The Hunt for WiFi... (AKA Sorry for Not Posting More!)

Good evening everyone!

It's been a pretty fun few days in the truck and I'm sorry for the delay in posting, but we've had a hard time stopping anywhere with WiFi and we've used all of our data until the 20th. ;) But here we are at a little mom and pop truck stop with free WiFi in Wisconsin, so I'm making the most of it!

The plan for the next few weeks was to try and run off of recap and see if it made or lost us money, but they gave us a load that was to a new customer so one of the dispatchers told him not to worry about saving his hours and just to try to make it to the customer as soon as possible, maybe even earlier than his ETA. We made it there about an hour before the updated ETA so I think the head honchos are pretty happy with TH right now and I'm happy because I get another restart.

In other news, it's November 15th which means that TH and I will be heading home in just a little over two months or so! (We haven't agreed on an exact date yet.) The longest we've ever stayed out before has been about two months so the decision to stay out from late September until January was a tough one to make, but I agreed because money is good and I can stay home for a couple of weeks in February to spend some quality time with friends and family. So far this trip out hasn't been bad at all and while we have been getting into it a lot, we've been pretty good about going to our separate corners and getting some time apart. This blog has helped a lot too because I love to write and it provides a change of pace for me.

(Sidenote: TH just gave me part of his grapefruit because I've always been a picky eater and am trying new things now. Oh my goodness I love grapefruit now! I told him I'm so helping him eat that bag he bought!)

TH is currently trying to get through to Emergency Maintenance because the ABS light on our trailer isn't working properly and the last time he got an inspection they counted off for that. They said it wasn't enough to put us out of service and we passed, but we're not taking any chances this time around.

I hear a lot of people talk about how the brotherhood is gone from trucking and all young truckers feel like they're the only ones who matter and all this, but we experienced a random act of kindness yesterday from another young trucker that helped reassure me that's not always the case. (For one, my husband has only been driving for a little over a year and he is all about helping other drivers as much as possible.)

It was dusk and a driver pulled up next to us and motioned for TH to turn on his CB. The driver then told TH that we had a taillight on the trailer flickering and that it was probably going out, so we pulled into the next area so that he could change it. I am so grateful to that driver for letting us know that we had a problem, and while TH was fixing the problem I had a chance to snap two pictures of the gorgeous sunset!

Absolutely breathtaking, isn't it? 

Oh, and I have a slight update to my previous post about working from the truck--one of the trucker's wives pages that I follow on Facebook mentioned this and so far I like it! You get paid for watching news videos and all of the ones I have available pay $2 a story. The site is running pretty slow tonight but I don't think it normally does, so I'm going to go back to it tomorrow and finish my available news. If you'd like to check it out, head here.

Well, we have to go back to bed in an hour or so and I still have a few things to do so I suppose I should stop here for now. I had asked for questions that I could answer on Facebook but I waited until the last minute so I didn't get any. 

So here's your chance to ask me anything (within reason) and I will answer in my next post! Until next time...

~~Manda (Currently in Wisconsin)

www.facebook.com/ontheroadagainasatruckerswife

Working From the Truck

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen! I am tired tonight--we've been on the go for about a week and now we are finally taking a restart, starting tonight. The best part is that we are stopped at an operating center so we have free Wifi and I get to continue my ever-entertaining search for a job that I can do online.

You see, he makes plenty of money to support us over the road but I get so bored sometimes and it would be nice to have money I earned myself. So I've been trying to find one or two legitimate jobs that I can do online from the truck. I haven't had a lot of luck yet, mainly because most of the jobs appear to be answering phones as a customer service telephone rep and it requires a home Internet connection and a quiet environment. (They also schedule your shifts which is understandable but I need flexible hours just in case we're in an area with no Internet signal and because the hours we run change with each load we get.)

 I have found a few really good resources for online jobs though and I'd like to share them with you here. After all, even if the jobs aren't right for me that doesn't mean that they won't be right for you at some point or time or that you don't know someone who it might be right for. (Also, this blog isn't just for those of us who ride along. Although that is obviously my main focus, I hope a variety of people can read this and maybe this post will help someone!)

WAHM

So far, this is the best site I've found for finding online jobs. They do their best to check the jobs out before they post and they also offer a LOT of different resources and articles for the self-employed.

