a voice that was slightly garbled, edgy and often difficult to understand.

"Bob," I would respond, "we're in Iowa. We're not within 1,000 miles of I-95."

He really was rude and his vocal directions were seldom anywhere near being accurate, but at least he had some minor entertainment value. Things went on that way through a few trucks and then, in our last truck, Bob morphed into a disembodied voice that could have been either male/or female. The new voice was even more difficult to understand, still too loud for the occasion, and no more accurate than before. We grew confused about our faithful friend.

Then, we moved into this truck, and the morph was complete. The voice is distinctly female, and generally pretty accurate, even if the look of the unit itself is the same as always. He/she does, however, try to take us through small towns when that is the shortest route. It may be the shortest way as the crow flies, but in a 70-foot rig, it's not always the best idea to take the shortest route. So, last night we decided to admit that Bob was cross-dressing (Beth thinks there has been a sex change procedure), and in the spirit of Political Correctness, we are now referring to Bob as "Lola, L-O-L-A Lola - La La La Lo-la," and we've started using "she" instead of "he." Even if he/she is "different," we want her to be well-adjusted.


Lizzy and Lola - the UN-identical Twin GPSs

Tin Lizzy is the GPS unit we bought at a Pilot truck stop in Missouri, just north of Kansas City. She's actually the second GPS we bought (or at least Beth bought). Beth had another unit (Zorma nee Christine), a very nice Garmin Nuvi, when I joined her. Zorma was the best (and most expensive by $200.00), but we managed to fry her back in September by leaving her in a hot tractor while we took five days of home time. She became dead. So, we had to buy a replacement unit, in part because we just couldn't completely trust Rude Bob. 

Lizzy is a PC Miler, and really pretty dependable. She is supposed to be truck friendly, and for the most part she leads us on roads designed for truck travel, and warns us when we're in areas that are not appropriate for hazardous material loads. She got her name because when you have the volume turned up all the way, she sounds like listening to a radio from a 1964 Ford Falcon Futura after the speaker has been blown out - very fuzzy and, well, tinny. She doesn't accept as many end addresses as Zorma, and she doesn't have as many bells and whistles, but she gets the job done. 


So now we have un-identical twin GPS units. Since the software is the same in both devices, and the voices are extraordinarily similar (although Lola often has the voice inflection of a Valley Girl), we get this weird effect. Lola is about 1/4 to 1/3 of a second behind Lizzy, which makes for entertaining and sometimes irritating voice directions...

"In .3 In miles .3 miles, take ramp take to ramp to I-95 I-95 north north." And, lo and behold, we were at the time actually .3 miles away from I-95.

Actually, the whole point here is that our dueling GPS units not only get us where are going most of the time, but they are also a somewhat amusing part of this weird adventure. Throw in a Rand-McNally truckers' atlas, and the instructions that come through dispatch from the actual customer, and pretty much the only time we get lost is due to operator failure. If we're careful, and we pay attention as we are supposed to do, then yes, we can usually get there from here. 

Still, every once in a while the system breaks down and we find ourselves backing this thing out of some strange situations......