CHAPTER 17
(Second Place is the Biggest Loser)
I was in complete shock when I opened the Email. At first I was convinced it had to be some kind of phishing scam. Just another email that escaped from the junk mail. But the Caption was real.
PTL TO HOST A BIGGEST LOSER COMPETITION.
$1,000.00 Grand Prize
I was enthralled yet hurtful all in one. I didn't really know these people. Who in there thought I was fat? Could most guys in their mid thirties crank out 50 push-ups like I could? I continued to read the email and concluded the upcoming competition was indeed legit. Somebody had ratted me out that over the months I had become a butterball and was now toting a few extra trucker pounds. A lot of it may have stemmed from all the gambling I was spending my time with. Instead of going for walks every now and then I literally spent my free time doing my horsey research. My gigabyte usage was high and I probably had over 1000 racehorse names memorized.
Somehow I let myself plump out to 260 lbs. the fattest I had ever been in my life. There were more steak dinners swimming inside my belly than I knew what to do with. And now somebody had entered me into a Biggest Loser Competition!
Eventually my cellphone number ended up in a group text. I think I was in team 23 or something like that. We had about 5 on our team. Not everyone in our team were truckers. The company had put some fatties from the office in our team. I still couldn't help but be curious. Who in there had noticed Blaker209 had fattened up quite a bit?
Nevertheless I was delighted to be a part of something but still felt the office workers had the advantage over the truckers. We had long 14 hour days almost EVERY DAY. How would we get to a gym? And most importantly where would we get our shower to spray down our wet stinky asses after our workouts?
The Biggest Loser competition went on for a good few months and it didn't take me long to go from 260 to 240. A nice weight loss of 20lbs. It was difficult finding time to go for a jog so I ended up eating mostly hard boiled eggs without the egg yolk. I had to eliminate sugar completely and take it as far as no longer even adding creamers to my morning coffee. We were required to pay our 0.25 cents into the weighing machines at the truck stops and submit the weight pics to the team. Every week the percentage results were listed in the company magazine. Even though I was losing weight I was getting mad that I never reached a week where I landed first place. It always ended up being that couple that drove team. I didn't think that was fair either. Those love birds probably burned enough calories just doing the humpty hump each night back in the sleeper birth. I'll never forget how grossed out I was getting issued my first 10 speed Trucker Cycle at Celadon. Used of course. I don't know what newly institutionally released driver had it before me but he must of had some REAL serious words with his frightened dispatcher because he left some very, and I mean VERY, crunchy privacy curtains behind for the next guy. Unfortunately that next guy was me:( To this day I can only imagine how that conversation went between the driver and his dispatcher while he had his Dick out followed by a big toothy grin. Celadon of course. The place known for drivers purposely smearing poo ALL OVER THE BATHROOM STALLS.
“Oh yeah? You want me to take a load where? For two hundred miles huh? I-95 bumper to bumper traffic the WHOLE way through? And my detention pay from last week is where?”
I could only imagine how the conversation evoked a hideous pair of crunchy privacy curtains covered in protein stains.
As the Biggest Loser Competition played out I eventually saw my name bump up to the top of the list. I must have had a week where I lost a lot of weight because there was one week where I finally reached second place. Second place. Most often described as the "First Loser". I wasn't really sure that I liked second place just knowing I couldn't be at the very top. The contest was fun but I was quickly learning that not all of my teammates spoke horsey language like I did. It was a shame because during those months were right during the period of the triple crown and I was texting the group very credible horsey tips. VERY credible. It seemed only one lady in the group found me amusing and was absorbing all the credible horsey tips I offered the group text. I even encouraged the group to partake in much gambling as it would leave them no money for food and help them win the contest. Why was my group mostly so lame? Did we really have to act out or Dilbert comic age?
Once I squeezed down to 230 pounds my body started yelling at me. The waitresses in the truck stops were giving me looks like it was time to scoot up to the big boy table and leave those 2/$5 hard boiled eggs alone. I was making plenty of money as it was and $1,000.00 prize money was merely chump change to a Billy Big Rigger like me. I had already played a thousand dollar hand of black Jack before and giggled about it after I lost up at Hollywood. Some younger guy won the competition and before I knew it the weight creeped it's way back up. I started hitting some record high blood pressure numbers and soon found myself with a serious case of gout in my left foot. I had never experienced this kind of pain in my foot before. I could no longer jog and before I knew it I had put the entire thirty pounds right back on!
I'll never forget the one rainy day when I had to brake hard for a red light. I heard a thud sound from the back and assumed that the car behind me rear ended me from stopping hard but nobody was behind me! My second thought was perhaps the sudden braking caused my load to shift so I opted to drive to the nearest truck stop in my route. I was in for a real treat when I did my post trip at the end of my day. My rear bumper was flipped upwards and barely hanging on by a thread! Had I been rear ended by the invisible man?
I shined the flashlight all over the damage until I finally started chuckling as I pieced everything together what had actually happened. There was no accident. There was no invisible man. The dilapidated trailer I was hauling was no good. What had happened was the trailer pin had popped off when I had braked hard on a wet day for a red light. Usually rainy days can make the brakes a lot more touchy than usual. The tandems had slid back and rammed against the bumper causing it to flip up and making it appear like I was in an accident when in actuality it was equipment failure. The company allowed me to bend and bust off the bumper until it could be repaired. I ended up getting to use a free body pillow that night as it took me forever squeezing that big dirty cold bumper into my rig.
