Episode 162 - Navigating the Season: Trucking Tips and Tools

Music. Down what's up jfw family welcome back to the channel 23 podcast the purpose of this podcast is to reach out and touch a fleet to engage and inform everyone with all things jfw good morning jim brother brother super dave what's happening guys hi everybody it is a.

Fine wednesday it is a beautiful winter december day right perfect day and perfect morning to say our pledge to the allegiance right i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the rebutt look from which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right before we get into the trucker prayer we'd like you to keep erica white in our prayers this week erica broke her clavicle doing some dirt bike stunts over the weekend and she

has surgery this friday so keep her mind during the truck of prayer and it was a short short start of the of the job right and be off already and yeah but man talk about grit you know when she came in monday morning you could just see like she's she's like breathing through the pain and i think she told you brother dave like well i wasn't gonna not show up for my third day of work that's exactly what you said yeah yeah it seems that happens a lot when we hire a driver and then

a day in their kids in the hospital or they get really really sick it's not all that uncommon. Well, especially with the amount of people that we have work here, we see a lot of things. Yeah, we see a lot, Jim. That's an understatement. A lot of life. A lot of life happens here, Jim. That's it. Father God, we thank you for the opportunity to go out and do some trucking today.

We pray for the safety of our fleet, all of their families, and all the other families and individuals we come across on the road today. We pray for the patience and the making of good, safe decisions. We pray to be accident-free, and that we all make it back to the comforts of our homes this evening. We pray for healing and 100% recovery for all of our family members that are ill. No matter what, we trust you, God, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen.

As a reminder. Pray that the deers don't run out in front of us in the morning. Too late. I know. It happened this morning, didn't it? Yeah. Pedro Sotelo, he got struck by a deer.

You know we just pulled it well the video was already pulled because he had a harsh break but it was a buck little forky and it looked like you know he just came out on a road and just rammed the side of the truck right he was hauling ass i mean the deer not madro not at first it was so weird because at first he just kind of got out and then like the truck was coming by and then like he turned on the gas like they must have been like he couldn't back up.

Just stop right jim yeah just stop he thought it was a doe he thought it was a hot doe, clarice that was on tv the other night yeah yeah rudolph silence of the lambs you mean no rudolph rednosed reindeer wasn't that the doe's name clarice is on there no wasn't that the little doe's name that he has a crush on i don't know i didn't really watch that but i've watch Sailing to the Lambs. Yep. So, wait a minute. So, who's Clarice?

That wet a little doe that he has a crush on? In Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Uh-huh. Really? That's kind of creepy, really. Well, that came out. That's about a generation before Silence of the Lambs. I know. I know. That's my point. Like, that's kind of creepy.

I was thinking of a skin suit.

Right? it jam you and i were i'm like what clarice i really freaked out when he said rudolph, oh man as a reminder anything you hear on today's podcast is just our expressed opinion and nobody else's you don't even have to agree with our opinion but it'd be nice if you listen to you episode 161 had 285 downloads we have 85.7 000 total downloads and held steady at 654 followers that's awesome great super dave are you gonna use my dad joke no go ahead and use yours i can yeah or anybody else,

are you ready this this is a good one it's actually from a robin williams movie but a husband is driving home and he gets a call from his wife and the wife says careful honey they're showing on tv that there's some sort of lunatic driving the wrong way in the freeway, and he says one oh no no there's hundreds.

Ba ba boom, some people just aren't going to get that super right yeah oh i got it right away yeah like he's done one, yeah yeah no doubt that's funny well mine may not be pc but i'm going with it so yay a kindergarten teacher is trying to explain to her class the definition of the word definitely to try to make sure the students have a good understanding of the word she asks them to use it in a sentence A student in the front row raises her hand and says, the sky is definitely blue.

The teacher says, well, that isn't entirely correct because sometimes it's gray and cloudy. Another student says, the grass is definitely green. And the teacher again replies, if the grass doesn't get enough water, it turns brown, so it isn't really correct either. Finally, Billy raises his hand and asks the teacher, do farms have lumps? The teacher looks at Billy and says, that isn't really a question you want to ask in class. Discussion. But no, Billy replies, then I definitely shit my pants.

That sounds like a little jolly joke. That sounds like the weather's going to do. That was good. Totally PC. Well, I went, I went back to some Christmas stuff. So if Santa raised cattle, what would he be called? Cattleclaws. Cattleclaws. A jolly rancher. Jolly rancher. Oh, very good. And when Santa stops moving, what is he called? Frozen. Stockclaws. Oh, you're close, Dave. Santa paws. Santa paws.

That's pretty good well are you done i am i know the beginning of this joke has been told but i'm gonna tell the rest of it but first let me set the moon did you guys hear about the italian chef that night no he passed away we can only do so much his legacy will become a pizza history, all because he ran out of time wow and then do you know why you guys don't want to iron a four-leaf closer or clover four-leaf clover yeah i do yeah i know you do i don't like tell dave because

you don't want to press your luck oh there you go. New employees, we got Andres Alvarado starting today. He's doing the system backwards. Who knows? Maybe this works and we keep doing it like this. I told him, I met him this morning, shook hands with him, and I said, man, you're going old school. You're going to train first and then go through class. Yep.

So he's actually somebody I talked to back in July, and he- Wasn't really sure he had his own truck, and he wasn't sure whether he had a contract to run it. Turns out he ran a side dump for a little while with it. But anyway, too much going on. He's got a baby on the way and slow work, bad rates, things, and he's like, I'm done. So he called me back and said, listen, I sold my truck.

I'm ready just to go to work and just go to work. And so I brought him in and talked to him again and a positive dude, just somebody that'll be a really good fit here, has great experience and knows how to work hard. Awesome. That's great. Hey, the name reminds me and we probably did last week, but should we make an introduction? Cause I know Andre. Oh yeah. Started in the shop Monday night and I don't.

Excuse me, Andre and Warren. Warren. And I don't think, you know, Andre's position, we should announce to the guys, right? He's the new shop foreman and if you, he's replacing, you know, little John. And if you guys have a problem, he, I met him last night and he's got a hell of a handshake and a big smile and, and seems like a heck of a nice guy.

So I don't, you know, like I said, I don't think we said anything last week, but he started Monday night and he'll be your go-to guys, go-to guy for the drivers coming in the afternoon. If they need to write something up, make sure you check with Andre. Definitely got a good personality and a good attitude. Yep, yep, yep. Now, Warren, I met him last night. He seemed like a nice person as well. Yeah, I haven't met Warren yet. I haven't either.

Mikey just said he's super quiet, so he won't introduce himself. You'll have to initiate. Sure. But your little spiel about Andre's made me feel like a commercial, So like, tired of low bids, tired of being slow, come back a chance.

There you go. Yeah, so welcome everybody. Glad to have you starting. Absolutely. Celebrations. This is a big one. It has nothing to do with JFW, but Tracy and Jennifer Holloway are celebrating 30 years of marriage this past Monday. Yep. Congratulations, you guys. Absolutely. Congratulations, Tracy, Jennifer. Yep. Anniversaries, work anniversaries, that is. Anthony Harper hit four years this Sunday the 8th. Frank McCoy, two years tomorrow.

And Don Keller will hit four years on Saturday. Congratulations. Speaking on, there's some numbers. Big numbers, yeah. Birthdays. Linda Frazier had a birthday this past Sunday. Anthony Harper had a birthday this past Monday. John Jordan, he had a birthday yesterday. Ish Coronado has a birthday today. And Rick Colleen has a birthday coming up on Friday. Congratulations, everybody. Happy birthday. Happy birthday. We had every day

except for Thursday. Wow. Birthdays. but family birthday celebrations addison addison's wife lisa had a birthday on the eighth. Alex's wife yasmin has a birthday on the eighth as well or had one gerardo's daughter yaziel had a birthday on the ninth don keller's wife judy has a birthday today fabian sotelo's son nathaniel has a birthday today steve barnes's son mason has a birthday tomorrow and then francisco and Brenda Alvarez, their daughter, C. Clotley, has a birthday Friday the 13th.

Congratulations. Yeah. Happy birthday. Yeah. Happy birthday, everybody. Yep. Good stuff. Shout outs. Well, you want to take these first two there, BD? Sure. First one here for George Potgeater. He stepped up and had a friend that was interested in buying one of our trucks and trailers. And we just wanted to say thanks, George. That was awesome. They bought it and here we go. You know what I mean? They're going to go trucking.

So yeah, thanks George for putting that together. We slipped him a little, little dinero there for hooking us up and it was a win-win. So appreciate it, George. Thank you. And then the second one, I don't know if it's really a shout out. It started as a shout out. So Mikey and I were over at yard 23 last week and, and we noticed one of the fronts of the, one of the trailers that was sitting there in a bear spot, 0083.

And the front of it was just all covered in oil. And I just, when I see that, it's like a red flag goes off, right? Like we've got an oil leak, what's going on? We need to address it. And we're leaving and bear happens to be pulling in. And I said, Hey bear, what, what's the oil on the front of the trailer, you know? And he said, Oh, I had a hydraulic tank leak and they repaired it, you know? And he said the, the, and I said, Oh, the trailer hasn't been washed yet.

And he was like, well, the truck or trailer hasn't been washed. And I was like, Ooh, that's a bummer. And he's like, yeah, it hasn't been washed for about a month. And I'm like, Oh, we, we were supposed to get everything washed over there, you know, at least twice a month or once every two weeks. Right. And he kind of shook his head like, Nope, that doesn't happen. And I'm like, really?

Because I feel like we were knocking him out of the park over there and actually getting him washed maybe upwards of three times a month. And it does turn out, we skipped his truck. I don't know if it went to Kenworth or it was in the shop that night. We did skip his truck. And I had no information on it when he first searched on it. And by pure coincidence, Alex from that yard showed up yesterday and turned in all their paperwork.

And coincidentally, it was washed October 30th, which he's right, wasn't November, but then it was washed November 17th and he's about to come up again. So it, it did fall in there. It's not quite twice a month, but I mean, we went to the 30th, almost virtually two weeks later on the 17th. So should be, should be falling pretty close. Yeah. It should be falling here again for the holidays. We weren't working every weekday. Yeah.

