I've reached a point in the story where another major change is about to occur, but first I need to do a quick recap of the summer of 1972. (Some of this has been covered before - some hasn't.)
My sister Karina started the summer married to a blind, diabetic drummer (Mike) from Ardmore, Oklahoma. That didn't last very long and she ended up back with Bernie (her prior husband from another very short marriage)... And that's who she was with at the end of August.
Also, in late spring of that year my mother (who had been hospitalized with cancer for many months) refused chemo and checked herself out of the hospital - and by the end of August she had almost fully recovered. (There was no medical explanation... It was always her opinion that hospitals are the primary cause of illness...)
Then sometime in July I sold the 1963 Fairlane (my first car) to a guy who lived at the apartment complex. The agreed price was $200 but the $50 down payment was all I ever got. (Yes - I had given him the title. Lesson learned)... Meanwhile I picked up a '61 Ford Falcon from a friend of mom's but I hardly ever drove it. Then Bernie got laid off from his regular job (at a music store) and since money was a bit tight he let me drive his new Mazda RX-2 as long as I covered the payments. (It was Karina's idea - I don't think he was thrilled about it.)
Then around the last week of August I quit my job at A-1 Plastic Supply...
Even thought I was the "sole breadwinner" there was no immediate financial crisis. I had saved quite a bit of money over the summer and I was still getting child support payments from dad. Also, aunt Vesti was sending mom a monthly check.
Still - within a couple of days I had gotten a new job mowing the lawns at our apartment complex... Yeah - it was an incredible pain in the butt. The complex was huge so by the time you got to one end it was time to start again at the other end. And there weren't any big lawns anywhere - just lots and lots of little oddly shaped bits of grass. It very time consuming... And it was (still) hotter than hell out...
Then after the first day of mowing I started noticing some shortness of breath, and it kept getting progressively worse... Of course, mom insisted I didn't have asthma (that would mean I wasn't "perfect", which she could not accept). But around mid-morning of the 4th day I ended up in the emergency room. The doctor gave me an adrenaline shot and informed me that I had severe asthma and should not be mowing lawns at all (let alone every day)...
The woman who managed the complex was livid. She kept trying to tell me I couldn't quit even after I explained that it was medically necessary... It was a very uncomfortable exchange...
Aside: The woman in question was a young, tall, "smokin hot" blonde, and was (in my opinion) a total "b-word"... When I mentioned it to my sister her response was that the woman didn't behave any differently than a man in the same situation and I just had a problem with women in authority... After thinking it over I had to admit that there was some truth to Karina's assertion. But I still thought the woman was a "b-word" :-)
So... Both Bernie and I were both unemployed and didn't have any ties to the Dallas area... Between us we had a good chunk of change saved up, and neither of us had paid our September rent yet.... We had a new car (the RX-2) and the interstate highways at our disposal, and Karina was in the mood to go west.
Yes - it was time for a road trip...
Friday, November 30, 2012
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Conclusions
I could probably write a dozen more posts on the three months I spent working
at A-1 Plastic Supply in the summer of 1972 - but most of it's irrelevant... I
suspect that a lot of it only stuck in my mind because at that point in my life I had no idea how many
types of businesses there were and what kinds of things people did for a
living. (You'd be amazed at what went on in some of those nondescript unmarked buildings.) So, I'm just going to tell a few more stories, draw the conclusions, and get on with my life :-)
First - there was the time I delivered some materials to one of those unmarked buildings in Oak Cliff, and as I walked through the door I found myself "danger close" to a bunch of rotating gears and rollers. As I glanced about I realized that the entire room was packed with machinery and there were no covers or barriers anywhere to prevent someone from getting "chewed up" if they ventured too close... But the thing that really got to me was the extreme heat and humidity (part of the machinery was generating steam and the building wasn't well vented). There were 7 or 8 guys working there and I don't know how they survived. (I'm certain OSHA did not know the place existed.) The man who signed the invoice told it was some type of felt processing facility - definitely the harshest work environment I've encountered...
Then there was the Continental bakery. I remember it for two reasons: The first was that I got to see Twinkies being made. (That was really cool.) And the second was how slippery the floors were... I'm sure they mopped the place constantly but the air was saturated with oil vapor and there was no way to keep it off the tile. It was worse than ice :-)
Finally, there was the Morton's potato chip factory (went out of business long ago). BTW: This is another one of those stories that nobody else seems to think is funny...
The first time I made a delivery there I ended up walking along one wing of the factory and when I glanced through the windows I immediately noticed this huge piece of machinery. Now, I've always been fascinated by mechanical stuff, and this thing was a behemoth (about the size of a locomotive but twice as long). So, I ended up stopping every few steps to watch the machine at work - trying to figure out exactly what it did. Given it's size I figured it had to be producing huge quantities of something... My anticipation (and curiosity) grew with each step, and when I finally reached the end I discovered it was spitting out those itty-bitty "snack machine" bags of chips...
Now - the key to humor is the unexpected, and nothing could have possibly caught me more off guard than the sight of those tiny bags coming out of that monstrous machine. I started laughing so hard I had to lean against the wall to avoid falling down, and I was still chuckling when I reached my destination. When the guy asked me what was so funny I muttered something about "big machine - little bags of chips", but he didn't get it (just gave me a really weird look...)
Then sometime near the end of August I quit...
As I've said before, I learned a lot from William T. (the guy who ran the place). No matter what the situation he always had a solution. Often it was brilliant - other times not so much (like having me drive the truck with a missing fan blade). But he never got flustered - just made the decision and went with it... The problem was that it seemed like he was constantly criticizing me. Some of it was constructive (and I appreciated that) - but a lot of times it wasn't (like accusing me of abusing the truck)... It seemed like hardly a day went by that he didn't say something that got under my skin.
The first major issue was when he told me that some of our regular customers had been complaining about the length of my hair. (The"redneck" place was not one of them.) The thing is, during my initial job interview he had assured me that my hair would not be an problem. But now he was claiming that it was hurting business... Yeah - that was total B.S... I interacted with all our "high volume" customers almost daily and I can guarantee that none of them had an issue with my hair... But I went ahead and got it neatened up anyway...
