Sailorbum Blog has been trancended and superceded.

Due to some web address ownership issues, I have abandoned Sailorbum as a potential brand. The changes I have made will hopefully make following my rantings a little easier to comprehend. Non-boat related posts and my rambling prose, including all the original Sailorbum posts, can now be found at ToddRTownsend.blogspot.com. All my boat posts and future adventures in the boat will be found at BubbaThePirate.blogspot.com. Thanks for your patronage, your patience and your patronization. :o)

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I used to have a driver's license with the address of the main Post Office in Sarasota. While living on a boat, with no address but a P.O. Box, I tried to update my license. The girl at the counter balked at issuing the license. I explained that I couldn't furnish a street address. When she asked if there wasn't someone's address I could use, I had an idea. I left and walked down the street to a phone booth. Armed with the "address" of my mailbox, I returned. No one batted an eye and I got my license.

This week, Mom was digging through some St. Patrick's Day stuff in preparation for their celebrations in Florida. She came across a letter I had written in 1994! Dad typed the whole thing into an email for me. It was a pleasure to revisit the memory of a book I really liked and it is completely topical for this week. So, here it is, just the way it appeared back then. But please don't use that address. I've worked hard to lose the Florida Marine Patrol and the I.R.S. :o)

What is especially funny is the tag after my signature. Here it is 15 years later and I am almost in the same spot! Don't doubt for a minute, however, that I have never been as close to doing just that as I am today. Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!

Here's the letter:



From the bilges of . . .

Todd R. Townsend
PO Box 49821
Sarasota, FL 34230

March 15, 1994



Dear Irish Friends,

This won’t make it for St. Paddy’s Day because it is the 15th already, but as St. Paddy passes I thought you would like to know of an Irish bombshell that I discovered in my readings. The Irish discovered North America 400 years before the Vikings and a thousand before Columbus!

A Welshman who was an expert on medeival English literature was discussing a certain tale of the voyages of an Irish monk with his wife, an expert on medieval Spanish literature. (A terribly exciting couple I’m sure) They were struck by the fact that the story lacked most of the “special effects” of medieval Christian writing; that it seemed rather factual in its presentation. The story was about St. Brendan, an early Irish monk and his voyage along the “stepping stone” route from Ireland to North America by way of Iceland and Greenland. To cut a long story sideways, the Welshman (almost as good as an Irishman) decides to build traditional Irish leather boat and sail to North America in an attempt to prove if it could be done.

It seems that in the third and fourth centuries, the intellectuals of Europe were fleeing persecution to Ireland. The monks collected their books and recorded their knowledge. The Welshman’s research led him to think that most Irish monks believed the earth was round even then; having read of Ptolemy’s calculations and other astronomers’ work. Further, it seems the Irish, always intensely religious, made a habit of going off to some deserted shore to commune with their God. This made them accomplished navigators.

There is a modern lighthouse on a small island off the Irish coast. The windows, several hundred feet above sea level, are sometimes blown out in gales. During the construction of the lighthouse, they found evidence of a monastic community on the island!

St. Brendan was a bishop in Ireland in the fourth century. He tells of a long voyage to a land west of Ireland. Another church official, writing later about the geographical scope of the Catholic Church, complained that not enough had been written about the westward travels of the Irish. St. Brendan’s story was probably a story of many voyages, not one and a tour by a church “bigwig” rather than a voyage of discovery. In the story St. Brendan travels from Ireland north to the shores of what is now Scotland and then to the Faroes Islands. His voyage took him to Iceland and then Greenland and then to a land of plenty past Greenland; probably Newfoundland.

The voyage in 1976 and 1977 by the Welshman and a crew brought new light to certain aspects of the story. The ancient monk/mariner spoke of a pillar of crystal in the water – likely an iceberg. An encounter with s sea monster was probably a whale; a creature the monks would never have seen before. The modern voyage found the whales were quite smitten with the hull of the leather boat. An island called the Land the Smiths, throwing hot rocks at the monks, could have been volcano spewing lava from its shore. St. Brendan encountered tremendous fog before reaching Newfoundland; weather conditions that exist today.

The Welshman and his team made it!! In fact, they discovered that traditional wool clothes and traditional dried meats were better suited for the trip than hi-tech materials and dehydrated rations. There is no evidence yet of the Irish on North American soil, but the Brendan Voyage 1976 and 1977 prove that it could have happened much like Thor Heyerdahl’s Pacific voyage in a Polynesian raft. _May_ 17th is St. Brendan’s Day in Ireland. The true Irish will have another occasion to imbibe, while our loyal fans will wonder anew why the Irish don’t rule the world.

