Dave Carter

In conversation yesterday, I made it a point to wish those with whom I spoke a “Happy Independence Day.” I did that because it seems that “Happy 4th of July,” doesn’t cut to the core of what it is we are celebrating. And it is probably more important now than at any time in our recent history to remember what it is we are celebrating. As a son of the South, I’ve always been proud to be thought of as a rebel; someone who isn’t content just to go along with the herd. But then, we are a nation of rebels, are we not? As British subjects, our ancestors told King George III to essentially take his scepter and shove it, and then they laid down their very lives in war to found a country in which the freedom of the human spirit would be embraced rather than feared. It was, and still is, a remarkable concept. And it worked.

Last evening, I stopped at a truck stop in Niota, Tennessee. Niota is located about halfway between Chattanooga and Knoxville, on I-75. A quintessential slice of small town Americana, Niota celebrates Independence Day by gathering at Crazy Ed’s Truck Stop (and fireworks stand) for a gospel sing (ACLU protestations to the contrary) and some fireworks. I stopped in at Crazy Ed’s for a late lunch, and the waitress was kind enough to invite me to stay for the evening’s festivities.

The gospel singing portion consisted of a lady with big hair, and a voice that sounded exactly like Dolly Parton, singing her way through some old familiar gospel tunes as well as some of her own material. She also sang a fair share of patriotic tunes. When she sang God Bless America, you could have heard a pin drop in the restaurant.

At dusk, a good size crowd had gathered outside Crazy Ed’s. The fireworks were shot from a field located between the restaurant and the Trucker’s Chapel just across the parking lot. Cars and trucks (mostly trucks) parked all over the parking lot and also at the adult video store across the street. I walked through the crowd, searching for a vantage point where I could watch the fireworks and not infringe on any family gatherings that were taking place in the middle of the parking lot. In short order, the fireworks lit up the sky, while the loudspeakers played a Lee Greenwood disc full of patriotic tunes.

There, in the crowd, I saw mamas holding their babies, little children staring wide-eyed at the bright bursts in the air, and wheelchair bound men wearing hats that displayed their military medals. There were young men who stood quietly as Lee Greenwood sang the Star Spangled Banner, older couples who stood arm in arm, truckers who walked out from the cocoon of their sleepers to take in a patriotic festival, and of course one old vet with his hair in a pony tail standing there misty-eyed at his good fortune to be here on this night.

I know that larger cities have more extravagant displays, some with orchestras, some with enough pyrotechnics to give a rock and roll fan like me a real head rush. But looking around me last night, it occurred to me that these were exactly the kind of down to earth good folks that took up arms against the British, that fought and died at Gettysburg, that shed their blood in the trenches of Europe in the First World War, and stormed the beaches at Normandy and saved the world in the Second World War. It was the common folk, from what the pompous-assed class refers to as “Fly-over Country,” that shivered through the numbing cold of Korea, brought death swiftly to the enemy in the jungles of Vietnam, faced down the amassed military and nuclear might of the Soviet Union, and answers the call to this day in a barren part of the world from which an inhuman evil seeks to cross our shores and kill as many of us as possible. These people are not only the backbone of America,…if you will pardon the crudity, they are its balls as well. The American spirit of independence runs strong through these good people. When tragedy hits, they don’t wail for the government to come bail them out, rather they roll up their sleeves and help each other. For my money, I can’t think of any other group of people with whom I’d rather celebrate Independence Day than these folks.

It also occurred to me that while America enjoyed its barbeques, its fireworks, its beer, its family gatherings… the price for this festive celebration of freedom is even now being paid by volunteers thousands of miles away. Looking through our national history, the good life we live and celebrate is very costly. The old adage that freedom is never free has as much meaning today as at any time in our history. Those who have served, have made sacrifices necessary for loved ones and countrymen back home to be able to live up to the ideals enshrined in the Declaration of Independence.

We are the Land of the Free! That means the freedom to pursue our God given talents as we desire, the freedom to speak our minds (McCain Feingold notwithstanding), the freedom to provide for our families, the freedom to save and own property (the Supreme Court notwithstanding), the freedom to defend our family and property (Gun Control Nuts notwithstanding). For me, this all comes down to the following: After 20 years in the military, I now have the freedom to wear my hair long, to work in a job that provides shelter and food, to drive across this great land in a line of work which effectively makes America my office, and to live a life that I only dreamed of years ago. As a free man in America, I’m humbled by the blessings my God and my Country have given me. I’m determined to defend my freedom and the freedom of my countrymen regardless of the cost. As long as I have anything to do with it, we will not give in nor bow to any blood thirsty bastard whose God tells him to wear a diaper on his head and kill as many innocents as possible in order to fornicate with 72 virgins in the hereafter. Not on this cajun’s watch.

