Re: Best companies to work for

"bbelly" <brian-belliveauNO@SPAMshaw.ca> wrote in message
news:El5hh.492325$5R2.243357@pd7urf3no...
> Douglas W "Popeye" Frederick wrote:
>> "arachnid" <none@goawayspammers.com> wrote in message
>> newsan.2006.12.16.01.19.59.512787@goawayspammers .com...
>>
>>>On Fri, 15 Dec 2006 18:21:01 -0500, Douglas W "Popeye" Frederick wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Opinions vary on the "shortage" of drivers within the industry, but
>>>>companies have sign-on bonuses from 1-3000 bucks, and, 5 grand not
>>>>unheard of.
>>>>
>>>> That sure is a shxtpile of money for a -trucking company- to throw
>>>> away
>>>>for absolutely no reason.
>>>
>>>But first you have to stay with them a certain amount of time to collect.
>>>That's usually a year. With an average 100%-110% turnover rate in the
>>>industry, the odds are pretty good that they won't have to pay off. If
>>>only one driver out of 10 stays the full year, the program costs them
>>>only
>>>$300 per driver.
>>
>>
>> One thing has nothing to do with the other.
>>
>> If you don't stay, you shouldn't get the bonus.
>>
>> But FFE's 5k bonus pays in 6 months.
>>
>>
>>>>>Then the company gets selective on who they hire. That's why I always
>>>>>say keep your record clean so you'll have the advantage. We had a 5
>>>>>year
>>>>>waiting list. A new hire would have to wait until a driver retired
>>>>>until
>>>>>they could get on. Unless there was a new market opening up and a new
>>>>>terminal was going to be built. Or some driver was stupid and got a DUI
>>>>>or stoled gasoline. I saw very few drivers leave. It was just too much
>>>>>to give up and almost impossible to find something better.
>>>>
>>>> I'm glad that job worked for you, but it's the -exact- opposite of
>>>> what
>>>>some guys look for in a driving job (as I watch the sun set in Moose
>>>>Jaw, Saskatchewan).
>>>
>>>That's why I avoid recommending companies to people. Everyone wants
>>>something different and what people want before they've ever been in a
>>>truck is very likely to change after a year on the road.
>>
>>
>> That's a far cry from telling them not to be a trucker at all.
>>
>> Plus, I can only tell them why -I- like it- I can't tell them why they
>> will.
>>
>> They may decide that trucking isn't their bag in 90 days, and it will
>> have nothing to do with the job at all.
>>
>> The FFE 5k guy was the night breakdown guy at my last job- he had 17
>> years OTR experience, and went back in the truck after about 5 years.
>>
>> He couldn't stand it, stayed just long enough to clear the bonus, and
>> turned in the truck.
>>
>> There's only -one way- to find out if you wanna drive a truck.
>>
>> Dave loved his job, I would hate it.
>>
>> E.B. likes Crete, I wouldn't drive for them.
>>
>> They may hate the job I have, but you have to have some experience to
>> know.
>>
>> I have -zero- interest in local driving, or regional, or even a
>> dedicated coast-to-coast.
>>
>> That's fingernail-on-chalkboard monotony to me.
>>
>> I gotta drive across the top of the Great Lakes this week on TC-17,
>> I'm -erect- with anticipation.
>>
>> Some guys are hauling the same old scow up the street and back, home
>> for dinner.
>>
>> And they're happy for it.
>>
>> I chose this gig from several possibilities as a semi-retirement, and I
>> frikkin -love- it.
>>
>> But I don't have a wife or kids, and I have two houses carefully rented
>> out so that they pay for themselves.
>>
>> If you've ever had renters, especially in another state, you know what
>> I mean.
>>
>> I'm happy in the truck, I take runs in the mountains and bad weather
>> that other guys hate, and I -love- waking up in a different place every
>> day.
>>
>> I arranged my trip to make a two hour stop at a museum in Moose Jaw in
>> the a.m., I'm parked across from it now.
>>
>> Everybody wants something different.
>>
>> I'm a sailor at sea.
>
> Enjoy the view. Have you been?
>
> I was born at the big stink (TB) about 2 hrs east of my 'home' at Thunder
> Bay (TB).
>
> In the next few days, I'm gonna cut and run back to TB, to finally get my
> (our) family back in one place ... my wife finally got her job terminated
> about 8 months later than our plans included. You may see her workplace as
> you pull in to town ... at the first lights (Canadian Tire), she worked at
> the big blue stink off to the right (south) ... behind the airport, in
> front of the mountain, from your point of view.
>
> Our house is on the big river, across from the 'hysterical park'.
>
> FYI ... some kick ass hills on the "circle route".
>
> East from Nipigon ... Kama Hill is just a grind.
>
> Caver's Hill is a major deal ... there are many stories of the decent gone
> wrong, and I've seen some of them. I'm told I was a passenger on one such
> adventure, when the truck my dad was driving us to Thunder Bay in, lost
> it's brakes ... Mexican overdrive all the way down ... and I've been
> quoted as saying " again ! " which may have been stolen by a baby
> dinosaur, though I said it the late 50's. The old road was 7 switch backs
> ... ran above the cuts, came to the mid-hill rift crossing, and then wound
> around the knobs. The original alignment will be above you on the right.
> When you can see that that route is not working, carry over the rift, and
> watch for the old road as a ledge above and right
>
> The hill after Pays Plat (do the posted limit on the flat ... 70 or so I
> think ... if the camera is out, they will nail you bad ... reserve
