other dog

I called decal guy yesterday and she came over and slapped a decal on the fender that covers up the hole where the fender mirror bracket was bolted to the hood. Best part was she didn't charge me a thing!

Funny thing was the paint can said "for best results do not use a roller". I don't know why, but that's what it said. I didn't even ask paint guy up the road about just painting the hood. He's the guy that was going to paint the big green International that runs now for $10,000 and then changed his mind. I'm sure he would have wanted me to take the hood off and take it to him, and I couldn't have done that by myself anyway. If I had known then what I knows now I would have done like mower man suggested and bought a cheap spray gun to start with. I polished a little spot on a fuel tank, several times actually, and I decided to ask truck washer guy up the road how much he would charge me to polish 2 tanks and 2 wheels. He said "send me a picture", so I did, and he gave me a price of $550. To polish 2 tanks and 2 wheels. I bought a brand new tank for the big green International that runs now for I believe somewhere between 6 and $700. So I couldn't see paying truck washer guy $550 to polish 2 tanks and 2 wheels. So I said thanks, but no thanks. I'll have to do them myself too. By hand, in the driveway, like everything else. I have the one looking pretty decent now but I've gone over it about 10 times. Haven't started on the driver's side yet.

I've been working on another "rattle can restoration" but it's not going as well as the big green International that runs now did. The paint just didn't want to do right, I sanded it and repainted it about 14 times, then I just gave up and ordered a quart of the same color and bought a brush at the hardware store.

The captain of the Mexican ship that hit the Brooklyn Bridge.

Naw, that was just a regular old 18 speed. I drove 3 T800s and the silver Peterbilt with 18 speed transmissions in them. Best transmissions I ever drove. Most of the time you just drove it like a 13 speed, but you could split the low side too if you needed to. They were the easiest, smoothest shifting transmissions I ever drove too, every one I drove was like that.

No, mine was a comment on the gray button.

Two of my favorite things!

Maybe regulated out of binness. I told a good friend of mine who used to drive, but he had to give it up due to health issues, that a food truck would be perfect for him. He had a pizza place in Reynoldsville, Pa. for a while too, but sold it. And he said he had considered it, but they have to pass all the same inspections that a restaurant does, and you had to have all kinds of permits, and it was more hassle than it was worth. I guess that's good, it's just a lot more to it than I ever thought, at least in Pa. I thought you could just make 15 sausage bistits, 21 bacon bistits, 23 sausage and egg, 19 bacon and egg, and go sell 'em. Then come home and make 39 cheeseburgers and 28 hamburgers and go sell them at lunch time, but apparently it doesn't quite work like that.

That job site was up near Frederick, MD. somewhere I think. They were building a new school but it's probably finished by now because it was about 7 or 8 years ago, so that food truck is probably someplace else by now.

This is true! I remember back when they were commonly referred to as "the roach coach", and some deservingly so, because they had just crappy overpriced food. But when you were a truck driver, stuck at some job site for who knows how long you didn't have any choice, you either bought some crappy overpriced sammich or went hungry. But over time they have gotten waaaay better, and I've had some absolutely fantastic food from the food trucks.

I was at a jobsite one time and bought the best burrito I ever had anywhere off a food truck. I didn't want to eat it too fast, but it was so good I flipped the gray button and got on with it. It was great.

My 2 cents- I think that has a lot to do with it, starting young. I can't watch the video on my phone, I'll look for it on YouTube one day. But I was steering a Farmall C tractor in the hay field before I even started school. I steered between the rows and square balls and my dad and grandfather loaded them onto the wagon. At the end of the field Dad would jump on the back and start me up between the next 2 rows. The first time I drove a truck I was in a '74 Transtar with a 350 Cummins and a 10 speed Roadranger. I was riding with a guy and he said "you wanna drive it?" So I said "absolutely, hell yeah", or something like that. And he showed me when he was driving "you don't even have to use the clutch". And I started driving and after taking off I didn't use the clutch any more, and it just shifted smooth as butter. But a 10 speed Roadranger is about the easiest transmission there is. As I always said " it takes a lot more skill to drive a 5 speed Mack than a 10 speed Roadranger". Sometimes I'll use the clutch to take it out of gear, but not to put it back in gear, after a while it's just all in the feel of things you know. You kind of know what it wants...or something.

Oh yeah, got all that. It was at the top of the list. I'll bring it to Macungie.

Happy birthday!

She's 81 now. Here's a photo of her from this year.

We got some plants, a bottle of Lucas because the front hub on the furniture truck was just a tad low, a bottle of power steering fluid because the reservoir on the GMC was just a tad low, a few bags of rocks for the driveway so I can back the GMC in beside the furniture truck... don't remember what else, I'll see if I can find the receipt and get back to you...

We found out that a single axle sleeper is kind of hard to come by.

No, it's black. I haven't seen any evidence of red paint on anything.

Just a unit we picked up that was for sale. Zina saw it on marketplace and showed it to me and said "that's the truck we need". I said "yep, sure is, too bad we just bought that GMC". I was actually going to go look at it for somebody else, then he said it was no longer for sale, then the owner called me and said I could get it if I wanted it, so we went to look at it and drove it. And ended up bringing it home. I had already told both of them that if the other fellow didn't buy it we would, and he didn't, so I was committed to buy it then. The GMC is too slow for her, so maybe this will be the one that we can get in and go places. It's a fleet-spec truck, has about a million miles, but had a Re-mack engine installed at around 800,000. I've been doing a little painting and polishing on it, and put a new mattress in the sleeper. Cleaned the interior, it looked like it hadn't been cleaned since 1998. So I guess the GMC is for sale...I guess the big green International that runs now is too.

I had a Muncie 4 speed in my hot rod Nova that I had when I was a kid (18), then I put it in a 70 Chevelle SS that I bought. I had a Hurst Competition Plus shifter on it, but when I saw some guys small block Vega with a vertigate shifter in it I thought I had to have one, just because it looked so cool. But it wasn't nearly as quick as the Hurst, had a longer throw too, but it did look cool!

I get e-mails all the time from trucking companies trying to to recruit me to drive for them. And some of them offer like TWICE what I was making before I retired. Makes me wonder...but I'm not going back.

Just got the GMC back from Powell's Truck and Equipment. They ended up sending the pump off to be rebuilt because it was taking so long to get a pump for it. Been up there since February. They also replaced the air bags, leveling valve, a fuel line, and a turbo clamp. A little over $4400. But we drove it to the Walmart store today.