Finally an update

I *finally* managed to get online here at Carlisle. Had quite a few problems getting online, but at least I finally managed it.

I arrived at the Hotel Carlisle mid-Sunday afternoon. The place was really easy to find - it's right off I-81. I checked the hotel's website before coming up - don't believe what you see there. The "data port in every room" might make you think it's some kind of broad band access. It's not. It's just an extra phone jack. From the photos it looks like quite the fancy place. It's not. It's actually pretty much just an average hotel.

Don't get me wrong here. I've stayed in worse places. Worse by far, in fact. On the flip side I've stayed in places that were much better, as well. Oh well. It's not like I'm paying for it.

Back to my arrival. The girl that checked me in seemed to be new here. At least I'm hoping that's what the problem was. One thing is for damn sure. She had absolutely no idea what she was doing.

Oh yeah. Another thing. That "complimentary continental breakfast" they mention? It's pretty much a joke. Fortunately I'm not much for breakfast.

On to the schedule so far.

Monday (the 15th) was all classroom, with a bunch of paperwork to sign. All kinds of introductory stuff, policies, handouts, the usual first day type stuff. One issue I immediately had was that the classroom for the first week students is *much* colder thatn I would have preferred. Other thsn that it wasn't too bad. Breaks are regularly given - usually about 15 minutes each, with two in the morning and two in the afternoon.

Also given out the first day is one of the more important things - your meal vouchers. The first day you get four of them, then four more Thursday, and the last three on Monday. Each voucher is worth $5.50 in the OC cafeteria. If you want more than that, you can just pay the difference. And no, you don't get change if you get less.

A quick word about the cafeteria. It's actually pretty good food there. A little on the pricey side, but each day there's a student special that comes out to exactly $5.50 and includes a drink.

Tuesday (16th) was a whole lot more paperwork, including probably the most important - payroll! A reminder here. If you want direct deposit (which I personally recommend) you want to have either the full details from your bank, or a voided check.

After lunch on Tuesday we were introduced to our driving instructors. After a few minutes talking with our driving instructors we then got introduced to the trucks. After a bit of introduction to the trucks we went for a drive with the bobtails. Little side note here - hope you get better weather than we had for this day. We had rain. Moderately heavy rain at times, but it rained all friggin' day! For someone like me who had never experienced a big truck before, the combo of rain and bobtail was scary. Feeling the rear end of a 16000 pound vehicle get sideways is damn near terrifying.

Wednesday (17th) was all day in the truck. No class at all. Today we got to drive with trailers. Even though all three of the guys in my group (myself included) are going bulk we started out with a regular van trailer to start out with. Our trailer was loaded with four concrete jersey barriers, each weighing 7000 pounds. Damn what a difference that made regarding shifting. Surprisingly it made shifting a whole hell of a lot easier. Damn what an experience driving a big truck for the first time was!

Seeing as how it's now almost midnight I need to get to sleep. 5 AM comes awfully early. I'll try and get as much more updated tomorrow after class as I can. If nothing else we've been kept incredibely busy.

Getting ready to head to Carlisle

Well I've got just about everything in the car ready to go. Just one or two last minute items to grab on the way out. At least I've finally got the accumulated trash cleaned out of the car.

I'm still trying to decide whether I'm more excited or nervous about this. If a year ago someone had told me I'd be going off to truck driving school I'd have thought they were nuts. Though in defense of our hypothetical person truck driving is an idea I've kicked around for a bunch of years - since about the late 80's or so (high school years for me).

I guess what really did it for me was I just got so fed up working retail. Three years of running registers at the local WalMart and I was seriously starting to hate people. Especially after an extended tour of duty at the service desk. A change in jobs was in order.

So now here I am getting ready to head off to Schneider National's driving school in Carlisle, PA. I'm slated to go into their bulk division. For those unfamiliar with the industry, that means I'll be pulling the large tank trailers. For those familiar, yes I'm going to be one of those tanker yankers.

My intent is to chronicle my adventures with Schneider (and the rest of my life as well!) via this blog. I've never done a blog before so I don't know how well I'll do in keeping it up to date. I suppose we will just have to see as time goes on.