As the glow of Independence Day celebrations recedes, would it not be a good idea to celebrate Independence Day every day? Shouldn’t every day that we wake up above ground be a chance to renew the spirit of independence and freedom? Shouldn’t we resolve that our freedom will not be given in whole to foreign enemies, nor in bits and pieces to advocates of omnipotent government at home? Look around at what we have and what we are able to do in this country. As the saying goes, “You can’t do this in France.” We are the Land of the Free precisely because we are also the Home of the Brave. After the Constitution was drafted, a woman asked Ben Franklin what the founders had given the American people. Franklin answered, “We’ve given you a Republic, if you can keep it.” How well we really understand the meaning behind Independence Day will determine whether or not we can remain independent.

It's been a long, long time since I posted, I know. Much has happened, as always, and much of it not worth writing about, as always. But now I have a bonafide exception. My daughter is on the road with me. What a trip this has been!!

The girl doesn't have much more sense than I have, which while unfortunate for her, is hugely entertaining. She manages to find fun in almost every situation, and she never fails to surprise me. Addicted to this pop country channel on satellite radio, she listens to pretty much the same rotation of songs. In fact, the advertisement for this station should say, "New Country: The same #@$& songs, all the #@$& time." So yesterday I changed to a channel that plays older country music, and the familiar twang of the first bars of Johnny Cash's song "Folsom Prison" song came on, and Christie knew the song! She started singing the song and I nearly fell out of my chair. How could someone so enthralled with that whiney little fairy, Rascal Flatts, know anything about Johnny Cash? She got a good laugh out of my surprised expression.

We left last Sunday and made our way to Little Rock, AR, then down to Monroe, LA. From there it was down to Pineville before making out way to Shreveport. We stayed that night at an absolutely wonderful truck stop. They have showers with a total of six shower heads hitting you from all directions. It's like a car wash for people!! It was at that truck stop that I tried, unsuccessfully, to operate an alligator lighter, prompting Christie to put the lighter away and lead me out of the place muttering that she can't take me anywhere.

We went on to Dallas, where I had an absolutely awful day. The trailer I was supposed to pick up was broken. It took forever to get another one assigned to me, by which time I had missed my pick-up appointment in Ft Worth. It took 2 hours to go 40 miles to the appointment. Having hooked up to the newly loaded trailer, I saw that it had a flat tire. This was a 4 in the afternoon, and they wanted me to have the thing in Indianapolis by noon the next day! Hobbled the trailer to our terminal in Dallas, where they didn't get it fixed until 9 that evening. I was out of hours, so any chance of delivering on time was thoroughly shot. We left early the next day and went from Dallas to about 30 miles south of Cape Girardeau, Missouri, which wasn't a bad drive at all. Delivered the load in Indy yesterday just after lunch, and am now waiting for the next loaded trailer to arrive at our terminal here in Indy. We will leave for Atlanta early tomorrow.

Our trip will come to a close on Thursday, but it has been a great experience. We've not had one cross word on our trips each summer, and this is the fourth one we've made together. Christie has become an accomplished road warrior,....on top of which she can make a mean peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

My myspace page has been completely revamped, also courtesy of my technically savvy daughter. Check it out at www.myspace.com/gumbeaux62.

Toodles for now....

DAVE'S TOP TEN REASONS TO PROCRASTINATE

1.

London, Ontario. I'm not sure what sort creature inhabits this region, but it isn't human. I mean, they look like humans, walk like humans, talk like ...well,...at least they look like humans. But no human would willingly reside in this environment. The place isn't meant for human habitation. It's meant for polar bears, penguins, ice cubes, but not people.

I've been on the road now for 12 days, and have spent six of those days parked due to winter conditions that made it unsafe or impossible to proceed. Left the house on Monday the 12th, picked up a trailer full of toilet paper that was needed in the mountains of the northeast Pennsylvania. Apparently, something has recently hit the fan up there. I got as far as Raphine, Virginia Tuesday night when an ice storm moved in. I found a truck stop just as things were rapidly deteriorating. The ice pelted the truck throughout the night, but the heater kept me nice and roasty inside the sleeper. The next morning, about a half inch of ice coated everything, and the interstate was shut down because the 18-wheelers couldn't get enough traction on the ice to make it up the hills. I stayed at the truck stop and had a hot meal, watched Judge Judy, etc.