The southerners were known for being gamblers just like myself. When I encountered tire blowouts the mechanics often encouraged me to what they liked to refer to as "limp" along. I met an old guy that liked wearing Jesus hats and was real picky about logging the full 15 minutes for those pre-trips. Needless to say our Jesus Christ Safety Star didn't last too long at PTL. PTL was extremely forgiving when it came to accidents if you agreed to adhere to their "shut up and drive" trucker mantra. I couldn't believe some of the lofty numbers I had seen in their hall of shame that were still employed with the company. Those guys of course would have no problems "limping" along. In fact they would even go the extra mile. A few extra miles as a matter of fact and let all the tires blow out and just use the train tracks to make those deliveries. PTL was a great place to go for those wild eyed child "yessir" "no mam" type. Some extra tight nut hugging blue jeans with a John Deere polo shirt got you in good with the company on any given day.
Once I got within a few weeks of a year mark with PTL I noticed my loads really started to suck and my paychecks were getting shorter. I was still sport gambling quite a bit but no longer found extra money to support my Habit as my miles were ostensibly waning. I was getting really scared that the doctors might pull my medical card because my blood pressure had reached stage 2. My foot wasn't getting any better and my doctor had it X-rayed which wasn't necessary. I soon found myself limping around but because the company had placed me into an automatic truck I had no excuse for a doctor and had to keep on trucking. I didn't like giving these people seven days a week of my time for back to back $300 and $400 paychecks. It made no sense at all as we were often faced with lofty parking fees not to mention a proper meal at the TA could easily run ya $25.00. I wasn't one to skip meals.
January 16th, 2016
It has been exactly 12 years since going under the knife in Chicago. PTL is still ripping me off with owed detention/breakdown wages. I'm even certain they are not properly calculating my pay miles. I know I need to leave this company as I am convinced they are at least $1,000.00 behind in owed wages. But what has me petrified the most? My health. The doctors have already curtailed my medical card to 90 day restriction. I know my blood pressure is still extremely high and the payroll ladies definitely aren't doing anything to help bring it down. Nobody in there even appreciates my horsey tips I submit via Qualcomm. At the end of the week I go to check on my paycheck and I realize they shorted me on three days breakdown pay. I'm not happy with this. I got a full year in with these people and I realize it's time to go. So I submit my two week notice via freeform message on the Qualcomm. Less than an hour later a message pops up adding an additional $50 to my paycheck for breakdown pay but they are still another $100 short! Not to mention owed wages have reached $1,000.00! I stay adamant with my resignation. I don't need to put a fur coat on these people anymore. Besides, the doctors are gonna pull my medical card in just two weeks!
TWO WEEKS LATER
As soon as I pull into the PTL terminal I remove my GPS from the windshield. A man sporting his GI-Joe pants is frowning at me as if trying to intimidate me. It's almost as if I can read his thoughts that seem to be speaking out loud. What are you doing Steidler? Are you really gonna throw all of this away? Do you keep forgetting you're a hot one? Do you know how many strings we had to pull to shush the witches that would love to politick about you Steidler?
I didn't care. 99% of the time those military uniforms intimidate me three times more than a Poh-poh sporting their blues but I just wasn't in the mood today. Besides, the doctors didn't need to know anymore about me than they already knew. The per diem at this company was extremely high which does nothing in the long run for my retirement. No way was this BillyBig Rigger gonna slave away seven days from sun up to sun down my entire life only to have Queen B at the Social Security office tell me to go claim my spot under a bridge like everyone else because all that work I did in life never reached the book keeper. I was no sucker to this shit. I also knew that the per diem would substantially reduce UC payouts as well as Disability should I ever face another serious injury. I knew I had to give these red blooded republicans a good cover story if I wanted to stay in their good graces. Dan was the company's feedback guy and wanted to know where Blaker209 was heading off to next. I didn't have another trucking job lined up and I knew it was driving them crazy. I knew my best option was to convince them I was going to continue the republican legacy. I had ideas of running my own vending business.
*Zzzzzzz*- *zzzzzzz*- *zzzzzz* My cellphone was buzzing. "Yes?"
"Hey it's Dan I see that you are leaving us?"
"Yes."
"Any reason why? Was it something we did?"
I lied. "Oh no it's not like that. I put some money away and I have plans of starting my own vending business."
Dan chuckled. "May I ask of what?"
I knew we were just one week away from a very serious Nor'easter blizzard on its way to the east coast. I tried to stifle my giggles over the phone.
"I want to start my own snow cone business." "It's January Blake."
I knew Dan could detect at least one chuckle I was hiding from him. "I know I'm gonna sell snow cones in a blizzard. Save up the money for my girlfriends in the wild Wild West, head out to Nevada and sell sand boxes in the desert."
Dan didn't know how to respond. He changed the subject while I could hear him leafing through my file.
"Well, I'm really liking all this positive energy. What I'm mostly impressed by you is I see you made it here an entire year and managed this entire time to stay off our radar. Nobody in here really knows who you are."
And let's keep it like that Dan. The pee pee story is old news and my Uncle tells me bombs and botched pee pees are deemed a bad mix for Human Resources so let's just pretend I'm a ghost I thought to myself.
"Yeah I don't really know how to answer that Dan. I guess I never really got the chance to really know anybody in there."
Dan continued. "Well if you're serious about leaving I guess I'll close your file. Good luck with your hot dog stand."
I corrected him. "Snow cones Dan. I'm selling snow cones in a blizzard."