Which way did they go?

10/15/2018
 
    Think I slept wrong last night woke up to back spasms (haven't had those in a LONG Time) Sleep came pretty easy to me yesterday which was a welcome trade off from the usual insomniac nights but I guess those will return soon. I get one decent night sleep every couple weeks so, good thing when I get my own truck I will be driving mostly NIGHTS, hey if I'm gonna be awake might as well make money right?
   
     Got to class today and most of them forgot that they had to do log's for Saturday AND Sunday, so had to wait for 20 mins for them to catch that up. Many of them still struggle with this simple process, would be a little more understandable if we were all students learning this for the first time, but we are all here because we already have our cdl's (although how some people got theirs is beyond me) We spent the day INSIDE, doing "soft skills" ie BOOK WORK. Today was using Work Flow and doing trip planning. Basically Work Flow, gives us the pick up information, (trailer number, bill of lading, trip number, weight, pick up location and drop off location ETC) there are several steps to go through before you can actually turn the wheels of the truck. We went STEP BY STEP through 3 examples and then he wanted us to try a fourth one by our selves...Deer in the headlights for most of the people in class, like the instructor had just asked us to Re-Write Beethoven's 9th symphony or something. Here is the kicker, they gave us a cheat sheet that tells you EXACTLY Step by Step What to do and HOW to do it. After 8 1/2 EXHAUSTING HOURS most of them still didn't get it, it's a pretty easy concept. You need to know how far you can drive every day, and how long it will take to get from your pick up to your drop off and if you have enough hours on your clock to do that. SIMPLE. Most people Trip plan EVERYDAY, most of the time subconsciously. Okay I need to meet the clients for dinner at 7pm, I get home from work at 4 pm I need an hour to shower and change and an hour for the drive there, do I have enough time? Trip planning pretty simple, only real difference is our "car" is a lot bigger and we usually have further to go then 30 miles to dinner. This "class" is suppose to be a "finishing" Class if you will, to get us comfortable with Schneider's way of doing things. Some people act like they have never heard of this stuff or never driven a big rig (okay I get it not ALL CDL Schools go over this stuff, and I give an E for Error on their part, if you are going to TEACH Someone how to get a CDL and drive then you should TEACH them they entire Aspect of DRIVING, which included Trip Planning. Ah well not my issue, I have an easy route, pick up at one city go to another city 1000 miles away rinse and repeat haha.
Tomorrow we are out on the range, making sure we have pre-trip, coupling un coupling, pre-trip backing stuff down pretty good, and some more city driving. Getting closer every day
#NBA (never broke again)

We started the class with 29 people and we are down to 21, curious to see how many will pass final eval later this week or next.

Thanks For traveling with me
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firemedic2816

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