The Corpe "Nuts"

Families are wonderful, especially when the extended family gets together.  For the Corpe family this happens once every two years in Lafayette at my aunt & uncle's home.  These are not just potluck get-togethers but all out 2-day extravaganzas complete with themes, costumes, games, talent shows and prizes.  There have been Hawaiian luaus, Mexican fiestas, wild west days, around-the-world festivals all with coordinating costumes and theme food.

This year the theme was "circus".  We had a couple of clowns, a lion tamer and lion, a knife thrower, gypsy fortune teller, tightrope walker, mime, ice cream cone and a cotton-candy vendor that got caught in her machine and had "cotton candy" all over her (me) and what circus is complete without a lot of color?  Every fingernail on each hand had a different color of polish.  The weather was perfect although just a tad warm.

We played carnival games: ring toss, bean bags in the hole, toss the balls to knock cans over and even a hole in one mini golf game.  We won tickets and had prize drawings.  Kids and adults had their shares of trying to see how many tickets could be won.  Pictures were taken and food was eaten.  This family is known for its great cooks and no one was disappointed.  We had hamburgers, hot dogs, smoked turkey (because this tradition started out as Thanksgiving-in-July), salads, popcorn, cotton candy, snow cones, lemonade, circus cider (root beer) cookies, treats, even sawdust pudding because what circus doesn't have sawdust?  In case you're wondering--sawdust pudding is one of my mother's creations: graham cracker crumbs layered with butterscotch pudding and bananas.  Absolutely delicious and a family favorite.  Amid all the fun was a ton of laughter and giddiness.  And all this was Saturday, the first day.  34 people had a fantastic time!

Sunday was just a basic lazy day of conversation, eating leftovers and catching up on two year's worth of family news, reminiscing about people that have gone Home, silly things from our pasts, what plans we have for our futures.  We are so blessed to have such a family!  I can hardly wait for the next one.  The theme has already been selected:  Mardi Gras.

We got home Sunday evening, packed the truck and left again on Monday morning early.  Such is the working person's life!   Sooo, until next time . . . . . . . . . .

Unexpected on the Highways

A lot has taken place since my last post.  We were on our way to a delivery in Allentown, Pa. going down I-476 at 60 miles an hour when we were rear-ended by a flatbed semi.  Ron was driving and I was reading when we had this huge jolt.  It seems that the semi was following too closely, decided we were too slow and proceeded to swing out to go around us.  He was too close and the flatbed trailer hit the left rear corner of our truck.  By the grace of God no one was hurt!  But the damage to our new truck was such that we couldn't open the left back door.  Our load was small so we could get it off and the next load we already were given was also not a large one so, luckily, we didn't lose it either.  As a result we turned the truck in to the company that built the box part to get repairs in Columbus, Ohio, rented a car and went home for an unscheduled visit.  That gave us a chance to be home for the 4th of July.  So we spent a very busy week painting the front deck, getting landscaping done, some routine bloodwork done, and the car in for its first oil change.  We were able to spend a relaxing 4th afternoon with friends for a cookout before heading out again on the 5th.  We picked up the truck on Friday afternoon but it was not ready for the road again until Monday late afternoon.  So we had a late start to this week.  After getting a load we could accept we went to sleep in preparation to leave at 4 a.m. only to be awakened at 1:30 a.m. by our dispatcher in a panic.  A truck with a temp-assured load from eastern Pennsylvania had mechanical problems with their temp-control unit.  They were only 50 miles from us and desperate to keep the cargo within temperature range.  So we made a mad dash over to Youngstown, Ohio, exchanged cargo and headed for a mad dash to Denver, Co.  The weather here is sunny and HOT.  99 today.  And the waiting game begins again with half a dozen other trucks for a load out of here.  I guess the old saying is true:  Always expect the unexpected, even on the highway!  Until next time . . . . . . .

Three Wonderful Years

Yesterday was our 3rd anniversary.  Time certainly has a way of flying.  We celebrated in Denver with dinner at an authentic German restaurant enjoying weiner schnitzel, sauerbraten, spaetzle, red cabbage, potato soup, finishing it all off with German cheesecake and  Apple Streusel cheesecake.  Fabulous food and  atmosphere.  After dinner we stopped at Walmart (our social club) to restock the truck and walk off all that good food.  To make the evening wonderful my romantic husband booked a motel room for us to give us an evening OFF the truck for a while.  We've been out for a month and are not planning to be home until the second week of August.  Needless to say, he scored all A's in my book!