And we get behind over in that yard this time of year because of the weather. We're not indoors. So they have a small window to wash when it gets freezing temperatures. We obviously don't wash over there. But Bear, I just want to say hang in there. You've got a great attitude about that stuff. And by gosh, we did get her washed, but maybe you just drove it the next day and it got filthy because it was a storm or something. I know, forgot.

I know that was a- But the trailer might not have been washed because he's up to a boat or a lot. Absolutely, yeah. it's it's possible so basically double cheeseburger well that's what i had in the shoutouts from you jam we bet a hamburger that it was washed and i was like oh i'm gonna make an announcement that it wasn't washed and i owe you a cheeseburger but bear it looks like you owe me a cheeseburger.

Yeah because saturday you were like well shit super dave i owe him a cheeseburger right and it was alums came up with the list it was pretty pretty big coincidence because i asked Lexi. I said, Hey, somehow we've skipped 83 over there. You know, we, we, when we skip a truck, we have to come back and make it up the next night. Right.

And I understand that's what the wash bay does, right? If, if they have 10 trucks on the list here in this yard and one of them is in the shop, you skip that one that night. Cause it's in the shop being worked on and you catch it the next night. And I thought, okay, well it just got skipped in rotation and never got brought back to you. So I'm glad it was, I'm thankful it was. Absolutely. I think he's messing with all you guys. Yeah. I think he doesn't want it washed.

Yeah? Yeah. So he can sneak up on those turkeys? Yeah, or he's wiping it down with kind of like buck urine or something. Turkey attractant, and you can't wash that off. So the worst it smells, the- Yeah. I was going to hint, I'm not opposed to a good turkey burger. He just needs to ask Pedro what he uses. Right. Right. That's fun. I want to give a shout out to Tracy Holloway for kicking ass and taking names yesterday.

Yep yesterday morning there was a lot of radio traffic and phone and i was out you know by the fuel up front i was like man it sounds like tracy might need some help in there so i walked in i'm like tracy do you need a hand and he's like no he's like people just need to be patient i mean he was so calm and right you know i was like i just saw you might need help with the phone he's like the phone's not really ringing he's like i was on it right now but yeah

it's mostly radio traffic so yeah great job tracy good stuff yeah yeah do we touch upon like yesterday farther in i mean i know i've read the outline but why why was he so busy right you know i mean i think we do we can address it sure we talk about start times and why and yeah yeah. All right. I got one shout out that was texted to me this morning. Oh, yeah. So Fabio would like to give a big shout out to Zach Tharp, 0075, Tracy and Jam.

They helped him overcome a big challenge last Monday while heading to Utah. It was his first time chaining up and he was overwhelmed. They stepped in, guided him, and helped him stay calm to get the job done right.

And thanks for the help and that is the definition of teamwork that's outstanding and another shout out that from fabio again goes out to edwin double 95 i believe that's edwid for helping me a couple of weeks ago at gmco on his first road there so very cool shout outs from fabio to the rest of the gang yeah that's awesome that's awesome i get a general shout out i wrote down here and i wanted to thank the people you know we talk about you know i've said

it a billion times hitting that fence post and how many times we go by and don't hit the fence post but there is a whole group of of people that think about the what ifs and i don't know if they get the shout out they probably seem you know drive a little slower they react a little slower they they might stop here and there but they're thinking of the what if of driving that that big truck or when they're doing something in the shop or or stuff like that and i i wanted to give those

guys a shout out because the the what if you're thinking about what your actions mean to everybody else and we really appreciate that so thank you to everybody that. Looks at the what ifs of the situations. Yeah. I liked Lou Ryan's Fabio. Since he brought it up, I'd like to talk about that just real briefly. So one thing, you know, talking to Fabio on the phone, he said he was really struggling. So trying to dig down and, you know, figure out what was going on.

You know, he had put some chains on, they came off. And then just talking to him, he's like, you know, Jim, he's like, you guys have talked about this on the podcast about having good gloves. He's like, and I don't have good gloves. and my hands are cold. So when you're throwing chains and your hands are cold, that can make the difference of a good and a bad experience. So if you are cold, nobody says you have to get out and throw all your chains on and not get back in the cab of your truck.

You could throw a chain on and warm up. It's been so cold one time, all I did was get the chain draped on a tire, backed onto it, hooked up that rear link on the inside of the tire, and I had to get back in the truck and warm up. You know, there's nothing that says you have to go do it in one shot.

It's helpful, you know, to get you on the road. But if you're cold and you're struggling and you feel overwhelmed, sometimes it's just best to walk away for a minute, regroup, warm up, get your thoughts about you, and then go finish your job. Yeah, when Super Dave just made that announcement, you know, and you've talked about it earlier that he was struggling with the chains and it could be just a figure of speech. Dave said that, you know, he was struggling. It's his first time chaining.

And the first thing I thought of is, is why? Why is that the first time you've chained? Because we've asked everybody to practice chaining before you get in the cold. Practice chaining before you're in that situation. Maybe he did and maybe the cold totally threw him off, but that's the, that's the, that's the reason we asked that, you know, so you're not overwhelmed. Hey, I've done this 10 times in the warm.

This isn't foreign to me. Yes. Yes. So, you know, anybody, you know, hopefully anybody that's listening, that's running that run, maybe you've lucked out and not chained. Maybe you're here in town and, you know, not chained. If you haven't chained, we've got some beautiful weather the next 10 days, we've had it behind us, grab your chains and throw them on your truck. So you're not overwhelmed. Be prepared.

I just thanked everybody about the what if, you know, and you have to be a, all the little things, you have to be a Boy Scout, you have to be prepared, you have to be proactive, you have to not be reactive. And, you know, there's so many things, but we don't talk about this stuff like we're making it up. So hopefully that truly wasn't his first time chaining. I hope he, I hope he took some other direction. I mean, you just mentioned it last week.

Your buddy that does new, no trucking, we we've been, we've been talking about change since August.

He's like chaining. You guys been talking about that since August. Even I know about that. Right. So where I bet, I bet if Timmy had a chance, he'd chain his car. And we've been asking people to slow down since 71. Are you kidding me? Holy shit, Dave. That's no kidding. Yeah, sure. We got to ask them to slow down 271. That's next. Yeah. Well, before we get into that, let's talk about tomorrow being the deadline to sign up for 2025 benefits.

Open enrollment ends tomorrow. Joanne will be available for any questions or help needed. So get that done. If you haven't signed up and you want benefits, tomorrow, oh, today is actually the deadline. Yeah, she sent that to me yesterday. Today is tomorrow. Today is tomorrow. Yeah, I actually did it on Monday, and it's super simple. If guys are saying, well, I don't have time, it doesn't take that long. It really is super simple.

You just open the app and follow the instructions, and you're going to have to type in your name and your wife's name or your kids' names. It's very black and white, and just follow the instructions. It shouldn't take you more than five minutes. Yeah, I mean, Dave, all my stuff was loaded. I didn't have to. Well, mine too. by two, but even if it's your first time, it's still with insurance is going to have type names. They're not going to ask you what's the sum of 72 divided by five.

It's not like that. I mean, I'm sorry, maybe I'm on the low road, but if you don't have time to fill out your benefits, you shouldn't have benefits. This is the only place I know that chases people down to sign up for benefits.

Any other place I worked, you either got it done or you didn't have coverage i mean i know none of you guys will bet me a cheeseburger that someone's not going to sign up and go to joanne on friday or monday next week and be like hey i forgot to sign up yeah yeah we forgot yeah probably 10 people will do that. Yeah, and I know the guys, you know, are in Paycom all the time because they're doing their hours and stuff, but I bet it takes me longer to sign in to Paycom.

Yeah, because you've got to do it twice. Because I'm not in it every day, you know? Because every time I sign in, it wants a new password because it's been whatever, however many days it goes and wants a new password. Yeah, I have to sign in as an employee and then sign in again as a manager. Yep, yep. I'm the opposite. Yeah, no, so mine signs in as the client, right? And then I just pick ESS login and it'll switch me over to the employee.

I'm the opposite, yeah. Very cool. Yeah, I haven't done it that way, Jim. I like Super Dave, I go in and out. Oh, interesting. I asked Joanne why I had to.

I couldn't just use the single login. it gives you an option and then it tells me my password's no good and that's the password i picked and i asked how do i fix that and she was like i don't know i'll check and then they never get back to her have you seen a meme it's like god tries to sign in and it's like password's no good, tries and password's no good creates new password you can't use the same password twice in a row, that is funny that's happened to me you know yes the apple

let god sign it you know god can't sign a new can yeah well ryan paycom please review your address your email your phone numbers and update everything so that when the w-2s are processed everything is accurate right the w-2s is how you get your tax return. So you want to make sure all that stuff is correct. And then yeah, you'll be able to file your taxes pretty quick here.

Yeah yeah absolutely coming up yeah end of the year huh yeah so this next topic is a hot topic i've had a couple people text me this morning asking to go over it i'm like it's already on the it's already on now all right but start times holy smokes everybody please come in at your start time not before it and not after it okay we had drivers leave early yesterday that created a lot of extra work for us here.

And when I say a lot of extra work, we have four people that could be helping drivers do things or five people, but we're trying to get a truck unstuck out of the driveway. We also had a truck already, you know, 50 miles away, you know, on the way to Fair Play. You know, I get it. We're gung-ho to get up there to the pit and we want to do a good job. But if we have a 6 a.m. start time, there's a reason for that.

It's not because we want to hold you back. it's because one the road conditions may not be favorable two the plants don't want material yet and three you don't have support to go do what you want to do perfect it turns out that the.

Company and the pit both canceled all those loads and we had to try to get hold of the driver and get him turned around that's number four yeah we don't even know if those jobs are actually going that they're tentative you know so yeah on those on those winter days i mean we see the orders come in and the pits want this and that and it's like there's no way they're gonna take that right you know so yeah well well put jam i don't know how much we can you know we just had a discussion

discussion this morning about what xbe says and what toro says and you know we're dispatching a load, that might be when you pick up the load or supposed to get the load or the time we send you the load. There's a lot to change to make Toro absolutely perfect for exactly when you're picking it up. That's the reason we do a five o'clock start time or a six o'clock start time. You know, five o'clock start time has been for the last five months easily. Did I say five or six?

