Archive for the ‘Environment’ Category

Just in case any of my readers think I’ve given over my site entirely to animal rescue, today I want to talk about customer service.

When Marilyn and I were on our way back from our trip to Alberta, we spent a couple of nights in Winnipeg awaiting a reload. Due to seasonably warm temperatures I was forced to run the truck both nights so we could keep it cool enough to sleep.

Now anyone who has one of these environmental engines will know how much they hate to be idled for any length of time. As much as I love this DD-15, all the problems I’ve had with it involve environmental mechanisms.

On the second morning, while picking up my load in Portage la Prairie, the “regen” light starts flashing at me. While that in itself is not too serious, I know from experience, that to ignore it for too long can result in complete engine shutdown.

I tried to do a parked “regen”, following the directions in the manual but the light continued to flash tauntingly at me.
My first inclination was to take it to a Freightliner dealer since that is what I’m driving after all. Turns out there are only two of them in all of Manitoba but one is in Winnipeg and it wasn’t too far out of our way.

The first thing I noticed upon arrival at Freightliner was a lack of parking. Not a good situation when your primary customers drive big trucks. So I parked in the yard of a warehouse across the street and walked over.

The first person I encountered was a sour faced woman at the service desk who was having an unpleasant encounter with a customer who soon left in disgust and frustration. From this I figured my best approach would be a low key one, with a little humor and empathy thrown in for good measure.

“Looks like I’m not the only one having a bad day.” Says I with a little smile.

“Wouldn’t be so bad if I could get a few things caught up” she replied, not even looking up at me. She continued what she was doing for a few minutes while I waited patiently.

Finally she looked up and said in a grumpy voice, “What can I do for you?”

I explained my problem, to which she immediately responded, “We couldn’t even look at it till later in the week.” As if I’d told her I had a picture of my truck I wanted to show her.

The lady (and I use that term loosely) did me one huge favor though. When I protested that I had a load of frozen food with a desperate need to be in New Brunswick by Thursday, she said, “Why don’t you try Waterous Diesel?”

She even went so far as to give me an address and look up the phone number for me. I marvelled that their shop was doing so well they could afford to send business elsewhere, but thanked her politely and left.

Now this is the point where my Winnipeg experience made a definite change for the better.

I went back out to the truck, told Marilyn what had transpired and called Waterous Power Systems on my cell phone. The man who answered was friendly and polite. Told me, “Sure come on over. We’re a bit short handed but we’ll fit you in.” He told me how to get there, where I could drop my trailer and said he’d see me when I got there.

I was already feeling better about my situation than I had since it started.

I don’t want to drag this out any longer than necessary so just let me say this. I encountered, and spoke to, six different people during the time I was at Waterous Power Systems. Every one of them was friendly and helpful and treated both Marilyn and I with nothing but respect.

Most importantly they solved my problem in about an hour and we were on our way. Well maybe that wasn’t quite the most important part. When I asked how much I owed they said, “Don’t worry about it. We didn’t actually do enough to make it worth printing out a bill.” Then they gave me a two page printout of my fuel consumption data and bid us a good day.

Now you tell me. Where do you think I’ll go first if I ever have engine problems in Winnipeg, Manitoba again?

Thank you Waterous Power Systems. You’re tops in my books.

Spring has sprung
The grass has riz
I wonder where
The birdies is.

That old childhood rhyme sprang to mind this week as Mother Nature begins to make her powers of renewal evident in most parts of the country.  Of course the biggest evidence I see is the massive bug collection on my grillework and the backs of my mirrors.

There are still a few areas being reluctantly dragged into showing signs of the impending summer. Not the least of these is right at home in Nova Scotia.

There is little question, even there though, of where the birdies is, as many of them are falling within the range of Marilyn’s questing camera.

I’ve decided to include a few of Marilyn’s most striking images in this post as she is learning the patience needed to get the perfect shot. 