Thursday morning the highway was open, so I continued north on I-81. Got as far as Carlisle, PA, when I learned that I-81 further north was closed. Fortunately, my company has a terminal in Carlisle, so I went there and shut down again. It snowed quite a bit, and the temps never got out of the single digits, so the stuff wouldn't melt. It took several days for them to open the interstate again (you may have seen video of huge traffic backups on the news). My problem was that the place I was delivering to was accessible only via narrow mountain roads that were not yet passable according to the state police. The result was that I sat in Carlisle from Thursday afternoon until the following Tuesday morning before I could make the delivery.

Hoping against hope that I would be dispatched out of the frozen north, I was not surprised to see that my next assignment was a delivery in Toronto, Ontario. At a truck stop in Milton, PA, I saw another driver unable to park her truck because she had manuevered onto a patch of ice and could not get traction to move any further. Someone had a shovel, so I used it to dig a trench behind her drive tires so she could move the beast. It worked. The following morning, my truck was stuck on ice and I found it interesting as the people who had either helped or watched me help the previous evening walked right on by without offering me any assistance. Great bunch of people up north, no?

So Wednesday evening I arrived in downtown Toronto, made my delivery (truckload of garage doors), and then found a place to stop for the night. The computer onboard beeped and my next assignment was in. Was I going back south again? Wrong, diesel breath! My next destination is the Upper Peninsula of Michigan! I was delayed yesterday by a heavy snowstorm and high winds. Made as far as London, Ontario today when I saw a lighted sign above the highway telling me that my highway to Purt Huron, Michigan is closed. I called the Provential Authorities here, and they confirmed. Apparently, this morning's snow storm caused white out conditions resulting in a bad accident involving a tanker truck. The road is shut down until tomorrow morning, at which time I'm sure something else will happen. Oh yes, and I'm to be home Sunday. Good think I like this job, eh?

The good news is I've finished several books and have gotten lots and lots of sleep. But I can't wait to get out of all this ice and snow. I've adjusted to the temperatures,...if it's above zero I don't get too bothered. But the ice, slush, and miserably slick roads and highways are just pure insanity. There have been some horrific accidents which, luckily, I've managed to avoid. But I now understand why so many Canadians migrate to Florida each winter. What I don't understand is why they drive so slow once they get there. Here in Canada, they just mash the accelerator to the floor and hope for the best. In the meantime, I anticipate my next assignment will be to bring elf furniture to the North Pole.

Will someone please ship Al Gore to the Great Lakes region to explain what this global warming stuff is all about? Come to think of it, I could have used some global warming the last few days. I spent Sunday afternoon, Monday, and Tuesday morning in temperatures that never even reached zero. Monday morning as I made my way from the truck (parked a loooong way from the truck stop due to a shortage of parking spaces) across the parking lot for some coffee and a restroom break, it was 10 degrees below zero with a wind chill of 25 degrees below zero. At that temperature, skin starts to burn rapidly only to become numb within a few short minutes, which was the amount of time it took me to get to inside. Thanks to thermal drawers, lots of layers, gloves, and a mask that made me look like I was about to meet 72 virgins, I made it in fairly good order. But temperatures like that, and the regions that are home to temperatures like that, really are no place for human beings. I think this is why so many folks up north are grumpy so much of the time. I wasn’t exactly the life of the party myself.

At any rate, I had an assignment that called for some heavy duty driving. I left Detroit Monday afternoon and stopped in Toledo, OH. Yesterday, leaving many hours before sunrise, I drove from Toledo to the outskirts of Memphis. Today, rising at 1AM, it was Memphis to Jackson, MS, to Baton Rouge, and then finally to La Place, LA, just outside New Orleans. So there we have over 1,000 miles covered in very short order. Ugh. So here are some questions and thoughts in no particular order, as my brain wanders the zone between real thought and stream of something or other…

* Geek Alert: I just got a new phone with Blue Tooth. Problem is, when people talk to me, they hear and echo of their own voice while I’m talking to them on blue tooth. Why for? Also, any recommendations for a blue tooth with some good volume so I can actually hear the other person on the line over the truck noise?

