I got to the truck stop in Rolla, MO about 6:00am this morning. Met with my classmates and had breakfast, crawled into my bunk and slept until 3:30 this afternoon. I have spent the rest of the day feeding myself and taking a shower. I received my load information for this evening and it is going to be a tight squeeze, but I should be able to get it done by 10:00 am tomorrow morning.
My night will begin at 8:00 pm. I will start my clock when I start to drive back to the DC (distribution center) in Moberly. I should arrive there around 10:30 pm. I would guess that my new load will be available by 11:00 pm. My first stop will be in Pekin, IL. I should get to the store around 3:00 am. By the time I do all the computer work, phone calls, backing into the dock, waiting to be let into the store and unloading the correct freight, it usually eats up an hour or so. If I leave the store by 4:00 am, I should get to my next stop in Washington, IL at 4:45 am. Add another hour and I should be ready to leave that store by 5:45 am. It should take around four hours and fifteen minutes to drive back to Moberly. That would get me there at 10:00 am.
Once I start my clock, I have 14 hours to work. I cannot work more than 14 hours without violating federal law. During the available 14 hours to work, I can only drive for 11 of those hours. So if I got into the truck and drove for 11 hours straight, I would have to stop once I reached the last minute of those 11 hours. If I don't, I am in violation of the law. Today it will take me all of the 14 hours to get my work done for the day. If anything goes wrong, I run out of fuel, run into a traffic jam, whatever.....I will run out of hours before I could get back to Moberly. When that happens, I end up spending the night some where on the road. Like I did today.
OK....I am going to do my pre-trip inspection of the truck. I want to make sure it is in good working order before I head off into the rain this evening. Have a good one ....Tom
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