Did I say five? Five o'clock start time has been that way for six months, but. But we've had such nice weather, Jim. I mean, we've started at the regular time, which is 5 a.m. Right. And I know we had a discussion, well, we need to do more about it. We need to change it. We need to do everything else. But, you know, the Balker team, they figure their start times out because they're doing something special. The Coolers guys on the weekend figure their start time out.

You know, we got the Super Dumps paving, but we usually have something for them to do before they go pave. So they have a 5 o'clock start time or a 6 o'clock start time. It's simple, you guys. And if you're really in doubt. Call, call before, not the morning of, you know, ask, Hey, I, I got a six o'clock start time, but I'm, I'm running fair play. I want to leave early. No, you know, not, not working. So you guys got it.

It's a couple of simple rules and you know, if you, you know, and then if you're really concerned and we have a six o'clock start time, show up here at five and go, Hey, we got a six o'clock start time. I'm wanting to know if I can leave. Bad idea. You don't know it, you know, follow, follow the, the announcements or, or check before you leave. Yeah. So you're either not checking or you don't care. That's why I see it. Right. We have a 6am start.

Either you didn't look or you think you know better than what we're asking you to do, but we're asking you to do it for a reason. There's a reason. There's a method to our madness, so we speak. Right. I mean, I found it a coincidence yesterday we had a late start time because there was an inch of snow on the ground and it was 20 degrees out, right? Right. I think those coincide. Right. And I have to clarify, when we say start time, that means be at the yard.

Yeah. If it's a 5 a.m. start time, that means get to the yard at 5 a.m. Doesn't mean be at the pit at 5 a.m. Yeah, and we went over this, and anybody that's getting their Friday-Saturday bump or their safety bonus or grabbing their PTO or anything, we say it's a 5 o'clock start time. We give you till 6 o'clock before we mark you off. You're not late for an hour. When you have a meeting, you can't show up to any place else an hour late and be okay. Meeting? Job.

Yeah, job. Yeah, 9 o'clock, 9 to 5. You can't show up to 10. I mean, what's our start time? The leadership team, the safety team, what's our start time? It's five. Can I show up at six every day? You guys are probably looking at me like.

But you figured it out, Jam. Well, right? I mean, I guess that's the point. Why can't we figure this out? You know, and the one driver that started yesterday that was ahead of everybody or earlier than everybody, then it wasn't a good pre-trip. You know, we drug the trailers through the yard from the parking place. We didn't check whether our tarp worked. There's so many things that, you know, I mentioned it earlier, just slowing down and thinking about the what-ifs, making things work.

Again, this job is different right now. This time of the year with the snow and the cold, it's not like when it was in August. You need to check everything out on your tractor and your trailer to be successful.

We did have a driver yesterday left his spot out of the red lot drug his tires all the way to the driveway where he was getting ready to pull out on the street if we didn't notice who knows how far he would have got before he realized you know also you know a dragging tire a skidding tire always wants to come out and lead the trailer wasn't even being pulled straight right but windows are up. Guess, you know, foot's on the throttle, and the driver was happy.

He was getting to go to work, and he was leaving early. Probably thought he was going to have a great start to his day. Unfortunately, you know, you got to make sure those trailer wheels are turning. You have to. Window needs to be down. Put the truck in drive. Let the urge to move pull the truck out. Put the truck in neutral. See if it keeps rolling. Look out your window. Look in your mirror. Are the wheels turning? I mean, those are all easy ways to check.

Speaking to the driver i'm like hey you're you're you know you're dragging your trail wheels well i did a pre-trip okay you could do all the pre-trips you want in the world if you're not visually looking and hearing with the senses that god gave you that those wheels are turning you could have a problem you know a lot of guys i'll drag tired tires one time i remember when i first started i drug my tires about 20 feet out of my spot and

then realized something was wrong right but you You guys taught me, listen, you got to have your window down. You got to look, throw the truck in neutral, make sure it's not stopping on its own. Yeah. And we, you know, we talk about this, not to ridicule that driver, but to educate everybody else because we've had it. We have it happen probably once a week and we're talking about it. And then we've had the extreme cases.

We, we blew the tires out. We drug the trailer from yard 23 over here one morning on dry pavement, drug the, blew the tires out and, and you're just like that, that, yeah, we can't do that. We're, we're fighting ourselves. And it just gets frustrating to continue to do that. Yeah. So what's the big deal other than blowing the tires? Well, yesterday that driver ended up blocking the south entrance. Again, not to ridicule him, but we just want to kind of show you the gravity

and the weight that these things have on everybody else. So he's stuck in the driveway. Well, we're trying to get his air freed up. You know, it's frozen somewhere. Something's frozen.

Well, it's not working out so well. so super dave ended up dragging the tires you know out on the street for a little short distance into the to the north entrance you know so we could get the truck into the shop well because that skidding wheel wants to come around the trail is not coming straight well then now we're blocking now we're blocking a part of the north side yeah you know and it took i mean there was four or five people working on this for about an hour to just get everything

back to you know status quo where we could function out of all of our driveways you know and the thing i thought about that too because i i just i guess through the years or getting old or whatever i'm thinking of the what if for that driver yesterday if he was five minutes earlier none of us would have been here right he would have went out the gate and down the street yeah five minutes earlier is all the difference between because we were all parking when he

came through yeah i forgot some in my pickup i was just walking out to grab my cb or my car i can't remember what i went out for but i was just going out there to you know grab something out of my truck and i'm like what no you're a pretty quiet guy too jam i heard you yelling whoa whoa whoa i was like oh jam's on. Oh, man. Thank you for that. No, you're welcome.

All right, well, we're ready to kind of address this before and right now, but the starter procedures, right, if both your air valves are pulled, which are very common this time of the year, right, because you lose the air and they'll pop off, start your truck up, let your air build up to 125 or what is it, 125, right, where they pop off? Yeah, basically just listen to the air dryer.

Yeah, once that air dryer pops off, charge your trailer by pushing in the red valve you'll notice your air pressure gauge they're both going to drop down and then they'll start building back up once your air dryer pops off again it's time to roll put your truck in drive start pulling out of your spot throw it in neutral make sure your wheels are turning keep your windows down look listen do everything you can to make sure you're not

dragging those tires absolutely all right all right anything else on that guys? No. I think we should just mention the finicky nature of your air system in the cold weather. Absolutely. Sometimes your PTO won't engage because that little quarter inch airline is frozen underneath the trailer. Sometimes your airbags won't air up even though your tailgate is closed. So you need to check that as well.

And those airlines are only a quarter inch in diameter and they are strung all underneath your truck and your trailer. They're exposed to the cold. They're exposed to the snow and the ice. And man, they're finicky in the winter. You just got to be careful with all these systems. Absolutely. A lot of air goes to that trailer to run everything through those little quarter inch lines, right?

So, all right. Let's talk about the workload we currently have and the opportunities we have and some of the differences I've been seeing.

You know for example the other day i'm talking to a driver he's like yeah he's like all i got was two fair play loads today which i mean that's a day of driving going to fair play and back twice i mean it's not like you just sat around all day right but they were kind of you know being pessimistic like you know i couldn't get a third load or this and that but in the meantime we got a guy that does you know he was pre-roated for base light runs down to colorado

springs runs two fair plays and then a Young's ranch. What's the difference between those two drivers and how does one guy take advantage of the opportunity of the workload that we currently have versus the other guy is my question.

Hard to explain, Jim. I don't know. You know, we fought that, you know, through the years, you know, people have often asked, you know, why do we pay percentage because you, you just, you can't do hourly because people seem to take advantage of that because you're not in a setting with other people. You know, somebody in an office, you're hourly, everybody's accountable because everybody's watching.

Right. When you're out there in your truck by yourself, you know, that's, that's when you're hourly and you you're accountable for yourself and you just you don't you don't go get the loads you know and that's that's an hourly piece but if you're if you're going and getting these other loads you know we have the cameras we have samsara we have all these things and most of the guys i have to say all the guys that are making the top money doing the the best out here they're not

speeding they're not hauling heavy they're not you know racing up and down the hills They're not, they're not doing all that stuff, Jam. And I don't know. I tried to look up earlier this morning, you know, the science behind, behind wanting to be a truck driver. You know, you look up, why would you want to be a truck driver? And it's usually, you know, consistent pay, good benefits, you know, seeing the world.

You know, a variety of locations, you know, you're not stuck in a cubicle, but part of the science of it is that trucking forces you to live in the moment and leave everything behind you. If you find trucking relaxing, there's a scientific reaction happening in your brain. Your amygdala, a walnut-sized area in the center of your brain, is responsible for controlling emotions.

When you are practicing mindfulness, meditation, relaxing, and whatever gives you, those feelings such as trucking, it relaxes your amygdala, amygdala, duh. I still didn't have amygdala. I did it. I got it the first time, right? Which in turn engages the parasympathic system, nervous system, and that's a fantastic thing. So that's some of the science behind that, that when you're out driving, you put everything behind you and you're relaxed.

But we got some guys that are keyed up and got to go and all that stuff so you know i i can't answer that jam what a what a great question we we have the work but you know is it the human nature where i i don't like that run so i can't do it i think it has a lot to do with perspective and attitude and the will the will to do it because once you know oswald was the one that pointed this out to me you know cause I was talking to him about it and he's like, yeah, he's like, we got guys,

you know, Cabello do two fair play. And then there's this guy, he did all this. And I happened to be driving out of yard 23 the other day.

And when I saw that driver, I was like, Hey man, nice job the other day doing this and this and this. He's like, jam. He's like, I'm just going to be a few at the end of the year. You know, I'm going to be so close to making a hundred thousand dollars. I've never done that before. Like he was just so excited, you know?

And it's like, this was a rough year at jfw and if you're still knocking down you know six figures you did a good job and you worked hard and you made yourself available you didn't have excuses and you went out and you did the damn thing you know so jim i've always liked what you said here you eat what you kill you eat what you kill we got some people that are hungry and some people that aren't yeah you know and if they're content and they're eating

enough that's enough i guess i mean that's cool but you got some people they wanted you were you killed it's a problem with society in general right. Worried about the Joneses. Yeah, the thing here, I looked at that too, Jim, along those lines. And it's after all this time, I realized that we can, JFW, can bring opportunity. But what we cannot bring is determination. And that we can only actually help the person that brings determination.

