Truck Driver’s Life

Truck Driver’s Life

Most people think of truck drivers and immediately they think we have it made as truck drivers, they believe we make loads of money, go everywhere and see the whole country side. There are many other believes, like: they think we do this for a living because we can’t do anything else, we are ignorant, we are loud mouths, have many women in different towns, eat what we like, and the most frequently heard is that we have a foul mouth. Well, let me set you straight on truck driving:

              First of all, while it is true that we make good money, we have to drive our asses off to make that money. That’s not to mention that a lot of our money can be taken away if we are not careful with our responsibilities. For example: if you at your job screw something up, usually your boss or company will take the loss. Not with us, if anything goes astray we are financially responsible; the truck, the trailer, and the cargo; if anything happens to any of the above, it comes out of our pockets, no ifs or buts. No one wants to hear any excuse you may have for the mishap, all everyone associated with trucks wants is the driver’s money, and if we are not careful, they will take it. Everyone from the company you work for to the companies you pick up and deliver to, to the government, and especially the police/law enforcement, everyone wants to get in our pocket. So don’t go thinking we make all that money, because from time to time they succeed at getting it from us.

              Now, not all of us are pigs that don’t shower and stink. The reality is that most truck drivers are very clean people that happen to live in very tight quarters and no matter how much you bathe, the truck sometimes smells and unavoidably so will you because the smell might get on your clothes.

              Not all of us are fouled mouths either, I know plenty of truck drivers that will never say a bad word even when the situation may call for one or two “fucks”. A lot of truck drivers had a different profession before taking this way of life, for this is more than a job, this is living uncomfortably, eating poorly, terrible sleeping habits, enduring bad weather, minimum sex, overdue haircuts, daily bad hair days, etc.

              When you decide to drive trucks you probably don’t know for sure the disadvantages you face with the law enforcement community, but they are out to get you for the most part. Especially rookies, they will go out of their way to find as much wrong doing so their tickets will be as high as possible. Did you know that the same ticket you get in a car can be as much as three times higher in a truck? Just the fact that we have a commercial license makes us a target for some officers that need to make up their lack of ticket issuing. We have to be very careful when it comes to traffic violations because a CDL is our livelihood, if we lose it we can’t work. Now, I am not saying we are angels, in fact I have met truck drivers that have had their license suspended or totally taken away and are still on the road, sometimes with a fake license or one from a different state, yes, because even though it is a federal license and states are supposed to check, a lot of people in certain states fall through the cracks and are able to get a new license.

              Like I was saying at the beginning, we are responsible financially for just about everything when it comes to a truck and its load. We have to check the merchandize that is loaded into our trailers to make sure that it’s the right merchandize stated on the paperwork, that it is in good shape and not damaged, and that is loaded properly and the correct amount of whatever it may be. Some shippers, (and I can think of a few) will try and cheat you, not the company that is shipping, but the employees that are actually loading your trailer. They know that if you didn’t notice that they loaded twenty cases of ham instead of the twenty one stated in the bill of lading, their families and friends will be eating ham for free and you will be paying for their meal. Even when you arrive at the receivers, you have to be vigilant of the guys unloading you; they will willingly lightly damage part of the load and then refuse it in an attempt to keep it for themselves. You may be responsible for those charges also.

              Then there is the dispatchers that actually are supposed to be there to assist you; These are your worst enemy on the road, if you get a dispatcher that is an asshole, you might as well quit the job and go somewhere else. These are the people that will be friendly when convenient for them and two minutes later stab you in the back. They will talk to you as if they were your lifelong friend, and ask you for a favor, like taking a hot load (a load that is late), and when you are done with the delivery, they turn around and write you up for running illegally. They are also the same ones that will ask you to take a load even though they know you just came off a run and you are tired, but they need you to take this one trailer for them; but as soon as you stop to get one or two hours sleep because you are exhausted, they will wake you up and threaten you over the radio (never in person) with firing you if you don’t get back on the road NOW! Most are cowards that when you meet up with them face to face, they will blame their bosses and cry like the bitches they are and call the police on you because they feel threatened.

