Portland, OR

Well it looks like I'll be celebrating the New Year in Portland. Woo Hooo! I've been sitting here since yesterday about this time and it's been quiet. Not a lot of freight I guess. It's raining but not too cold outside. The truck stop is only about 3/4 full because of the holiday which makes it easier to get showers and supplies without the usual crowd.

Thor had fun at Christmas and grudgingly got back into the swing of things when we left Willows. We went down to Lathrop and grabbed a load going to Costco in Seattle. After that we did a small run back down to Portland and here we are.

Christmas Eve 2005

My daughter hates daylight. I think she's a vampire...



Thor and my Mom chillin... waiting for Santa...

Red Bluff, CA

BAH HUMBUG.

Fresno, CA

I'm backed into a dock at KRAFT in Fresno. I've been here since 3 PM and they're takin' their sweet time to load me... I'm headed to Los Angeles (Target DC in Fontana) with this load and then picking up another load to come back up to Woodland (another Target drop) tomorrow.

My truck was in the shop from Saturday until Monday evening. All they did was change the fuel filter. I lost 3 loads because of them, I was pissed off today... I hate Los Angeles and now I have to go down there. I wasn't mad about L.A. as much as the runaround I keep getting from the different terminals when I need something fixed on my truck. Anyway...

I got a few nice shots of the sunset here and have posted them. Thor can't get out here because it's a warehouse for food product so he's kinda grumbly with me.. what can I do...? I feel sorry for him though. He's a real trooper and puts up with the long hours on the road with only a few pit stops. I think he's kinda glad to be back in warmer weather after dealing with taking a leak in the rain with anywhere from 13-26 degree wind chill... he hated that shit. Heh-heh.

Well, I'm gonna go rattle someone’s cage and find out what's taking so long...

Lathrop, CA

I'm here in Lathrop witing for my truck to go into the shop again for a fuel blockage that still plagues me. I have a load to Wal-Mart DC in Red Bluff as soon as the truck is fixed. I'm trying to get my radio swapped out also since the CD player is all screwed up and skips all the time now. We'll see if they consider that 'non-essential equipment'...

Last night I went over to Stockton and waited in line at Best Buy from 4 PM until 8 AM this morning along with about 50 others. We were there for the XBOX 360 which they only received 47 units. It was cold and miserable. It rained and there were strong winds most of the night. We set up tarps and a few had tents. Even though I had my truck there I had to remain in line or lose my spot.

In the morning the local news crew came out from UPN 31 and did interviews and shot live footage of us. Apparently there were lines of people camped out at ALL Best Buy's everywhere last night. The woman who was reporting ended up buying two XBOX's from the guys who were in front of me in line all night. She told us that she was keeping one and the other would go up for auction on eBay where we all agreed she would probably make about $1000 on it. All in all, a rough nigtht. It was worth it though, I got my XBOX, made a face on live TV and had a pretty good time in spite of the weather.



UPN 31 Video

Tipton, CA

I'm in Tipton until morning waiting to get an empty trailer. That's my truck in the picture above. I'm parked at a Shell station right off HWY 99 in the dirt lot out back.

I'm hoping to get a load heading north to either Washington or Oregon. If not I'll be heading down to Los Angeles...

Shafter, CA

Dropped our load at Sears this morning at 5 AM and then bobtailed over to a Flying J down in Shafter. I'm tired. More later...

Kingman, AZ

I was practicing some night photography earlier. The 3 shots below were taken using the Time Value setting. I used a tripod and a telephoto lens. I have a great appreciation for professional photographers and have much to learn. You can see each picture gets progressively brighter as I increase the time for exposure. Still they pretty much suck.

There's a reflection caused by my failure to remove the UV filter. You can just barely see it in the bottom 2 shots.







This was some kinda refinery out in the desert in eastern Arizona off I-40. Anyway, we're in Kingman, AZ now and will finish the trip off tomorrow. Still have no idea where we head after that.

I'm gonna watch 24 and then sleep.......

Albuquerque, NM

We're in Albuquerque. On schedule and getting ready to go to sleep. It's a bit colder here than I had expected. Thor is already fast asleep and twitching...

Oklahoma City, OK

OKC.. heh heh. Home of the Unibomber among other things. Or was he from somewhere else? Yeah, anyway... Thor and I stayed here last night. We're headed out to California with a load of tires we picked up in Alabama the other day. This load delivers to Sears out near Bakersfield on Friday.

There were problems at Michelin during the pick up. I didn't get a pickup number which was needed to secure the paperwork. I called my company and got the run around as usual. It took about an hour but I finally got it. Then I went to drop my empty trailer in the back of the lot and it wouldn't disengage from the king pin. I worked at it for another hour trying various things to knock it loose but it was jammed.

I ended up calling for on road service to come out and help me. They took another hour to show up and charged $275 to get it unhooked! I'm in the wrong business. Whatever. Anyway what should have been a 15 minute drop and hook turned into a 3 1/2 hour ordeal.

Oh well. I'm on the road now and will be able to see my punky kid at Christmas so I guess it's not that big of a deal. I'm used to things like this happening by now anyway.

The weather is fair. It stays about 50 - 55 during the day and drops into the upper 30's at night. No rain or snow though. I've been watching an episode of 24 (The season 4 DVD) each night before I go to bed. It's a great season. Although I'm a huge fan, I thought that season 3 was beginning to head downhill. It was good but I think it just wasn't as good as it could have been. Season 4 makes up for it though. I also saw that season 5 will be doing a 4 hour premiere in January!! Kewl.



My kid is looking forward to seeing me at X-mas... or maybe she's just looking forward to taking possession of my Jeep... hmmmmmm....