Because when they bring determination, we have an opportunity. Boom. But when the opportunity lacks determination, nothing happens. Wow. I love that. Nothing happens. Because that's exactly what you were talking about earlier, Super Dave, about, you know, the guy had his own truck. He's determined, but there's nothing for him to do. When you have the opportunity, you just have to be determined. And let me ask you, Jim and Dave, like, what do you think about the workload this winter?

I mean, obviously compared to the last winter, but how are you guys feeling about what's happening these last couple of weeks versus, you know, four or five months ago? Yeah, it's outstanding. I mean, we've literally gotten in trouble because there's a communication problem, but we're not delivering the plants, all their material. I mean, we're short last week when we did a report between Brandon and ourselves, we were 680 tons short for the week, right? For the week. How is that possible?

Yeah. We totally dropped the ball. Yeah. You know, either between dispatch or what the drivers are doing, you know, something else we've run across. I'm going to, I'm going to call everybody out is, you know, that we talk about hourly and we talk about our jobs and we, you know, you, you kill what we eat. We have our whole fleet of, I'm going to call it the rock failures.

You know, they go do rubble, they bring material in and, and I guess most of them are comfortable because sometimes we have to hire leases trucks, leased trucks, whether they're speeding or get up a little bit earlier or work a little bit later, they run rings around our drivers. And it's not us bringing that to our attention. It's Brandon. Wow. It's the loader operators. It's the plant managers. It's higher up that goes, hey, this guy got, and he doesn't drive in the plant speeding.

He doesn't, you know, it doesn't look like he's doing anything else but going and getting the job done. Wow. And that's not, you know, when you hear that stuff, it's, it's, it's. It's hard. It's under your skin, doesn't it? It does. It does.

You know, and you, you, we're, we're trying to, you know, take care of the customer and, and lately we're not. So you talk about the workload and obviously we're not, we're not getting it done yet. We can even be doing it. Even for the guys that aren't going out of town. There's more loads out there for you, you know, but if you're going to come in five minutes before you're late, you know, roll out of the yard, you know, one minute before you're late and then not go get that last load.

Yeah. I mean, your, your income is going to be limited. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in the, in the last, I would think 60 days, maybe it's been a little bit longer. Yeah. We've added two breweries, we've added A1 chip seal, and we've added EnviroTech. Wow. Four huge customers, customers that need to be taken care of. Right. In winter. Right. I mean, I know we got it in here. What's next or whatever.

The winter solstice starts the 21st, but winter for us is, you know, end of October, November, December, January, February, and March, basically. Awesome. So, yeah, we have good things. I just remember seeing you guys scratch and claw to get the business show, too. You know, I just remember, like, well, we learned something. We learned something from last winter and never again. Right. And here we are. I mean, you know, the work is there. So are we getting the 45 loads out of Utah? Yeah.

More? Yeah. I want to say last week we got 46. Okay. That's more. It's one more. You know, I mean, we could probably do more. Right. You know? Yeah. So I believe the work is there, especially I bet there will be some more orders dribbling after the storm Monday. Right. You know, everybody will use a little bit and place a few orders. Sure.

Yeah. Yeah. I think the workload will go up. And, you know, it's so funny because it kind of gets pushed in the background, but I'm sitting here, we stare at our creed, this whole podcast, you know, and the first line is to face and overcome all that stands before us. The second line is we're accident free. The third line, are we joyfully creating honest value for those we serve? What we're just talking about, right? Celebrate our differences and respect those with whom we work.

That kind of falls right with honest value to me. And then are we accountable for our words and our actions if we're not going to get in the loads or, you know, we're killing some time here or there or whatnot, you know, and, but in the end, we're the JFW family. So how, how proud of that do you want to be? You know, you'd be super proud because you're killing it or. It is what it is, right? I mean, you are so right, Dave.

You've talked about it. Jam's talked about it. You take that creed and take it anywhere and live. And there's a thing of doing an affirmation for yourself every morning. And you could literally take that creed and do that. I am going to face and overcome everything that stands before me. I am going to be accident-free. I will joyfully create honest value for those I serve.

You can make that statement if you want to live that way. Yeah, it makes me think of kind of what we're going through right now a little bit. Makes me think of, you know, I'm not the sports guy, but picture a sports team. And they huddle up, you know, before the game and the coach starts going over plays and somebody's like, no, I didn't read the, I didn't watch a film this week.

But you know i didn't know i was supposed to or how do i watch a film where do i watch it at can i do it you know you know or you know no i don't i don't read that play or i don't i don't know my job like you're not gonna win sure you're not gonna win if you don't know the playbook yeah man you and dave are on analogy roles man his analogy last week about the actor getting up and not knowing his lines yeah but some of them i just figured no oh yeah yeah so it was the actor.

If you don't know the words right yeah i mean good good analogy jam that's it gets a little frustrating but we will stay positive all right let's talk about the utah run one thing about this run things don't always go as planned you have to be able to pivot if you're going to utah you know what i mean by that is yeah ultimately the the idea is for you to get up go drive out to utah make it to redmond get loaded and make it back as far as grand junction right that is perfect scenario plan a yep

how tight is it to do that you got about a 30 minute window to make that work okay you got 30 minutes for things to either go wrong or you know you stop the check stop too long yeah and that's including a 30 minute break and a pre-trip and loading fueling Yeah, you got 30 minutes for everything to go perfectly or for a 30-minute window. Well, if that doesn't happen, you may not make it to Grand Junction. You may have to sleep in Salina, I think. Time to pick.

Green River or there's a lot of different things that could happen. If you shut your truck off on the side of the highway. If you stop on the side of the highway. Over and get a speeding ticket. Yeah, all of those. Like literally, it's like you said, perfect case scenario. You'll have 30 minutes extra to do what you got to do. Yep. But things don't go that way, especially with the weather, right?

So sometimes you may only make it to Grand Junction, or you may have to load in the morning, or maybe you get loaded and you got to stay right near Redmond, or there's just a lot of different things that could happen, and you just got to be able to pivot. And what I mean by that is we're not mad at you. We're not going to be upset. Heck no. You know, we had one driver call me yesterday and he's like, hey.

You know, I'm having going to stay in i think it was green river and i know i let you guys down and all this stuff and then i look on samsara it's like eight drivers staying there so bro you're fine yeah like you did we all we expected is you go out there and go get some salt right you know that's the expectation you know now can we you know if if you're doing things that are getting your own way is one thing but you can't control the weather you know there's certain things out

of your control yeah so you know i mean the other day we did we asked people to leave at like 11 a.m yeah shout out to zach tharp he took us up on the offer and worked here like five hours and went that way and had to chain up in the stating grand junction and i believe he went yesterday morning grabbed a grabbed the load and he's back yeah he beat well he beat some of the guys that left that morning right yeah yeah by leaving at 12.

But, you know, there's a guy that you want to talk about prepared. Yes. I mean, he wants to know every single detail about everything. Anything that he might be able to face. I guarantee he had his cold weather good with him. I guarantee he knows his chains are good. I guarantee, like, he had everything mapped out, ready to go. Yep. Yep. He's a different person. Yeah. He's a rock star. Yeah. Successful. Yep. Determination. Absolutely.

Jim, I think I'm going to give this one to you. The speed's out of Utah? Yeah. I mean, we've been, I mean, really, it's Dave's deal because he. Turn it over to him. No, I won't give it to Dave because he is just so frustrated with it. He, you know, spends his time, you know, asking about this, asking questions about this. He asks about dispatch. He asks about the drivers. He confronts the drivers. He's out in the shop asking about the mechanics.

He's trying to pick up on all the little details that the rest of us miss when we're when we're buried in our jaw you know a guy that's just trying to pick up the the pieces and every day he's faced with new things that just shouldn't be shouldn't be an issue or should be picked up i mean i don't we we we talked about changing the speed limit on samsara so we're all more involved and we we were on the fence about doing that and i think casey right dave casey ran a

report yeah casey ran just a report out of samsara of what's what's what is our most problems out of there if we're if we're.

Having anything go wrong that we're not getting all the drivers are getting a hundred percent score in the samsara what is it it's speeding okay so he runs this report hey no no deal we got a we got a report says our speeding you know what what are what are our truck governed at 72 right so we get a report and we have 29 different people and 29 occasions of trucks going over 80 miles an hour we is that possible how

how is that possible right jump jam sorry we we even have an award-winning driver at 90. Wow. 90 miles an hour. Oh, I thought he corrected you to, like you said, it was 90. I mean, I bet the truck may have shown that, but to get technical about it, it's like 90.73. Yes, Dave, you are. That report shows that, does it not, Dave? Unfortunately, the speedometers don't do decimals. So I bet after 0.5, it was like, we're 91. 91, right? But a lot of the people on the list, they have kids.

You know, and we try lots of different ways to confront the driver, to bring a point home, to make it realistic. And the drivers that have the kids that are 80 mile an hour plus, would you suggest to your son or daughter to go out in the car and drive 80 miles an hour plus? Would you do that? I tell Sam all the time, and I quote Stingray, and I thank him for the quote, go fast, take chances. Right? Go fast, take chances. When he leaves the house, right?

Very successful. Just go fast, take chances. Yeah. Because you don't care about the what ifs of him dying or injuring somebody, losing your home, everything you've worked for. Odds are he'll be fine. Right? Right? When do we reach? And then, and then, and then the driver that was going 90 miles an hour, Dave tried to have a conversation with him and it, and it was, it was so futile. Dave comes off as somewhat of an ass and all he does is give a fuck.

And this other driver has excuses and, and you're, and you're like, what in the world makes it okay that you're in a truck? You know, one of the things we said, Dave said, what makes it okay to drive a truck at 90 miles an hour at 80,000 pounds?

He started to argue and go, no, I was only 79.5. I mean, I'm sorry. If this driver is upset, you know, from hearing this, because hopefully he's listening, we're using you as an example of what not to do. When you're the driver that has done something so erroneous that you're an example, it's a problem.