All in all a great bunch of shots from Marilyn and I know she took many many more in order to get the ones she saved.  I hear nothing but groans via the instant messenger during every rainy day that keeps her from roaming the yard with the camera.

To view more photos click on this one.

 If anyone else has some great backyard bird shots they’d like to share with our readership please send them along. Include any information you’d care to add and email them to grumpy@grumpyoldtrucker.com.  See ya next time and stay chirpy.

All my life I have been appalled by the callous disregard of a certain segment of our population toward littering.
I would estimate that maybe one per cent of the population of the earth would take drinks and snacks in disposable containers out on their front porch, and then when finished eating and drinking simply wing the containers out in their yard. We’ve all seen yards like that and probably most of us just assume the residents there are either mentally deficient or hopeless alcoholics.
How do we explain the much larger percentage of the population who think its perfectly fine to do the same thing on streets, roads, highways and in parking lots all over the country?
There is no excuse for such anti-social behavior in this day and age. Either they are mentally deficient or they witnessed their mentally deficient parents committing such acts, and for some reason assumed it was sensible to copy them.
I don’t wish to cast aspersions on mentally challenged people, as I know quite a number personally who wouldn’t think of tossing garbage out to pollute the landscape and force others to clean up after them.
It really takes so little effort to keep a bag or box in our vehicles in which to deposit garbage, and then throw it in a trash bin every few days or weeks. I’ve seen people who wouldn’t walk 10 feet out of their way to a garbage receptacle in plain sight.
When I was a kid in Manitoba, (I know, ancient history) the province had a program called Orbit. Every few miles on most major highways they had little pull-offs with big round ball-shaped trash receptacles called Orbits. Sort of a take-off on the space program. There would be signs saying “Put your garbage into Orbit one mile”. I think the program was quite effective at the time but I don’t think its still being used. Somebody from Manitoba correct me if I’m wrong.
The point is, parents should be teaching their kids not to litter with just as much diligence as toilet training and looking both ways before crossing the street.
The best way to teach kids is by example. They should know you think littering is wrong just as surely they should know you think any crime is wrong. Nine times out of ten they will do what they see you do. Don’t let the ignorance continue.

Well I should have known that my week had been going just a little too smoothly.  I left Nova Scotia on Wednesday with a load of snow crab bound for San Antonio, Texas.  Had a bit of rain for the first couple of days, but that only served to clean a few thousand bugs off the grille and mirrors.

Plenty of time, and the truck was running well. Regular stops for meals, showers and sleep. All was right with the world.  Then I was informed that the earliest appointment I could get for delivery was 5 PM Monday, so that gave me even more time.  I actually dawdled a little.

Then when I was less than an hour from point of delivery a message came on the satellite, “By the way there could be a lumping fee of up to $150.” And me already 10 miles past the last truck stop coming into San Antonio.  They would put that amount on my card they said, but then came a mad scramble to figure out where I was going to be able to access the money.

Finally after studying the truck stop directory and the atlas I drove right past the customer and on east a couple of miles on I-10.  After the third truck stop I tried, I finally had my $150 in hand as well as a couple of hundred I decided to take out of my own account through the ATM just to be on the safe side.  Back to the customer, and still a half hour early for my appointment.  But then I was informed I had the wrong PO number and they couldn’t find me in the computer.

By this time it’s after business hours in PEI and everyone’s gone home for the day.  However, I tracked down a dispatcher on his way home for his supper and he reluctantly turned around and headed back to the office. Thanks Johnathan.  A half hour or so later, I have the correct PO number, I’m backed into a receiving door and waiting patiently for the lumper to show up. Finally the lumper knocks on my door and informs me the price will be $180.  Thank goodness I had the foresight to take out the extra cash.

Now when I left home the temperature was in the upper teens and low 20′s Celsius.  By now I’m looking at low 40′s, which is something I’m not really accustomed too, but thankfully the A/C is working fine and I’m pretty comfortable except when I have to go outside.