Legitimate Work From Home Jobs (About.com)

This (and the related articles) are a great resource if you're worried about being scammed. They give great tips on how to make sure that a job is legitimate and how to protect yourself. (I may not have any experience with this yet, but I recommend always using a Paypal account to get paid if they have the option.)

Also, I just signed up for this website but I have seen it blowing up on Facebook lately. All of the reviews I've read rave about the product. And they have a limited-time-only offer for a completely FREE sign up.

I tried selling Avon once but I found that their quotas were impossible to meet and as hard as I tried, everyone I knew already had an Avon lady! That attempt to try to launch an independent business with flexible hours failed pretty miserably and I've never tried again, either because I couldn't afford the start-up costs (some of which are astronomical) or because they had quotas. I didn't want to get burned again!

But I read about this on a blog I've been following for a while, read through all of the extensive information they have available and it looks really legitimate to me. I asked Heather (the owner of the blog) about solely selling on the Internet and she said that would be completely fine because there's no in-home parties or anything that would require you to be home in order to do it. And perhaps the best part is that there are no start-up costs or quotas and you get paid every two weeks as long as you've accumulated $10 in sales.

Jewelry In Candles is a company that sells candles with jewelry inside that YOU get to pick. You can choose from earrings, a necklace or a ring (you even get to pick your size) or you can choose to be surprised. The candles are all-natural, 100% soy and they burn from 100-150 hours. And not only do they have the candles, they have scented wax tarts and aroma scent beads will be arriving soon.

From what I've seen and read about this company, these products are selling like crazy and this would be a great way to make some extra money before Christmas! Plus if you sign up as a rep, you get a great discount on all of the items. Signing up as a rep literally only took me five minutes and it only took me a minute to update how I'm going to get paid (PayPal, thank you very much!).

All that you have to do is click here to read about the company (I highly recommend reading the FAQ), click on the button that says "Become a Rep" on the right side of the page, add the FREE ecommerce store to your cart and then select the "FREE CHECKOUT" button. So you're probably wondering what the catch is and there is one...

Signing up is ONLY free until 11/15/2013 so you only have 5 days to claim it from the time of this posting. I highly recommend that you sign up now even if you're undecided... Since they don't have quotas, you will have some time to look into the company and decide if this is something you want to do and I'd rather you decide to let the store be inactive and eventually deleted than for you to miss out on this deal. That's why I signed up!

Okay, sorry for the sales spiel but I certainly hope that you'll check out my store and consider signing up as a rep while it's still free! Please let me know if you decide to sign up and sell and how your sales are going! :)

I'd love to hear from you, and if you know of ANY legitimate online jobs that can be done from the truck then please leave them in the comments. I'd like something else on the side!

~~Manda (Currently in Atlanta, Georgia)

www.facebook.com/ontheroadagainasatruckerswife

"How Do You Not Kill Each Other?!" and Other Questions

Today was a really nice day. TH and I drove through a few different states and we stopped at a rest area in Tennessee to stretch our legs and take some pictures. I posted all of mine on the Facebook page attached to this blog (link under my signature) but here a few of my favorites:

 


 

It was perfect weather too--warm but not hot. It was a nice change from the freezing temperatures we've been dealing with for the past few nights.

But back to the point of this post--my family and friends always ask me and TH a lot of questions. The one we get most often is probably, "How do the two of you not kill each other?" It's a pretty valid question for the most part because I think we all know that spending too much time together can drive the closest of couples crazy. I usually smile and just answer, "I'm not really sure!" and I really don't. But I do have an idea. 

You see, we do drive each other crazy from time to time and we fight a lot more than we did before I came out on the truck. That's only natural. All of our little quirks that used to be endearing tend to turn to annoyances pretty fast when you're dealing with them every waking minute of nearly every day. Add that to the fact that the truck isn't all that big and you have a recipe for almost certain disaster. So how do we avoid this? Well, we listen to the radio a lot and I will go to the bunk and hang out for a little bit almost every day.

We try to give each other space whenever possible (for instance, I am typing this in the front seat while he's hanging out in the bunk talking to his sister on the phone). When we take re-starts, I usually will spend a little time in the lounge watching TV or using the Internet and outlets now that I have a laptop. Basically, we try to give each other SPACE whenever it is humanly possibly.