Then near the end of August he told me that a bunch of customers were complaining about my sleeveless shirts. Now - we're not talking about plain t-shirts here (which I agree would be tacky). These were really nice (non-white) shirts that I got at Target. And the only reason I wore them was because the temperature was above 90 with high humidity every freaking day and the truck didn't have air conditioning and I was sweating my tail off... Furthermore - most of our customers' warehouse guys were wearing similar shirts. Of course, when I asked which customers were complaining he did his whole "confidentiality" tap dance, and (once again) I'm sure that he just had a problem with exposed armpits (or something) and wouldn't admit it...
So I went home that evening and sat there fuming about the whole situation (not just the shirt thing), and decided that I'd had enough... I called Jim (at home) and asked him to pass the message that I wouldn't be in the next day - or ever again... Yeah - it was a totally immature and self-centered thing to do, but that's how I rolled at that age :-)
Epilogue:
Jim and I touched bases again a few weeks later and he told me that William T. had ended up hiring his big redneck buddy (the one who used to hang out there) to replace me. And apparently the guy couldn't do nearly as many deliveries per day as I'd been doing so they had to hire a second driver to pick up the slack... And to top it off, the buddy had taken a shortcut through a residential area and failed to notice a low hanging tree limb... Totally destroyed the truck bed cover... Yeah - Jim was just as amused by that as I was :-)
I can't help but cringe when I think about the way I quit that job. Ever since then I've made a point of never leaving a job (except for the military) until I had another one lined up, and I've always done my best to depart on good terms. But the point remains that if William T. had made me feel just a little bit appreciated he would have saved himself a lot of money - and my life might have followed a much less rewarding path :-)
First - there was the time I delivered some materials to one of those unmarked buildings in Oak Cliff, and as I walked through the door I found myself "danger close" to a bunch of rotating gears and rollers. As I glanced about I realized that the entire room was packed with machinery and there were no covers or barriers anywhere to prevent someone from getting "chewed up" if they ventured too close... But the thing that really got to me was the extreme heat and humidity (part of the machinery was generating steam and the building wasn't well vented). There were 7 or 8 guys working there and I don't know how they survived. (I'm certain OSHA did not know the place existed.) The man who signed the invoice told it was some type of felt processing facility - definitely the harshest work environment I've encountered...
Then there was the Continental bakery. I remember it for two reasons: The first was that I got to see Twinkies being made. (That was really cool.) And the second was how slippery the floors were... I'm sure they mopped the place constantly but the air was saturated with oil vapor and there was no way to keep it off the tile. It was worse than ice :-)
Finally, there was the Morton's potato chip factory (went out of business long ago). BTW: This is another one of those stories that nobody else seems to think is funny...
The first time I made a delivery there I ended up walking along one wing of the factory and when I glanced through the windows I immediately noticed this huge piece of machinery. Now, I've always been fascinated by mechanical stuff, and this thing was a behemoth (about the size of a locomotive but twice as long). So, I ended up stopping every few steps to watch the machine at work - trying to figure out exactly what it did. Given it's size I figured it had to be producing huge quantities of something... My anticipation (and curiosity) grew with each step, and when I finally reached the end I discovered it was spitting out those itty-bitty "snack machine" bags of chips...
Now - the key to humor is the unexpected, and nothing could have possibly caught me more off guard than the sight of those tiny bags coming out of that monstrous machine. I started laughing so hard I had to lean against the wall to avoid falling down, and I was still chuckling when I reached my destination. When the guy asked me what was so funny I muttered something about "big machine - little bags of chips", but he didn't get it (just gave me a really weird look...)
Then sometime near the end of August I quit...
As I've said before, I learned a lot from William T. (the guy who ran the place). No matter what the situation he always had a solution. Often it was brilliant - other times not so much (like having me drive the truck with a missing fan blade). But he never got flustered - just made the decision and went with it... The problem was that it seemed like he was constantly criticizing me. Some of it was constructive (and I appreciated that) - but a lot of times it wasn't (like accusing me of abusing the truck)... It seemed like hardly a day went by that he didn't say something that got under my skin.
The first major issue was when he told me that some of our regular customers had been complaining about the length of my hair. (The"redneck" place was not one of them.) The thing is, during my initial job interview he had assured me that my hair would not be an problem. But now he was claiming that it was hurting business... Yeah - that was total B.S... I interacted with all our "high volume" customers almost daily and I can guarantee that none of them had an issue with my hair... But I went ahead and got it neatened up anyway...
Then near the end of August he told me that a bunch of customers were complaining about my sleeveless shirts. Now - we're not talking about plain t-shirts here (which I agree would be tacky). These were really nice (non-white) shirts that I got at Target. And the only reason I wore them was because the temperature was above 90 with high humidity every freaking day and the truck didn't have air conditioning and I was sweating my tail off... Furthermore - most of our customers' warehouse guys were wearing similar shirts. Of course, when I asked which customers were complaining he did his whole "confidentiality" tap dance, and (once again) I'm sure that he just had a problem with exposed armpits (or something) and wouldn't admit it...
So I went home that evening and sat there fuming about the whole situation (not just the shirt thing), and decided that I'd had enough... I called Jim (at home) and asked him to pass the message that I wouldn't be in the next day - or ever again... Yeah - it was a totally immature and self-centered thing to do, but that's how I rolled at that age :-)
Epilogue:
Jim and I touched bases again a few weeks later and he told me that William T. had ended up hiring his big redneck buddy (the one who used to hang out there) to replace me. And apparently the guy couldn't do nearly as many deliveries per day as I'd been doing so they had to hire a second driver to pick up the slack... And to top it off, the buddy had taken a shortcut through a residential area and failed to notice a low hanging tree limb... Totally destroyed the truck bed cover... Yeah - Jim was just as amused by that as I was :-)
I can't help but cringe when I think about the way I quit that job. Ever since then I've made a point of never leaving a job (except for the military) until I had another one lined up, and I've always done my best to depart on good terms. But the point remains that if William T. had made me feel just a little bit appreciated he would have saved himself a lot of money - and my life might have followed a much less rewarding path :-)
Friday, November 23, 2012
Places I Hated Going
I'm willing to bet that every delivery truck driver has a list of places he'd prefer not to go. That was certainly the case for me in Dallas back in the summer of 1972.
The first was Texas Instruments in Richardson. Now you'd think that a military contractor (especially during the Vietnam war) would have tight security, but not TI... They had guards at all the gates but I honestly don't know what their job was. I never saw them stop anyone going in or out and they didn't seem to have a clue where anything was... I had to make deliveries to six different locations on the campus and the only way I managed to find them was by driving around and asking random people for directions.
