Well, yesterday and today were the same pretty much. Yesterday I started the day by sleeping in because of a schedule issue we had. Then I went in for lunch and then headed out to the simulators. They are pretty interesting. About 90 grand each...screens in front and around you, plus all the gauges you regularly have on a truck. We did a few simulations with weather, obstacles, unexpected things...etc. Then we went outside and went over the pre-trip inspection.

For those of you who don't know...trucks (in theory) should be inspected daily before and after the run. The pre-trip can be rather detailed depending on how you do it. My company has a very lengthy one...basically name every stinkin part of the truck, how it works, the various connections...etc. ie "Air conditioning unit, gear driven, mounted solid, wires are connected, no frays. Hoses connected, no cracks or leaks"...etc something along that line for every part in the truck and trailer. Many of the instructors are also third party CDL examiners for the state of CA, one pulled out a copy of the CA examination sheet and the pretrip was pathetic. Ours encompases practically everything.

Anywho...after that, I got out and did a enroute inspection along with a four point inspection...coupled the truck and headed out on the road for a couple of hours...getting back at the hotel around 7:30ish.

Today, back to school at 6am, drove right away this morning and then back for lunch. Then simulators where we ran down a grade in various gears, learning the snub braking technique. Ran a couple of very tricky scenarios involoving slow manuvering.

After that, we learned about the intermodal operations and the canister trailers.

The simulators are fun...better than nothing, I figure. The only problem is that Im getting headaches when I use them. Not sure why...bugging the heck out of me. They said it does happen, people sometimes get sick...etc....still can't figure out why its happening to me.

So far, we have about 14 people out of 24 left. wow.

Really crazy that my training is almost halfway done. So far everything is going pretty good. I just need to practice truck stuff...inspections, coupling procedures...etc. Gotta get all that in my head.

And such was my birthday.