* So two border patrol agents shot a drug carrying illegal alien in the butt after they said he assaulted them. The govt granted amnesty to the illegal and prosecuted, convicted, and jailed the agents. Then the warden put one of the agents in with the general prison population and he was beaten up badly once his identity was compromised. Meanwhile, a deputy sheriff was almost run over when a van full of illegals used their vehicle against him. He shot at tires, and a metal fragment of some sort hit one of the vans occupants. No charges against the illegals, but the deputy is being prosecuted. He stands a good chance of doing as much time as the border patrol agents, both of whom are doing much more time than convicted child molesters in Vermont and Ohio. These sorts of things, plus my own experience with the legal system in recent years make me wonder, at what point did the justice system cease to exist? It’s been replaced with a legal system in which any real occurrence of justice is an unintended and much lamented accident. The Supreme Court has found that the Constitution does not in fact protect property rights, but it does contain heretofore unknown protections of the right to stick a fork in a baby’s head. This bothers me.

* Global Warming: If the phenomenon is man-made, as opposed to being caused by things like the sun, for example, then I have some questions. Why was it warmer in the 1930s than it is now? Polar ice caps on Mars are melting. Since the UN scientists say this isn’t due to the sun, are we to suppose that Mars also suffers from our CO2 emissions? In 1974, Time magazine told us that “global cooling” was a real problem. Do these people read their own work? Why is the ice cap on the Antarctic getting thicker? Why is Greenland gaining in ice mass as well? As the sign for Hooker’s Bait Shop in New Orleans says, “There something fishy going on around here.”

* I get to go home tomorrow. It will be nice to spend a day or three in Florida before being shipped back up north to further ponder Mr. Gore’s thesis.

Heard on the country music station today:

"Put another log on the fire,
Cook me up some bacon and some beans.
Go out to the car and change the tire,
Wash my socks and sew my old blue jeans.

C'mon baby you can fill my pipe,
and then go fetch my slippers.
Then boil me up another pot of tea.
Then put another log on the fire, Babe,
And come and tell me why you're leaving me."

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA


It's coooold out. I'm in Lexington, KY. It's in the low 20s. With the wind kicking up, the wind chill is around 5 degrees. Tomorrow I go to Detroit, where the wind chill is slated to be minus 15 or so, with lots of snow, etc. I could have thought of a better place to travel and would not have taken long at all.

I've been on a reading binge, which is one of the reasons I haven't posted in awhile. I read the autobiography of the top Marine sniper a few weeks ago. That was followed by Bob Woodward's "State of Denial," which was then followed last week by a novel by WEB Griffin. Good books all. Bob Woodward has an aggenda, which unfortunately tends to taint his work. Looking beyond his bias, it is evident that the civilian leadership at DOD, namely Don Rumsfeld, botched things up in Iraq. We should have gone in heavier so we could secure the place. The "Debathification" went too far, in effect alienating people that were prepared to help us, which in turn helped fuel the sectarian violence. The worst part, which I'll write about more in-depth in due course, was the failure at the flag-officer level to speak up when they knew the civilian leadership was making mistakes. Then again, most flag officers didn't get to be flag officers by being the "squeaky wheel." They are so accustomed to selling their souls for the next promotion, that by the time they get to positions of real power, they are so conditioned to selling out that the troops have no real leadership to rely on. This is why the ass-covering careerists wait until after they retire to speak their mind. By then, of course, it is too late to help the troops who are suffering under the next generation of bureaucrats in uniform.

Time to take my cold medicine and hope that I can feel better at some point. Toodles...

So this guy goes into a bar and he’s got a frog on his head. The bartender asks, “How did that happen?” and the frog replies, “Well, it started out as a bump on my ass.” Ba da boom.

That’s as good a start to this as I can think of at the moment… It’s been a long time since I posted, and much has happened. Some of the highlights:

* I had to work Christmas, which really wasn’t so bad. The miles were great. Typically I run around 2,500 miles each week. In only 10 days around Christmas, I ran over 4,200 miles. Apparently, I was the only one keeping the economy going while the rest of you were sipping egg nog and opening packages of new socks, etc. One thing I did notice was that the drivers were much less courteous right around Christmas. Christmas Day, I drove from Charlotte, NC to Wilmington, DE. It was a rainy day, and I saw 5 accidents before I even got out of North Carolina! Three of them featured cars that had rolled over! The accidents continued as I traveled north that day. Apparently, people were willing to run over each other in their haste to get to Grandma’s house and spread Christmas cheer.

