Gave Away My Saturday

Don't be fooled by the well manicured title above, I didn't give away my day for a good cause, or even a cause at all. I didn't waste it like I otherwise would have loved to do. I didn't make it disappear in a Copperfield type of illusion. I worked, well sort of. Another team in our company has this fancy planter. It is a cool piece of equipment and can do really neat things. Problem is, no one on that team has the equipment or ability to move their little rig around. Cue the Tugboat. Last year my team had to drive the unit all over the southwest. Literally drive a tractor around on the roads. Have you ever tried to drive a tractor for 3-4 hours on a road. It is incredibly boring and also fairly dangerous. Cars are stupid when it comes to farm equipment on the road, and their drivers are worse! [Rimshot] So this year I was hoping to avoid this same game, we got a bigger trailer last fall for our program and the other team saw that as a move to help them. So I get a call asking me to move it from one spot to another for them. It's only about a two hour trailer ride, which is a lot. I foolishly agreed, knowing that next time I probably won't help, because I'll be using the trailer myself. Last year for trips like that they hired a trucking company for $300. More on that. So I left my house ahead of half past six in the morning. I got the trailer hooked up and picked up the unit. It didn't load smooth and then people kept stopping in to say hi and ask what was the deal with such a fancy, small rig. They thought it was small but it is certainly big for that trailer. I'm almost certain it is too heavy but we've never weighed it and I didn't have the time or the patience to bother with that. I just wanted to get the adventure over with. It had already been an hour with the trailer on before I got to the rig. I made my way on the smoothest roads I could find toward the big highway. Despite that it was a rough ride. My abs were sore from trying to stay in the seat while it bucked on each bump. Another sign that there is too much weight. I was just hoping that nothing terrible happened like blown tire. So I white knuckled my way down to the highway, stopping on the side of a busy road to check the chains before getting on the big road. Being the 'truck driver' isn't much fun. Everyone tries to pass you and drives risky doing it. No one likes you but I couldn't go much faster. Not for comfort, literally the truck wouldn't go faster, some hills I had it pinned and was losing speed. So I got across and up to the other location. I unloaded it, parked it, locked it and hid the key. I had to drop my trailer to be able to get fuel. The local stations don't really have room for trailer as long as mine while fueling. So I did that, drove the ten minutes back to the trailer and got back on the road. All told it was  a nine and a half hour adventure from when I left my house to when I returned. For my time, the fuel, the uncertainty on weight, etc that $300 to hire a professional looks to be worth every penny. I will push for that next time. To calm my nerves, I made some of my signature Tugboat's Gut Fill Gumbo and laid down for the rest of the evening, watching trash until the NHL Draft Lottery. That ended well for me, so I will take my leave of consciousness shortly, just after nine. Glad to be done the day.