The book, “The Brendan Voyage” is very well written and should be available at a good library. I hope you enjoy St. Patrick’s Day and propose that you remember St. Brendan in May as well. An Irishman and a mariner; he must have been a good guy.


Warm Irish regards,


Todd R. Townsend

Living like a monk,
Wishing I was a mariner!

Lost in a River Town.

Leaving Chicago to the west, I was soon reminded that Plains reach all the way into Illinois. I should have known, but it is hard for a guy from Michigan to realize the wide open plains are so close. The wind slashed at my windows and hit the trailer like Pacific Surge on the rocks of Big Sur. I was weaving my way across US30 toward Clinton, IA.

All the prairie towns seem lonely. Usually huddled around a river or a lake. There is a little car dealer, maybe only one fast food joint, a family restaurant, a hardware store and a sporting goods store. Sometimes these last two are the same. Today, the snow is gone and the rivers are swollen. In the prespring days of early March, the mud along the road looks more alive than the lawns. Everything is brown and grey, waiting for resurrection and the green and blue of spring.

Before I reach the Mississippi, I cross a National Wildlife Refuge. Not much wildlife, but all the trees, bushes and clumps of grass are wearing ice skirts. The rising water had frozen and when it receded, left a little ice tutu around each.

Truckers will tell you, with a wry smile, that Dispatchers lie. A broker is a dispatcher who will probably never talk to you again. How much care does he have to put into this transaction? I'm hauling a broker load. The directions seem easy; US30 west, go south on US67 which turns into 2nd Ave, to 1219 2nd Ave South.

I cross the bridge and the "Big Muddy" into Iowa. It is a typical rivertown trying to make in the modern world; touristy stuff and a casino mix with the remnants of industry on the river bank. Huge refinery stacks and old brick buildings form the romantic backdrop to your big weekend at the blackjack table. Turning South on US67, I am confronted with construction. Everywhere. Apparently, the casino is spending some money on Civic Pride and Beautification. The road, that I would have guessed I need to take, is closed. A bunch of guys in orange vests are doing their best to keep warm rather than finishing the fancy brick pedestrian crosswalk.

US67 curves West and then South again. I've lost 2nd Ave, but there is nowhere to turn around. Clinton is chock full of heavy industry. Refineries, food processing, packaging. All the way through town, I never saw 2nd Ave. again. There is, however, a small truckstop. It is time to call for help.

Dispatch gave me the customer's phone number and a very nice lady, who says she is in a different building, gave me directions to where I need to be. She knew the address I had, she must be right. The Broker's directions were completely wrong! I needed to go North on US67. My new directions are US67, stoplight North of US30, turn right, turn left on 2nd Ave, under a bridge and then under a Railroad Bridge, second on the left.

I wind my way back through town and cross US30. My stoplight is right where it is supposed to be - turn right, then left. I turn into a city street that hasn't changed since the war. I mean the big one - WWII. There is Nora's Cafe, Herb's TV repair, Family Furniture and Lexington Apartments - a real honest-to-goodness apartment block. It is 5 stories and the whole block. Miscellaneous retail fills the first floor along with a State Agency and the Landlord. "Furnished Apartments Available. First Week Free."

I am looking down a long Main Street from the old days. It used to be a concentration of trade. Everyone went downtown to buy anything. Those days are long gone. There a couple mumbling bums walking around with plastic grocery bags dripping with collected cans, but it is just me and them. This is exactly why First Weeks are free around here. It is why Ace Remodeling, Flaming Dragon Body Art and Joe's Comics can afford the rent.

It occurs to me that this long, romantically retro, main street goes on for a long while without going under any kind of bridge. Waking from my internal monologue, the addresses are going up and I am in the 1400's already. This is a problem. It sneaks into the back of my head that the address suffix was "South" - 1219 2nd Ave. South. I'm going the wrong direction. The road is getting less retail, more residential, and narrower. Turning around 80' of truck and trailer, as always, is going to be interesting.

US67 turns left on the way out of town. The turn is tight in a secondary downtown strip going East and West. It is my best option, and luckily, in a couple blocks there is a gas station/convenience store with a large plaza and fuel area. Left off US67 and left on another side street and I can turn through the plaza and head back down US67 the other way.