Let me ask you. What's the speed limit and why is it a problem? The, the, the, I'm on which part jam. So I can, I can just jump out cause Dave brought it to my attention and I think he even tried to ask the driver yesterday. Do you know what the tires are even rated for on the trucks? Speed rated. Speed rated. All tires are speed rated. Sure. Most people don't even know that. Right. Most people don't even know their car tires or their pickup tires are speed rated.

The average it's kind of like how many laws are you put into effect here in colorado nobody knows right right i guess my point is i i think wasn't the speed limit 75 or 80 miles it's eight it was it was 80 because i i mean as i go through if we if somebody doesn't jump in and help me where the 80s happening is utah okay so the speed limit's 80 if the speed limit was 60 or 65 in town and i was doing 75 you probably wouldn't be so upset well we would still question

how you got to 75 okay let's say that's the big red flag speed limit's 55 and i'm doing 65 are you calling me up and asking me about it these are some of the things we're starting to press upon jam but no we're not they're not right i'm not calling you because you went 10 over okay on an interstate So what makes us different? The amount and excess of speed for a semi. Right. And how did we get to that speed? The trucks are governed at 72. Right. Well, in the 80, there was another lip to that.

I don't know if you came down yet, Jim, but I think you had, but there was also a point of, I was only 10 over because the speed limit's 80, right? So it's okay to go 90. And that was another train of thought. How do you, excuse me, how do you go 10 over when your truck's governed at 72? Well, that's the, do we need to let out the secret? Because these 29 people have figured it out. Have they talked to each other? I believe they have.

You know, is it just a thing? Because it's supposedly happening in a certain area in Utah, and you're either letting the truck run away, and we have a random report on the RPM. But my understanding is you're just putting the truck in neutral and letting it go. So your truck engine is at idle, not building any air, raking down a hill as fast as a truck would go. Has anybody seen a recap come apart at 60, at 55? Yeah. Blows all over the place. Yeah. Do you think we have recaps on every truck here?

Tractors? I would guess they're on every single piece of equipment we own with the exception of the 33 brand new trucks we just bought. Exactly, dude. Yep. Have you seen a recap come apart at 90? I haven't seen it come apart at 90. I tell you what. But I bet when that manufacturer creates a retread and builds it, they don't go speed test it at 90. Right. Right? But it's okay. Because you're only 10 over. Yeah. What is, do you know the speed rating on the tires off the top of the head?

They would be different on the truck, on the drive tires, on the trailer. What's your wildest test? Jim, I don't know. I would have to look. I know when you look up just commercial transportation, like class eight tractor transportation, they expect an average speed of, is it 60 or 65? 65. 65 miles. And I looked at it. That's just, anybody in a big truck hauling 80,000 pounds going faster than that is pretty much out of the norm. It's a rescue tire failure.

Well, and it's two points, Dave, when you bring it up, it's fuel economy and safety. That's the 65. And then everything else falls in, your tire rating, your ability to stop. I mean, it waterfalls at 65 miles an hour. And like you, you brought up earlier, Jim, we're not complaining at anybody running 72. Right. And it's, it's man, it's, uh, I can't even, I can't even describe the feeling of, of anger and frustration that it leads us that, you know, putting the truck in neutral.

This is getting back to my sports analogy, right? So we all in this room get to see the reviews and the complaints and some of the negative things that's said about JFW. I want to be able to be like, bullshit, we're a great company. You know what I mean? Our drivers won't do that. So to me, this is like a football team that's doing really good. And then one of their star players gets in trouble for drinking, driving, and beating up his wife. You know what I mean? Yeah.

This is egg on our face. This makes us all look like shit as a company. And I don't want to look like shit. Right. I want to look... Pristine. Pristine. Right. Better than average. Right. Superbowl champions. The best. The best. Yeah. And that's, that's a pride, you know, that 90% of the time I have working here. But when I hear about these things, it's like, man, we just don't look good out there. You know? And is it because we have more trucks? Is it because we have more drivers?

Is it because we can't get everybody engaged or not? Everybody's on the same page. I know we're all banging our heads. Like, How do we reach everybody? We talked about on a podcast last week, how do we get everybody to be on the same page? And it's, it just. You're right, Jim. And I look at this and I'm just going to do some quick math, you know, and shorten the numbers up here. Let's, so I know I counted it. We have had 29 people that were 80 plus, right?

Let's just say we have a hundred drivers and it was 25 people. That's 25%, right? Is 25 acceptable? are you you know you the super bowl teams everything you two are just talking about is a super bowl team okay if 25 of their people suck nope you can't win you can't win and we're not talking about winning a super bowl we're talking about killing people right and and and.

Wrecking and we're damn sure talking about the risk of it right dave where is the risk at and I repeatedly asked, how is that okay? How do you think that's okay? And that's what, that's what in that conversation, the driver didn't get that, Dave, he wasn't getting your question. And I'm not sure that they would, would ever get that question. But the question is again, how is that okay? How is this okay, everybody?

And we do have, I mean, according to, I mean, I just spit at the figure, we have 75% of the guys doing it right, doing it right. And, and they're listening to the podcast in frustration right now. Right. And even some of the names on that list are guys that do a lot of things right. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. They didn't do this. Yeah. They didn't, they didn't. Man.

And I don't know if this is a character defect I have, but like, we're talking about this and you know, I thought about your opening words before where you're like, you know, do you guys have families? And you know, I was talking about like our families on the road and And man, I just went to this dark place of rage, like thinking about somebody put my family in jeopardy and like, I was just in a completely weird spot, just like, you know, I'm ready to fight.

It hasn't even happened and I want to fight people, you know? But would you, but that, that, and, and yes, that's what, I mean, we try to get people to think, but would you ask your kids to go do that? Is that okay? I know this one driver's got a daughter. Right. I mean, I think you know me well enough. And it's okay for her to go drive 90. Where? And if she looks at you and goes- In Utah, that's only 10 over. And if she looks at you and goes, it was the same thing you just said.

Right. Because it was 80. I was only on 10 over, dad. Yeah. And you're going to go, okay. I'd be like- But you have brand new tires on the car. It's all aligned. It's all ready to go run 90 mile an hour. On that Toyota Corolla, I bet they are. Bet they're rated for 80. Pruits does 90. It's just the what if. When do we start taking responsibility for ourselves? Yeah. Super, anything to add? Yeah, I shouldn't say this, but why not? I'll throw it out there.

So can I throw my truck into neutral, go down Eisenhower? No, no. Why not, Super? I just had to make an example of that. No, you can't. Yeah. You know, I mean, I just looked up the maximum speed rating on our steer tires and it's 75 miles an hour. There you go. That's steer tires. Those are virgins. Steer. Brand new tires. So once I'm going to control that truck, one of those blows out. Yep. Another thing we're going to talk about is stopping the truck. Oh yeah. Yeah.

Like how far do you have to, how far does it take to stop a truck at 79.5 doing 91 miles an hour? I mean, because at 55, it's like three football fields. Yeah. I mean, at some point you have to get some brake fade in there jammed too. So think about this too. Say a deer runs out in front of you and then all of a sudden you have to really apply your foot brake real hard. And then you try to put it back into drive at excessive speed from an idle, right?

There's a pretty big split right there between 650 RPM and the RPM you need to go up. And what if that computer can't figure out that split and it won't make the shift for you? I mean, have you seen these trainings in their training fault? Yeah, you're just asking for that, right? Right. And then what about the public? Because I would assume, you know, I mean, I've went to Moab enough that, you know, everybody's running 80, you know, 85, stuff like that.

But there's always those couple of cars that just aren't. And you just went by them at 90 mile an hour in a big truck. What, what, you know, or even 80, they're running 75, you know, and big trucks shouldn't do that. We're, we're just, we're, we are not looked upon well, right? All right, I can change gears here a little bit, cool off, and then we'll get heated back up. But right now, in regards to time off and time off requests,

seven days notice is a must right now. We are just getting beat up too much. Typically, I've been a little bit more lenient about the seven days notice, but man, it's just week after week of people out, people hurt, you know, the normal people we let out from vacation and then the call outs, you know, nobody on a safety team, including myself, minds driving, but we have other jobs to do. And when we're all in trucks, it's just taken away from JFW.

So, you know, if you can't give seven days notice, we, you know, reschedule your appointment or change something on your end to make that happen. This has been a longstanding rule.

It's nothing new, but it is being enforced right now. Yeah. Well, good point that, you know, come in and do your job, be think, be mindful of other people and what, and what your decision's causing. I just looked up the speed rating on the, on our super sales that we run. Yeah. I don't know how to look up the caps because there's different manufacturers, but the Virgin trailer tires, the Bridgestone Great Tech M835s that we run is 75 miles an hour or two. There you go. Wow. Wow.

All right. Did you guys want to talk about accidents and reserves? I know we were kind of up in the air about it. I did get that final figure for you. So did you want to discuss that? Is that something? It's not that it's wrong to talk about it, Jam. I mean, what is the final figure of what we have on reserves for accidents we've had? So 330 plus 200 plus 250. So 450 plus So $780,000? $780,000 we have in reserves to pay out claims.

And just a little explanation, a reserve is you have an accident and before the claim is settled, they go, the car is $20,000, your operation to fix you is $30,000, you're going to want $50,000 in a settlement, blah, blah, blah. It's an estimate of what it will cost, right?

Also protection. the case i feel like they they they might over like that member a little bit you know but they're saying like we feel comfortable setting three hundred and thirty thousand dollars aside for this accident three hundred and thirty thousand dollars my house isn't worth much more than that you know i mean with that three of them that's more than my house is worth oh yeah yeah yeah i mean it's it's yeah seven hundred and eighty thousand

dollars in reserves and you know if we do end up paying that out, which, you know. Pray to God we don't, you know, that's going to affect our insurance rates.

And, you know, we've talked about it year after year after year. And if, and if you work here, we do our damnedest to pass on our success to the drivers, to the, well, to everyone, it's not just the drivers. And, you know, part of that success, when we, We say we have internal and external customers, and what we're here for is the drivers. You know, they're our internal customers, those who we have to take care of because they take care of us.