The other issue was finding someone to sign the paperwork... It wasn't unusual to show up at a loading dock and find it completely unmanned. Sometimes you had to sit there for 5 or 10 minutes before anyone wandered by... The insane part is that there were pallets of high tech equipment all over the place. I could've loaded up and taken off and I doubt anyone would have noticed.
I had the opposite problem at Vought Aircraft in Grand Prairie. (Another military contractor.) They made you wait outside the gate for 20 or 30 minutes while they checked your truck and verified your identity. Then they'd give you a map marked with the exact route and travel times and they told you that if you deviated you could be shot. (I'm not making that up)... And when you arrived at the destination they would not sign the invoice until they'd measured every piece of plastic with precision instruments. And (of course) they searched your truck again on the way out... It was definitely a "schedule killing" stop...
Neiman Marcus in downtown Dallas wasn't much better (but for a different reason). Their loading dock was only big enough for two trucks and they would not sign your paperwork until a "gofer" from whatever department ordered the goods came down and removed them from the area. There was always a long line of trucks waiting to get in (and blocking traffic)... I used to schedule at least 50 minutes for that stop.
Next on my "hit list" was the DFW airport. Back in those days it was under construction and out in the middle of nowhere. (We didn't have another customer within 10 miles.) Furthermore, all the roads on the construction site were gravel and you couldn't go over 25 MPH... I had to schedule about an hour for that stop. (All that to deliver a few gallons of epoxy mastic...)
Aside: One of my most frightening experiences was heading south on Belt Line after a stop at the airport... I was hit by a sudden squall coming from the north. The visibility dropped to almost zero and the truck was being propelled forward by a 50 MPH tailwind. I could barely see the road and was literally standing on the brake pedal and couldn't slow down... I don't know how long that went on (time almost stood still) but eventually the wind let up a bit, and then the hail started. It was so heavy I was afraid it was going to break the windshield. Luckily, I spotted an old gas station (the only building in the area) and got under cover... The whole thing lasted less than 15 minutes but it really scared the heck out of me.
Another place I preferred not to go was the warehouse where we got our rolls of plastic sheet. (Most of our suppliers delivered. They didn't)... I remember one day in August when it was over 100 degrees and I had to load 3000 lbs of the sheeting (in cardboard boxes weighing between 30 and 70 lbs) into my truck. Their dock was uncovered (exposed to the sun) and the boxes were stacked on pallets about 20 feet away. I asked if someone could please grab a forklift and move them closer to my truck but they claimed they were "too busy" (translation: they were total a**holes). And I don't even want to talk about how hot it was in the back of my truck... I managed to load it all in less than 15 minutes but I was shaky for hours afterward...
And finally, there was the "house of rednecks"... I no longer recall which business it was, but their warehouse guys would invariably give me a bunch of crap - calling me "girlie" and asking me why I wasn't wearing lipstick or a dress, etc... (Yes, my hair was a bit long - but not that long...)
The thing is, by the summer of 1972 the whole hysteria over "hippies" had passed. At that point a lot of country singers (like Kristofferson, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings) had hair longer than mine. But apparently the bozos at "redneck central" hadn't gotten the memo... Unfortunately, they were customers so I had no choice but to take it - but I still hated going there.
The point of all these stories (except for the last one) is that a good delivery driver has to be obsessed with time. You stop, unload, get the invoice signed and go. If you manage to exchange a few pleasantries that's great, but don't spend any extra time on it because a few minutes at each stop can cost you 2 or 3 deliveries by the end of the day...
The funny thing is that I never realized (at the time) just how much I'd learned (and how good I'd gotten) in those few months working for A-1. Sigh... when it came to "self-image" problems the worst was yet to come...
The first was Texas Instruments in Richardson. Now you'd think that a military contractor (especially during the Vietnam war) would have tight security, but not TI... They had guards at all the gates but I honestly don't know what their job was. I never saw them stop anyone going in or out and they didn't seem to have a clue where anything was... I had to make deliveries to six different locations on the campus and the only way I managed to find them was by driving around and asking random people for directions.
The other issue was finding someone to sign the paperwork... It wasn't unusual to show up at a loading dock and find it completely unmanned. Sometimes you had to sit there for 5 or 10 minutes before anyone wandered by... The insane part is that there were pallets of high tech equipment all over the place. I could've loaded up and taken off and I doubt anyone would have noticed.
I had the opposite problem at Vought Aircraft in Grand Prairie. (Another military contractor.) They made you wait outside the gate for 20 or 30 minutes while they checked your truck and verified your identity. Then they'd give you a map marked with the exact route and travel times and they told you that if you deviated you could be shot. (I'm not making that up)... And when you arrived at the destination they would not sign the invoice until they'd measured every piece of plastic with precision instruments. And (of course) they searched your truck again on the way out... It was definitely a "schedule killing" stop...
Neiman Marcus in downtown Dallas wasn't much better (but for a different reason). Their loading dock was only big enough for two trucks and they would not sign your paperwork until a "gofer" from whatever department ordered the goods came down and removed them from the area. There was always a long line of trucks waiting to get in (and blocking traffic)... I used to schedule at least 50 minutes for that stop.
Next on my "hit list" was the DFW airport. Back in those days it was under construction and out in the middle of nowhere. (We didn't have another customer within 10 miles.) Furthermore, all the roads on the construction site were gravel and you couldn't go over 25 MPH... I had to schedule about an hour for that stop. (All that to deliver a few gallons of epoxy mastic...)
Aside: One of my most frightening experiences was heading south on Belt Line after a stop at the airport... I was hit by a sudden squall coming from the north. The visibility dropped to almost zero and the truck was being propelled forward by a 50 MPH tailwind. I could barely see the road and was literally standing on the brake pedal and couldn't slow down... I don't know how long that went on (time almost stood still) but eventually the wind let up a bit, and then the hail started. It was so heavy I was afraid it was going to break the windshield. Luckily, I spotted an old gas station (the only building in the area) and got under cover... The whole thing lasted less than 15 minutes but it really scared the heck out of me.
Another place I preferred not to go was the warehouse where we got our rolls of plastic sheet. (Most of our suppliers delivered. They didn't)... I remember one day in August when it was over 100 degrees and I had to load 3000 lbs of the sheeting (in cardboard boxes weighing between 30 and 70 lbs) into my truck. Their dock was uncovered (exposed to the sun) and the boxes were stacked on pallets about 20 feet away. I asked if someone could please grab a forklift and move them closer to my truck but they claimed they were "too busy" (translation: they were total a**holes). And I don't even want to talk about how hot it was in the back of my truck... I managed to load it all in less than 15 minutes but I was shaky for hours afterward...