As you might have guessed, I'm still 5 blocks away from the intersection where this all started and I can already see two bridges. Back past the Lexington Apartments, which should really be Lexington Arms, I'm going under a bridge. The bridge I crossed the Mississippi on. Directly after it is the Railroad Bridge. I've arrived.

If I had kept my head up and my wits about me, I would have made the right turn. From the stoplight, I could have seen the two bridges if I had only wasted the calories on turning my head to the right. I've got good instincts, when I use them. My morning would have been smoother and less stressful. All for the turning of my neck!

It works for life too. So what are you doing? Are you paying attention to where you should be going? Or are you just following someone else's directions? Take a stake in your destination.

Karmic Deficit Imbalance

So, just when I thought I was pushing my luck with Weigh Stations, I hit the jackpot and drained my Karma all in one fell swoop. I'm upside down like the Chinese Trade Deficit. I had passed closed stations when I knew I was pushing the GVW limits, I've gone East when only the Westbound Coop was open; only to find the West closed and East open as I passed the other way. I bless my luck but thought I was near the end. I even wove my way through the Irish Hills of South Central Michigan to avoid scales on I96 and I94; wasting hours and driving miles I would never get paid for.

Monday I picked up a load in Lexington, KY. I meant to scale at the Pilot at the 129. Talking on the phone, I drove right past my exit - oblivious. Suddenly the Kentucky scale on I75 Northbound appeared around a curve. I was "all in" whether I wanted to be or not. I rolled on through and assumed I had been blessed. No holy water or chants, but I figured if they didn't stop me my weight was OK. You know what they say about A S S U M E.

Well, I sauntered my way through the hills of Kentucky and down into the Ohio River Valley. I passed through Florence Y'all and into Cincinnati. The bypass is a broad circle and way too many miles. In midafternoon, after hitting I71 just over the river, I pulled right through town. I was on a tight schedule, but was doing good. I had had to take a 10 hour break in Lexington and picked the load up at the very end of my pickup timeframe. This left little time for breakfast or any other goofing around on the way to Delaware, OH.

As I came upon the Ohio Scale, their sign glowered "OPEN." No problem - I've been blessed by Kentucky DOT. Imagine my shock, dismay and general put-out-ness when Ohio had the audacity to tell me to pull around behind. Damn! This is never good and often the worst possible thing.

I gathered my logbook, checked that I knew where my Medical card was, got the Bills of Lading and climbed out of the tractor. The scale lady poked her head out of the building and told me to pull back around front, but stop on each axle.

I pulled around and got rechecked and carefully weighed. This is the trucking equivalent of a colostomy. Her voice scratched and tore at the intercom, "Pull around back again and bring in your truck and trailer registration."

She didn't say logbook, and I was at least 45 minutes ahead of my log, so I left it tucked away in the cab. I pried open the trailer capsule and took the paperwork inside.

"Today's your lucky day," she cackled.

"I don't feel lucky at this very moment," I moaned.

"Well, they just called my Trooper away to an accident," she informed me. "There's no one here to write you a ticket. They just saved you $157."

If it wasn't for the clinical stainless countertop, the security cameras and her badge, I would have climbed over and hugged her. Instead, I thanked her and made my way to the door. I fought off the smile until I was completely out of the building, out of sight.

Then it hit me. I need a Trillion Dollar bailout just for my Karma. I've been walking old ladies across streets, kissing lepers, dropping change in tin cups and prostrating myself in front of all kinds of craven images ever since.

I'd rather be Lucky than Good, but this is ridiculous!

We stand for freedom!

A regular feature on the Prairie Home Companion, "Dusty and Lefty, The Lives of the Cowboys," is a old timey radio show featuring two cowboys, one a poet, often trapped somehow in the modern world. I heard one recently that was fabulously appropriate.

Dusty, played by Garrison Keillor, abruptly finds out that Lefty, Tim Russell, is considering retiring. They argue a bit back and forth. Lefty says "There aren't Cattle Drives anymore, beef is delivered overnight to your doorstep. They don't need us anymore, come with me . . . just retire. Dusty says "They do need us. They may not know it, but America needs us because Cowboys stand for freedom; like Hobos, and Truckers, and Sailors." If I bought a cowboy hat or some boots, I'd be 4 for 4!! It's just a service we provide. Fly and be Free.

Nothing . . . to be afraid of

Sometimes what is not there is scarier than what is. Sort of the devil you know from the other perspective. Long ago, I sold plastic parts in Florida. I was based in Tampa and went to the Southeast Coast about every three weeks.