Still think the life of a truck driver is good? Oh, you are thinking about the women… Well, let me tell you that when you are young and you run into all these girls that are usually runaways from their dysfunctional families you feel like a king rescuing the damsel in distress. You make time to have sex as often as possible and when there is no time, you have sex while driving. It’s a blast! But that is only when you are young and most truck drivers are not young. It’s not that we don’t want to do these things anymore, is more like our priorities change and even though every once in a while we still do crazy stuff with women on the road; it becomes not as important any more. Besides, you get to thinking of the venereal diseases out there, the fact that they may get pregnant, and then there’s child support and an extra mouth to feed and there goes the erection. And as for having a woman in different towns, think about that… Do you really believe that women are just waiting for you to come around whenever you get scheduled to go to their town? Be realistic, you are not that good a lover and/or provider to have women waiting on your return. You may think you have women, but in reality you are sharing women with other men when you finally get there.

How about all the places you get to go to? I’ve been a truck driver for a long time and I will tell you that there aren’t many places in this country I haven’t been to, but by the same token, there are very few places that I can truly say I have visited. You see, you get to a town like Seattle, WA and you go straight to your destination, you don’t get to walk around, or catch one of the many ferries, or visit the Needle, or go to the stadium nor any of the things you would do if you were just visiting, no, you deliver and if you haven’t done it by now, you get your dispatcher to get you a load out of Seattle so you can keep making money; that is why you drive a truck, to make money.

The glamorous life of the truck driver is anything but glamorous. Truck drivers drive sleepy, hungry, sick, angry and horny. No glamour in any of that. We may bring a good paycheck home, but it’s usually to a home we don’t get to enjoy because we are on the road so much of our time. We don’t get to watch television, go out Saturdays night, lie on the beach, hang out with friends, or do many of the things most people take for granted. We live a solitary life of work and danger. Everyone wants to screw us for the little we make, everyone else involved in your driving makes more money than you without the risks, and at the end of the day, not only you don’t get to go home to your loving family, but you don’t even get a thank you from the people you just served.

Truck drivers are…. You better think again

Jorge

Michelle Obama

Michelle Obama

I wish everyone would stop saying that Michelle Obama is beautiful. Nothing could be further from the truth. She is uncomfortably tall even to herself so she‘s hunchbacked, skinny, and shapeless (no coca cola shape here), with buck teeth, has an ugly look about her, her disposition while her husband was running for office was despicable, and now she thinks she is all that, her prejudice was obvious even if now she appears to be more tolerable, she walks like a basketball player, has no grace or class and has no idea of how to behave with royalty. Please stop saying she is beautiful because even though she has been remodeled, she is still like the saying goes: a rose is a rose is a rose. Instead of saying how beautiful she is, tell the truth and say how lucky she is to be married to a good looking, smart and eloquent man who happens to be the president of the United States. And even that doesn’t improve her looks!                     

Jorge

From Sheen to Clinton

From Sheen to Clinton to…

So there you go. Finally Charlie Sheen got written off the show Three and a Half man. I guess even Hollywood celebrities pay the consequences of their actions; some of them anyways…

I never did like the show to begin with but, it seems that I am the minority, for there are many millions of fans all around the world that seem to just love that show. I always found it to be cheaply written, badly acted, and demeaning to women and regular men. The kid is fat and ugly, the regular guy projects his feminine side, and Charlie’s character is a figment of bad imagination. The reality is that womanizers aren’t like Charlie’s character at all, I know, I used to be one and I know many of them. Maybe if they were to hire a male chauvinist pig womanizer to write some of the scenes, but then again, when you are a womanizer there is no time to be writing, you are just too busy remembering the names of the different women to concentrate on writing. Besides, having sex several times a day on the daily bases, kind of diminishes the creativity necessary for writing.

I am glad that Charlie got the boot, not because I dislike him, (and I do) but because certain behavior in public figures has to be eradicated. His own kids should be kept from him until he gets over whatever it is that is going on in his mind. Anyone with two cents worth of sense realizes that if there is “no drugs” affecting Mr. Sheen, then he must be suffering from some kind of mental dysfunction. He has never come across as being a degenerate nor a pervert or even a drug addict, unlike some of our politicians, but he must get help, not just as a front to please the masses as Woods did, but for his own good and the good of his kids.