And finally, there was the "house of rednecks"... I no longer recall which business it was, but their warehouse guys would invariably give me a bunch of crap - calling me "girlie" and asking me why I wasn't wearing lipstick or a dress, etc... (Yes, my hair was a bit long - but not that long...)
The thing is, by the summer of 1972 the whole hysteria over "hippies" had passed. At that point a lot of country singers (like Kristofferson, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings) had hair longer than mine. But apparently the bozos at "redneck central" hadn't gotten the memo... Unfortunately, they were customers so I had no choice but to take it - but I still hated going there.
The point of all these stories (except for the last one) is that a good delivery driver has to be obsessed with time. You stop, unload, get the invoice signed and go. If you manage to exchange a few pleasantries that's great, but don't spend any extra time on it because a few minutes at each stop can cost you 2 or 3 deliveries by the end of the day...
The funny thing is that I never realized (at the time) just how much I'd learned (and how good I'd gotten) in those few months working for A-1. Sigh... when it came to "self-image" problems the worst was yet to come...
Monday, November 19, 2012
Malfunctions
In the forty-plus years that I've been driving I've never had to call a tow truck for one of my personal vehicles. I attribute that to a couple of factors: The first is that my daily drivers are always well maintained and I frequently check for leaks or signs of unusual wear. The second is that I tend to notice subtle differences in how the vehicle is behaving, meaning that I can almost always detect problems before they become serious... But that was not the case with the delivery truck I drove in the summer of 1972.
The first incident was when the exhaust system fell off. Yeah - the weld broke right below the exhaust manifold... (Never seen that happen before...) The main reason I remember it (aside from how loud it was) was watching the old mechanic at the Dodge truck dealership (used to be on Commerce in West Dallas) try to fix it. They didn't have the correct down pipe in stock so he decided to fabricate one and he really wasn't very good at it... Measure, cut, weld, cuss ... measure, cut, weld, cuss. It was painful to watch... He ended up patching together bits and pieces of four different pipes. It worked, but it was ugggg-lllly.
Then one day I was in downtown Dallas when the clutch got so badly overheated that it warped and wouldn't release. I discovered the problem while approaching a red light. I couldn't get the tranny out of gear and the only way to stop the truck was to kill the engine. And then I had to restart it (in second gear) to get moving again... (And yes - I had been telling the boss the clutch was slipping for weeks but he said to keep driving it...)
Eventually I stopped at a gas station by the expressway and called the boss to let him know what happened. While I was there the clutch cooled off a bit and I managed (with a bit of effort) to force it into third gear... Luckily, I was able to get it started that way and I limped it onto the expressway so I wouldn't have to deal with any more stoplights... I felt really bad about it because I couldn't go much over 30 MPH and traffic was really heavy (I probably caused a huge backup) but at least I got it to the repair shop without having to call a tow truck :-)
And now for the most memorable breakdown:
I was pulling away from the loading dock at the Sweetheart (now Solo) Cup manufacturing plant down on Ledbetter when there was a loud thump followed by severe vibration. Turns out that one of the blades on the engine fan had broken off. (I've never heard of that happening either - it had to be defective.) ... So I called the boss and told him that the truck was absolutely not OK to drive but he refused to pay for a tow and told me to drive it to the Dodge truck dealership (10 miles away). And that meant going right through the center of Oak Cliff.
Now - I've heard that there's been a lot of "gentrification" in Oak Cliff in the decades since (and a large Hispanic influx), but back in 1972 the core area was almost entirely black. (Think Watts or Harlem.) And tensions were particularly high at that point because earlier that summer the Dallas PD had shot and killed an unarmed 70-something year old woman and a 5 year old child in Oak Cliff in separate incidents (a couple of weeks apart), and when members of the black community tried to march peacefully into downtown Dallas they were blocked by police in full riot gear... And that's why I was somewhat apprehensive about passing through that part of town at that particular time...
I no longer recall which intersection I was at when there was another loud pop and the engine suddenly started running smooth again. At first I thought it was a good thing, but then a plume of steam appeared at the front of the truck which was a pretty clear indication that things had gone from bad to worse... Luckily, I was right next to a gas station and it only took a few seconds to pull in and kill the engine, but the damage had been done. The unbalanced fan had caused the water pump to break off and launch itself through the radiator... (So much for saving a few bucks on a tow.)
The station attendant was totally cool with me being there (much to my relief), although he was highly amused by how much trouble I was having understanding him. (We're not talking "ebonics" here. This was a local dialect that was way beyond that)... He let me call the office and it was decided that Bert (the VP) would bring me his GMC Caballero (same as a Chevy El Camino) to use for the rest of the afternoon while he took care of getting the truck towed to the dealer...
So I spent the next 50 minutes or so observing the ebb and flow of life at the corner gas station... It was kind of a "mini" mini-mart - not very big but there were racks with cigarettes and assorted food all over the place. I ended up sitting in a chair in the far corner of the room (pretty much obscured from the cash register) so not many of the customers even noticed me, but every once in a while someone would inquire about the honky and the guy would point to my broken truck and they'd all have a good laugh :-)
Then the Dallas cop sauntered in. (He didn't notice me either)... Apparently he was investigating something that had happened the prior day and - let's just say that his demeanor, language and actions were highly unprofessional. I was beyond appalled... After a minute or so he finally stopped and looked around - and you should have seen the expression on his face when he spotted me and realized I had witnessed the whole thing... He suddenly became very polite (asked if I was OK, etc) and got the heck out of there... Afterward I said something to the attendant like "What the f***? Is that how cops usually act around here???" He assured me that it was... Yeah - that was a real eye opener...
Epilogue:
Bert arrived around the same time as the tow truck, and after we transferred the remainder of my load to the Caballero I took off to make my afternoon deliveries... And for some reason people kept almost tail-ending me... I figured I must just be having "one of those days".
Then when I got back to A1 and handed Bert his keys he said "Hey, did I remember to tell you that my brake lights don't work?"... No, Bert - you didn't... That would have been really nice to know :-)
The first incident was when the exhaust system fell off. Yeah - the weld broke right below the exhaust manifold... (Never seen that happen before...) The main reason I remember it (aside from how loud it was) was watching the old mechanic at the Dodge truck dealership (used to be on Commerce in West Dallas) try to fix it. They didn't have the correct down pipe in stock so he decided to fabricate one and he really wasn't very good at it... Measure, cut, weld, cuss ... measure, cut, weld, cuss. It was painful to watch... He ended up patching together bits and pieces of four different pipes. It worked, but it was ugggg-lllly.