It was faster, especially during the perennial road construction, to cut across the swamp. I would take FL70 through Arcadia. If I was headed to West Palm Beach, I would stay on 70 and go around the North Side of Lake Okeechobee. Heading to Miami or Fort Lauderdale, I would take US27 around to the south.

Out past Arcadia and around the lake is Florida's cattle country. Cows and Steers with Cattle Egrets on their backs lolly-gagged in verdant paddocks sweating and switching flies with their tails. From Arcadia to US27, there was very little evidence of human occupation - few houses, the occasional farm truck or tractor. One of the few places to find a Cadillac with bullhorns on the hood outside of Texas or Oklahoma.

One trip through this part of Florida, I got behind a guy in a pickup truck eatin' chicken wings. Every 90 seconds or so, he would fling a bare bone or two out his window. One or two bounced off my car. The wings must have been plain. I noticed no sauce after the bones, with sinew and bits of skin hanging on each end, arced from his truck and bounced off the windshield in front of my face.

On another trip, I drove past the Clock Restaurant on the east side of town, there was "Try Are Pies" on their sign. Down the block, a garage sale sign advertised a "Hudge Sale." I'm surprised they're having the sale while Mom's at work.

Yet another trip, I was driving across in the dark. The moon was full. Shadowy visions of pastures and clumps of Live Oak trees ghosted along beside me. For miles, it was just me, the road and a ditch on each side with barbed wire undulating on the outer banks. I had to pee.

A smile turned up into my cheek. I hadn't seen another car for a long time. The four way flashers popped on and I stopped; just stopped in the middle of my lane. Its a guy thing, alright, a little boy thing, but there I stood in the middle of a state highway, peeing on the yellow center line and chuckling.

There was no wind; just the moon and a clear cloudless night. It would have been a pleasant Florida evening, but there was no wind. And no other sound. No buzz of an insect, no clunk of a cowbell, no steer grunting in disapproval, no rustling of the Spanish Moss. Just the pitter patter of me peeing in the road which suddenly stopped.

Had I known, I would have left the car running. There is something about stone silence; something unnerving. There was the moon, the barbed wire, a Live Oak across the pasture but not a sound. In any scary B-movie, this same silence precedes something really bad happening. I think, however, it is hard wired into our fight or flight instincts; obviously the flight side. Nothing. Scary. Spooky. Chilly. Nothing.

Flip! Zip! Slam!!! I was back in the car - scared out of my wits . . . at nothing. I don't know why. I'm a fairly rational guy but gooseflesh, hairs on end and fingers fumbling the ignition - I'm outta here!!

This week it happened again. Somewhat more civilized as I'm driving familiar roads and know where the rest areas are.

Just west of the Portage River, west of Port Clinton on OH2, there is a little rest stop. One side serves both directions of highway. Just behind it and over a field or two is Lake Erie. I like the trip through here; especially in summer. I was driving through an early winter storm - fog and torrential rain but a few miles before Port Clinton the rain stopped.

I approached the Rest Area in the slick metallic wetness of a recent rain at night, past the Air National Guard Base and a turn to the left. A lonely car passed me on the right. Just past the Rest Area is a low slung "No Tell Motel." It was probably quite a place in the days before the Interstates. Now it does weekly rentals. I've lived by the week. I know the kind of crowds that live there. Check out Dave Alvins' "30 Dollar Room" if your not sure.

I'm not paranoid, but on this job it pays to be alert and aware. As the air brake sighs, I climb down from the cab and scan the lot. Especially in the directions of the motel. 15 or 20 rooms, 5 or 6 vehicles, no obvious activity. Walking around the front of my cab, I glance back down the road past the ANG base. Nothing. A car goes by on the highway. I watch it roll by like a long pan in a Hitchcock movie.

Coming out of the Mens John, the Rest Stop Lobby is all glass. Lit from the inside, as the Governor and his Lieutenant smile down from the bulletin board, I can't see outside at all. Stupid, but there's that icy finger on my spine again.

I push the door open and look around; motel one way, air base the other. Nothing. Not a sound either, like the storm drug the sound away with it. I walk toward my truck with forced nonchalance. Herky Jerky as one leg wants to lift too high too fast; left brain wants to run, right brain is faking cool. I look left and right as I cross the curb from the Car Lot to the Truck Lot. The wind comes back but I feel it more than I hear it. The icy finger tickles my ear.

