Chapter 11

After making some calls, I learned that both Shawna and Ashley were out-of-town. I went down to the bar to have some food and a much-needed drink. When I finished my dinner, I called Beth. After a little chitchat, she told me that since I needed to return to Nashville on Monday for an initial demonstration of the freight tracking software, it would be best to return early and relax for a day or two. I caught up on all of my reading and then went to bed. I awoke early, did my exercise routine, and checked out early, so I could catch a morning flight to Nashville. I was there by lunchtime.

I checked in with Craig and told him about my meeting with the investors.

"Britt, you and I are killing ourselves now for the big payday in ten years. Most people work for forty or fifty years after school. I've been at this longer than you have, but we're both young. Every day, as this continues to move forward, my excitement continues to grow."

"I know. All of my friends are settling in and hooking up with other people. I feel left out, but I knew that this would happen. Even the girl over at Vanderbilt that I was sleeping with found the man of her dreams."

"It sucks. I have to listen to my wife and kids bitch that I'm never home, and you go home to silence. I'm not sure which is worse."

"Craig, I chose what I have over what you have, so you must have it worse."

"Thanks and screw you. Speaking of screwing you, I had a thought the other day. We're closing on two of the largest trucking companies next week to get their contracts. They both use primarily independent owner operators. I think it would be good for you to get your CDL (commercial driver's license) and ride along with some of the drivers. It would be great if you could plan it, so you can stop at the new truck stops that are opening and learn about the routes."

I said, "You want me to go to truck driver's school? That sounds cool. How long does it take to get a CDL?"

"I actually want you to go class and see how they teach. We will either want to buy them or hire them to get our drivers trained."

"Craig, I agree that we should have trained drivers, but let the schools stay independent. This area is not something that we can expand out to the masses, so let them do their thing. We can let them cover the overhead and insurance of new drivers and I want them grinding the gears on someone else's trucks."

"I thought you wanted to own the world, or at least the world of trucking."

"I do, but I want to make sure that we are strategic in our thinking and what we eventually place into the real world. I hope we can make a change, so we ultimately see a significant reduction in the turnover we're currently experiencing in the industry. This will mean safer drivers and fewer new guys being trained."

"I understand what you're saying, but what about getting a license?"

"I'll go through the class and then ride the routes." I said.

There's a school in Chattanooga that has room for you in their class that's starting on Wednesday. It will go for two and a half weeks. I had Beth put you up at the Palmer House downtown. Let's get back to the meeting on Monday. You're going to like it, because we will finally be looking at the Beta version of the software."

Later that night, I had dinner by myself, and then returned all of my messages. I went over to the YMCA to swim and put a mile behind me before crawling out to dry off. I was walking out and I stopped on a bench to tie my shoes. There were five guys wanting to play basketball, so one guy came over to me and asked if I wanted to play as the sixth man. "Sure," I said,

I was now full grown, standing at six-foot three and a half inches, and around hundred and ninety pounds. I had very little fat, and had good strength from the push-ups every morning. My team was 'skins' and I dropped my shirt on my bag. I shook hands with everyone and we started. After four years playing with Reggie and his frat brothers, I played fairly well. I could hit a jump shot from inside twelve feet and could dunk on a good day. I was best at rebounding and opening the floor for my teammates, in addition to a decent inside hook shot.

The other team had a guy around six-foot four two hundred and fifty pounds. It appeared that his normal game was to dominate inside, but he wasn't very good at it, because he was as slow as Christmas. I was the bus driver and I was taking him to school underneath the basket. It was just a pick-up game, but it was easy to make him mad, and the teasing comments from his friends weren't helping much.

It came to a head when my team had the ball. Joe had the ball up at the top of the key to the left and passed it to Marty at the top of the key on the right. I dropped down to the base line to get on the other side of the hot head, Mark, and when I was almost past him, I caught an elbow right under my eye. I went down and took my time getting up. Mark was acting as if it was an accident. I walked it off and finally settled down enough to continue the game. All the other players were giving him shit and telling him that it was a cheap shot.

It was only two plays later that I signaled Joe to give me an alley-oop pass. I jumped as high as I could and dunked the ball. I held on to the rim and then as I swung forward I kicked the motherfucker, Mark, right in the mouth. I never did take any martial art lessons, but at this point in my life, I felt very tired about always being the punching bag. He went down and smacked his head on the court. No blood from the back of his head, but I think I broke his nose and he bit something in his mouth. He can blame it on picking on a guy who hadn't had any pussy recently.

That ended the game and I got some lip, but as they say, 'payback's a bitch'. Joe asked if I wanted to grab a beer. I told him that I was wearing my only clean clothes, but I'd meet him somewhere if he wanted. He mentioned a bar downtown, not too far from my place, so I told him that I'd meet him there in thirty minutes.

I changed into some jeans after a quick shower and wandered over to the bar. I noticed the beginnings of a black eye from the elbow, but I realized that I'd live. Joe was at the bar nursing his drink when I walked in. I ordered a Rolling Rock and he told me that Mark was an ass and a hot head. When we started to talk about work, he said that he was an agent in the music industry. He represented a couple big name performers, and about twenty that were trying to become big name performers. I told him about my business as a consultant in the trucking business.