Secondly... Well, actually that's pretty much it. Space.

Other questions I get are, "Don't you ever get homsick?" Well, of course! In fact, that's one of the only cons of being on the truck with my husband. I miss all of the little creature comforts that we get so used to while we're at home. For instance, we recently got a hotel room because the truck had to go in the shop and the thing I was most excited about wasn't free WiFi or free TV... it was the knowledge that I could go to the bathroom and take a shower whenever I wanted! But dealing with homesickness isn't that bad when I think about my home without my husband there. While TH was training, I had to stay home for six months and I missed him terribly. The homesickness isn't anywhere nearly as bad as the loneliness I experienced then was, and there's a lot more remedies for it. For instance, the iHeartRadio app allows us to stream our local radio station from anywhere in the country. I touched on this in my previous post about technology, but let me repeat myself: technology is awesome. We can keep in touch with out friends and family at the click of a button and really, that's the worst part of being homesick--missing the people back home.

Another question I got asked the other day is, "Don't you ever get tired of being on the truck?" Well, yes. Despite what some think, riding for hundreds of miles a day every day gets pretty exhausting after a while. That's why TH and I came to an agreement recently and I can stay home for two weeks every couple of months. This will also allow me to catch up with my friends and do things with them and then he'll just get a stop-by and pick me up. We tried it a couple of months ago and it worked pretty well. The time apart also REALLY helped us to appreciate each other's presence a lot more.

Well, it's getting pretty late and I want to watch a movie before bed so I think I'll stop here. What questions do your family and friends ask you the most and how do you answer?

~~Manda
www.facebook.com/ontheroadagainasatruckerswife (Make sure to 'like' this page to keep up with all of my recent posts and things that don't make the cut to be posted here!)

Ain't Technology Grand?

I spent a few hours on Skype with my mom the other day and got to virtually meet her new boyfriend. I love how technology has made it so easy to stay connected with my friends and family back home. I can text, call, Skype, Snapchat, Facebook... The people I care about are there to contact at the touch of a button, whenever I want to talk to them and see how they're doing. A lot of people take this for granted these days, but I still remember growing up with my dad driving over-the-road and let me tell you, this is an amazing advancement.

When my dad was over-the-road, we had to make plans to talk to him because he could only call once he was stopped somewhere with a payphone. The calls were usually somewhat brief because other truckers wanted to talk to their families as well, but they were never anything less than special. We always had to be mindful of our time limit and make sure that we told him everything that we wanted to before he had to get off the phone. We rarely bothered him with problems at home because we knew how stressful the job was and besides, we didn't want to waste our time talking to him complaining.

Now that I'm on the road, I can't imagine how my dad did it. It's a lonely life on the road, even with my husband by my side. I miss my family and friends a lot and I'd be lost if I wasn't able to talk to them whenever I want or need to. It's made me even more grateful for my smartphone and my new-to-me laptop.

I'm constantly amazed by the things that they come up with--there's a new app that I haven't needed to use yet called Life360. You download the app on your phone and whoever's phone you want to track, and it will let you see their location whenever you want. I wish that I'd known about this app last August when he started driving because it would have saved me a lot of worrying. There are some glitches to be worked out, but most of the reviews I've read say that it's an amazing thing and they love it. Skyping my mom, her new boyfriend, my sister and my brother only used a little data and it helped ease my homesickness. It was a great way to re-connect with my family we left behind and it was a fun way to pass an hour or two of our restart.

Speaking of technology, I also wanted to mention that the smartphone is a fantastic invention that provides an easy way to pass the time when we're going through fields with nothing interesting to see. I have several games that I play on it when we don't have an Internet connection and when we do, you can usually find me lurking on Facebook. For such a small device, it certainly has a lot of power to entertain! One of my favorite apps is iHeartRadio because it means that no matter where I am in the country, I can listen to my local morning show. This is especially important to me because the original host passed away a few months ago. I was so saddened by his death because I had grown up listening to him and it felt like I'd lost a friend. Even though I hadn't listened to the show in a few years when he passed, I was devastated and when the rest of the cast returned to the air, I was listening. If it wasn't for technology, I wouldn't be able to hear them every day or watch their videos on YouTube. I love it and hearing their voices really helps me when I get homesick too.

