End of this line

While I'll likely write a much longer post on this later today or tomorrow, the short version is this: Thanks to a complaint from one store that falls somewhere between exaggeration and fabrication, I no longer am welcome at that store and, therefore, no longer eligible to run the account I've been on for the last six months. I intend on sending a complaint of my own to corporate to try set the record straight and appealing it to the two people within my own company who are capable of overturning that decision, but it's extremely unlikely that it's going to go anywhere. Unless something miraculous happens, effective Friday I'm off the account.

I've been "offered" a chance to transfer to regional or over-the-road, but neither of those is a very appealing option. Under regional services I'd likely take a pay cut and be home only weekly, plus would give up any certainty at all to my schedule and might not even be home on weekends consistently; my days off could fall mid-week when there's nothing to do and nobody to do it with. Over-the-road would be even more depressing: home no more than every other weekend. And of course, both of those options would leave me dealing with random people on the phone and all the problems that come up when dealing with an ever-changing mix of contacts within and without the company.

Given that this is all coming about because of a complaint that isn't even truthful, I'm seriously reconsidering dealing with the company at all. If someone can just make something up and create this much drama, I have little reason to believe that it wouldn't happen again even if I somehow dodge this bullet.

Hard Brakes

No, that isn't a typo. It's what might get me fired, though.

According to our company policy, decelerating at least 9 mph in one second counts as a hard braking incident. Three within thirty days is termination. I've had one of those weeks where I racked up three of those incidents just since Tuesday. Allow me to recap:

1. Tuesday afternoon, while on US 31 just south of Kokomo, the semi in front of me stomped on his brakes hard enough that they immediately started smoking. I had little choice but to do the same, despite maintaining an adequate following distance. The reason for the braking? Far as I could tell, a cop pulled someone over into the median and said person pulled into traffic without looking, nearly causing a six-vehicle pile up. There was a guy towing a small recreational trailer at a 60 degree angle to the road everyone came to a full stop. Of course, the cop didn't do anything about it.
2. Friday morning, on US 31 in Carmel. The road conditions were improving as I went south and I know that 31 is a top priority through that area. I was accelerating from 45 to 55 as the speed limit increased. There's a stop light at the end of a wide, sweeping curve in the road. The light changed to yellow; I hit the brakes and started sliding on the only patch of ice they missed. I had to get off the brakes, correct my trajectory, then decelerate. Somewhere during that I triggered the fault. I stopped right on the line, though.
3. Today, about 4 PM, on I-70/65 in downtown Indianapolis. I was in the middle lane trying to pass two people doing 25. One of those people - without signalling - moved into my lane. I pressed the brakes and started to skid. The speedometer dropped sharply from 40 to 25; the hard braking alert went off once again. I am almost certain that my actual speed went from 40 to 30 over several seconds, not near-instantaneously. But, as far as the computer is concerned, I somehow screwed up again.

Except for perhaps the second incident - in which I might have been travelling slightly too fast - I don't see anything but quick reactions in defensive driving situations. Had I not done what I did, I would have blown through a light, rear ended someone else, or worse. Trying to keep other people safe by reacting quickly and decisively, apparently, is very likely to get me fired when the account manager sees all this data Monday morning.

I'm worried sick about this right now. It doesn't help that the trailer I'm trying to pick up has frozen brakes - hence why I had time to write out this blog post - which gives them yet another reason to fire me: for being unable to deliver a load on time. When I called the manager to explain the problem, he seemed angry that I'd even considered trying to get Monday's load early to ensure we wouldn't be screwed on time for Tuesday's run. I've been waiting over an hour for a wrecker service to come out here and try get me out of this quagmire, but they still haven't contacted me or the breakdown department. There's now no way at all I can do anything about this and yet, if I don't somehow do at all myself, I'm done.

We'll see, I suppose. Eventually.