> police ) is a big uphill grind. In the first iteration of the downhill
> side, the long final grade scared a lot of people, because the road
> appeared to run directly into a lake at the bottom! The upgraded route
> changed the sight line to eliminate this view. Old road is below on the
> left.
>
> The present alignments are mostly from a 2nd stage in the 60's & 70's.
> Even today, the 'old road' is visible, though an intimate knowledge skews
> my perspective.
>
> As I recall, one of the rock-cuts here is the record holder for such an
> engineering feat ... largest volume of rock for an 'open cut' ... and that
> was in the 60's when they did it ... it's better than twice as wide now.
> We had a bit of snow one week about 12 years ago ... it took DAYS to open
> one lane through the cuts here ... vans virtually buried where they
> stalled.
>
> As you drop off this hill, passing Rossport, you get a nice stretch along
> the lake shore. As I recall, signs for "Rainbow Park" will be at the start
> of the next up grind.
>
> Grinelda (sp) is at Rossport. I am confident you know that anyway ... my
> cousin has been there ... he lost buds as well & he knows more than most
> about the 'graveyard' in Thunder Bay harbour
>
> Between Schreiber and Terrace Bay, just after the RR overpass, you get a
> nice straight 3 lane stretch. If you glance left, you may catch a glimpse
> of Hay's Lake. After a bit, you pass a water tower on the right ... and
> you'll be close to the same elevation as the top of that tank, which is
> the surge tank for the water from that reservoir passing through a
> generator at the lake shore.
>
> If you have the opportunity, I would like to suggest you view "the
> Agusabon Falls Gorge" ... access from the highway just as you enter
> Terrace Bay limits, it's at the campground. I would not suggest trucking
> in, though I really don't know how it might work out. If you were to flash
> on the road-side, the gorge is about a 10 minute walk from the road, and
> what you get to see is all that elevation dropped in one fall (150 ft?),
> and then it passes through a 'rift valley' ... two walls of granite, laser
> straight for several hundred feet, about 12 feet wide at the river, &
> perhaps 40' wide at the top. Learn t technical rock climbing on these
> faces - long before I realized how much it hurts when good gravity goes
> bad.
>
> McCausland hospital may remember me .. I was a cry baby.
>
> Spent a couple years on reconstruction of the paper mill.
>
> The stretch from Terrace Bay (TB) to Marathon is so pretzel-ated that some
> places you can see your back bumper.
>
> Little Pic River bridge is the "highest above its' watercourse" on the TCH
> ... eastbound, it's a downhill run to a slow turn (perhaps a 60 klik
> advisory).
>
> You will pass a service station / convenience / liquor store at Ney's
> Provincial Park - my uncle did that. (Ney's was a WW2 POW camp - mostly
> Germans ... the penalty for escaping was ... ACCHTUNG! you are in Northern
> Ontario during one of the four season's ... bug's , mud's , snow's, or
> heat. When you find your way back, knock gently, but not too early, and we
> may let you back in.)
>
> At White River, you pass through an arch bridge (assuming it hasn't been
> replaced). My dad was a crane operator for that project - I was a gleam in
> his eye at that time, and he was a professional small town hockey player,
> getting paid to play with a crane, to fill the time between games (met my
> mom in Montreal when he checked out the opportunity This is where Winnie
> The Pooh was captured ...
>
> Wawa ... great big goose on your left ... don't know if this is the
> 'record size' of its' genre ... I have noticed many such oddities ...
> perogy - mushroom - sausage ... and many more around Ab.
>
> The most dangerous part of your route (imho) would be Montreal River Hill.
> South of Wawa. Lake Superior Provincial Park. Snoozed at the over view one
> evening ... 70 F perhaps - went to about 30 as I slept. It was September.
>
> The Edmond Fitzgerald is off to your right, just a few hundred feet below
> the surface.
>
> Hope this missive finds you before you it's too late ... just got in from
> a major bad weather adventure (if the temperature is -4 c, and it's
> raining, is this a bad thing when you get paid never less than 60 minutes
> per hour?)
>
> Hope to catch you on the flop
>
> Brian Belliveau
>
> Bruderheim, Ab

Thanks, BBelly.

I'll watch the downgrades.

I'll be loaded lite, about 23,000 kilos, but that'll just present a whole
different class of problems.

The wind and the ice have been... special.

The snow's finally quit, think I'll get a shower and boogie.

I don't know how anyone could trade this for a cubicle, or $200 slacks, or
home-every-nite driving.

I remember one of my Belgian friends from Rec.scuba asking "how come
you're 'just' a truck driver now"...

"Douglas W "Popeye" Frederick" <Popeye@finalprotectivefire.com> wrote in
message news:12oagns7mptdm6d@news.supernews.com...
<snip>
>
> Thanks, BBelly.
>
> I'll watch the downgrades.
>
> I'll be loaded lite, about 23,000 kilos, but that'll just present a
whole
> different class of problems.
>
> The wind and the ice have been... special.
>
> The snow's finally quit, think I'll get a shower and boogie.
>
> I don't know how anyone could trade this for a cubicle, or $200 slacks,
or
> home-every-nite driving.

I can, but that's just me
I've no problem driving in ice, snow, wind. However 'd have a problem with
wrecking

Though when I saw the photos.......

--
Dennis