Send a Bullet, Over Burgers

Greenwich Village, New York City

Lady Liberty is a matchmaker of sorts.

Recently we dined with a director, a producer, winnners of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for Documentary and an executive partner in an internationally known art studio. An evening courtesy of New York City’s compressed economy.

The Corner Bistro in NYC - click to enlarge.You’ve heard the saying: If you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere. This is New Yorker-spin. If you can make it in Toledo, Ohio then you can make it anywhere. There's an economic phenomenon that's given many a New Yorker a boost.

No doubt about it, New York is interesting. Extremely interesting. It’s a shock-a-block. A city where....

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The Palette of the Long Dawn

Fargo, North Dakota

We were loaded in Navajo Nation territory in New Mexico under brilliant sunshine with a refreshing breeze. The next 2,000 miles would be on two-lane highways, over mountain passes, across rolling hills, through fields of sunflowers giving their shoulder to the wind. North to the land of the Long Dawn and Dusk.

Chatting with shipper guy, who was checking serial numbers on the freight, Fargo, North Dakota came up.

The Space Alien Bar & Grill in Fargo, ND
“I just came back from Fargo,” he said. He lived there five years. His family wouldn’t move, so he returned and was lucky to find this job even though he drives 76 miles to work every day, 152 round trip. There are only minimum wage jobs where he lives, he said, pointing southwest to a ridge of mountains. His friends who had worked construction in Phoenix, Arizona have been scraping together a living for a few years now. North Dakota has the lowest unemployment rate in the nation.

I told him the ribs at the Alien Grill have been highly recommended. He was impressed...

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These Boots Are Made For....

Austin, Texas

Suze Orman is whispering in my ear.

“If you invested that money at a return of eight percent per year, do you know how much you’d have at 65?”

We’ve driven by Austin many times thinking, one day, we’ll get a load here. We'll eat TexMex, listen to live music and watch everyone two-step. Finally that day arrived. The customer where we delivered had some open space and let us leave the tractor and trailer for the weekend. Truckers reading this will drool. Don’t let the boots and hats fool you, Austin is City Slicker Texas, it is not big truck friendly. The closest truck stops are 30 miles north.

Making a political statement " Made in China, New York Sewer" with my red Iguana Lucchese boots.Parked under security’s watchful gaze, we pulled out our bicycles, packed a small bag and called a taxi. In 20 minutes we were surveying Austin from the 24th floor of the Hilton. Austin is shorter than we thought. There are some towers, 25-to-30 floor range downtown, but there are many one, two and three-story buildings.

We justified the Hilton stay, the second in July, by recognizing that July 29th was our ninth wedding anniversary, 20 years together, but only nine married. Mostly our anniversary is another day -- we told our mothers only Greg must remember -- without celebrations or gifts. We laugh about how time flies, comment on our growing stack of eyeglasses and wrinkles, which mercifully fade in a blur when the glasses are removed and that we have attained a new category in officialdom. Our hair color, according to Homeland Security, is now “partially gray...

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Luxury Trucking: Time to Enjoy

Nashville, Tennessee

The value of time is a growing older lesson. The years pass and we learn that time, not a McMansion, nor a porsche is the greatest luxury of all -- although Greg would disagree about the porsche. That point was driven home by my father's dying words to me and brothers: don't work yourself to death, no one will thank you.

The New York City Truckers' goal in life is to find the magic formula, the most money for the least effort.

Bike path runs parallel to I-5 near Central Point, Oregon. Time to pull our bikes out of the tractor means we have the right pace of freight.
Three months into driving....

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CityMouse Meets Real Trucker

Carlisle, Pennsylvania

A blue mini-van pulls up in front of the parking space where I’m standing, my bike leaning against the meter.

We’re waiting on an outside table at the Gingerbread Man Bar and Restaurant, a popular local hangout known as the G-Man, in downtown Carlisle. It’s a warm, balmy evening, golden light in the sky. We’re having a real people evening, dinner among the historic buildings of this Norman Rockwell-style college town.

Our folding Bromptons are conversation starters, traffic stoppers. People like the tiny folded package. Mine is City Slicker Red.Takes the driver three attempts to put his vehicle into the rather large spot, using two pull ups -- trucker talk for pulling forward to get more space to realign the trailer for backing up because in a big truck, the wheel turns opposite to the direction required -- but that’s typical. Most people can’t parallel park anymore thanks to all those big pull in spots at shopping malls. I wasn’t really paying attention anyway.

Out climbs a man, a little older than me, graying, blond hair, a deeply-lined, sun-weathered face, tall and lanky. Handsome in a Clint Eastwood way.

“I drive tractor-trailer,” he says. “You’d think I can park...

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