Truck Drivin' Man

It's been back to school since Wednesday. Before our instructor went out on vacation, we did some shifting and I had a little trouble there.

Wednesday our instructor, Tony, drove us to an industrial park in Pennsauken. There we took turns driving around and shifting. I found that it came easier to me now, by the end of my turn behind the wheel Tony had me downshifting.

Thursday was a real challenge. Tony said we were going out to the same place, but this time I was driving out. "You're ready" as he put it.

I no sooner left the parking lot and was just getting ready to downshift before an off road construction zone, when a flagman jumped out from behind a bush and signaled for all traffic to stop. I stopped the truck no problem, a bit of a skid from the back wheels for a moment...but must have done everything right, because Tony was yelling at the flagman and not at me! Otherwise, the drive went without incident, matter of fact I was downshifting a lot easier.

Today it was my turn to drive back from the industrial park. At this point I'm finding that shifting and downshifting are no problem, now I'm learning to judge whether green lights are about to turn red. We did all this in the rain (it poured all afternoon). I had to stop quickly on a couple of lights where the instructor said he would have gone through, but at no time was the truck in danger.

Each day it's getting easier and I'm picking up on new things. Maybe this is because I've driven big vehicles before (deuce-and-a-halfs, half tons, and straight flatbeds). But the bottom line is that I'm lovin' it!