* New Years was spent with my wife’s family in south Florida. We really had a good time. Michelle’s parents opened their home and put up with a couple of “us” for a few days. The food was incredible. My mother in law can cook like nobody’s business. Of course, her family appreciates good food, and so when New Year’s dinner was served, it was taken seriously. You get the food while you can or you are simply out of luck. Of course, being good Catholics, Michelle’s folks are big fans of Notre Dame. Me being from Louisiana, I’m a total LSU fan. So the Sugar Bowl was a big topic of conversation. Michelle’s Mom is a hoot,..and she talked enough trash about the game that I decided we should stay an extra day and watch the game with her parents. LSU did as I expected, and offered Notre Dame fans a hard lesson in humility, and offered the nation a lesson in what happens when you take an SEC team for granted. As far as the game was concerned, a great time was had by,….me. (hee hee hee) But the visit was wonderful and we hope to see the folks again.

* After taking 10 days of vacation (commencing on New Years Eve), I’m back on the road. Saw two interesting things today. First, driving by a golf course, I watched a guy hit the ball directly into a lake and then furiously throw is golf club into the lake, get in his cart and head back toward the clubhouse. Stupid me,..I thought people played golf to relax. Next, in Augusta, GA, I saw a police chase. We were all stopped as a car sped by, with cops chasing it. The car wheeled into a Wendy’s parking lot, tried to go through the row of hedges and smacked right into the telephone pole on the other side of the hedges. The driver got out and took off on foot, with the police pulling in immediately behind, taking off on foot after him with weapons drawn. I don’t know how it turned out, as traffic started moving again. But it was amazing how this unfolded in one parking lot while all around the surrounding businesses people went about their business as if nothing at all was happening. They didn’t seem nervous, or even curious. Of course, it wasn’t a very good neighborhood I was in (funny how frequently that happens). But I thought it odd how people with pistols were chasing someone and everyone else was walking about as if nothing was happening at all.

* There are other stories to share, and no end to my opinions on current events. Now that things are back to some sort regular routine, I’ll have more time to chime in. Hope you all had a great Christmas, and the very best to you and yours for a splendid new year.

30 Miles Outside of Reno, Nevada: What an interesting trip this has been. Thanksgiving Day was spent in Dallas, at our terminal for a free turkey dinner, and then in a motel room taking cat naps during football games. My truck was due some serious maintenance,…more serious than I had originally thought. New tires, new steering whatchamacallit, new fifth wheel (the thingamajig that connects to the trailer’s whoozit), new tail light, a new doogamaflotchit to stop the slow air leak in the air valves behind the dash, you know…all that technical stuff. It took two days, chiefly because they only had a skeleton crew over the holiday and we all know how slow skeletons can be. I also took time at the terminal to study and get tested to recertify my hazardous material endorsement,…which test I managed to get 100% correct. Wheee!!

By Friday morning after turkey day, I had a fresh travel mug of coffee (or was it brake fluid?) and was ready to roll. Got into some ugly traffic,…but managed to get up to Oklahoma City (where the wind comes sweeping down the plain strong enough to knock you right on your arse if you aren’t careful), and over into Amarillo, TX. I don’t remember much about that night except the news that my grandmother had been hospitalized that evening. My children were in Lake Charles visiting, and they called with the news. Out of respect for her privacy, I won’t go into clinical detail,…but suffice to say she is at home and doing fine. I talked with her on the phone the following evening and she allowed as how the nurses and staff could not ask her a single question without her responding with a story of some sort. “Do you smoke?” A simple no from Granny would not do, of course. Not at all. Instead, they heard that not only did she not smoke, but how her Daddy (Pa Pa Ben) turned her away from smoking without ever raising his voice. That’s my Granny! Always a story,…and always worth listening to.

Saturday I got an early start and headed for Arizona. Drove all the way through New Mexico and couldn’t help but remember the years I lived there. My daughter was born in New Mexico,…Alamogordo (an ancient Indian term which loosely translates into what one would yell if one’s pants had caught fire). Driving through Albuquerque, I noted that the homes along the highway were painted colors that blended in with the surroundings, i.e. dirt. Some were the color of sand,…others clay, still others mud, and then just plain ol’ dirt. Might as well paint them like that, since the wind is always kicking the stuff up and covering everything in sight. The New Mexico dessert is easy to describe. Take the moon,…add tumbleweeds, and there ya go!