Then one day I was in downtown Dallas when the clutch got so badly overheated that it warped and wouldn't release. I discovered the problem while approaching a red light. I couldn't get the tranny out of gear and the only way to stop the truck was to kill the engine. And then I had to restart it (in second gear) to get moving again... (And yes - I had been telling the boss the clutch was slipping for weeks but he said to keep driving it...)
Eventually I stopped at a gas station by the expressway and called the boss to let him know what happened. While I was there the clutch cooled off a bit and I managed (with a bit of effort) to force it into third gear... Luckily, I was able to get it started that way and I limped it onto the expressway so I wouldn't have to deal with any more stoplights... I felt really bad about it because I couldn't go much over 30 MPH and traffic was really heavy (I probably caused a huge backup) but at least I got it to the repair shop without having to call a tow truck :-)
And now for the most memorable breakdown:
I was pulling away from the loading dock at the Sweetheart (now Solo) Cup manufacturing plant down on Ledbetter when there was a loud thump followed by severe vibration. Turns out that one of the blades on the engine fan had broken off. (I've never heard of that happening either - it had to be defective.) ... So I called the boss and told him that the truck was absolutely not OK to drive but he refused to pay for a tow and told me to drive it to the Dodge truck dealership (10 miles away). And that meant going right through the center of Oak Cliff.
Now - I've heard that there's been a lot of "gentrification" in Oak Cliff in the decades since (and a large Hispanic influx), but back in 1972 the core area was almost entirely black. (Think Watts or Harlem.) And tensions were particularly high at that point because earlier that summer the Dallas PD had shot and killed an unarmed 70-something year old woman and a 5 year old child in Oak Cliff in separate incidents (a couple of weeks apart), and when members of the black community tried to march peacefully into downtown Dallas they were blocked by police in full riot gear... And that's why I was somewhat apprehensive about passing through that part of town at that particular time...
I no longer recall which intersection I was at when there was another loud pop and the engine suddenly started running smooth again. At first I thought it was a good thing, but then a plume of steam appeared at the front of the truck which was a pretty clear indication that things had gone from bad to worse... Luckily, I was right next to a gas station and it only took a few seconds to pull in and kill the engine, but the damage had been done. The unbalanced fan had caused the water pump to break off and launch itself through the radiator... (So much for saving a few bucks on a tow.)
The station attendant was totally cool with me being there (much to my relief), although he was highly amused by how much trouble I was having understanding him. (We're not talking "ebonics" here. This was a local dialect that was way beyond that)... He let me call the office and it was decided that Bert (the VP) would bring me his GMC Caballero (same as a Chevy El Camino) to use for the rest of the afternoon while he took care of getting the truck towed to the dealer...
So I spent the next 50 minutes or so observing the ebb and flow of life at the corner gas station... It was kind of a "mini" mini-mart - not very big but there were racks with cigarettes and assorted food all over the place. I ended up sitting in a chair in the far corner of the room (pretty much obscured from the cash register) so not many of the customers even noticed me, but every once in a while someone would inquire about the honky and the guy would point to my broken truck and they'd all have a good laugh :-)
Then the Dallas cop sauntered in. (He didn't notice me either)... Apparently he was investigating something that had happened the prior day and - let's just say that his demeanor, language and actions were highly unprofessional. I was beyond appalled... After a minute or so he finally stopped and looked around - and you should have seen the expression on his face when he spotted me and realized I had witnessed the whole thing... He suddenly became very polite (asked if I was OK, etc) and got the heck out of there... Afterward I said something to the attendant like "What the f***? Is that how cops usually act around here???" He assured me that it was... Yeah - that was a real eye opener...
Epilogue:
Bert arrived around the same time as the tow truck, and after we transferred the remainder of my load to the Caballero I took off to make my afternoon deliveries... And for some reason people kept almost tail-ending me... I figured I must just be having "one of those days".
Then when I got back to A1 and handed Bert his keys he said "Hey, did I remember to tell you that my brake lights don't work?"... No, Bert - you didn't... That would have been really nice to know :-)
Friday, November 16, 2012
Three Ladies
I'm going to take a quick break from writing about my first real job to talk about some other events from around the same time that may not be particularly interesting but are nonetheless memorable (to me).
As I've mentioned in many prior posts, my mother was (from time to time) an astrologer and "psychic counselor", and after she got out of the hospital it didn't take long before she (once again) had something of an entourage. And among that group were three friends:
The first was a blond woman in her early 20s who had been kicked out by her wealthy husband (who was more than twice her age) apparently because she was sleeping with the pool boy, the gardener, and (I strongly suspect) her 18 year old step-son. She was quite attractive (despite being rather skinny) and had tastefully done implants (C-cup? Totally plausible on her slender frame - I didn't even realize they were fake until my sister clued me in).
The second one was a blue-eyed redhead in her mid to late 20's who was also in the process of splitting up with her husband. I don't know what the issue was, but they had been married since right after high school and had a couple of kids right away - apparently they just grew apart... As I recall, she was "full figured" but not overweight, and had a totally "wholesome girl next door" vibe going... Definitely one of the prettiest women I've seen.
The last friend was a young lady about my age with long black hair and dark eyes. She was much taller (and bigger) than me, never wore any makeup (or anything else "girlie") - and whenever she entered a room it instantly became a darker and gloomier place. (She probably would have been "goth" if there had been such a thing back then...)
Aside: For some reason my sister Karina thought I should try and strike up a relationship with the "queen of the dead" but I really couldn't figure out why... I didn't find her the slightest bit attractive and (to be honest) she scared the hell out of me...
Now... I probably would have never met these women except one weekend the blond was moving into a new apartment and my mom volunteered me to help out, together with the aforementioned female friends, the stepson and a couple of older male friends.
Aside: Those two other guys were total asshats. They referred to women using derogatory (anatomical) terms, some of which I had never heard before (or since)... I remember wondering "Is that seriously how you feel about the opposite sex??? Your lives must be really pathetic!"... Of course, the ladies were totally unaware - women in general don't seem to be very good at asshat detection... But I digress :-)
OK - I have to admit that the highlight of moving day (for me) was the 18 year-old stepson's '69 RS/SS 396 Camaro "Indy Pace Car" convertible. He was trying to sell it for $1200 (in 1972 dollars) and he let me take it for a test drive. I'm totally not into Chevys but I have to admit that thing was wicked cool. I seriously considered buying it, but (once again) there's no way I would have been able to keep it during the months that followed so it's just as well...