A couple of hours later my load is off, my bills are signed, and I head back over to the Flying-J for the night.  I’m not really expecting a quick turn-around because there are hundreds, maybe thousands of trucks in the area all looking for paying loads.  So, I settle in to the truck stop, hook up to the WIFI signal and work on my websites.

The next day (Tuesday), mid afternoon, I’m informed I have a reload out of Laredo about 2.5 to 3 hours away.  Trouble is it doesn’t load until 7 PM Wednesday.  So I hunker down, make myself comfortable, happy in the thought that I’ll at least get a reset on my logbook. Well the real problem began after supper, when without warning the truck’s engine shuts down.  There goes my A/C, and believe me it doesn’t take long in these temperatures to notice the loss.

To make a long story short but sad, I ended up awake most of the night, since the earliest appointment I could get at the Freightliner dealer was 7:00 Wednesday morning.  I worked away on the computer inside the truck stop till 3:00 in the morning or so.  Then I tried sleeping in the truck, but the heat and humidity soon drove me out into the cooler night air with a nice breeze blowing.  I ended up for the last 4 or 5 hours in a chair in the driver’s lounge in front of a blaring big screen TV.  I don’t know why they call it a lounge as any lounging I was able to do in that most uncomfortable chair was painful to say the least.  Somehow I managed to doze on and off and maybe got a total of an hours sleep.

Anyway I’m now at the Freightliner dealer awaiting the news.  I know it has to do with the emission control system, and it shut off on me 5 or 6 times on the two mile drive over here, but at least it didn’t require a tow which would not be included under warranty.

The long and the short of it is that a truck is just like a kid.  When it behaves it’s a genuine pleasure to have around but when it doesn’t, it’s like a kid throwing a tantrum.  There ain’t much you can do except stand by and wait for the air to clear.

Here’s hoping all your miles are happy ones.

Let me preface my comments by saying I’m not trying to pick on California.  I chose them as my topic today because 1). I was there this week for the first time in several years.   2)  I was there for 3 days mostly due to having to reset my logbook, then driving more then 300 miles to get my reload.  And maybe 3) Because they are such a sharp contrast to the part of North America I live in, the east coast of Canada.

First you can’t get much more contrast then two coasts more than 3000 miles apart.  Some of the similarities are unremarkable.  There are friendly and not so friendly people on both coasts.  There are criminals and law breakers on both coasts.  Percentage wise crime may even be the same but due to the much larger population in California the incident rate is far greater.

Most of the things I noticed had to do with the environment.

* Open burning of trash and brush.  Not allowed in Nova Scotia except by special permit and only at certain times of the year.

* It was obvious that a huge percentage of vehicles passing me on the streets were big gas guzzling V-8′s.  Most people in the east have long since converted to 6 and 4 cylinder engines.

* No control on emissions from factories and industrial plants.  The air in California stinks almost everywhere.  The stench even crept into my cab with the windows tightly closed.

* Poor visibility almost everywhere even way out in the country.  There seems to be a perpetual haze in the air.  I assume it’s smog but my only experience with that in Canada is around Toronto and Montreal during a weather inversion or when there are forest fires burning somewhere.

* Maybe it’s just a symptom of an older and more crowded part of the country but there seem to be many businesses and properties abandoned and moldering in states of ruin and decay.  Also a lot of useful land just lying unused and weed choked.

On the plus side, I saw many crews out cleaning up garbage along the highway, though why this should still be necessary anywhere in North America in this supposedly enlightened age is beyond me.  I guess there will always be slobs who think it’s all right to just turf it out the window and let someone else pick up after them.

I’m sure there are many more redemptive qualities to California as well but to the casual observer only there for a few days, it seems the negatives jump out at a person much more readily.  I welcome comments from those who would like to point out some of the better qualities or defend against any of my comments here.  Not that defense is a requirement, but California after all calls itself the Golden State.  The only gold I saw was the sun struggling vainly to shine through the smog.