Arizona was interesting in that the cactus plants had some variety. The mountains were varied,..some jagged,…some looked like they were right out of a Roadrunner Cartoon. I stayed at the Hopi Travel Plaza that evening. Huge assortment of silver and turquoise jewelry for sale there. Sunday morning I went in for a shower,…which was not a good idea. I think it was $6.50, which is a good price comparatively speaking,…but the shower was awful. The room was sweltering hot. To compensate, the water from the shower was ice cold. After a long wait,…the water never warmed up. Since getting pneumonia was not at the top of my To Do List, I went back downstairs and demanded a refund. I told the guy what had happened, and asked if he thought warm water was too much to expect in the 21st Century. He didn’t say anything,…and since I don’t speak Spanish, I said the hell with it and went across the hall to get some coffee. Of course, this was another wrong move on my part. This stuff didn’t rise to the level of dishwater. But it was hot, so I went to the register to pay. Another Mensa Society member was at the register trying to figure out how to pay for his lottery ticket and his smokes. This was an arduous process apparently. I was starting to remember the things that made me want to leave New Mexico many years ago. These folks just can’t seem to get the basics right.

My drive into California, by contrast, was wonderful. There was desert. There were mountains. There were green areas. There was some landscape that looked positively prehistoric. Gigantic boulders somehow stacked on top of each other. Mountains dotted with boulders, or a large open field with a pile of boulders right smack in the middle. How did they get there? How long have they been there? Some mountains were smooth as glass, probably made so by a torrent of water in ages past.

My first night in California was spent in Barstow, at a TA truckstop. The food wasn’t bad. The people were friendly for the most part. There was some odd hippy looking dude standing in the doorway of the men’s room as I was trying to depart the place. He just stood there, smiling at me, blocking my way. “Hello,” he said in an odd sort of way. “Move,” I replied,…and he moved out of the way.

The next morning, having gotten a decent shower, I walked to the truck only to notice that a guy was standing outside his truck a few yards away, peeing in the parking lot. This was in broad daylight,…and there were no other trucks around him to shield this activity. He was only 30 yards or so away from the truck stop, which had restrooms even if they were frequented by the occasional fruitcake blocking the door. I climbed in my truck, wrote down his truck number and his company’s phone number, and called them up. Truckers have a huge public image problem, with many people assuming that we have an IQ only marginally higher than a vegetable. And slobs like this are one of the reasons why we have such a poor public image. I shared these thoughts with his company. The nice lady said she knew exactly who I was talking about, and that they had had similar problems with him in the past. She promised to address the issue with him “Immediately.” I gather it wasn’t a good day for him,…but really, standing there sunning one’s tallywagger in front of families, etc., …not a very bright idea.

My delivery in San Jose went off without a hitch. I must say, having driven through San Jose yesterday, and Sacramento today,…California’s landscape is one of startling contrasts. The Mojave desert is a lot like New Mexico. The mountains on highway 152 from I-5 to US 101, are positively gorgeous. These are mountains that have that tan desert color,…but which sprout some really gorgeous evergreens. How do they do that? Sacramento, by the way, is a very pretty city. As much lush greenery as I see back home in Louisiana,…and situated next to a desert. It’s as if the Almighty simply suspended the rules when He made California. We think of the eastern part of the US as green,…the western part as brown. But both co-exist perfectly together in California. And in the desert portions sit mile after mile of groves! Orange trees,….groves of almond trees, pistachios, etc. The land of fruits and nuts indeed! It is a truly interesting place.

I’m on the way to Des Moines now. I’ve managed to get myself into winter storm trouble. Drove through my first batch of snow today,…some 7,700 feet above sea level,… the temperature went down to 19 degrees, and the road was narrow, badly maintained, and icy. This, it turns out, was the famed “Donner Pass” that I’ve heard so many truckers talk about. I’ll have more to say about that later,…it was quite an experience. The weather channel says I may not make it far tomorrow,…winter storm warning are out, as well as high wind advisories. This has been one of the most interesting trips in this job thus far. Stay tuned….

A few random thoughts:

Do You Know the Way to San Jose? If you do, please let me know since I’m on my way there myself. I left the house Monday morning bound for San Jose. I’ve been to California only once, and that was a three hour layover enroute to a year’s tour in Korea. I’m sure this will be a fascinating trip to the left coast, and I look forward to sharing bits of it with you.