Another awesome thing about technology is that I am currently writing this while riding through Illinois, on our way to Kansas for a delivery. I'm able to do this because I can turn my phone into a hotspot and harness my smartphone's Internet for my laptop. I think that's pretty neat!

So, today I pose a question to each of you who are reading--what is your favorite technology and why? I can't wait to hear your answers!
~~Manda (Currently in Illinois)
www.facebook.com/ontheroadagainasatruckerswife

Hey You!

Yes, you. Hello there! :)

I decided to start this blog so that I can keep track of the many adventures that I have as a trucker's wife who travels with him. I've noticed lately that there are a lot of support groups and blogs for the trucker's wives who stay home and miss him (as there should be) but I haven't found very many places for those of us who have the opposite problem--trying not to kill him as you spend weeks or months together in an enclosed space.

Now, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Manda, I'm 26 years old and I was born and raised in Texas, spending summers and holiday vacations in Arkansas with my dad. I have four brothers and one sister, three wonderful parents and a lot of amazing family. My dad has been behind the wheel of a truck for pretty much my whole life and I went with him several times as a child, so I thought I was prepared when my husband came home and opened a discussion about him going to school to get his CDL. His big thing was that he didn't want to be away from me so he stressed that I had to be okay with being on the truck with him after his probation period was up. I remembered all of the good times I used to have with my dad and agreed almost instantly, thinking that it was going to be a blast and that this was the easiest decision I'd ever made.

Boy, was I wrong about that last part!

I'm sure that you can see the differences between going over the road with your dad and going over the road with your husband. I'm also pretty sure that you can see the differences between going out on summer vacation and permanently. I did. But what I failed to account for was the differences between going over the road as a child and going out as an adult.

Think about it--when you're a child, everybody takes care of everything for you, you don't have to help out a lot and most importantly... they make sure to get you to a bathroom as soon as possible. As an adult, you are often helping your husband back out into the street by blocking traffic (scary!), trying to get the truck's engine to turn over while he looks at it to try to figure out problems, helping with a pre-trip, helping him unhook/hook to a trailer...

The list is endless and mostly I don't mind doing any of it. (Well, except for blocking off traffic. I don't like doing that part because it can get pretty hairy.) It was a pretty rude awakening though to realize that I wasn't just getting to quit my job and see the country with no effort on my part. Instead, I became a part of his job and even though I don't have a CDL I consider us a team. He drives, I cook and clean. I go into the truck stops in the morning to get us breakfast, Coke and coffee and help with the pre-trip if he's not done by the time I get back. I try to help him out as much as possible because now I understand how stressful this job really can be.

Bathroom breaks are seldom and far between because of tight loads, huge stretches of highway with absolutely nowhere to stop and sometimes just because we need the money and can't afford to stop. "If the wheels ain't turning, you ain't earning."  I'll never forget the first home time that we had after our first trip out together. I thought that sleeping in my bed was going to be the best thing ever but as it turned out, being able to just get up and walk a few yards to go to the bathroom is my favorite thing in the world now. We even got a hotel room the other night because of truck problems and all that I could think was, "Yes! I can go to the bathroom with little effort!" (True story.)

But, with all of the bad things that I've listed so far... I love this life and I wouldn't trade it for anything. I've been to 27+ states so far, I meet new people all the time, I'm getting to see things that I never dreamed I'd see, and most importantly I get to spend every day with my husband. This may not seem like that big of a deal unless you have ever had to go for weeks/months at a time without seeing your significant other but let me tell you, it sucks. I spent six months at home only seeing him for two days every two weeks. That means that we only spent four days out of the month together and even though we talked on the phone often, it's not the same.

Now, the one drawback about spending so much together is that we fight a lot more. All of the little nitpicks turn into big annoyances when you spend so much time together. He always wants us to spend time together when the truck's not moving but I've recently started putting my foot down on that. We spend quality time together but I will also take my laptop into the truck stop every once in a while and just get away for a little while. It's already helped a lot!

I suppose that I should let you see what my trucker and I look like, huh? The first picture is over a year old and the picture of us is a few months old but neither of us like to take pictures. :) Our picture is from just before we went to the wedding of two of our really good friends.

So... I think that I've made this long enough for now. :) If you have any questions about truck driving, me or anything else then please feel free to ask me!

~~Manda (Current location: Davenport, IA)