Back from home time, my first trip was a beer Load out of Colorado to Oregon, but the instructions were for me drop it at the terminal in Idaho. Another driver would pick it up from there, and take it on to its final destination. I picked up my load of beer and headed out of Colorado into the vast highland prairies of Wyoming. About halfway through the day, I realized that I could make our terminal in Utah that night, and if so, why not call my two sons and have them come and meet with me, and go out to dinner to celebrate Thanksgiving a little early, since I wouldn't be there to celebrate with them in person. I made a phone call, and was lucky enough to catch my oldest son by phone, and the arrangements were made. I was thrilled to see my family. I was able to introduce them to Bruce, the truck they'd heard so much about, and let them see this tiny little world that I live in. The went to a nearby fast-food restaurant for an informal Thanksgiving dinner and then the visit was over, way too quickly.

By noon the next day, I was just pulling in to our terminal in Idaho where I dropped my load of beer. Upon arrival, they assigned me a local load to pick up at the terminal, and take out to a large refrigerated warehouse as its final destination, however, I questioned if this load would work for me because I only had two hours available on my clocks, and experience has taught me that grocery warehouses are not usually finished within two hours, so after I expressed my concern, I received another dispatch: A 4-stop delivery in the Boise, Idaho area for tomorrow.

My first delivery was to a large grocery warehouse at 3am, and it was about an hour's drive away. I got up at 1:30 am and was headed over to the bathroom to brush my teeth, when to my surprise, out of the darkness stepped a young man, a fellow driver, and he explained that his battery had died, and could I please give him a jump start. I told him I had a 3am delivery, and I was already tightly scheduled. He assured me that he had the cables all hooked up and ready to go. I pulled around, and had to maneuver into a tight area so the jumper cables would reach, but a few minutes later, we had his truck running.

My first delivery appointment was for 3am and my 2^nd for 7am. I didn't leave my first appointment till after 7am, and didn't hit the second one till 7:30. 3^rd appointment was a crazy backing maneuver around a building and down a small incline, up onto ramps, and to the dock. By the time I hit my last delivery, I had been on duty nearly 14 hours, and my time was quickly running out. I could see that I wasn't going to make it back to the terminal as I had hoped for the night. I asked the seed company where I was delivering if I could park my truck and spend the night. They said yes, and so I spent the night in the parking lot of a seed company. Throughout the night, dark brooding clouds hung over the valley, and left a chill in the air, and then during the night it started to rain and the temperature took a much colder change. This was my introduction to winter storm, Argos.

My load the next morning was a 8am at a refrigerated grocery warehouse just over the border in Oregon. My destination was St. Cloud, Minnesota and the routing took me on a swinging route through southern Idaho and back up the western side of Idaho into southern Montana. As I plotted out the routing given me by the trucking company, out of curiosity, I decided to do a weather check for the mountains I would cross getting into Montana. To my considerable concern, the forecast called for snow on Tuesday and Wednesday. I calculated the miles to go, and the hours needed, and figured that if I could be just two hours at the shipper getting loaded, and depart by 10 am, I should have enough time to get over the mountains and safely parked before the storm hit.

My schedule began to fall apart right away. When I arrived on time at the shipper, I was informed that my scheduled load time was 10am, not 8am. It wasn't till noon before I left. My hopes for getting over the mountains were slipping away. Then, the next delay popped up, since I was this close to one of our terminals, I needed to go by and complete my 45 day evaluation. Had it really been that long as a solo driver already? After I was finished getting loaded, getting fuel, weighing, and adjusting the axles for the weight, I headed over to the terminal for my evaluation. I parked near the maintenance facility because I wanted to see if I could get an extra set of tire chains for the trailer tires, or drag chains. There is a set on the trailer, but they are secured with a padlock. I had spent a lot of time already attempting to get the padlock to open, but no matter how I configured or tried the combination, it refused to open. My plan was to get a couple extra sets of chains, and just carry them on the truck so that regardless of the trailer, if I couldn't get the trailer chains, I'd have an emergency set on the truck.

I went into the maintenance area, and no one was around, but there were plenty of signs around indicating that drivers were not allowed in the maintenance facility.

Outside, I found some barrels with chains inside and the chain sizes written on the barrels. I picked up two sets of chains, which were very rusty from their life in the elements, and lugged them over to the truck and stowed them away. It wasn't until I was in the office and noticed the lady I was speaking to looking at my pants that I realized that the rust from the chains had made some very large stains on my jeans. Not a good impression to leave, since appearance is important to the company!

After waiting around for a few minutes, I was told that the person to do my evaluation was busy, and it'd have to be done sometime later. This was a relief to me, because now, finally, I could get on the road, and hopefully be closer to winning the race with Argos to Montana. It was now, nearly 3pm. About halfway across Idaho, my available hours on my clocks began to dwindle, and parking options up ahead were narrowing, so I pulled into a rest stop for the night. To my left, the angry dark clouds boiled and became darker over the mountains of Idaho.

I began this job with a list of situations that provoked stress and worry for me. One of those is finding a parking space at night while I still have time to find one. Another is going over mountain passes in the winter. There's something about the descent of a mountain pass with gravity tugging at the 40 ton vehicle and load, and trying to fight that gravity on a slick, winding, mountain road. Then, as contemplated my situation, and check various weather forecasts, an idea hit me. Why not ask the company to re-route me over I-80 and then straight north on another interstate from directly to Minnesota. These were already routes routinely traveled by our trucks. As long as the miles were still within reason, why not ask for a change? I sent a message on the Qualcomm expressing my concerns and my solution and was told that I'd have to wait for morning till my driver manager arrived. Only he could authorize routing changes. After 7am when I knew he would arrive, I sent him a Qualcomm message, with all the same information. I knew just arriving at work, he'd be swamped with all the drivers issues from over the night to handle, but the highway to take my new route lay only 20 miles ahead, and so I had to commit right now to one route or the other. Finally, with a desire to get on the road as quickly as I can, I called him. “No,” he said; “You have to stay on the route you were assigned. I can only change routes if Safety Department issues some warnings.” “You have chains onboard, don't you?” “Yes” I responded; “Then use them if you need them.”

Even though I didn't like the answer, at least I had one. Now, it was me, my fears, a truck name Bruce, and a winter storm  the National Weather Service named Argos.