We were both still young, I was twenty and he was twenty-eight. He became distracted when two ladies came in behind me. I turned and saw two very cute ladies. Since the bar was busy, they were having trouble getting the bartender's attention. When one glanced at me, I asked her what she wanted to drink.

Her friend, standing behind her, said, "A whiskey sour and a glass of white wine."

I turned, and at six feet three inches, with an open bar tab, it was easy to get his attention and order the drinks. As the bartender set them in front of me, I just stood up and pulled out my bar stool for her. The dark-haired short one, Anna, took my stool and the taller blonde took Joe's stool as he stood for her. She asked how much the drinks were and I said, "I don't know. My accountant will see the bill at the end of the month."

"Are you in town on business?" Anna asked.

"No, I'm tired of business. I'm back in town for a weekend off. I've been away on business for the last month or five."

Joe was talking with Molly and seemed comfortable. I asked Anna, "What about you, are you from here or just visiting?"

"I grew up in Memphis, but went to school at Vanderbilt and stayed here after school. Molly and I both work for the marketing department of the Grand Ole Opry."

We had a few drinks and then I asked if we could interest them in joining us for some dinner. If they weren't, I was going to have to switch to martinis just, so I could have some olives. I was starving. Apparently, I wasn't the only one that was hungry, so the four of us went in to the dining room. I tried not to look like a pig, but had a big dinner while Anna had a small salad and a baked fish dish.

I asked them if they had any plans for the night. When they said no, I asked them if they'd like to go dancing with us. We were all getting along very well and I looked to my wing-man to point us in the right direction. He mentioned a club called the Cotton Eyed Joe. I didn't know where it was, so I said, "Anna, do you know where it is? I walked here from my place. Can you give me a ride to the club and I can catch a cab home?"

"You can ride with me and Molly, unless Molly wants to ride with Joe."

Molly wanted to ride with Joe, so I rode with Anna. When we arrived at the club, Joe knew some people and they led us to the VIP section near the stage. We listened to some music and had a couple of drinks. I asked Anna to dance with me and showed her all that I had learned about the two-step. We were on the dance floor dancing for most of the night. At the end of the night, it was a little different. Joe wanted to take Molly home, but she just wanted to give him her phone number. Anna wanted to take me home, but had Molly with her. I gave Anna a kiss and told her that I'd find a ride home and that if she wanted to give me her number, I'd try to call her sometime. I told her that since I'd be traveling for the next few months, she shouldn't wait by her phone.

Over the weekend, I worked out both days, did my laundry, and finally caught up on my reading. I went to get some new clothes and a backpack. Since I'd be on the road for a while, I had to pack light. I went with a few pairs of jeans, shirts I could layer and underwear and socks. I also packed some shorts and t-shirts and figured that I'd wear my running shoes everywhere. Last, I packed a bathing suit if the opportunity rose to go for a swim.

At some of the truck stops in the southern states, where our construction crews could work both inside and out over the winter, they were getting ready to open to the public. I knew that we were about to close on two large trucking companies. Once we owned them, we'd immediately start to make money on the loads just like the existing companies. We had several other advantages that included being self-insured and offering our trucks the fuel though our pumps. Currently, the drivers would still be pulling the loads from end to end, so they'd make use of their sleeper cab trucks with the larger and less efficient motors.

On Monday, I sat in on the beta demonstration of the bar-code technologies. It all looked great and we'd start testing it on our southern routes. It would mean a significant change for the drivers because they would now need to stop every four to five hours and drive through one of our truck stops even if they weren't fueling up. The current trucks had large capacity tanks that would allow them to drive up to two thousand miles based on two 150-gallon tanks and achieving seven miles to the gallon. Each gallon of fuel weighs eight pounds, so that in the beginning, a full fuel load can add a ton of weight that the truck must haul. With smaller tanks, we will cut the maximum weight to eight hundred pounds or a hundred gallon tank. This would be enough fuel to drive for over ten hours on the road.

I left on Tuesday to go down to Chattanooga. The Land Cruiser was six years old, but still in good shape. I checked into the hotel and unpacked my three sets of clothes. I then drove out to check out where the class was so that in the morning I could find it easier. After a dinner and a walk around downtown, I went to bed early.

The class was just what I expected. What you need to envision, is learning to drive a car, but on a much larger scale. First, was the class work; learning the rules of the road, etiquette for big rigs, the parts of a truck and how it ran. We learned about air brakes and jake brakes and about how to use four times the number of gears that we have in cars.

After the classroom work, we went to work on the truck. We learned how to hook and unhook a trailer. We learned how to hook up the air lines for the brakes. They taught us how to check the wear and air pressure in the tires and how to put out markers and flares if we ever had a breakdown. We learned all the basic head knowledge we'd need to pass the test. Next, we took turns driving. We worked in a big lot with cones instead of telephone poles and cars because at the beginning, we all ran into something trying to navigate a right hand turn without using six lanes of traffic.

When we finally got the going forward down, we then had to learn the hard part - how to do it all backwards, using the truck's mirrors. We practiced and practiced, because the penalties of even the smallest mistake can be costly. When they thought that they had provided us with all the skills, we took the exam and received our CDL. We each then drove a couple thousand miles with an instructor to show that we could do it all on the open road, and it included a fair amount of in-town driving. It wasn't rocket science, but it made you think twice before cutting off a truck with your car, knowing how much distance the truck driver would need to stop all that weight he was dragging behind him.