Color Changes

So I looked at my blog and thought, "Why is it in blue? I really don't like blue all that much." So I changed it to green. But wait, I really don't like green either. But I do like green trees and the green of spring and summer. And since we are in the midst of winter where colors are white, brown, and white, maybe it is a way to feel a little bit hopeful for spring to come. I know it's still January, but one can hope, can't one? I was amazed at how green California was after all the rain they had in the month of December. It almost did look like spring there.
We've already done a good share of snow driving this season. Before Christmas we had to chain up three times in just one week. It is not my favorite time to drive. And since my black ice scare last March, I'm a little more hesitant about driving on snow and ice.
Last week we drove through Missouri, Illinois and Indiana through a significant snow storm. The temperature was in the low 20's and teens so the snow was very dry and, in a lot of ways, safer to drive on then the wet stuff.
We made it through fine, but our truck is covered in salt and dirt from the salt and sand solutions that is put down. Today it we were in Arizona where the temperatures actually warmed up into the 40's so that the last of the ice still on the grill, trailer, and the back of the mirrors, was able to melt. The highlight of our day!

Regulations

I have to believe that this is the most controlled/regulated/watched over by big brother job in the whole entire world.

Once a year we have to have a physical to make sure our blood pressure is at an acceptable. Do they (and here I am referring to all the politicians/bureaucrats not realize that part of why our blood pressure is so bad is because of all the job requirements we have?

We need a special Commercial Driver’s License, which isn’t hard to keep up once you got it. However, if you want to do something special, like pull doubles, or haul Hazardous Materials you have to take an extra test. With HazMat, you have to take a test when you renew your license, and because of 9-11, you have to have a background check, which includes fingerprinting.

Then there’s all the fees, licensing, IFTA, fuel taxes, permits, etc., just for the truck itself. Thankfully, being a company driver we don’t have to worry about that.

Then there’s all the DOT rules for all aspects of the truck, the company, the drivers, how you run, how you operate, how you take care of business. It fits into a nice 3-5 book that’s about 2 inches thick and can be real fun to read when you have nothing better to do with your life.

The log book is a real joy. We have to mark every stop we make, all the miles we do and show pre-trip inspections of equipment. There’s even a protocol on what needs to be checked during that.

We have a Driver Tech on our truck which is like a mini-computer, which is our little tattle-teller. It records when we stop the truck so we have to be pretty accurate on our log-books because this will be used in an audit to see if we were telling the truth.

Then there’s all the hoopla about distracted driving and all the laws they want to impose on us about that.

We are seeing more and more states not letting trucks idle, which just makes me mad when they have more regard over animals being left in hot cars than they do for drivers needing to survive in hot trucks. One driver (and there’s many stories about this) watched an officer sit in his nice air-conditioned car while he was writing out a ticket for the driver who was idling his truck trying to stay cool. Something morally wrong with that.

Then we have CSA 2010 that is supposed to keep better track of infractions, tickets, rule breakers, etc., and weed the good companies from the bad companies. It’s to make companies be more compliant and if not then they have more repercussions, such as more control and possibly even, closing down. I guess it’s good to get rid of the riff-raff, but it puts more stress on us to make sure we don’t get any tickets and pass all roadside inspections.

So, no, it’s not just driving down the road. And being legal is just part of it.