The rest of the morning was uneventful. Then around lunch time I found out that I had been chosen to accompany "goth girl" down to Forest Lane to assist in bringing back a bunch of KFC...
At first I thought it was a matchmaking attempt but I soon discovered that they picked me because nobody else would get into a car with little miss "death wish" :-) Yeah - four times during the trip she pulled out right in front of another vehicle... It was insane. She simply did not seem to give a crap if we got totalled...
Of course, I didn't let on how scared I was. (It's a guy thing) ... I attempted to calm my nerves by making small talk and quickly discovered that she was even worse at conversation than I was. It was a very uncomfortable trip indeed... BTW: I went horseback riding with her a couple of weeks later (I think Karina talked me into it) and it was just as awkward...
Fast forward to mid-afternoon. The blond woman and I had just carried some boxes up to her bedroom when she flopped down onto the bed and struck (what I considered to be) a highly suggestive pose... She was lying there in a skin-tight white tank top (no bra) and equally tight jeans, giving me this little smile and ... well - it sure seemed like she was trying to convey a message... So I made some noises about getting more boxes and got the heck out of there :-)
Later that afternoon I described the incident to Karina (who knew the woman rather well) and asked her what the heck that was all about... Her immediate response was "It's exactly what you think it was, and do not go there. It would be the worst mistake you ever made!"... She apparently knew something I didn't, but wouldn't elaborate. And (despite my curiosity) I never did find out (either directly or indirectly) what my sister was so concerned about...
And on to the final part of the story:
A week or two later the redhead moved into a house not far from where I lived. She apparently had enough helpers for the initial move (my presence wasn't requested), but the next day she called and asked if I could swing by because there were a few boxes that needed to be carried upstairs and her back was hurting from the prior day...
So, I headed over and took care of the boxes... And then she started talking about how when the kids left to visit their father that morning she suddenly realized that she was "all alone" for the first time in her life, and we talked about that for a while.... Then at some point she winced a bit and that got us on the subject of her back pain. And I honestly don't recall whose idea it was for me to give her a massage but shortly thereafter she was face down on the couch and I was working on her neck and shoulders...
Now - I really, really wanted to enjoy touching her but that would have been totally disrespectful given that she was the married mother of two - right? ... So I thought about cars, and sports and whatever else I could focus on to keep my mind off of that lovely red hair... And after a while I helped her up and asked if she felt better. She said "much" and gave me a little smile... And then (deja vu alert) ... she sighed and said "I am so sorry, but I just can't do this... It's too soon - you're too young - and my life is complicated enough already, etc, etc..."
Yes. It had happened again... That was almost verbatim what the divorcee in my French class had said to me roughly five months earlier when we were about to head to her apartment to "listen to music"... And once again, I absolutely did not see it coming... I mean, the thought that such a pretty woman would have even considered it was simply beyond my comprehension... But at least (given my prior experience) I was able to figure out what it all meant a lot quicker this time :-) ... I assured her that I totally understood and went on my way...
I guess there are two conclusions that can be drawn from all of this... The first is that there must have been something about me at that age that appealed to older women (lord knows what)... And the second is that I was undoubtedly the densest 18 year old male on the planet :-)
As I've mentioned in many prior posts, my mother was (from time to time) an astrologer and "psychic counselor", and after she got out of the hospital it didn't take long before she (once again) had something of an entourage. And among that group were three friends:
The first was a blond woman in her early 20s who had been kicked out by her wealthy husband (who was more than twice her age) apparently because she was sleeping with the pool boy, the gardener, and (I strongly suspect) her 18 year old step-son. She was quite attractive (despite being rather skinny) and had tastefully done implants (C-cup? Totally plausible on her slender frame - I didn't even realize they were fake until my sister clued me in).
The second one was a blue-eyed redhead in her mid to late 20's who was also in the process of splitting up with her husband. I don't know what the issue was, but they had been married since right after high school and had a couple of kids right away - apparently they just grew apart... As I recall, she was "full figured" but not overweight, and had a totally "wholesome girl next door" vibe going... Definitely one of the prettiest women I've seen.
The last friend was a young lady about my age with long black hair and dark eyes. She was much taller (and bigger) than me, never wore any makeup (or anything else "girlie") - and whenever she entered a room it instantly became a darker and gloomier place. (She probably would have been "goth" if there had been such a thing back then...)
Aside: For some reason my sister Karina thought I should try and strike up a relationship with the "queen of the dead" but I really couldn't figure out why... I didn't find her the slightest bit attractive and (to be honest) she scared the hell out of me...
Now... I probably would have never met these women except one weekend the blond was moving into a new apartment and my mom volunteered me to help out, together with the aforementioned female friends, the stepson and a couple of older male friends.
Aside: Those two other guys were total asshats. They referred to women using derogatory (anatomical) terms, some of which I had never heard before (or since)... I remember wondering "Is that seriously how you feel about the opposite sex??? Your lives must be really pathetic!"... Of course, the ladies were totally unaware - women in general don't seem to be very good at asshat detection... But I digress :-)
OK - I have to admit that the highlight of moving day (for me) was the 18 year-old stepson's '69 RS/SS 396 Camaro "Indy Pace Car" convertible. He was trying to sell it for $1200 (in 1972 dollars) and he let me take it for a test drive. I'm totally not into Chevys but I have to admit that thing was wicked cool. I seriously considered buying it, but (once again) there's no way I would have been able to keep it during the months that followed so it's just as well...
The rest of the morning was uneventful. Then around lunch time I found out that I had been chosen to accompany "goth girl" down to Forest Lane to assist in bringing back a bunch of KFC...
At first I thought it was a matchmaking attempt but I soon discovered that they picked me because nobody else would get into a car with little miss "death wish" :-) Yeah - four times during the trip she pulled out right in front of another vehicle... It was insane. She simply did not seem to give a crap if we got totalled...
Of course, I didn't let on how scared I was. (It's a guy thing) ... I attempted to calm my nerves by making small talk and quickly discovered that she was even worse at conversation than I was. It was a very uncomfortable trip indeed... BTW: I went horseback riding with her a couple of weeks later (I think Karina talked me into it) and it was just as awkward...
