It's time to play..WHO'S IN THAT TRUCK?!

[louixo]

I'll never get to meet everyone out there. Neither will you. I always found it really interesting to find out what was the trigger that sent someone on the road. So, give us a short bio, and tell us what you did before, and how you came to be behind the wheel. I'll start.

I did a few things before being a road warrior. I sold TV production equipment and services. Sold resort property, and was a real estate broker. When I was a boy, I was always fascinated by the big rigs, and always wanted to drive one. Some kids wanted to be airplane pilots, others race car drivers, firemen etc. I was successful in my career, but never satisfied, except for short periods of time. I was real bored with the corporate life in my late 30's, with the business meetings, quotas, office politics etc. One day, I decided to give my boyhood dream a try. I answered an ad for North American. I loved it! The rest is history. I spent most of my trucking career in electronics and trade shows, and later on switched to expediting. For the last couple of years, I do very little trucking, and I don't know if I'll go back or not. But only because I like what I do now, which is whatever I want to do.
Now you.

 

[Jenny]

After I graduated high school, in 2003, I started working for a division of the F.D.A. that made food and animal safety testing supplies. After 3 years I decided that was not to correct career path for me. I went and got my life and health insurance licenses, and tried that for a while. Once again was not the correct line of work for me. I went back to office work until I lost my job last June.
At the time my boyfriend, The Enemy, was out on the road and I came out with him for 2 weeks as a little vacation before I stared looking for a new job. After that two weeks he asked if I would like to get my license and stay out on the road with him. I said ok. I finally got my license and started driving with him January of this year. So I have been out here since June of last year.

After we get off the road, to settle down and start a family, my plan is to open my own coffee shop and bakery down in Florida.

 

[Scuba]

My dad was a trucker and I followed in his footsteps I guess. I joined the Army right out of high school at the time the mos was 64c10 wheel vehicle operator and I went to FT Leonardwood Mo. While I have left driving from time to time it always pulled me back to the cab.

 

[Yesteryear]

I was a cosmetologists for many many years. (sure miss that salon gossip lol) My husband was a police officer from the time he went into the military at 19 as an MP until 3 years ago when we decided to become Expediters. He decided it was time to retire from police work and try his hand at something different, finally settling on truck driving. We talked it over and thought "wow, that sounds like an awesome idea". Yes, we are one of those couples that said, "ya know, wouldn't it be nice to see the country and make money while doing it? Ya know, a permanent paid vacation." Of course we know now truck driving is not what we thought it would be, you see the country only in passing, and trucking is an actual job that can be hard work.

 

[moose]

I drove most vehicles mankind could come up with .
was very involved in off road driving , navigation and competition .
what they call in Europe Rally .

at work i was a diesel engineer , working at the farm fields , driving every thing from them big tractors , to ATV's .

i was in a vecation in Rhode Island ,and was visiting a friend at work , when a Shcnider's truck rolled in ,
I was very impresed .

2 weeks later , I lost a bet in a pub !
it was like -5 beers say : 'you don't have what it take to drive it' kind of a thing ,
so i got my self across the Globe , into a Driving school , it was supposed to be just to prove a point for my self . a few weeks , maybe for the summer ,
that was 8 years ago.

I can quit at any time - but I really Can't !

 

[cheri1122]

I once dated a truck driver, who, when I asked him to teach me to drive the truck, patted me on my lil head & said "But darlin, no one would hire you."
He was wrong about a few other things, too.

 

[iceroadtrucker]

U need not know so ill hit ya with some quotes and proverbs. "I hear and I forget I see and I remember I do and I understand. -Chinese Proverb "Attitude defies limitation and exceeds expectation." -Source Unknown "Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from reaching his goal; and nothing on earth can help the man with wrong mental attitude." -Thomas Jefferson "Be not afraid of going slowly. Be afraid of standing still." -Japanese Proverb "Youth is a gift of nature, age is a work of art." -Helen M. Carrall "If I could wish for my life to be perfect, it would be tempting, but I would have to decline, for life would no longer teach me anything." -Allyson jones "Opportunity...often it comes disguised in the form of misfortune or temporary defeat." -Napoleon Hill "You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing we call FAILURE is not the falling down, but the staying down." -Mary Pickford "Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, NOT absence of fear." -Mark Twain "The highest reward for a man's toil is not what he gets for it, but what he becomes by it." -John Ruskin
Some where some one is training if your not you meet you will loose. Failure is not an option, The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one. Pain is weakness leaving the body. The only easy day was yesterday.
Do or do not there is no try.
Have a nice day.

 

[greg334]

WTH was that?

 

[Doggie Daddy]

WTH was that?

Don't you recognize the preamble to the constitution?

 

[Moot]

I am the clouds
I am embroidered

 

[TheOGExpediterGuy]

I graduated High School in 2004...and worked at Taco Bell for 2 and a half years, then I started Driving...Drove for a company outta Cambridge, Ontario...Dynamex Expedite, then drove for All-Types Expedite (CROOKS), then for Express 1, Then for Nations Express (CROOKS), and now for Expedel...!!! An Im still single!!! Hope ya'll are safe out there...Oh and I sing back home for some cash on the side!!!