Home Accents: I stopped at a truck stop deep in the heart of Cajun country today for a bit of lunch and some familiar accents. The red beans and rice were wonderful as usual. The assortment of Cajuns in the place was,..well,…colorful and funny. Now, almost every truck stop in Louisiana has a casino. In fact, truck stops seem to dedicate themselves to the proposition that no vice should be left unattended. The casino is located right across the hall from the restaurant in the truck stop I visited today. So during lunch, one guy popped his head in the restaurant and told his buddies, who were enjoying some gumbo, that he was doing well in the casino. “You won you some money?” asked one of them. “You better believe it,” he answered. “Congratulations,” said one of the guys in the restaurant, adding, “Now take you-self to dat register an pay for ma food.” We all had a good laugh.

Another stop home: I was able to stop in and see my Mom, Granny, and my Sister for a few hours last week. Had a quick lunch at Mom’s house. The place is complete. The construction, which was spear-headed by my brother-in-law, had virtually everyone in the family helping in some capacity. It’s a beautiful home, wonderfully built. And there are so many stories about it’s construction. Mom can go from one room to the next and tell you who helped assemble, wire, paint, etc., each corner of the place. The whole project was a labor of love, and it really shows. It’s brand new, and yet when I walk in, I know I’m home, and you can’t ask for a better feeling than that. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Mom raised two kids (one pretty well behaved, the other,…was me) and has worked for many years in the church because that’s where she believed she should be. Her salary has not reflected her worth, and she hasn’t complained. She was where she believed the Lord wanted her to be, and He takes care of His own. Then she loses her home, and we all wonder what will happen next. Indeed, He does care for His own, and her new home proves it. I’m happy beyond words for her.
Early Thanksgiving: Had to celebrate Thanksgiving last weekend since I’ll spend the actual holiday on the road with lots of other turkeys. Last year, you may recall, I tried to use a smoker and smoke a very large bird. The Missus says it was a turkey, but I remain convinced it was an ostrich. We put enough coal in the smoker to power the Orient Express, and succeeded only in getting the attention of the police (there was THAT much smoke), and burning the outside of the ostrich while leaving the inside red. Not good. This year, we bought a smaller turkey boob and cooked it in the oven for three and a half hours, and viola! It turned out good!! It was a great thanksgiving.

Milton Friedman RIP: You may have heard of him. He won the Nobel Price for Economics in 1976 for his, "achievements in the fields of consumption analysis, monetary history and theory, and for his demonstration of the complexity of stabilization policy." In short, his work tore to shreds the major assumptions of John Maynard Keynes, who had been thought of as the preeminent economist at the time. Friedman also helped to make economics understandable to more people by engaging leading intellectuals in rigorous debate. His work formed the foundation of President Reagan’s entire political philosophy, which centered on human freedom. He began touting the idea of school vouchers in the 1950s. He wrote in 1961 that, “I cannot think of a single example at any time or any place where there was a large measure of political freedom without there also being something comparable to a private enterprise market form of economic organization for the bulk of economic activity.” On the idea of “flat tax,” Friedman wrote in 1995 that, “The only way we are ever likely to get it is if there is a drive for a constitutional convention to repeal the 16th Amendment (which gives Congress the power to tax income) and replace it with one mandating a flat-rate tax. However, I regret that that is not an immediate prospect.” And in an editorial in 2004, Professor Friedman wrote, “In the almost six decades since the end of World War II, intellectual opinion in the United States about the desirable role of government has undergone a major shift. At the end of the war, opinion was predominantly collectivist. Socialism--defined as government ownership and operation of the means of production--was seen as both feasible and desirable. Those few of us who favored free markets and limited government were a beleaguered minority.

“In subsequent decades opinion moved away from collectivism and toward a belief in free markets and limited government. By 1980 opinion had moved enough to enable Ronald Reagan to win the presidency on a quasi-libertarian agenda.

“The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 delivered the final blow to the belief in socialism. Hardly anyone today, from the far left to the far right, regards socialism in the traditional sense of government ownership and operation of the means of production as either feasible or desirable. Those who profess socialism today mean by it a welfare state.”

Friedman was 94 years old when he passed away last week. Not everyone has heard of him,…but we’ve all benefited from this exceptionally sharp mind, nimble wit, and warm spirit.