Fast forward to mid-afternoon. The blond woman and I had just carried some boxes up to her bedroom when she flopped down onto the bed and struck (what I considered to be) a highly suggestive pose... She was lying there in a skin-tight white tank top (no bra) and equally tight jeans, giving me this little smile and ... well - it sure seemed like she was trying to convey a message... So I made some noises about getting more boxes and got the heck out of there :-)
Later that afternoon I described the incident to Karina (who knew the woman rather well) and asked her what the heck that was all about... Her immediate response was "It's exactly what you think it was, and do not go there. It would be the worst mistake you ever made!"... She apparently knew something I didn't, but wouldn't elaborate. And (despite my curiosity) I never did find out (either directly or indirectly) what my sister was so concerned about...
And on to the final part of the story:
A week or two later the redhead moved into a house not far from where I lived. She apparently had enough helpers for the initial move (my presence wasn't requested), but the next day she called and asked if I could swing by because there were a few boxes that needed to be carried upstairs and her back was hurting from the prior day...
So, I headed over and took care of the boxes... And then she started talking about how when the kids left to visit their father that morning she suddenly realized that she was "all alone" for the first time in her life, and we talked about that for a while.... Then at some point she winced a bit and that got us on the subject of her back pain. And I honestly don't recall whose idea it was for me to give her a massage but shortly thereafter she was face down on the couch and I was working on her neck and shoulders...
Now - I really, really wanted to enjoy touching her but that would have been totally disrespectful given that she was the married mother of two - right? ... So I thought about cars, and sports and whatever else I could focus on to keep my mind off of that lovely red hair... And after a while I helped her up and asked if she felt better. She said "much" and gave me a little smile... And then (deja vu alert) ... she sighed and said "I am so sorry, but I just can't do this... It's too soon - you're too young - and my life is complicated enough already, etc, etc..."
Yes. It had happened again... That was almost verbatim what the divorcee in my French class had said to me roughly five months earlier when we were about to head to her apartment to "listen to music"... And once again, I absolutely did not see it coming... I mean, the thought that such a pretty woman would have even considered it was simply beyond my comprehension... But at least (given my prior experience) I was able to figure out what it all meant a lot quicker this time :-) ... I assured her that I totally understood and went on my way...
I guess there are two conclusions that can be drawn from all of this... The first is that there must have been something about me at that age that appealed to older women (lord knows what)... And the second is that I was undoubtedly the densest 18 year old male on the planet :-)
Saturday, November 3, 2012
The Joys of Driving
Once upon a time I really enjoyed driving. But that was before I did it for a living... The two or three months I spent driving a delivery truck in the summer of 1972 took most of the joy out of it (and I never quite got it back).
It wasn't just because the truck was dog slow and didn't have turn signals... It was the effort required to keep a schedule while negotiating heavy traffic 6 or 7 hours a day - having to constantly adjust and readjust - trying to find the quickest route from point A to point B - the same thing day after day. It really wore me down... And it seemed like hardly a day went by that I didn't encounter an accident somewhere along my route. (Some of them fairly horrific).
BTW: I was only involved in one "incident" (an extremely minor one). Some "bubba" in a pickup truck got so engrossed in talking to his buddy (Beer? Football? Guns?) that he drifted into my lane during a turn and clipped the back corner of my truck. (There was a "quarter sized" dent in his hood - no damage to my vehicle)... I had been watching him in my mirror the whole time and he never once looked at the road. I tried to avoid it but just couldn't get over any further... I didn't stop right away because I honestly wasn't sure there had been any contact (I didn't feel a thing) and I was behind schedule. But then he flagged me down and jumped out screaming that I had run into him... When he threatened to call the police I calmly pointed out that the paint from his hood was clearly visible on the back of my truck, which meant he would almost certainly be cited for reckless driving... That took the wind out of his sails and (after saying a few more choice words) he left...
Aside: For the past 40 years I've been claiming that I've never been in a moving accident in a 4 wheel vehicle... For some reason this incident never crossed my mind. I guess I just didn't consider it to be an accident... Of course, if you really want to get technical (which I always do) the truck did have six wheels. So there! :-)
But that's not really the point of this post. This is:
Up to that point in my life I had always believed that there was no such thing as an unavoidable car accident. In other words, a truly vigilant motorist could anticipate and avoid anything that happened... But that summer I had a couple of close calls that changed my mind.
First - early one afternoon I was heading southbound on Central Expressway approaching Mockingbird Lane when a white Dodge van somehow flipped over the guardrail on the overpass and landed on the expressway in front of me. I was far enough back that I had time to brake, but if I had gotten there a few seconds earlier the van would have landed on my truck and I would have never seen it coming... Yeah - it's pretty difficult to avoid vehicles falling from the sky...
Second - I was eastbound on the LBJ Freeway approaching Central Expressway when a Buick went straight across the freeway in front of me (going about 40 MPH) and slammed into the center divider. (The driver appeared to be unconscious the whole time)... Totally freaked me out! ... I never saw it coming, and if I'd been there a second sooner I would have hit him...
You know - I pay pretty close attention to everything going on around me when driving. And whenever I'm near an intersection I do my best to expect the unexpected. But a vehicle crossing the freeway at a right angle in between interchanges just isn't something that shows up on my "radar"...
BTW - That one really had me puzzled... I figure the driver must have passed out on a side street and accelerated across the grass divider onto the freeway... Yeah - sometimes sh*t just happens...
Of course, there were other incidents that were not "close calls" but still stuck in my memory:
Like the accident that ended up blocking all 8 lanes of the LBJ Freeway (4 in each direction.)... I didn't see it happen (just got stuck in the backup) but as near as I can figure here's how it it unfolded:
A semi tractor was heading westbound pulling a long trailer full of gravel when its front axle fell off. (No idea how that happened - the truck looked brand new... Maybe a manufacturing defect?) ... Anyway, the trailer hit the center divider and tossed its entire load across the eastbound lanes, then flipped back over and came to a rest blocking the westbound lanes... The entire freeway was shut down all afternoon... Definitely one of the strangest accidents I've seen :-)
Finally - I usually don't laugh when I witness an accident (especially when someone gets injured) but this was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen:
There was a woman in a blue Pinto stopped a couple of cars ahead of me in the left turn lane. The light turned green and a semi started turning left from the opposite direction... Now, vehicles make simultaneous opposing left turns all the time - they simply pass without incident. But in mid-turn the woman in the Pinto somehow managed to run smack dab into one of the truck tires. (I mean, how could she not see it?? It was right in front of her!)
