Real Trucker?

Sometimes I think I'm not a real trucker, because I drive shortline and am never more than a day's drive from home. Then I have days like today, when I a) spend 9 hours, unpaid, sitting in a repair shop waiting room, and b) spend part of that time on the phone with my car insurance company and the DMVs of two states trying to find out why my rates have gone up astronomically over an alleged two-point violation I got in the truck in another state last year, which in fact did not have any points associated with it, and incidentally was issued for choosing the safer although illegal of two courses of action.

For a trucker, I have a very cushy life. I'm home every weekend and several nights during the week, and I can't even compare that to the life of someone who is away from home for weeks at a time (which has been my life before and I don't want to be again). But a day spent sitting in a waiting room because the truck in the repair bay is my only means of transportation is the same whether that shop is in Las Vegas or 10 miles from home; and the legal responsibilities and ramifications of driving a 75'-long vehicle 40+ hours a week also don't change with geography.

Smokin'

It's Monday morning and I'm sitting in the waiting room in our local repair shop smelling like burned rubber. On my way to the terminal a few hours ago I noticed something in my mirror I'd never seen before: a cloud of smoke coming out of my drive wheels. I pulled into the plaza parking lot next to me and parked next to a small mountain of snow, which I proceeded to throw on the offending rims by the handful. They sizzled like skillets. I kept it up for a while and waited a while longer. While I was trying to cool them down from overheating I was also trying to warm them up so that whatever part of them had frozen up would release. I parked the truck at an angle so the morning sun would shine down in the narrow space between the tires and the frame. (The sun is the solution to so many wintertime problems.) Whether from the heat of the sun or of the hot brakes themselves, they eventually released, and the smoke eventually subsided, so I decided it was safe to try to drive a few miles up the road to the shop. I want to have everything checked out before I head out of town with a load.

Lesson learned: Don't drive on frozen brakes in hopes of warming them up and thawing them out. Park them in the sun and come back later. Don't drive on them. Okay? Okay.