The spooked left brain reminds us that there could be someone hiding on the other side of the truck. I peak under the trailer as I walk toward it. Rounding the truck, I casually get my keys out and unlock the door. SLAM! I'm up and in the driver's seat, locking the door. I can't even remember climbing the steps. My heart is racing . . . and for what! Stupid Human Tricks, I guess. I think I would have been better off if the lot was full of bikers and gangbanger Cadillacs.

I start the truck and check my mirrors. There's still no one around. I pull out and start heading east again; chuckling at my self.

Ice Dancing

It was clearly a night that I should have called in sick. Or at the very least bailed as soon as it started to go bad. We had had a slight warming and then a ferocious cold snap. The drop yard was thick with ice and full of ruts and clumps and holes from the last traffic before the freeze.

Creeping along in my pickup, I bounced and shimmied and shook across the lunar lot. Occasionally, the violence of falling in a hole or clammering over a ridge was almost painful. My forward progress interrupted enough that I wasn't sure I could get moving again.

Dispatch had given me a tractor number to use. After two painful trips around the yard, I was convinced it wasn't there. Calling back in, I got "Well, let me see here . . . damn, someone else is in that one." Armed with a new, and successful, truck assignment, I started packing. I've got a duffel of clothes, a cooler, a tub of truck stuff and another tub that serves as my pantry. As usual, I also have a 12 pack each of water and Diet Mountain Dew. This week, I didn't bring my guitar. All that and a broom to hang on the back of the cab; I'm ready to roll.

It takes a couple more trips bouncing around the lot to find that the trailer my load is on rests across the street. I get hooked up and check the paperwork. I am 1200 lbs. over gross; not legal for the highway. The previous driver thinks its the ice on the roof. He's probably right but this load is very heavy - bottled water for a warehouse store somewhere in Illinois.

This is where right and wrong, risk and reward, get paved over for a new Bypass to maintain economic activity. I could call in and refuse the load. More politically, I could call and ask for advice. They can't tell me to go around the DOT Scales but they would really rather that I did. It is unspoken and retains the Clintonesque plausible deniability. Anything I do, other than drive away with the load, is going to cost me a couple hours and damage my working relationship with dispatch. I craft a plan.

I've got 7 hours to make a 2 1/2 hour trip. Its a set appointment, so getting there early won't do me any good. There is only one scale between them and me. If I leave now, and get past the Indiana Scales, I can take a nap at a truckstop and then go in for the delivery. At this hour, on Dec. 26th, the scale is likely to be closed up tight. I take the gamble and drive off.

The trip goes fine. I run down the West side of Michigan. In the summer, I can smell the lake from the highway. I scoot through Michigan City, past the Scale and stop at Burns Harbor. The forecast is for warmer weather with the possibility of freezing rain. All I need is a three hour nap and I can roll again.

Halfway through my nap, I wake just enough to hear the rain. It must be getting warmer. I roll over.

When my alarm goes off and I climb out of the truck to make a pitstop, the last meddling detail of the forecast slaps me awake - Freezing Rain! The entire earth, as far as I can see in all directions, has been glazed over like a Krispy Kreme Donut. I can barely walk.

My well planned, half executed, plan has gone to hell. Rumors are that the State Police have closed the highway. I need to fuel up and get on down the road. I gotta go!

I break out my Motor Carrier Atlas and paw to the State Road Conditions page. I call Indiana and Illinois. Each prerecorded message gives weather conditions that sound hours old and cheerfully better than what it looks like now. Neither mentions any highway closures.

To get to the fuel island, I have to pull forward and off to the left. There is a small ridge of leftover snow right in front of my steer tires. Ice is everywhere.

I back up to nudge my way over the ridge with a running start. It seems to work, steer tires, then drive tires, both axles, lumber over the ridge. The trouble comes when I have to start turning right at the moment the first trailer axle reaches the ridge. It stops me cold, like a cow looking at a new gate. I back up and try to hit it a little harder, but the acceleration causes the drive tires to spin. The lot is so slick I can't turn and clear the ridge at the same time.

A driver steps out to repeat the rumor that the highway is closed. I know its a mess out here, but I don't want to shut down on hearsay alone. I back back into my parking space.

After a few moments' contemplation, considering the lot is only two thirds full, I decide if I back up, there is no ridge to intercept my turn. Trouble is the parking lot imperceptibly cants down toward the back row. When I back up to come around the other way, the weight of my load takes over. Now I don't have enough traction to pull the load up the slope. Back was easy; downhill. Forward is now impossible. Luckily no one is behind me, and I back into a slot in the back row. Now I've got to call this in. I'm not going to make my appointment.

