This is a good one.....

At a delivery today and trying to find the correct building on a  military base (that's your first red flag). Nothing matches the "address" on our paperwork (remember military base). So after driving up and down the same road for 20 minutes (in a truck with a logo as big as your house).

We pull into a building where there are loading docks and ring the bell. The sign on the door says " do not ring bell more than once, we hear you". So we wait some more....  then we call the number, again. Quote...." yes Sir, I don't know where you are but I'll come find you".

An interesting morning!

North Dakota prarie changed forever?

I've spent the last year traveling the lower 48 states and Canada but I haven't seen anything like the oil boom in western North Dakota. They say the output of oil will surpass the Alaska pipeline.

I visited North Dakota over 15 years ago, traveling in a giant square so I could see it all, but I never saw anything like this. There are travel trailers as far as the eye can see, housing that resembles military barracks and so much new construction along highway 2 in the west that it takes my breath away.

Need a job....there was 39 pages of jobs on one website! Everything from geologists, biologists, safety managers, technicians, national guard, electricians and everything in between.

If you aren't afraid of the cold and you love to duck hunt this is the place for you!!!!!

For the Birds!

<p>Here is a little known fact.....birds love truck drivers! It's true! You see we drive across the roads of America gathering bugs on our grills. Then we stop at a rest area or truck stop and the next thing you known ....it's dinner time! </p>
<p>That's right....the little birdies sit on your hood and get the free pickins' off your truck. It's a smorgasbord of beetles, butterflies, bees and other crunchie edibles!

See truckers are environmentally friendly!

The turn-around

Last week we picked up a load from Kentucky to take to California. California doesn't bother us much because we have the chance to see family of we don't get a load back east quickly. So I was driving through Texas and just as I got to Amarillo we got the call....turn around and bring the shipment back to the shipper, they made a mistake! Yeesh! So what do you do? Turn around!

So we drove all the way back to Kentucky. No family visits this trip! We did get some cool post cards in Oklahoma though so the trip wasn't a total loss and they do have some funny looking cows! Ha!

Common courtesy

I realize that we all grow up differently. Some with parents, some without.  Some go to church, some don't.  Some grow up in rural areas, some in the heart of the big city.  Some have money, some barely get by.

We are a diverse nation of race, religion, color, ethnic background and values.  Each of us are just a small drop of water in an endless sea of struggling to pay bills, make a living and trying to etch out some vacation time.

But do you have the faintest idea of right and wrong? Don't you for a moment consider the other guy? Is it really all about you?

I admit most of my life is about me and my desires. I don't sit around and listen to music I don't enjoy or use shampoo that I hate the smell of just in the name of "personal growth".

I do however occasionally allow a car in front of me during a traffic jam, hold the door open for the person behind me and quite often say the words thank you.

It seems to me that there is less of that going on every day....

Crying the blues

So we're having a rough week....seems we're having a little difficulty getting back into the swing of things since our May vacation. Having little runs without anything of substance makes life difficult! 

Granted our current location in Vermont isn't a hot spot of activity for FedEx but we were in NY and nothing was happening there....NH either last week for that matter.

So we cry the blues and then something I know will make me feel better rolls by! You just don't see this everywhere!!!!

Our backyard

Someone once said somewhere, "The whole country is my backyard." That was true for us this weekend. We were on the border of Maine and New Hampshire waiting for a load and decided to take advantage of our location and visit our backyard.

We spent time in a small coastal town in Maine (New Harbor) where a friend of ours used to live and I got to eat my first whole lobster. Of course we subsequently had crab cakes, crab rolls and lobster rolls after that too but not all at once.  Very good stuff! Then we spent the following day and morning in the Bar Harbor area and explored Arcadia National Park.

It threatened rain all day on Saturday but we didn't let it dampen our spirits and had an great day. Sunday brought rain and awesome waves to the coast that were magnificent.

Definitely worth the trip and I would recommend it to anyone who has a few dollars to spend! It's expensive but these days what isn't? Sometimes those few extra charges on the credit card are worth it!

Repairs

So we get a little maintenance done on the reefer unit, which turns into all new belts. Of course they don't have all the belts so we have to wait to get it fixed. In the meantime Fedex takes our flag off for Tval and we can no longer run reefer loads.

So we stop after our next delivery to get the belts put on and find out we have a bad hose. But they don't have the hose so we have to come back the next day. The next day we show up, they switch out the hose.....but wait it wasn't the hose.....now its the water pump! Isn't that special?!?!???!!!!!

Life of an expediter!