Midnight versus 2 AM

Since I knew that yesterday I would have to run all the way to Emporia, I left Denver and headed up the highway an hour or so to a rest area at Wiggins, Colorado. This gave me fewer miles to drive for my Kansas load.


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I've run this trip before. We regularly take meat from a Tyson plant in Lexington, Nebraska and shuttle it down to Emporia, Kansas to yet another Tyson plant. The problem usually comes on the shipping end where they don't have the load ready until mid evening and still expect you to deliver by 0230 in Emporia.

For some reason I was sleepy after a couple hours of driving and stopped in Big Springs, Nebraska to take a power nap. Then, for some inexplicable reason I spent the next couple hours watching video and basically being lazy and that bit me in the butt.

DING! Goes the satellite unit: "Your load is ready now on trailer 579124."

FUDGE! I was still two hours away and it was about 1615 so by the time I get there, get checked in and swap trailers I will be leaving the shipper around 1900, putting me in Emporia around 0200. If I had just kept going after my power nap I would have arrived when the load was ready and would have arrived in Emporia at midnight.

Fuming at my own laziness I drove to Lexington, swapped trailers then headed to Wood River, Nebraska to top off the reefer. Driving non-stop from then took me right to 0200 when I dropped off the trailer in Emporia.