And if there's crashes going on and money being spent that should not be spent, it costs us all. You know, our insurance rates will go up. It will hurt everybody. And you can't, you can't have worked here for a while and not know that we've tried to do better year after year after year. Stingray, you know, Chris Beam. Rick Gray, where, you know, Rick, he's been here long enough. He's seen, well, Stingray too. He's seen, you know, health insurance being paid for, PTO. 401k.

401k, you know, safety bonuses, Friday and Saturday bumps. I mean, all the things we do to make it better for employees, but it takes you to make it happen. Not, not us. We're here for support. You know, same thing out in the mechanic. We had, we had a mechanic, hopefully the mechanics are listening to this. We had a mechanic leave a tire wheel loose. We ended up, that's a fireable offense. We had to let them go.

And again, thank God, you know, getting up and trying to do the right thing, you know, whether it's karma or whatever, the tire came off, the rim rolled down in a ditch. And then the rim came off and stopped by the truck. It wasn't that whatever they weigh projectile rolling down the hill and kill somebody. I mean, I don't even know how we lucked out on that.

There's not enough wood in the world for me to hit, to knock on, to thank God we didn't hurt somebody, but we had a wheel come off because somebody didn't do their job. You know, that brings up a really good point too. if you know your truck was worked on, or if, if you even know, if you didn't write something up and you noticed the truck was moved and you think it was in the shop, man, look at those lug nuts, look at those brakes. You got to take an extra few minutes.

No human being is perfect, but we damn sure put the pressure on our shop to tighten lug nuts. I mean, that is, you know, we've, we, we've been around long enough here in this room. It's probably been longer than five years, but It only feels like that. There was a husband and wife following each other northbound I-25, maybe eight years ago, five to eight years ago, around the 470 area.

And a set of doodles came off a truck going the other direction, bounced over the median wall and plowed right into the windshield of that car that the wife was driving. And the husband was in another vehicle following her and watched her murdered. Wow. That's not, that's not good. That is not a good thing. He's not okay. He is not okay. No, he's not okay. No. I mean, he watched his wife savagely murdered. Right. That's the bottom, that's how I look at that. And then you want to take

a picture because you know he walked up. Yep. Yep. You know he walked up. Absolutely, he went and checked on her. And what, what, what scene are you left with? If I'm not mistaken, wasn't the daughter in the backseat and she was okay?

Wow. Toddler or? i don't remember jam it really sticks in my mind i mean i truly remember the wife and husband dave i mean i i absolutely either way we're talking about the importance of what happened yeah that's never i mean as long as i've worked i've never heard that happening to us we yeah we well we haven't hit anybody but we've lost probably what three wheels and dave since 71 yeah yeah yeah we job or 1935. We've gotten back to the pit and not known it was. And the loader operator told

us we were missing wheels. Wow.

So, I mean, it's, you know, and I have to, it is, it is not that driver's fault, but I do know that that wheel wobbled for a while before it came off. I mean, it really annihilated the rim. That wheel had some movement in it. Yeah. Look at the pattern on that wheel from the lug bolts. It was pretty crazy. It wabbled. Yeah. The driver should have seen it too, Jim. Yeah, I agree.

I mean, if you're looking in your mirrors, you're checking out your equipment, you're not, you're not just focused forward, which you should never be. I think the driver should have noticed that, but that's beside the point. Right. The wheel was not tightened, but Dave's, Dave's asking too. If you know your truck was worked on, you had a flat fixed, go check the lug nuts. Absolutely. You know, drive to the pit and get out and look at the lug nuts. Right.

I mean, cause you're maybe not going to reach down and see if they're loose. You know, maybe they were left loose and you can just visually see it. Right. But don't, so don't leave your life in other people's hands. Do they just strip off the bolts eventually? I just don't understand how they all back off. You know, do they add, do they get loose and they just start? This one, it could have been tightened by an impact, James. Right. They weren't. Yeah. So to me,

Jim, it either finally strips the threads on the nut and the bolt. Got it. Or as it wobbles, it's pressure on the out, so it spins them. Yeah. It turns them off. It turns them off. Gotcha. You were talking about they used to have different direction lug nuts. Yeah. I mean, in old school, we had inner and outer on the left side of the truck, you spun it to the left and on the right side, you spun it to the right. So both sides were always forward. Yeah.

And, you know, in 94, I think basically when they went to the self-adjusting brakes, they switched to those, the new style hubs and nuts that we have. The hub piloted wheels is what they're called. Yeah. That's the reason you can show up someplace without an outside rim and have an inside rim because there was 20 nuts. Yes. Yeah, you had an inner nut and an outer nut, one spun on top of the other, obviously, and there you went. So yeah. Yeah. The hub pilot wheel.

And that was not a good, we always had wheels cracked. We had lug nuts. Oh my God. We had, it was a nightmare. When we went to this, it was like, oh my God. Hub piloted was an invention from the gods. Right. Like it's truly a modern warfare. Yeah, seriously. Oh my God. Yeah. Oh. From a maintenance standpoint, right? Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah, Dave. You go to change eight, do a set of drive tires, and you're like,

okay, how long is this going to take me? Because what's going to be messed up? F'd on there. Yeah. So what you're saying is that was the best invention since sliced bread. Exactly. It was equivalent to sliced bread. Yeah. You know, we were, when we first were, what's this shit? You know, this ain't going to work.

Technology. They ain't going to hold that on. we need a new gun and all this stuff. And you're like, oh my God, that's cool as hell. That's so funny because I was about to ask you guys, and then I kind of answered it for myself, but I was wrong. I was about to ask you like, were you guys always open-minded to like new technology as it came out? But you just asked somebody questions. I don't think, yeah, Joe, I don't think anybody's open to change.

Right. You know, I don't care how much you like to change. It's just something different. Right. You know, but if you can be open to it or give it a chance, usually it's, you know, we just had a meeting or we went to lunch with a representative from Peterbilt and Rush here, the dealership, and we were talking about the trucks. You know, these new trucks are phenomenal. You know, the jake brakes, the transmissions, the hub-piloted wheels, the air gauges.

The check engine lights. Yeah, the check engine lights. They're phenomenal.

But ultimately dave what jim's talking about and i made the reference okay so we're going to stick you in an 88 379 extended hood you got your big crate stacks you got your your retarder and engine brake if you'd like right we're going to run rings around you with our new equipment you got your 18 speed we got our 12 speed automated transmission we're going to leave you off the line we're going to get double the fuel mileage we're going to come down the hill faster than you and not touch

brakes We are going to run rings around that truck with the equipment we have of today. The technology there is absolutely phenomenal. And I think we take it for granted every single day. And we're to the point we drive these trucks like automobiles. They're like a freaking car and we're driving them like that. That's not good. It's not good at all. So if we could take that driver, you know, from 30 years ago or 20 years ago in that 88B, I guess 30, 40 years ago almost, 24 years ago. and,

and get that driver to take this new truck, he would. To accept the change. Yeah. Change is hard. Could you imagine never making any other change in your truck and you go straight from that truck, that's all you've ever driven to arse. Yeah. You'd be like, oh my God, I can pull this hill how fast? I can come down how fast and never touch a brake? What's cruise control? I thought that was just a cable you pulled out of the floorboard.

The whole thing that is good to what you needed. You know what I mean? It was these types of things. It's also going from three miles to the gallon to six and a half miles. That's what I said. Double your fuel mileage. Absolutely. Yeah. And lighter. Yeah, and lighter. And just everything about it. The efficiencies are so much better.

You know and then we threw on top of there the accident mitigation you know we've had a lot of people kind of break our balls about it a little bit about oh it's on me because i'm following too close and that it's not too close or you know something like that it's always going off and making noise guess what folks we just saved four people's lives last week because the accident mitigation worked for a driver that was drowsy coming up to a light on high guess where

highway 85 i'm going to announce that again highway 85 coming up to a light that he wasn't stopping and By God, that accident mitigation kicked on and stopped that truck. It saved people's lives. Yeah. Saved injuries for sure. Yep. Yep. So no matter what, our equipment, top notch, right? We got blind spotter to help you change lanes. We got mirrors on the hoods. You know, the last seven trucks, we've just added the digital mirrors or what our salesman Rick Bowen loves to call digi-mirrors.

You know, that's going to become a thing. It was going to become a thing because- Quickly. It sees the lug nut covers on the right front corner and the front bumper. If you hit something with that now, it's a problem. And it's going to be a you problem. Cause there's, there's no way you just playing out, weren't paying attention. It was a, you problem becomes a, we problem and we ain't going to be happy. Exactly. So yeah, man, the, the, like I say, the technology is just, it is out there

and, and we're utilizing it. It's, it's amazing. It's good stuff. It's good stuff. Take advantage of it.

What's, uh, what's your, other than the wheels or the hubs or that other thing, what's your next favorite?

It i would have to say like the fuse control and fell you tell dave just said pulling up the cable ike the cruise control kicks ass but then you i mean there's so many things i the the jake i'm gonna say the automatics yeah yeah and and yeah yeah when you yeah the cabs yeah the the bigness of the cabs when i drove air windows yeah you know i mean there was i mean we we we had we We used to have a passenger air window and then a crank on the drivers just because you're sitting there,

you know, that was the upgrade because the expense and then the window usually didn't work well. Yeah. Jim, there's, you know, I'd have, I'd have to say, I think all the air conditioners and heaters are twice as good. We've got heated seats. We've got ventilated seats. I mean, what? The disc brakes too. Oh, the disc brakes, Dave. Yeah. In case something happens, you know, there's just. So good, man.

Damn. There's, there, there is a lot. You know, and, and I guess if you want to, I guess I got to make a joke out of it because you, you mentioned, but it doesn't have a hood jam. If, if you think you're cool in that, you know, long hood Pete with the shifter extension and in that small cab with your tip down visor and the, and the noisy ass stacks have at it, but that's not us anymore. Yeah. You know, we've, we've, we've stepped into the future to be better. Amen. Yeah.

All right, last thing on my list for the discussion. Over a plan, 13, Billy and Scott would like the drivers to go straight to the north around the lake instead of cutting through the area where mixers get water and the bulkers unload. This enables the driver to see if there's another truck on the east side of the plant dumping or waiting to dump.

