On The Road Again

After a wonderful break at home and the ranch, we are back on the road again. We left Sunday afternoon, after loading sulfur in Billings, and delivered in central Nebraska on Monday morning.



Now we are in Texas loading feather meal at our old haunt, Mount Pleasant. This after delivering a load of DDG this morning in southeastern Oklahoma.



I had somewhat hoped that we would get on a different freight lane when we left the house and get a break from this Texas/California run. No such luck. However, it is a profitable load, so I'll not complain too much.



A week and a half out of the truck worked wonders for our attitudes. Granted, we'd still rather be home, who wouldn't, but we're not as bitter and cranky as we were before the break. Hopefully the attitude adjustment will hang on a while.



I had intended to share a few photos of our adventures at home, but something more current came up. So we'll postpone the pictures of home time for a few days.



Remember his little scene from back in December?


If you missed out on that little adventure you can refer to this post for the entire scoop. Just to re-cap though, Malcolm hit a deer in the middle of nowhere in South Dakota, and by a freak of nature, it slashed the steer tire and we were marooned on the side of the highway for several hours till morning.



Because of the damage to the front bumper, we had to replace it, and since we were replacing it, Malcolm decided to go ahead and order an Ali Arc bumper so that next time the damage would be done only to the deer, and not our truck.



When we were home for one of our day and a half fly by breaks, he picked the new bumper up at Kenworth and put it on the truck.

before:



after:

Looks pretty invincible doesn't it?




So we spent $2,600.00 on this bumper to protect the front of the truck, and what do you think happens?





Last night Malcolm hit a deer...or rather I should say a deer hit Malcolm.



Dang thing ran into the side of the truck...go figure!


Dented the hub cap...


...and busted the skirting that covers the fuel tank.




As you can see, the deer left a souvenir with us to remember it by. Sorry for the gore. I meant to be showing a close up of the damage, but the meat is just part of the shot.



I have to say, Malcolm and I took it pretty well. I think after enough experiences with it, you just kind of accept it. Its irritating a bit because of the damage obviously. Malcolm already called this morning to see how much that particular piece costs....around $1200 and that's just the cover. If the supports are damaged....well that costs too, and then the paint job, not to mention the graphic obviously needs to be replaced too. We'd save on the labor costs cause Malcolm would put it on himself. We might can get away with patching it up...maybe. We'll have to let the guys at the shop look at it. He's also contemplating leaving it off and taking off the other side too. He has a storage box and a hanger for our snow chains he'd like to put on the truck, but they don't fit on it with those skirtings on there. So...maybe this happened for a reason. He could use the storage space those things would free up.



I feel worse about the deer than the truck. I hate it when we hit them. Its so unfair! And I especially hate it when we hit them this time of year and into the summer, because we're basically killing two deer, not just one. More than likely it was a doe and she was probably carrying a fawn. I'm crossing my fingers that, even though its warm and green in Oklahoma, that she hadn't had a fawn already. The thought of it tucked away in the grass somewhere waiting for her to come back to it just sickens me.


Ok, that got depressing...sorry! Anyway, just some aesthetic damage this time, no mechanical damage, and we'll soon be rolling towards California. I'm curious to see whats changed in the last two weeks. This time of year is always amazing because nature changes its appearance so quickly as life is renewed everywhere you look.



I'll be back in a day or so to post my pictures of home time entertainments, including some of me playing cowgirl.

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