We had the last week off and got back to the truck this morning at 8am sharp. It took one phone call lasting about three minutes and we got a load of roofing material from Lake City, FL up to Lebanon, PA. In the next week we are scheduled to go to our main terminal for repairs. Due to the extremely heavy rain storm just north of the FL/GA border, we decided to call it a day and spend the night at the Brunswick FJ off I-95. After some steak and salad we picked up the latest copy (July 1-14 '07) of The Trucker, a publication, along with other "trucker industry" papers and magazines, we try to avoid reading. If you're new to our blog, we suggest you go back and read our May 14th posting for some additional background. One of the cover pieces (from The Trucker) really pissed us off. Not just the subject matter, but the poor way it was presented. We just don't like the "reporters" attitude. "He" comes off with more as a corporate "green" mouthpiece with an anti-driver agenda than a objective reporter. If you don't already know, the "trucker press" are a bunch of 40 year-old wannabees who know nothing about the realities of driving and living in a truck. "They" go around in private school-girl like "clicks" wearing their corporate golf shirts, hoping for recognition from the mainstream press, consistently failing to write intelligent articles about the leper colony known as trucking industry. "They" wouldn't last a day in the real world of OTR trucking. But since they present themselves and their "product" in front of our faces at truck stops around the country, [sometimes] we are bound to notice and comment on their ignorance. If anyone cared for a nanosecond about what we really do, the "pros from Dover" (The New York Times, AP or Christian Science Monitor for example) would come down from their ivory towers and professionally report on it. So, The Trucker story we're referring to is: "Will demand for no-idle solutions catch up to the sizzling forecasts?" by staffer Kevin Jones. Screw this guy. What the hell is he talking about and to whom? He says: "Everyone knows idling is expensive and environmentally unsound, right? Well, you could try telling that to the [truckers] if you could coax them out of their comfortable air-conditioned cabs, and if they could hear you over the racket." What did this clown say? He sure as hell isn't talking to "us". To suffer through more (if you can stomach it), you're dragged through this rag having to read more of what this pinhead has to say. Jones derives much of his pseudo "expertise" from the conventions and shows he attends. Do you really care what the maintenance director from a second rate carrier has to say about idling. No. Do you give shit about the EPA? No. We already know that everyone hates Idle Aire and their nonsense. Do you care about their bullshit? No. And do you care about what a flatbed carrier with purple trucks has to say about anything? No. The only "thing" this "approach" accomplishes is that Jones gets his golden staff "writer" chance to kiss the ass of an advertiser (or two) and get a rain check for calling them again to comment about some other nonsense. This guy knows nothing. This truck is our home for 8 weeks. When we're in it, it stays on. When our carrier (s) find some other way to keep us cool, warm and comfortable, we will probably follow. This Jones piece is crap. Listen drivers, he doesn't know about us. He is a fool. He is as good as the next thought some carrier suit or advertiser puts in his little pin head. Without the useless information he gets at the next show or convention, he wouldn't know what to write. Drivers, do the right thing - leave The Trucker in the stand. It does, though, make excellent lining for your cat box. Need to check your oil? Tear the front cover off and wipe. Throw the rest in the garbage. Want to save the environment? Stop printing it. Think of all the paper we will save.