At the behest of TSJAFO, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, some folks in my family, and finally the President himself (I heard him make the request live from Arlington), I wore my medals yesterday. I have a hat with a few shiny things on it that I earned during 20 years service. I keep the hat on the dash of my truck, and I enjoy watching people take a look at it, then look at me with my long hair, and walk away trying to figure this thing out. But I've never worn the thing in public. It's got seven medals on it, a couple of silver function badges,....I guess you could think of it as some serious "bling." I'm proud of what I earned, but I shied away from wearing the hat because I didn't want people to think I was trying to call attention to myself as some sort of hero or something. My contribution, honored as I was to make it, was modest in comparison with so many others. But I thought the Prez made an interesting point yesterday,..something I've heard from others as well, namely that we don't always appreciate the cost of freedom until we see how many people all around us have made some sort of contribution. In other words, it might help ignite some national pride that those whom we would otherwise not give a second glance served on the front lines of freedom.

Okee dokee, I thought. So yesterday, when I stopped at truck stop in Missouri, I wore the hat inside. A couple of baggy pants wearing gangster types were standing between me and the entrance to the truck stop talking to each other. They eyed the hat and then stepped aside in silence as I walked into the truck stop. That was interesting. Others inside the truck stop certainly saw the hat, and then immediately looked away. Odd.

I stopped last night in Memphis. My company has a terminal there. Inside the terminal, again, people certainly noticed the hat, but then looked the other way. I took the company car to Wal-Mart to get a few needed items. Inside Wal-Mart, the reaction varied from looking at the hat and then quickly looking away as if I wasn't there, to looking at the hat and then absolutely glaring at me as if I had done something wrong. Now, it wasn't like our brothers in the Vietnam era,..no one came up to me and spit and called me a baby killer,...but the scowls and glares were like a kick in the gut just the same. Remembering reports of how the electoral map looked in various areas, I recalled that the Memphis area is the one "blue" spot in Tennessee. These are people who probably believed the slanderous things John Kerry has been saying about us for decades. I don't believe there are any military bases in this part of the state,...so the whole concept is probably foreign to them,...but a lot of good men have given their lives for red and blue districts alike. No way to sugar coat it,...the reaction hurt. But then I remembered that Mark Twain said that the Constitution gives each of us the right to make an ass out of ourselves,...so I bouyed myself with the thought I had helped give them that right which they so enthusiastically exercised.

I wasn't looking for a parade from these folks. I wasn't necessarily looking for a handshake or even a verbal thank you,...but was a smile asking too much?

Back at the terminal, I had the hat next to me on the table while I watched a ball game. A gentleman walked up and pointed toward the hat and said, "Are you using that?" "Huh?" I asked,...and then he reached next to the hat and picked up a bottle of hot sauce and walked away. I was just about to give up on the whole enterprise and go back to relative comfort of my truck when a guy behind me asked, "What's that you got on your hat?" I showed it to him and said they were some trinkets I had picked up while in the military. He responded, "Dude, that's a bad-ass hat!" He asked how long I was in, and then shook my hand and thanked me for giving him his freedom. I'm sure I blushed, and just told him it was an honor to serve. Turns out he lost his older brother in Vietnam. It was his third tour there. We talked for the better part of an hour. Great conversation, mostly about his brother and life in the military.

This morning when I went back into the terminal, hatless, this guy was in there as well. He called from across the room, "Hey, where's that bad-ass hat?" I told him it was on display in the truck until another holiday. We again had a good talk. He asked where my load was headed, and when I told him McAllen, TX, he said it was his home town and he was trying to get home. His load was going to Laredo. So we called our dispatchers, and switched loads. He gets to go home, and I get better odds of getting a good load out of Laredo. He asked why I wasn't wearing the hat, and I told him about my experience the day before, and how my demeanor was deteriorating rapidly until he spoke to me. He blames it on how kids are raised today. As for me, I suspect it's a regional thing. It doesn't take the sting away from the animosity that was directed toward me,...but it explains it more I guess. Too tempting for some folks to believe the worst about something they don't understand,...or redirect their anger at a policy they disagree with toward those whose profession it is to carry out that policy. It's tempting for me to respond in the same fashion by asking myself, "You mean I spent 20 years putting my life on the line for these morons?" But I don't want to go the same level. The sacrifices vets made were to give people the chance to live free. Freedom denotes choice,... and that means the choice to make the best or worst of freedom, yes?

When Ben Franklin left the the Constitutional Convention, a woman asked him, "What have you give us?" He answered, "We've given you a republic, if you can keep it." Vets have given us freedom, if we can keep it.