I really didn't intend to laugh, but the Pinto bounced off the truck tire like a tennis ball off a wall. It was a "Funniest Home Video" kind of thing... Then I realized that the driver's head had hit the windshield...
Aside: One of the reasons there were so many serious injuries back then is that very few people wore seat belts (something like 1 in 5). Of course, there were still a lot of cars around that weren't equipped with them (like my '63 Fairlane - they weren't required equipment at the national level until 1966 when the federal vehicle safety act took effect), but the main issue was that most people felt like belts were too "confining" (as if a ending up in a wheelchair isn't confining)... Personally, I always wore a seat belt (when available - it seemed dumb not to) but I have to admit that I only wore the shoulder belt in my '66 Charger when I was planning on driving "stupid fast". Yeah - those early shoulder belts buckled separately from the seat belt and they weren't retractable. Once you fastened them you could hardly move - pretty much sucked rocks... But I digress...
Yeah - I learned a heck of a lot about staying out of trouble in traffic driving that truck. When you have so little maneuverability you have no choice but to focus on awareness and avoidance - learning to sense when somebody is about to do something stupid...
But the main lesson learned was that at the end of the day there is just no replacement for dumb luck.
It wasn't just because the truck was dog slow and didn't have turn signals... It was the effort required to keep a schedule while negotiating heavy traffic 6 or 7 hours a day - having to constantly adjust and readjust - trying to find the quickest route from point A to point B - the same thing day after day. It really wore me down... And it seemed like hardly a day went by that I didn't encounter an accident somewhere along my route. (Some of them fairly horrific).
BTW: I was only involved in one "incident" (an extremely minor one). Some "bubba" in a pickup truck got so engrossed in talking to his buddy (Beer? Football? Guns?) that he drifted into my lane during a turn and clipped the back corner of my truck. (There was a "quarter sized" dent in his hood - no damage to my vehicle)... I had been watching him in my mirror the whole time and he never once looked at the road. I tried to avoid it but just couldn't get over any further... I didn't stop right away because I honestly wasn't sure there had been any contact (I didn't feel a thing) and I was behind schedule. But then he flagged me down and jumped out screaming that I had run into him... When he threatened to call the police I calmly pointed out that the paint from his hood was clearly visible on the back of my truck, which meant he would almost certainly be cited for reckless driving... That took the wind out of his sails and (after saying a few more choice words) he left...
Aside: For the past 40 years I've been claiming that I've never been in a moving accident in a 4 wheel vehicle... For some reason this incident never crossed my mind. I guess I just didn't consider it to be an accident... Of course, if you really want to get technical (which I always do) the truck did have six wheels. So there! :-)
But that's not really the point of this post. This is:
Up to that point in my life I had always believed that there was no such thing as an unavoidable car accident. In other words, a truly vigilant motorist could anticipate and avoid anything that happened... But that summer I had a couple of close calls that changed my mind.
First - early one afternoon I was heading southbound on Central Expressway approaching Mockingbird Lane when a white Dodge van somehow flipped over the guardrail on the overpass and landed on the expressway in front of me. I was far enough back that I had time to brake, but if I had gotten there a few seconds earlier the van would have landed on my truck and I would have never seen it coming... Yeah - it's pretty difficult to avoid vehicles falling from the sky...
Second - I was eastbound on the LBJ Freeway approaching Central Expressway when a Buick went straight across the freeway in front of me (going about 40 MPH) and slammed into the center divider. (The driver appeared to be unconscious the whole time)... Totally freaked me out! ... I never saw it coming, and if I'd been there a second sooner I would have hit him...
You know - I pay pretty close attention to everything going on around me when driving. And whenever I'm near an intersection I do my best to expect the unexpected. But a vehicle crossing the freeway at a right angle in between interchanges just isn't something that shows up on my "radar"...
BTW - That one really had me puzzled... I figure the driver must have passed out on a side street and accelerated across the grass divider onto the freeway... Yeah - sometimes sh*t just happens...
Of course, there were other incidents that were not "close calls" but still stuck in my memory:
Like the accident that ended up blocking all 8 lanes of the LBJ Freeway (4 in each direction.)... I didn't see it happen (just got stuck in the backup) but as near as I can figure here's how it it unfolded:
A semi tractor was heading westbound pulling a long trailer full of gravel when its front axle fell off. (No idea how that happened - the truck looked brand new... Maybe a manufacturing defect?) ... Anyway, the trailer hit the center divider and tossed its entire load across the eastbound lanes, then flipped back over and came to a rest blocking the westbound lanes... The entire freeway was shut down all afternoon... Definitely one of the strangest accidents I've seen :-)
Finally - I usually don't laugh when I witness an accident (especially when someone gets injured) but this was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen:
There was a woman in a blue Pinto stopped a couple of cars ahead of me in the left turn lane. The light turned green and a semi started turning left from the opposite direction... Now, vehicles make simultaneous opposing left turns all the time - they simply pass without incident. But in mid-turn the woman in the Pinto somehow managed to run smack dab into one of the truck tires. (I mean, how could she not see it?? It was right in front of her!)
I really didn't intend to laugh, but the Pinto bounced off the truck tire like a tennis ball off a wall. It was a "Funniest Home Video" kind of thing... Then I realized that the driver's head had hit the windshield...
Aside: One of the reasons there were so many serious injuries back then is that very few people wore seat belts (something like 1 in 5). Of course, there were still a lot of cars around that weren't equipped with them (like my '63 Fairlane - they weren't required equipment at the national level until 1966 when the federal vehicle safety act took effect), but the main issue was that most people felt like belts were too "confining" (as if a ending up in a wheelchair isn't confining)... Personally, I always wore a seat belt (when available - it seemed dumb not to) but I have to admit that I only wore the shoulder belt in my '66 Charger when I was planning on driving "stupid fast". Yeah - those early shoulder belts buckled separately from the seat belt and they weren't retractable. Once you fastened them you could hardly move - pretty much sucked rocks... But I digress...
Yeah - I learned a heck of a lot about staying out of trouble in traffic driving that truck. When you have so little maneuverability you have no choice but to focus on awareness and avoidance - learning to sense when somebody is about to do something stupid...
But the main lesson learned was that at the end of the day there is just no replacement for dumb luck.
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