July 11, 1990, 2010

FIRST 5 YEARS:(Wednesday-Laredo, Texas)
I was up and awake at the Morton's home before Steven and Reida went to their teaching jobs for summer school. I called our Laredo dispatch and was told that if I got out today, it would be later into the afternoon on night.

I got my new computer out and played with it. I basically knew only how to turn it on, get it programed(learned yesterday) to start using and how to type on the keys...that's it. I had no idea of the basics that children know-in 2010- before they get out of elementary school here in North America. Pam got up, came out and we played with the computer(remember...no hard drives-just 3.5 in. floppy discs). We played with the computer until a little after 10 AM CST when Cathy came over.

In the last couple days I had mentioned to Cathy that I knew something about air conditioning and heating. She asked if I would look at her truck's air conditioning and I said I would. I had forgotten and this morning she came over-knowing I am here because my tractor was parked in the street-and asked if I could look at it. I said yes.

I asked her the symptom on why she thinks her air conditioning wasn't working right; sounded like a simple case of very slow leaking Freon. I looked at the system and yep, it was low on
Freon. I told her that if she drove us to the auto parts store, I could fix her problem. I would pay for the Freon and kit to put it in if she would have lunch at a fast food restaurant I liked; I would be buying, of course. She said OK and we were off. We had lunch together and I got her A/C unit working correctly.

It was about 1:30 PM CST when I got back to the Morton house. Pam had been playing with my computer-no "windows" at all...just "Dos"-but she couldn't show me anything new.

By 3 PM CST I was back at the Laredo terminal and hoping for a load out. Got one just before 5 PM CST to Detroit(Taylor), Michigan for Monday. Boy, I feel I have done this route a few times. What's worth is I have alot of time to do it. The best idea here is to get the load to Taylor as early as possible and, if they have few drivers, they will let me drop it and take another load. The local drivers can deliver it.

I was heading up I-35 by 6 PM CST and got up to "Just a Truckstop" at 8:30 PM CST. I had dinner but decided to get my fuel up in Red Oak(Texas) as they sometimes pump it for me; I don't have to log 15 minutes for fueling if someone else fuels for me...no, you can't fuel someone elses truck while they fuel yours to get out of logging 15 minutes.

Traveled up I-35, taking the lower level of the duel level interstate of Austin(Texas). Just after Georgetown(Texas), the traffic built up and slowed. Reason??? There was a bad multi car accident on the southbound side and northbounders had to slow and look at it

As my day ended, I still had a good couple hours to my planned stop in Red Oak, Texas.