You cannot stop and wait under the conveyor. If there's a truck dumping, you can pull around to the east side to stage, but do not pull too far south to block where the mixers go to get loaded under the batch plant. If you're delivering sand into bin one, please be aware of a wall that comes away from the bin at an angle towards your passenger side of the truck. Do not come into the bin at such an angle that you put your rear passenger side of the trailer into the bin wall.

When dumping, always back all the way into the grizzly until you are two feet from the pile it is okay to have your trail on the grizzly once you have dumped pull around the south side of the plant at the end of your day you must go get your ticket signed which a loader will sometimes do but usually you have to go up to the plant or the batch plant office to get them signed park your truck on the south side of the plant by the dumpster facing west but not blocking where mixers get loaded this

is an area to the west when you enter the plant to clean out your trailer thank you kendrick.

Ah thanks kendrick yeah thanks ken yeah and there was a lot there jam i read that and i haven't been down there in a long time i would be confused that's part of the podcast here this is something from billy and and scott and this is educational but if you get down there and you're confused walk park someplace where you know you're out of the way walk in and go hey billy we just did this on the podcast i'm lost what do you what do you want me to do also aren't they on channel eight.

Super day plan 13 which channel eight yeah i mean yeah ask i mean you're not gonna i bet i bet if I know Bill and Scott can be asses. They just want, but they run the tightest plant. Yeah. Why do we not have problems there? Because they run the hell out of it. Right. And if you go in the wrong way, they're going to tell you once. You go in there twice the wrong way, they're going to chew your ass. Yep. Which, what's wrong with that?

I don't think anything. Right? I bet the third time, you damn sure go in the right way. I bet you work by then. Right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, damn. Problem and it became their problem. Yeah. Anything else for the discussion, guys? Also, let me stop right there. Yeah. As far as okay to be on top of the Grizzlies, that's what they're designed for. The Grizzlies are designed to hold your way to that truck or that trailer loaded.

Ultimately, they would love for that whole road to fit into the bin, into the Grizzly where they don't have to push it up or anything like that.

You know, when the bin feed the plant, the idea is for you to just keep feeding that plant right out of the trailer into the plant you know with the load of doing as least amount of work as possible yeah then the old plant too we used to do it where load for load almost we couldn't really dump you could dump on top of the grizzly but it was a load for load.

Yeah plant one i thought it was two but not originally okay yeah okay plant one yeah thanks what was what was the but it was one didn't it have a name or was it just the street, oh yeah it wasn't all like wrigsby wrigsby yeah but no it didn't have a name it was just plant one yeah yeah but part of part of that being cool was oh if you call it the washington plant yes that's what it was the washington plant yeah because if you walked back and you could

see everything was running and there wasn't a load in there, when you dumped, if you just took a little bit of time and it wasn't, it didn't take a long time, but you could dump and put the whole load in there and it would take it. You didn't have to clean your mud flaps. You didn't have to look at the back of the trailer. You didn't have to do anything. Cause that material shot off,

right? Out the gate. Yeah. Yeah. Matter of fact, if you got some out of the grizzly, it was your job shoveling in the grizzly so the next truck could come. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Couldn't leave a pile there. Yeah. That would block the ramp. Yep. Yep.

Excuse me the good old days that was always the coolest thing too when your trailer was like three stages in the air it was a shit you just stopped you just raised it up and stopped and it was like, yeah just shoot now it's just shoot off that line list yeah yeah yeah good good shit yeah back in my day brother day didn't want to talk about what's next it's a children's hospital yeah i hopefully you guys can jump in and help me a little bit here but i just wanted to

address that a little bit because we kind of dropped a bomb a bit last week at the very end of last week's podcast i think it was a bomb when we couldn't do our toy haul yeah yeah yeah yeah i mean many of you know for the last several years we've done the salvation army macy's dr horton toy drive and because dr horton isn't participating in it salvation army is just going to pick up the toys direct from macy's So we kind of, we kind of lost a little bit of momentum on that spot.

Yeah. We just learned about it, you know, literally last week we kept pushing and asking. And then, so I don't know, I think somebody was finally just like, Hey, it's not happening. Right. So anyway, we jumped in and asking everyone to give to children's hospital and what a great thing to give to.

I personally donate to children's hospital on a, on a monthly basis.

And just, just, I gotta stop you, Dave. how many years have you done that a long time right yeah right i mean i i'm not going to go into it because it's not about me it's about i know but you know something is something that yeah it's important to the kids yeah and you've done a you know a long time yeah i give to two funds i give to children's hospital and i give to limb preservation society because i i had a limb threatening incident

when in clear back in 1988 and you know i didn't have the opportunity then but you know it's been a long time since i've been giving to them two years so but like i say that's not about me that's about about about helping the others so. Yeah. So there's a wish list that we sent out. I mean, I could read it, but it's a long list of things they need in the hospital. We're assuming they will use it in the hospital or who knows, maybe they get it in the hospital and they get to take it home.

And we had a couple people ask about bikes and scooters and stuff like that. Those are not on the list because if they are in the hospital, probably pretty rough for them to be riding a bike around or a scooter around or a skateboard or stuff like that. But man, there's just a great list of things here.

You know, coloring pencils, markers, crayons, coloring books, music, activity boxes, activity boxes that attach to a crib, Play-Doh, Crayola model magic, clay, putty, mad matter dough, you know, dry erase boards and markers, Nerf basketball hoops, high quality sketch pads, sketch pencils. Pastels and charcoal and, you know, journals for all ages.

I bet a lot of those kids, you know, they're, they're too sick to play, you know, so they can, they can write in journal in a, in a book or whatnot, you know, playing cards, uno, skip, skip bow, phase 10, whatever. Bluetooth earbuds, headphones, speakers, infant rattles, tethers, infant clothing. Just, you know, there's tons of stuff on here. Fisher Price thank you heroes, medical action figures. I didn't even know they had medical action figures. That's so cool.

You know, because those people down there are their superheroes. They're saving their lives. So good stuff. I don't know the date. I'm sure we can announce it next week. The date we need to have this in by. I mean, it's coming fast, right? It's got to be. Yeah. So, I mean, I would imagine if there's any chance this weekend or, you know, this week or definitely next week, we'll announce the deadline of when we have to have toys in.

I did see some toys in the hallway this morning. Yeah. Yeah, it was great. You can tell our door was closed. They dropped it. It was outstanding. I mean, that's just, everybody loves giving to the kids and these kids need that. The kids' families need it. Yeah. It's a great, great. I got to give a shout out to my daughter, Sarah.

She took her boys seven and five to the store last weekend and shopped for the kids at the hospital right and told these little kids hey listen pick out the best toys you can find but oh by the way these are not for you you can't play with these these are for the sick kids at the hospital how cool is that what a great lesson you know for those kids to learn they need to give to the other kids absolutely what a great great lesson good stuff erica i'm sure she's went back

to listening to the to the podcast and i don't think she'll be upset about this because this was a this was a teaching moment for for her and i but at one point in high school or maybe junior high she had a little bit of an attitude with me one morning and i just was not in the mood of it And, you know, basically lost my temper, sent her to her room. And I thought about it for a few minutes and I went back in and I said, get dressed. I said, we're going to children's hospital.

She's like, what? And I said, we're going to children's hospital because I want to show you what it is to be sick and not have the opportunities and not have the things you have and stuff like that. And I think that was an eye-opener for her to think about that.

We didn't go, that didn't happen, but it was just a teaching moment for both of us because I thought of how lucky they are yeah yeah it's it's a big thing yeah yeah and how i i you know i was out of town this weekend and we were at a at a show and a group of people were talking about us around us and just making chit chat and the one the one lady sitting next to me her her son flies for united so they got to come to take an airplane flight he's retired air force

he was a He was a fighter pilot working for United, got him the flights. They fly for free, got him the tickets for the show. But through the whole talk, I find out that her husband's got stage four cancer. And I didn't hear what type of cancer, but that was the reason for the show. You know, and you're just like, damn, just there's, everybody has life happening. No doubt. A couple other things coming up, not as exciting as that.

Children's hospital, but we got a full moon on the 15th. And then believe it or not, winter starts on December 21st. I'm like, wait, winter hasn't started yet? Felt like winter all week. Felt like winter Monday for sure. For me, the significance of that is it's the winter solstice, right?

So we have winter solstice, summer solstice, but that's the shortest day of the year and they start getting longer i guess i had to look that up dave because i knew that and and i wanted to test you so not i have to have like how do i ask you this how many hours of daylight is it it is the shortest do you know i don't know i mean obviously it's not 12 because 12 day 12 night That happens in like May or March, maybe, and then again in the fall.

But anyway, I'm going to take a wild guess and say nine and a half. Wow, Dave, you're spot on. Oh, wow. No, no, you're not. I mean, you are so close. It's nine hours and five minutes. Oh, wow. That is, yeah, you're not exactly spot on. It's a short day. That is a short nine hours. And it is, and it is the shortest day of the year. And from that day forward, it increases two minutes per day until the 20th of February. And then it starts to gain three minutes. Oh man.

Yeah. Cause it's partially sunrise and partially sunset. It comes around as the, as the, cause the sun on the, on the 21st, the sun is the farthest away from us. That's how it, so that's the reason it's the shortest. Wow. Yeah. Cool. Cool. I think about it a lot, too, because what if you lived in a northern city like Fairbanks, Alaska, or even Anchorage? But, I mean, what if you lived in Calgary, Canada, you know, and daylight's probably only like four hours. Right, right.

I mean, isn't some of the parts of Alaska right now, there's like daylight? There's no daylight? I mean, it's dusk kind of. Yeah, I think that's what Fairbanks is like. Like it's not dark, dark.

It's the sun doesn't rise, but it gets dusk. And I know if you go way north, like to cities in Sweden or maybe even like Iceland, I think it's dark, dark. Yeah. If you like some chocolate. I was thinking Mark, Mark. I was thinking. Mark was a dirter. Right? Not a PC joke. Mark Mark. We do have a question from the audience from Big Country. BC. He wants to know when the Christmas party is going to be. Have you guys thought about that? You should have the answer to that, don't you? We don't.