In my last post I mentioned I got a new laptop and a kindleFire for my birthday.  The laptop came with Windows 8 and I'm beginning to get the hang of it.  Things are so different with this one.  To top it all off, AT&T has revamped their email this week.  I think it may be a good change but I'm not too fond of change. I am having fun with the kindle.  So far I'm only playing games and checking my email on it.  I still have about a dozen more books to read before I need to start downloading them.  Last week Ron upgraded his phone to his first smartphone (I don't have one of those--yet!) and our data usage has gone through the roof.  So now we have had to change our Verizon plan to accommodate all the technology.  I think we've planned far enough into the future because before summer is over my phone is eligible for an upgrade.

I'm not sure how long we'll be in Denver.  We first arrived on Tuesday night with a load to deliver Wednesday afternoon.  Now it's Thursday night and we have had only 1 load offer that we did not get.  There happens to be about 4 other trucks like ours waiting in Denver for loads out.  Hopefully we have been here the longest and can have priority in getting a load.  I think it will be a while before we come back to Denver.  It just takes way too long to get something out of here.  As beautiful as it is here it gets a little old in this truck.  We are not close to the wildfire but last night we did have smoke, haze and fire smells in the air.  I don't want to be any closer!

That's about it for this time so---until next time . . . . . . . . . .

I'm Baaacccckkkkkk! Finally!

Hello faithful friends.  It has been too long since I last posted and I am ashamed of myself for it.  My only excuse is that we have been on the go with mostly all-night runs while working.  At home it's been hectic trying to get everything done that needed to get done before heading out on the road.

We were home the first part of March for about 10 days.  We had to get fingerprinted in order to renew our hazard materials endorsements on our drivers licenses.  The security checks done now are sometimes a pain.   This check can take up to 30 days and my license expired on May 19.  So back to driving for the next 6 weeks.  We had planned to be home the 2nd week of May but we had load that delivered near Chicago on April 29 so we came home a couple weeks early.  I got my license, complete with haz-mat and tank endorsements; Ron got his license renewed early; had his DOT physical; and we were able to spend Mother's Day with Robyn and Caleb. YAY!

We got back on the road May 13 and have been all over the country from the Atlantic to the Pacific since then.  We got to spend my birthday in Tampa with Ron's sister and a couple of her friends.  Had some really hot days of summer there.  Then went to California a week later.  From California we headed to Colorado. Had 2 days of lazy days in Denver.  After Denver we went to pick up a load Tuesday in Logan, Utah (between Salt Lake City and the Idaho state line).  This load was delivered this past Friday in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Talk about a long run.  We are spending this weekend in Willington, Connecticut.  We have a load to pick up in New Jersey Monday morning to deliver Wednesday afternoon in Aurora, Colorado.

I took these pictures from my phone while we were driving to our locations.  The top picture is of Vail, Colorado and was taken on May 31, 2013 in the morning.  They had new snowfall after Memorial Day.  Totally amazing!  The 2nd picture is of Bear Lake, Utah taken on June 4, 2013 in the afternoon.  This lake is very large and runs from Utah into Idaho.  There is a very nice resort around this lake and there are mountain cabins looking over all of it.  Such beautiful scenery created for us!  How blessed we are to be able travel around America and be among all this beauty.  Now that the fair weather has arrived we are taking advantage of as much of the countryside as possible.  It's just too gorgeous to ignore.

I got a new laptop for my birthday as well as a Kindle Fire HD and am feeling a little overwhelmed by all the new technology.  But loving all of it.  That will be the subject of my next blog.  Until next time . . . . . . . .

The Winter Upon Us

We have arrived at an impasse!  We HATE winter and there is nothing we can do about it.

 Ron and I spent over 2 weeks in the deep south, Florida, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi.  We were able to spend an evening having dinner with my sister and brother-in-law and some of their friends.  Our favorite place is Larry's Pizza.  If you're there on a specific night and time you get to have the Pizza Parade Buffet.  When you walk in you pay and get your drink and then find a table.  The servers then bring pizzas of every kind imaginable to your table and ask if you'd like to try a slice.  Some of the kinds are:  Loaded baked potato, hot wing, Canadian bacon, cheese Alfredo, chicken Alfredo, dill pickle & ranch (I'm not brave enough for that one), chicken-bacon ranch, Larry's deluxe, as well as the typical traditional kinds.  They also have a line of dessert pizzas that are huge hits:  Bavarian cream, chocolate chip, peanut butter-chocolate chip, banana cream, cheesecake, cherry-Bavarian cream.  I have tested all of these.  Absolutely delicious!!!  I sure wish Larry would open a branch in the Michiana area.  It would be an instant hit.

