I'd say it's been one of those days, but it's really been just one of those weekends overall. It started off promisingly enough, with a 1,000 mile run out of an area that I was worried wouldn't have any freight and enough spare time that I could, just maybe, earn a layover in Atlanta. I even managed to find parking at the Carlisle OC at about 10 PM on a Friday, as the shop was pulling dropped trailers out of the transient section. Unfortunately, that's about the last case of things going well.
First, I significantly overslept and didn't leave there until late Saturday morning. Then, while things were going reasonably well for most of the day, I had a tire blow out as I reached Statesville, NC. That cost me nearly four hours. It took over an hour just to get through to emergency maintenance; I found out during that call that they had exactly four people answering maintenance calls for our entire 14,000 truck fleet. Then it was nearly two and a half hours before Wingfoot arrived to replace the tire, and another half hour for the replacement to actually get bolted on. As such, while I'd originally planned on reaching Charlotte by about 5 or 6 PM, I didn't get there until after 10. This also ruined my plans of making Atlanta by Sunday morning; since I had a 9 AM appointment here I needed to be in Atlanta by about 8 AM yesterday in order to actually get paid for the layover.
So I decided at that point that I was going to stay in Charlotte instead, despite not having anything to do in the area, and leave at about 3 o'clock this morning to ensure that I'd get here on time. At least I was able to do that, as much as I loathe getting up that far before dawn. I wasn't able to get breakfast before I left, though, and due to concerns about the inevitable traffic jam in Atlanta I didn't want to risk leaving any later than I did. Sure enough, there were delays in Atlanta, including the smoldering remains of a car that bore an eerie resemblance to my own, but nothing as bad as I had expected. I attempted to park at a truck stop to get breakfast, but due to the place being badly overcrowded and my truck's clutch acting up in a way I haven't seen in ages, I just gave up, losing about 15 minutes and still being hungry.
I arrived here about 8:40, twenty minutes before my appointment. I should have figured something was amiss, given that it was showing an appointment for a drop and hook, though I have had a few of those before. But of course, they're starting to pull the same thing on me as they are on another driver: marking loads as drop and hook when they're really live unloads. It gets even more frustrating, though; while I was getting checked in, another truck pulled in and blocked me from getting to the docks, claimed he didn't have an appointment but he was supposed to be here anyway, then took the dock that I'd been assigned. Now they're unloading him while I'm backed into the dock next to him and my freight hasn't been touched. This means I'm losing even more time that I didn't really want to kill in the first place.
Of course, the freight situation down here is a perfect case of SNAFU. Over the weekend we didn't have enough capacity to cover the loads already in the system, which is why I was told I couldn't relay the load off at the Atlanta OC and keep the truck moving; this morning we've 18 more drivers than loads. This means that I could have dropped the relay, covered a load they needed saved, and there would have been drivers coming available that could have delivered this. I'm seriously starting to question if the trip planners even bother looking at anything other than the first number that comes up on the screen without thinking about the implications of things a day or two out. So while I could probably have helped them cover loads on the weekend and gotten some really good miles out of the deal, instead I'll probably be stuck waiting for more freight to pop up before I can go anywhere.
About the only other thing I can do at this point is try to call in, explain the situation, and see if they can try sneak me up the line for load assignments. I doubt that will go anywhere, though.
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