At least he may become a better person towards those who are not as lucky as he has been, be it because of his father’s influence or because of his own merits. We all need to improve our lives, some more than others and I am one to talk, but it seemed to me that it was about time that just because an actor or a famous person enjoys notoriety, it doesn’t give them a license to act the fool and be a bad example to others. I do not recommend that others do what Tiger Woods did, that was demeaning to him for what was at the beginning a private matter. True, his wife wanted revenge and money wasn’t enough, but he (Woods) didn’t have to lower himself to the public, he only had to apologize to his wife, she is the only one that was betrayed, not the fans. I believe that whoever counseled Tiger to apologize and go through “sex therapy” should be fired if he hasn’t been fired jet.

Certain behavior in public figures cannot be overlooked, and especially when the perpetrators deny their actions like this latest idiot Mr. Anthony Weiner; now he finally resigned and admitted his stupidity, there is also ex Presidential candidate John Edwards who not only denied his affair but wasn’t man enough to claim his offspring. But this brings to mind President Bill Clinton, I don’t remember if he ever admitted having sex with the Lewinsky girl. He also didn’t pay the consequences fully because of his wife’s ambition for political power and statue; she “forgave” his wrong doings.

True, powerful men have women throw themselves at them all the time, but if we are going to play, we should be man enough to face up to our actions. Then again we also have powerful men that think that because of their power or fame they can do as they please as is the case of the European Banker who was considered one of the most powerful man in the world, Dominque Strauus-Kahn is also prominent French politician and leader of that nation’s significant Socialist party, and he goes and allegedly rapes a maid in the hotel he was at; and if that wasn’t enough, another powerful banker a successful Egyptian this time by the name Mahmoud Abdel Salam Omar does the same thing a week or two later. You see in their countries because of who they are they can do these things and get away with them; not here!

There are laws and rules to live by and in this country they are different than in other parts of the world, but we live in this country and as such we must abbey and live by those laws and rules. I have found as I get older that morality changes in a man and morality is thought at home and lives within us helping us make decisions as we go through our daily lives. I am a sinner, so I make no claims to be free of sin, but as time goes by I realize that the world is changing for the worse and the advancements in technology aren’t helping make us better people, just better performers.

The one thing I know for sure is that I cannot make others live their lives as I think it should be, but I can try and live my life without affecting others; well, there are exceptions to that: Fuck with me or my livelihood and I will see to it that sooner or later I will affect your life.

So in ending this here anecdote I will say this: If you act stupid, you should pay the consequences, and I am glad so many are being made accountable.

Jorge

Rocks

Rocks

Have you ever been fascinated by something in particular and you find yourself at a loss as to why that is? I have always had a fascination with rocks, rocks of all types, colors and sizes. Sometimes I think that maybe in another life I may have been a geologist, or perhaps I lived in a place where the rock variety was immense, or maybe I was stoned to death, who knows, but I do know that in this lifetime there’s no reason for me to like rocks the way I do.

         Ever sense I was a kid I remember staring at rocks with the same intensity as I later on stared at women. Now, I know I was not a gynecologist in another life, but I find women extremely interesting, not just desirable, but it’s like I want to know and understand everything concerning women and it’s the same way with rocks.

        What is it about rocks that I find so mysterious? I don’t know, but the fact is that to me there is no ugly rock, no boring rock, and I feel all rocks have a story to tell, if only I knew how to decipher their secrets.

Maybe I should go back to school and take up geology, who knows it just may be that one thing I have been missing my whole life.

I have met people that have no passions in their lives, and I don’t know how they make it through. I think everyone should be passionate for something or in some cases, for someone. Life to me is very meaningless when there is nothing to long for, you must crave and desire, have a goal, but there has to be something that not only makes you get through the day, but also inspires you and makes you dream. Otherwise, why be alive in the first place if there is nothing that gives your life meaning.

         OK, that’s enough of that. Just wanted to establish that I have other interests in life besides women and rocks take first place after women, followed by fish, the sea, rivers and lakes.

         Perfect setting for me: a rocky beach at the mouth of a river, with a beautiful woman in the water surrounded by colorful fish. Now that’s not too much to ask for, is it?

Jorge