Dirty Truck

It amazes me how much our truck wash bill goes up in the winter.  A typical truck wash at the Blue Beacon costs between $45.00 to $60.00 depending on what we have done.  We often have the truck washed more then once a week.

There are not a lot of options out here to get our truck washed.  We rarely find a self-serve truck wash and we just do not fit in the car washes!  So we are at the mercy of the commercial truck washes.  We often wait in line an hour at a commercial truck wash that has two wash bays and where the truck is hand washed by a crew. Sometimes they do a good job and sometimes Bob has them wash the whole truck again.  We often open our lift gate for them to wash off.  I also usually have them wash our floor mats.  After we get the truck washed it is up to us to dry it off or uses the blow dry method going down the road.  If we wait too long to wash the truck the salt starts eating at the chrome and that can take Bob hours to buff out.  We have found is it much better to spend the money and maintain the truck then to be reactive and try to fix the damage the salt has done to the undercarriage.  We do not feel as if our customers need to see a filthy truck coming on to their property if we can keep that from happening.  In the summer time when the truck does not get this grimy Bob often just uses a bucket and a brush and washes the truck down himself.  Bob always says "A clean truck is a happy truck".

Packing the right clothes

We have found that we need to keep at least one set of good clothes in the truck. We stay out long enough that we never know what we might get ourselves into. If we meet up with someone and want to go out for a nice dinner we something different than jeans and a t-shirt.

We carry a hanging bag in the back of the truck with two pairs of good slacks, nice shirts and dressier shoes that are appropriate for a nice night out or to attend a business meeting. We are involved with enough groups that sometimes out here on the road we need to attend a meeting and we need to be dressed in business casual.  We also carry two sports jackets for Bob and one suit jacket for me.  We have found the hassle of having a hanging bag in the box of the truck with our personal supplies is worth it.  The bag takes up very little room and lets us dress for any event that we might have to attend on the road.

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Snow and Ice

What a week after all of our sun in California!  We took a load into Wyoming and then headed for Minneapolis, but did not get that far.  We had a offer to run a short load over the weekend just south of Albert Lea, MN

We delivered Monday morning then were offered a load from Duluth, MN to Shreveport, LA, and the idea of warmth made us accept the load.  What we did not take into consideration was that we had to go north to Duluth and it was already snowing. What a mess snow, ice, and wind made for a slow treacherous trip.  We made it to our pickup and the shipper let us stay on the property for the night which was awesome as anyplace that would have had extra room to park had piles of snow.  In the morning it was snowing, but it was not a big deal on the roads and we had an easier time going south.

The ice really bothers me in a couple of ways.  It can be very slippery to walk into the truck stops and I always worry about slipping on the ice.  Broken bones and driving just do not go together.  I also learned one year that hot tires and ice do not go together.  I parked the truck and then in a few hours we got a load and the truck was stuck!  The hot tires had melted through the ice and formed a valley and it could not get out of it.  Bob had to get the chains out so we could get enough traction to pull ourselves out.  Now when I park on ice I let the truck sit for several minutes and then I pull slightly forward or backup a tad so if I do melt through I can get a running start at getting out of my rut.

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