We're heading to Albuquerque, NM today and then Wednesday we'll drive to Needles, CA and finish up on Thursday to Bakersfield. After this drop I need to stay on the west coast until after the holiday or I may not get back in time. I anticipate a load headed to Washington.

Atlanta, GA - Aracnaphobia

This is the spider that attacked me in that forest out in Savannah, GA a while back. I finally found a picture of it.

I was looking for Thor who had taken off from the rest area we were stopped in. There was a huge grassy area and I'd let him out to play and do his thing before we took off. He had run out on the lawn and I was checking the truck tires. One minute he was there, the next instant he was gone. The only place I could figure he'd run off to was beyond the tree line that skirted the grass. So wearing a tank top, shorts and sandals I trudged across the grass and stepped through the threshold.

It was weird. One instant I could here the sounds of people and traffic, the next I could only here a stifled suppression of all noise. Kinda like putting your hands over your ears, you still try to hear sound but you can't. More like a silent yet loud ringing inside your head. Anyway, this place was so muggy and moist that I began sweating as soon as I entered. The ground was moist and covered in leaves and ivy in patches. I picked a trail out with my eyes that seemed to be the path of least resistance. The trees were thick in here and seemed to grow closer together the deeper they went. Ivy seemed to cover most of the trees, growing out of control here.

I wiped my brow and proceeded along my little makeshift route calling for Thor as I picked my next handhold and footstep. The ground began sloping upward and I scanned ahead, my eyes constantly sweeping for a path as my peripheral vision kept alert for movement of the dog. There seemed to be only one place to get between a clump of trees that grew at the top of the rise. I yelled for Thor again as I realized this was more work than I had anticipated. Not to mention the humidity was making me cranky as I noticed I seemed now to be constantly wiping my brow with little to no effect.

The canopy overhead blocked out the sun and although it wasn't dark it was strange and a bit eerie. I found myself thinking of movies like Blair Witch and Sleepy Hollow. Hansel and Gretel came to mind and I looked behind me half expecting to find the path I had traversed gone, swallowed by ivy and twisting branches. Nothing quite so dramatic though, I had only come about 100 feet and could see the edge of the tree line. Sun was poking through in spots where the leaves were thin making beams that seemed almost laser-like.

I turned forward again and shook off the creepiness that had engulfed me momentarily. This was ridiculous, the dog came in here, he must have. Now I told myself, let’s just go get him and get out of here. Simple. I reached up and grabbed a branch to balance myself as I lifted my foot and found footing on a massive root that came up out of the earth. I pulled myself up over the rise and stepped between the trees laughing at myself for thinking those things a moment ago.

That's when it happened. Suddenly I felt something on my face. A strand of web, you know the feeling, as soon as you feel it your hand shoots up wiping at it. You always miss it the first time and the have to feel gently for it and pull it away. That's exactly what I did but it didn't pull away. Instead my hand encountered more webs along the side of my face and the web matter was tough, kinda like widow web you know? The black widow spider spins some of the toughest web there is. This reminded me of widow web. Then as I began clawing frantically at my face and neck I felt something else. Not on my face but on my chest. I looked down and the first thought I had was that a baby bird had flown into me and was caught on my shirt. How stupid was that? A bird? But that's how big it was and as I began to realize what it was it began to vibrate against my chest. I know that sounds weird but that's exactly what it was doing, vibrating. Even in the nanoseconds that it took for my brain to realize it was no bird my hand was moving toward it. Not to crush it but to knock it away. I did just that, I knocked it away with a spasmodic jerk. When my hand made contact with it there was a sickening slapping sound and then it went flying. When it hit the ground it landed with a soft thud. This thing had some weight to it.

It sat motionless for a few seconds and then began to move up and down on all eight of its legs. I have no idea what that meant but it seemed like some sort of spider fighting stance to me and I turned and bolted. I slid down the rise I had crested moments earlier and crashed through the branches, ivy whipping at my face. I burst through the trees and was out. Noise flooded into my ears and head. Trucks, cars and voices. A baby screaming, it was awesome. And there was Thor, sitting on the grass as if he'd never been gone.

I finally got the web off my face and neck. It took a bit though as it seemed to embed itself into the fabric of my shirt. We left and later I looked for that spider on the internet. It's called a Golden Silk Spider and is native to the area.

Anyway, I thought I'd share that story with you.

Still in Philly...

Ooops... looks like it snowed last night. Not too deep, maybe a couple inches, but it's starting to rain now and turning to slush. This could be good or make it worse if it becomes freezing rain. More later, I have to get south of D.C. and then it'll just be wet. I hope.

Philadelphia, PA

It's cold. No real snow to speak of, but the cold bites right through you here. We picked up a load at the ship yard in Philadelphia today. It drops in Georgia on Saturday. We will be driving through Baltimore and Washington D.C. tomorrow and then on down I-95 through Virginia and take I-85 down into Georgia. It should get slightly warmer as we head south but there's thunderstorms to contend with... ah well.

The ship in these pictures is the United States. It looked like a derelict to me. You can see the thing from a few miles out as you approach.

Martinsburg, WV

Staying at the terminal here in West Virginia until 3 AM when I will head out for Pennsylvania.

I spent last weekend in Florida while I waited for my truck to go into the shop down there for regular scheduled maintenance. They did a half-ass job so I'm a little peeved. But whatever.

I got a chance to use my macro lens on some spiders... very cool stuff. I'm posting a couple of shots here. The rest will go on my photo page when I'm done. It's kinda creepy getting that close to a spider to get these shots. The lens is literally a couple of inches away from them when I take the picture... What if it jumps on me... ok, nevermind.

In other news.. I was planning to see my father at Christmas but plans have changed due to my step mothers bull-headed unwillingness to make amends with me. I doubt I'll ever be seeing them again. Sad. Instead I'll spend the time with my daughter.

I hate Christmas.