Tales From The Road

Over the years I've collected a bunch of unusual and amusing stories being on the road.  The past few years I've been driving 5,000 miles a month which I think qualifies me as a "Road Warrior."  I'm back on the road now and every now and then I'll share a few short tales from my travels.

I was delivering to a Pet Smart store and had the manager sign for the delivery.  When I asked him for his last name so I can type it in, he said, "Breeding."  I said, "did they believe that was your last name when they hired you?" He laughed and said they did believe him, but I really think his last name was Smith.  I wonder, do they call him Mr. Breeding at the Pet store?

I am awful with abbreviations.  When I started working for THE USA TODAY, I kept seeing references to USAT and people were pronouncing the word as "USAT."  I had to ask my boss, what does that stand for? I'm sure she was concerned that she had to tell me it stood for USA TODAY.

On my delivery list were the initials IMCMV with the address of  this huge amusement place called: Broadway at the Beach.  This location has almost every kind of entertainment and stores and rides you could possibly want and it's spread out over a tremendous area.  The question was, what does IMCMV stand for?  The phone number was disconnected and the guest information store had no idea.

The answer: it stands for Jimmy Buffet's Restaurant.  IMCMV is the name of the restaurant company and no one could have made that delivery. Couldn't they give me a clue on the route sheet?

I'm using a hand truck from the warehouse that is not ideal.  It's short and it's missing a cotter screw(yes, I admit I had no clue what that was) which would enable me to open it up completely instead of walking with it a little hunched over.  As I entered one office a woman commented that the last driver had a much larger hand truck and I have such a smaller one.  I replied, "well, I have a screw missing."  She said that I probably shouldn't say that too often and we had a good laugh. If someone questions my small hand truck again I'm going to tell them, "I used to be shorter and I'm shrinking now, so this is just right."

I know, some of you KNOW I have a screw missing.  The important thing is that I have a lot of other screws that make up for that one missing.