We did. January is going to be December 25th. Merry Christmas, everybody. Christmas. 16, 15, we, we picked it, Jim. Yeah. I don't know. January. So say the last couple of years after Christmas. Should I know that? For some reason, I thought you were on the email, Jim, with Joanne asking for dates, Joanne and Ann, but maybe it was just Joanne and Ann and us. I wasn't talking to the email. Wow. Ah. You should be. They don't like me. Email is female. No, no, no one likes me, Dave, so.

Yeah. Yeah. After, after Christmas. Okay. Tips and tricks from Ray Davis. traffic in the Christmas rush. Even though most gifts are bought online now are days, I feel there is so much traffic and a big rush to get all that shopping in. Here are a couple tips to help you in any traffic condition. Number one tip, you're going to love this one, Brother Dave, slow down.

That is so true because your energy level, your anxiety, just chills man you know you just get in that right lane let everybody go around you and you'll get there almost as fast with a much better frame of mind yeah chill dude you need to be like that serial killer i'm watching a new series and no matter what rush is on that dude's just calm and cool like like the police are all around him and he's just like motoring through not a

big deal man yeah look at fighters most of the time the calm fighters yeah yeah yeah Just like that Luigi dude that killed the insurance guy. He was stone cold calm when he shot him in the back. Yeah, that's easy. Yeah. How we got here, but here we are. We got here from you. Anyway, in regards to tip number one, slowing down, speed limits on highways, especially around curves and ramps are better suited for cars, not big red shiny trucks.

You never know when you come around a curve or ramp and traffic is backed up and you're coming full speed and a half to hit them brakes. It is vital to reduce your speed. Number two, stay calm. It is crucial to remain relaxed and keep a level head in stressful traffic situations. Number three, beware of your surroundings. When operating a large vehicle in traffic, you must be aware of everything around you. Keep in mind your space cushion and stopping distance.

How much space is in front of you? How much space is behind you? Be sure to constantly monitor your blind spots. and remember that cars are often not aware of these spots. Number four, try not to change lanes. Changing lanes is one of the more dangerous things a truck can do in high traffic. If possible, avoid changing lanes. However, if you must, be predictable and make sure the cars around you are aware of what you are doing.

Let your blinker blink at least four times before getting over and keeping your blinker on until you are completely in your lane.

I'm not after interrupting you but i'm going to jam because it god damn is that key right you know what i mean every time you change a lane your odds of having an accident like just multiply we have a whole safety campaign built on changing lanes right right yeah safety has no blind spot yeah number five expecting unexpected by now you have to expect cars are acting in unexpected ways Four-wheeler drivers get frustrated on congested highways and can recklessly weave between lanes.

You have to be ready to get unexpectedly cut off on the highway. So expect the unexpected. And that's so true. I mean, we, we all get good at predicting what a vehicle is going to do next.

Yes, Jim. I was just going to bring up, but I didn't know where you were going. What about Johnny and that brake check? Yeah. I mean, that, how unexpected is that? And he had, there's no clue that was going to happen. Nope. Right. Yeah. You don't know somebody who's going to act crazy. Yeah.

Right. And what if we acted crazy? what if johnny floored it right there just pie hold that guy and right into a ditch i think he would have learned a lesson don't mess with the big truck oh i'm sorry that was my outside voice.

It's true though we talk it's true you at a certain point you lose you lose your shit you'll want to snap yeah you know what i mean how far and i think i've talked about this on the podcast but how far we're gonna go yeah i'm willing to cut you off you're willing to honk your horn of me i'm willing to boat check you you're willing to mash on the throttle yeah i'm willing to get out and fight you're willing to stab me like exactly how does it

de-escalate well like how far are you willing to go because if all you're willing to do is blow your horn maybe road raging aim for you yeah yeah and that's where johnny was a hero yeah he just he just didn't do anything great job and it had to kill him inside yeah the whole west the rest of the way up that hill, a true professional though yeah yeah all right in this week's episode of did you know did you know december 11th what's

so funny i love it did you know december 11th 1882 the first christmas tree lights were created by thomas edison who decorated a large evergreen tree outside his laboratory with 80 individual hand-wired red, white, and blue electric lights. How cool is that? That is cool. My man, Thomas Edison. Did you know, December 11th in 1901, Italian inventor.

Guglielmo Marconi succeeded in sending the first radio transmission across the Atlantic Ocean, disproving the belief that radio waves would be blocked by the Earth's curvature. Sure. I thought the earth was flat. Hope all is well with the JFW family, friends, and listeners. Remember, safety has no blind spot. Look and lean. Sit up in a stool and don't be a fool. It's better to be slow than to be sorry. Much love and respect. Always ready to black sheet 0013. So how to ask Ray.

I'm like, Ray, do you have some nerdy prospect that writes these for you? And he's like, that would be me. Way to go ray yeah i really enjoy it i do too man yeah yeah and he did it and hey ray ray personal no don't forget to come get your paperwork from me oh yeah yeah he hit me up yesterday hey will you send me a copy of my ticket i'm like jim how's that he's like yeah but go upstairs and i'm like i'll do legs today i ain't walking up in those stores.

Don't forget legs there was a there was a meme yeah the guy was uh when you just don't want to do leg day and i was all expecting like always good because he pulled over a bench i thought okay you squat different you move different you do something because you just don't want to do leg day he just laid down on the bench and did chest when you don't don't do it that's funny never skipped like the yep well that was enjoyable and i'm ready to enjoy the high road hall and i

bet it's a good one well it's got a good silver lining to the end but you're gonna cry in the beginning he's on the actually it's about crying yeah it is it's about complaining are you a complainer no redis did you you know do i have a sister that's like that bless her heart she doesn't listen to the podcast that's her part she uh she bitches about everything there is no silver lining to that woman at all and so if you didn't know frequent complaining can badly affect your brain and here's why.

Recall the thoughts that you've been having recently while you were there. Go back to the week before and the month before that. And are there patterns? Can you see any repetition of thoughts that are negative, are unhelpful? And are you having them a lot? Are you then getting complaints from people that you are a bit of a whiner, right? And I probably should call her out on that and just say, man, you're a freaking whiner. You know, look at the bright side of things.

So anyway, science allows us a deeper insight into the brain. It can show us the functions of our neurological transmitters and what might be the reason behind such thought repetition. We can begin to understand why we might be stuck in this cycle of negativity. The question remains, can we stop the bad thoughts? In fact, saying negative things, as we probably know by experiencing this, makes us feel generally worse, puts you in a bad mood.

It also makes those listening to our incessant moaning feel bad too.

So the cycle continues. Your brain is a collection of synopsis. Synopsises. When thoughts arise in our brains, they send a chemical for one synapse to another. This builds a bridge and the synapses involved move closer together. In essence, the brain is shifting, rewiring to eventually making the thought come more easily and quicker. This means that if you are having negative thoughts, they are going to come more frequently.

That same thought pattern is going to continue and will result in a pretty negative personality. The flip side of this, as in the flip side of negative, is positive and positivity. The exact same process can occur with positive thoughts. We can train our brain to think positive thoughts the same way we can perpetuate that negative cycle. This will propel us towards a positive and healthy personality. Many things can inspire positivity and create positive charges through those synopses.

Aim for stress-free living and live in the moment. When you are depressed or down, the hormone cortisol is released. And cortisol is a very important chemical in your brain. Cortisol is a hormone that affects many of the body's functions, including stress response, blood pressure and blood sugar, immune function, metabolism, and your sleep-wake cycle. Cortisol is produced by the adrenal glands, which sit on top of the kidneys.

The pituitary gland in the brain regulates how much cortisol the adrenal glands release. Cortisol levels that are too high or too low can be serious and may indicate an underlying disorder. For example, prolonged high levels of cortisol can lead to Cushing syndrome, while prolonged low levels, and you can look that up on your own. I have no idea what it is. I've heard of this, though. Prolonged low levels can lead to Addison disease.

Other health problems associated with cortisol levels are huge. Anxiety and depression, headaches, heart disease, memory and concentration problems, digestive issues, trouble sleeping, and weight gain. So these health problems are very serious and that affects your whole life. Approach the life in the way that makes you most happy. And remember, the company you keep can make a difference too. If you are surrounded by negativity, it can rub off on you.

Don't let it seep in and mess with your cortisol. Surround yourself with positivity, light, and good thoughts, and you will succeed in training your brain with happiness. And the quote this week is by Lawrence G. Lovesick, who was a scientist that studied these things. He said, try to make at least one person happy each day. If you cannot do a kind deed, then speak a kind word and think a kind thought.

Count up, if you can, the treasure of happiness that you would dispense in a week, in a year, and in a lifetime. So there you go. So the more positive you think, the more positive your personality will become. That's awesome, Dave. That's a good one. Awesome. Final thoughts, everybody? I can jump in. I ran across a quote that doesn't say who the writer was, but they found it on a wall in an orphanage. And it says, if you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.

Be kind anyway what you spend your years building someone could destroy overnight build anyway the good you do today people people will often forget tomorrow do good anyway give the world the best you have and it may never be enough but give your best anyway so kind of kind of like that walking i like it too it's kind of funny that's i don't have final thoughts i I totally stumbled upon this quote, and it's, you're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.

And it's from A.A. Mine. I don't know who that is, but...

It and i do believe that's true oh no yeah you never you know a lot of times a crisis brings out your best things like oh my god i figured it out or i have i'm brave right and people just don't really you see it all the time yeah you don't think about until you're put in that moment you don't even realize it smooth scenes don't make good sellers and that's not my quote for today but i do also have a quote and that is big doors swing on little hinges

and that's from w clement stone anything else from you sue no i'm good just try to be positive and stop complaining. Don't forget to like and subscribe to the channel 23 podcast hit that follow button also don't forget to go back and listen to episode 72 tell find amber's mom links to her story will be in today's show notes. I say the creed and get on out. Let's do it. Together we face and overcome all that stands before us. Together we are asset and free.

Together we joyfully create honest value for those we serve. Together we celebrate our differences and respect those with whom we work. Together we are accountable for our words and our actions. Together we are the JFW family. Have a great day. All right, everybody. Thanks for listening. Ask your neighbor to listen. When I say neighbor, I mean the guy you parked next to or the girl. And we'll see you next week. Absolutely. Thanks, everybody. Be safe. Music.

On that Channel 23 podcast. Welcome and thanks for listening.