Back in the South

Well, we're back in the good Ole South! We arrived in Tennessee yesterday around 5:00pm, and met my sister Meagan and her boyfriend for dinner. They drove from Murfreesboro to Lebanon, where we were delivering, picked us up at the truck stop, and we went to Outback Steakhouse. We had a really good time visiting, laughing, and remembering, and Meagan, your new car is beautiful! It was Meagan and Chris's first day back to work. They are both teachers at the same school. So we didn't stay too late as they had to be up bright and early for another inservice meeting and we still had to unload at the Nutro Pet Products plant.

When we got back to the plant we discovered that there were now 4 trucks in front of us. I don't think we finished unloading until sometime after midnight, and then Malcolm had to get back up at 4:30am to drive into Nashville to reload. So much for a long nights sleep. But the visit was worth the sacrifice!

We loaded in Nashville bright and early this morning, and its something I never dreamed we'd be hauling. When Mark first gave us the load information I read the name of the shipper. Tell me what this makes you think of, or what it sounds like, "Metro Water and Biosolids."
I don't know about you but I told Malcolm, "That sounds like a water treatment place?"
This was a little foreboding to me because we were picking up fertilizer. Hmmm....

As it turns out, I was absolutely correct! We loaded at Nashville's water treatment facility. And what we loaded was fertilizer, or what they scientifically have labeled "heat dried anaerobically digested sewage solids," or as Malcolm put it, "We're haulin' S**T," literally!

I guess now that I'm over the shock, its really rather brilliant. I mean they've treated it and cleaned it, and its in these little tiny pellets. Really, what else are you going to do with it? Dump it in the landfill or the river? But at the same time its just totally gross! We just delivered it a little while ago in Pendleton, Arkansas. The guy at the plant in Nashville says a lot of places use it on golf courses (so don't golf bare foot!). But down here its rural. There aren't any golf courses that I've seen. Where we dumped it off, at an fertilizer plant on the river, they are growing rice and millet. So maybe that's what they are using it for.

I was wondering, is it a competitive market? Is one city's s*** more expensive than another's? Who knows? So its been one of the most unique, more disgusting, and most brilliant and environmentally friendly loads we've ever hauled. And for the record, I don't care how much you clean it...s**** stinks in southern heat and humidity!

(Excuse all the uses of the "s" word, but in this story, it's just what it is!)