October 10, 1991, 2011

FIRST 5 YEARS:(Thursday-Tulsa, Oklahoma)
I woke up at 7 AM CST and needed to call dispatch.  Heck with it!!! I rolled over and went back to sleep.  I finally called in just before 9 AM CST to find they had a load assigned to me.  I was to go to Kerr Glass in Sand Springs, Oklahoma(sits just west of Tulsa) amd pick up a load going to Cincinnati, Ohio.  There was usually a pickup appointment at Kerr Glass but this time I was just to go get it without an appointment.

I took Hwy 412 west to Sand Springs where I was instructed to back up to dock 6 for loading.  I walked to the loading docks and watched them load me. Before I got my load's paperwork, I went to my tractor to get my pen.  As I walked back to the shipping department, I bumped up against a Heartland trailer with a good sized burr(a piece of mental hanging away from original design) on one of it's rivets; leaving a huge bleeding cut on my left arm(can still see scare today)/  It was deep and I called dispatch.  I told dispatch that I was heading into Joplin and would stop at the terminal, which I did.

When I contacted dispatch, I turned in my paperwork and reported my injury.  I told them I needed stitches and I was seen by many persons before someone said that I was to take a taxi to the hospital.  They--the company--really didnt know what to do.  The Taxi came and took me to the hospital where the doctor put in two deep stitches and three shallow ones.  He told me to come back in a week to get them out and I told him that I didn't have a clue where I would be in a week and that I could remove them as I was a nursing student that had studied doing that sort of thing.  Stitches normally aren't hard to remove...
(Note: The hospital which I went to was heavily damaged--was rebuilt--by the huge tornado in May of 2011).

Got back to the terminal to find that my Cincinnati load was gone.  The local dispatcher asked if I would take a load to Chicago that had to get moving and I said. I was hooked up and fueled(38 gallons) just before 3 PM CST and heading northeast On I-44.

I stopped for dinner at Marshfield and filled up on some of the best bar-b-que around the midwest.  After dinner it was back on the road.  When I got to St. Louis, I took I-55  north toward Chicago and over the Mississippi River.  I followed I-55 up to the rest area at Funk's Grove, Illinois(like that name in my logbook) and called it a night.  Went to sleep... 

October 9, 1991, 2011

FIRST 5 YEARS:(Wednesday-Tulsa, Olkahoma)
I was up and walking around when the Walgreens employees wanted to unload me..While they unloaded, I walked around the ruck, watched them unload and visited the hamburger joint next door.  They were done unloading me at 11 AM CST.  I called dispatch and found there was nothing for me to pick up today. 

I drove to the 76 Truckstop off I-44 on the northeast corner of Tulsa. (Note: This truckstop was totally blown away by a tornado a number of years after this date).  I Had dinner with two other company drivers and then sat ond talked with the waitress(Linda) and filled out a number of "comment" forms(all good comments) for her.  Went to bed and watched my TV...