 

[wimpy007]

I'll tell you how long i've been in this crazy business. After a 10 + year stent in the Army with service in Korea and then Nam I deceided it was not the life for me. I started driving in 1963, it was much different back then, but here I am still at it, my wife of 55 years is right next to me.

 

[Dakota]

An Im still single!!! Hope ya'll are safe out there...Oh and I sing back home for some cash on the side!!!

You could get one of those vinyl wraps for your truck advertising yourself to all the ladies

 

[teamjdw]

4yrs Army,20yrs lawn fertilizing,5yrs filling vending machines.Time too fufill a dream,always wanted to drive big rigs.Drove for Stevens transport for awhile,but wiffy didn't like the 6 week seperation.Got local job hauling cars for Cassens transport,nice still driving big rig ,and home every nite.Then came the down turn followed buy a lay off.while looking on line for new job driving I came across EO.Now that wife and I are empty nesters.I asked her ,how would you like too see the country!Too my surprise she said yes.So off too school she goes.So here we are,having the time of our lives.

 

[youngsamuel]

After high school I worked various jobs manufacturing, landscape, etc. I then went into construction for about 10 years and really enjoyed it. A year ago I wanted a change and my father-in-law ran a few expedite trucks. I ran a van for a while then bought a straight. Everyone said I chose the wrong time to get into trucking but my response was I got out of construction at the right time.

 

[Wingnut]

Let's see.....hubby & I owned our own cattle business then sold that & started a rendering business. Sold that & started in expediting and have been doing it ever since. Now we own a small fleet and also drive too. Oh yeah, I also went to clown school & became a professional clown in between the cattle & rendering businesses. I still do it occassionally.

 

[RTOspeedwagn]

Ft Leonard Wood MO.....a great place to have pneumonia (Feb 79)

 

[iceroadtrucker]

wth was that?

NON YA TAT WTH Greg.

 

[Bruno]

I got out of High School in June of 1987 and went in to the Marine Corps on Sept 1 of 1987 and got a medical discharge because of my knees in Dec of 1987. Did many jobs over the next few years like working at a fence company, Burger King, a steel worker, framed house's and many other things. In 1989 I went to work for Rent-A-Center as an account manager in the daytime and Dominos Pizza at night. After moving up to the collection manager then to the store manager for a few years. A customer of mine named to Tom George drove his Roberts Express cargo van to my store to make a payment.

I thought it was great how he could see the U.S. in a van. My father had been an O/O for 25 years in a big truck and I thought it was great but didn't have the time or money to go to School and get my class A. Tom told me that you didn't need a class A to drive for Roberts Express you just needed a class C cdl with Haz mat. I took the test and called Chuck Wiedie from Roberts Express and told him I wanted to drive a van. They wasn't taking on any vans but they did need C and D units. Well, I didn't know where I could buy one of those so Chuck told me to call Dan Schultz out of Freightliner of Knoxville, Tn.

I got my 1st truck for $47,500 it was a FL 60 Freightliner with a 48 inch double bunk sleeper with no air ride. That was Jan of 1995, been in the game ever since. I upgraded my CDL to a class B in 1997 and drive a D unit when I'm out on the road training someone. I wouldn't change a thing, I love my job.

 

[chefdennis]

Left high school (vocational as from auto tech glasses) after 4 yrs, and worked as a auto mechanic. Moved to auto sales then on to management , then back to truck sales. Started and run (either to a profit and sold them or ran then into the ground, lost money and closed them) while working at some kind of sales in the automotive business since leaving college. Retired at 49 and turned the 2 exiting businesses over to others to run. Then got bored, read about the Personal Chef business (always had an interest in cooking) decided to go to Culinary school and started the Personal Chef Business. After signing a few fulltime professional athletes as clients as well as other clients, i figured I could tie the cooking business to health and fitness and weight loss or control so i went back to school. Gradutated with a nutritional degree and a certificate as a Personal Fitness Trainer, bought a small fitness center and proceeded to lose but butt. Closed the fitness center.

About that time a friend of mine told me he had a hard time keeping drivers at night for a business that run railroad conductors and engineers out to trains that had run out of time. So i told him I'd drive for him (3rd shift only) but only under the table. While doing that i kept seeing those Straight trucks with big sleepers and checked them out. A few months later after thnking about expediting, but not actually doing anything with the info i had picked up, I ran into a friend who I had sold cars and trucks with and he was now the VP of Sales for Bolt...he asked if i wanted to go back to sales, i told him no but thought about driving. I then forgot about it again. THEN!!

One afternoon while messing around online, I decided to google "freight expediting"....and after finding this site, and reading here, talking to drivers at truckstops, i talked to Mark, bought a CV and convertered it so that I could be comfortable on my terms and hit the road. That was 14 months ago.

So from high school to a auto mechaninc, to college to sales of all types and auto sales management to business owner (successful and failure) to more school to current business owner and expeditor.

And the beat goes on....