After dinner that night we headed to southern Louisiana for our next load.  That delivery was in Minnesota.  We arrived around noon Thursday to a dusting on the roads.  We were behind Nemo.  The weather wasn't too bad but the load opportunities were non-existant!  We never got a new load until Friday afternoon and that load doesn't pick up until Monday afternoon.  We are heading to New Jersey for Tuesday morning.  Sure hope the roads are all clear by then.  I also hope we are heading OUT of the snow that's now falling up here.  WE  WANT  OUT  OF  HERE !!!!!

Maybe we'll be back in the south when I get a chance to post again.  Until next time . . . . . . . . . .

The Beauty of Modern Technology

As I mentioned in my last posting there were a few glitches in the new truck, most of them involved electronics.  Now, I'm not totally illiterate in the field but I am in no way an expert either.  While we were able to get answers from the manufacturer concerning the major stuff, we were not able to get the TV nor the dvd player to work.  The dvd player kind of worked:  all movies were in black & white and there was NO volume.  We had to wait until we had a few days down time so be able to talk to someone and have them walk us through it.  I called the company that built the BlueRay/DVD player and the tech walked me through.  As it turned out, the installers used the wrong type of cable from the player to the TV and had it plugged in wrong.  We could use the wrong cable but to then watch the TV we would have to change cables from the player to the satellite and back again.  DUMB !!!  So we bought the correct cable and from that point we had DVD ability.  Yay!   After that I tried to pair our Directv box to our satellite.  I discovered the change I needed to make but could not get access.  By this time it was late and we decided to just watch a movie.

It's the next morning now.  After breakfast I called Directv and explained to the person what I needed help with.  She couldn't help but said she would transfer me to someone that could.  Ok.  The next voice I heard was the voice of the automated system.  Doesn't it just figure?  I had to go through the system and do her suggestions.  When she finally asked if this helped with my problem I said "NO" very emphatically.  I was immediately transferred to a real person.  This man was so polite and explained what I would need to do.  The screen was frozen and took about 10 minutes to clear.  We had a nice chat while he waited on the phone with me.  He promised not to hang up until I was completely happy with the results.  Amazing!  He explained that in order to pair the two things I had to put the first setting on something obscure, go to the second setting and set it according to directions for the satellite, and then go back to the first setting and reset it to the needed setting.  And now for the test ride!  Hallelujah, it all works!  We finally have TV & movies on January 18.  Now I am a happy camper!! 

We're heading for Colorado for delivery tomorrow and then Wednesday we head to Washington D.C.
I may not be able to blog for a few days but I will be back.  Until next time . . . . . . . .

And The New Year Begins

Let me start by telling you about our Christmas vacation.  We took our daughter, Robyn, and our grandson, Caleb, to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee for a very "down-home" country Christmas in a log cabin in the Smokies.  Ron's sister, Donna, joined us from Holiday, Florida.  We had a wonderful, joyous, wet time.  It rained every day and was damp and cold.  But we had the best time.  Donna is already planning for next Christmas.  We visited Dollywood on the only day that didn't rain.  It was very chilly but no wind or rain while we were there.  What a blessing to get away for a while to celebrate Christ's birth and spend a week with family.

Now, on to the new year.  We started by having Directv installed in our home so that we could have the satellite tv in our truck.  On January 3 we drove to Mansfield to pick up our brand new 2013 truck from the owner.  While we were in Ohio we took the truck to have the Quallcomm installed.  This is a computer that FedEx uses for our communications while on the road.  It also is our electronic log so we no longer have to fill out paper log books.  The next morning it had to be taken for installation of the Ameriscanner.  This is the recording device for our temperature-controlled loads (pharmaceuticals, art loads, etc.).  This took longer than anticipated and resulted in a later appointment for the branding.  After the installation was completed the truck had to be taken to Akron for branding-the FedEx lettering on the doors and box.  While Ron took the truck to Akron I took the car and headed back home.  Ron arrived @ 3:30 a.m. on Saturday the 5th.  We had a marathon packing time and headed back to Green, Ohio on Sunday afternoon.  Monday noon on January 7 we were at the FedEx main office lot for a 2 1/2 day testing of the reefer to make sure it is able to maintain different temperature settings.  After this was finished on Wednesday we had to do a dry run for at least 8 hrs.  We were finally finished with all the testing by 10 p.m. Wednesday and able to start running again on Thursday morning.  During this first week in the new truck we drove almost until we dropped.  We went from Ohio to New Jersey to Pennsylvania to California to Texas and back to Arizona.  At this point I was almost out of driveable hours and we had to spend a couple days outside of Phoenix.  During all this time we had no TV, no dvd's, just radio.  But I'm saving that story for my next blog.   So, until next time . . . . . . . . .