Take these wing ding things... please

Up bright and early and on the road after a brief chat with the driver who parked next to me. He told me he was coming west last night and was stopped for three solid hours around mile marker 150 while the police were in clearing a very nasty multiple fatality wreck out of the way. By the time I got to mile marker 151 this morning they were still in the process of cleaning everything up, including the trailer of a semi that looked like an accordion.

Our people and the Walmart people weren't able to come to an agreement as to when I should show up with the load until late in the day, but eventually I got a satellite message that I'd be worked in so long as I got there by 1900 local time. At that point I was 130 miles out with about 2.5 hours remaining, but Cincinnati, Ohio yet to go, and it would mean running through there at rush hour. Or, as it turns out, crawling through there.

I did the best I could, even hitting 65 and 70 along the way where possible. Still, by the time the last traffic jam faded behind me in the suburbs I was 45 miles out and only had 35 minutes or so until 1900. I rolled up to the guard shack at Walmart at 1905 and hustled the paperwork inside.

Despite the assurance of a late work in via satellite I was told in no uncertain terms the load would have to get another appointment made. I took down the name and phone number of the boss person there and texted it to HQ while I parked nearby. About 30 minutes later I was called by one of our CSRs and she's on a conference call with whoever needed to be massaged ever so gently. Shortly thereafter I was told to boogie back to Walmart and there would be a message left at the gate in my favor.

A few hours later I'm beat and back on the street, minus six pallets of "wing dings." I kid you not.

Tomorrow is shaping up to be another humdinger with another late delivery to finish this load up in Michigan and a new preplan heading to Oklahoma.