Dispatch gives me to the shop and they call a wrecker to winch me out. The shop calls back to tell me the wrecker is two hours out if the highway remains open. The day is shot and I've driven 137.5 miles.

I jump out and slither my way across the lot to get a newspaper. About halfway across barely able to stand, let alone walk, an icy finger runs up my spine. The keys I confirmed were in my pocket are still my personal keys. I've just made my morning even better - I've locked my rig keys in the cab. It's then that I notice the trucks sitting out on the highway. The State Police have shut it down. The wrecker can't move.

Six hours, three newspapers and four cups of coffee later, the highway is open and the wrecker arrives. The ice has melted enough I could drive out, but I need him to pop the lock. I spent the entire time in a booth at McDonalds and milling around the truckstop, chiming in to complain about the ice, not letting on that I would rather be in my truck reading or sleeping but for the lack of a key!

Things were looking up for a minute or two. Then I learned the customer won't take the delivery late. The warehouse store concept calls for deliveries after midnight but not during store hours. Dispatch has me take the load to a drop lot in Hammond. Someone else will take the load in tomorrow night.

Everyone on the highways is still a little skittish but they are moving along. The exit is fairly well groomed. The service road is pretty sloppy. Around the curve, first drive past the International Dealer, the drop lot is slick and white; like the underbelly of a great fish. Ice all the way back between the buildings, beyond the parked trucks - some waiting for Monday, some rusting hulks.

If I don't pause, don't hesitate for a split second, I can move over the ice. I see another of our trailers and turn toward it. My forward motion doesn't even change. There'll be no turning here. As I coast to the last curve before the fence, there is just enough traction at this speed to go around to the right. Carefully positioning the truck, I back into a hole next to my sister trailer.

I can't get out from under the trailer. Traction, or lack thereof, still devil's me. Dolleys are down, king pin unlocked, but my tires just spin. I try taking weight off, putting it back on to no avail. For traction, I decide to pull out and back in a couple feet to the right. There is snow there where no tires have travelled.

Halfway back in the lot, the trailer is not traveling with me! It has followed me out but is lolling side to side on the fifth wheel. When I bumped the trailer to re-lock the kingpin, the lack of traction psyched me. Luckily, the dolleys are still mostly down. If I'd have lost the trailer it would still be standing. I manage to get out from under the trailer but it is in the middle of the yard. Amazingly, the truck slips back under and I back in over the snow.

The snow offers no help - no traction. I've spun the drive tires a couple times. I might as well be on a lake Ice Fishing.

Over by the back of one of the warehouses, a skid with a built up crate of 2x4's and big thick cardboard rest akimbo at the edge of a pile. The long sides are three foot by four foot pieces stapled on. I yank them off and skitter back to the truck. Stuffed under the drive tires, they might offer some grip. My Kingdom for some traction! Of course, my Kingdom is 8 or 10 boxes in my parents basement, mail at my sister's and a boat that doesn't float yet.

Easing the clutch out as slow as I can, in a gear just a notch too high to prevent spin, I eye the cardboard in my convex mirrors. Sweet potential savior cardboard, hear my croak; my anguished plea for mercy.

The tires begin to move, is it?!?!? Come on! And Zip!! . . . the cardboard slips under the first drive axle and curls up in front of the second. Like a Cash Register Receipt paper jam - my transaction could not be completed. Plenty of traction on top of the cardboard; absolutely none on the bottom. I call dispatch for my second winch out of the morning.

Same company, same model wrecker, new driver. A wrecker to haul semis is a special beast; one huge animal. He has little trouble on the ice. The wrecker is part crane for trucks in ditches. He backs in front of me, hooks a cable and pulls forward.

The crane part has feet that fold out to stabilize like cranes and overhead lifts do. Rather than folding the feet out flat, he stomps the toes into the ice and pulls the cable taut with a dip of the crane - like a Transformer doing the Macarena.

I'm literally yanked out from under the trailer. He left me in a spot of ice, so there's a second yank. I crawl under the empty sister trailer but can't get out. This time he connects the cable and tows me all the way out to the road. I'm back on the lake, but Water Skiing rather than Ice Fishing.

I sign his ticket and get on my way. A glutton for punishment, now I'm chasing the storm into Michigan with an empty trailer. What a week and its only my Tuesday! Two days in, I've spent $385 of the company's money and, for me, I've driven less than 150 miles; about $50 before taxes.

The very next day, I made it to Ohio and sat for four hours to get a twenty minute fuel filter change. Things are looking up! It'll cost you a case a beer to hear that story.