CDL TEST: 1st Attempt

Passed the Pre-Trip inspection and Skill Pad test! Failed the road test (got my trailer tandem's up onto a curb in a turn). Ooops!

CDL Test Site Today!

I am at the CDL test site today with my 2 classmates...this is it, the "Final Exam"!! I might be turning pro today. (Here is a foto of the site)
--> Steve2.Net

Mashed Cone Rescue Attempt

Awwww, poor cone got a bad mashy!
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Cone's? What f_____n cones???

Gotta go with the cone flow, knowhatimean? No, prolly not.
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RR Nature Center

At the Rocky River Nature center yet again! Nice day for bike ride :)
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Truck Driving 101

Got to stay between the cones :)

Jj rules!

Jj cute huh!

Alright then, last formal day

Alright then, last formal day of CDL school on Friday, then 10 days without much action until the test. agh. so much down time!! sigh..

I am camera fone blogging again! It's a happy feeling. This is the window at Bella Dubby on Madison Ave. which, unlike Detroit Ave. is NOT a truck route. However, it is a wide street...Two lanes in each direction. Seems quieter than Detroit. The bands that were scheduled to play at the Beck cafe were outside tonite but the police asked them to quiet down. Bummer.

Detroit Theatre

The CDL School Student Driver Blues

OK, so, all this past week was spent in the Big Red Truck (which I should have a picture of posted here but don't) doing maneuvers on the skills pad (a really big parking lot type space) and it was all going pretty well, not painless by any stretch of the imagination (my clutching leg and knee...oooh), the first few moves being STRAIGHT LINE BACKING not as easy as it sounds in a combination vehicle over 54 feet long, but after MANY repetitions - back and forth back and forth - I finally got the hang of using the big West Coast Mirror on either side of the tractor to 'see the picture' of what the trailer is doing...and at first it just didn't make any sense, wow, especially in a very wide turn...with the instructor barking at me over and over again "Right! Hard left!! Hard right!! C'mon, turn the wheel!!! Get OFF the clutch!!! Let the CLUTCH OUT!!!! Let the CLUUUUTCH OUUUUTTTTT!!!" I like to ride the clutch because it makes the truck move so slowly but of course the instructors HATE IT when I ride the clutch. Anyway, after a that move we went on to the lane change move, very tough move, many attempts before I got it going on, and it is possible to get into a funk during the learning of these moves. Finally on WED. we started parallel parking...and it was not to hard to get the hang of it, I thought I was doing fine, my mood was high...then the dreadful ALLEY DOCK move came in to play late WED. and aaaaaaallllllllll daaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy Thursday, man, what a tough move to get the hang of. Sigh. By the end of the day on THURS. I had attempted it, like, 15 times and STILL was only getting close to getting it going on. Well, I was beat last nite. I have today off, next week we start OTR training.

CDL School: Day 2

Monday I started CDL classes with Tri-C (Cuyahoga Community College), the real name of the school is the RTI or Regional Transportation Institute, sounds fancy don't it? It is sorta fancy: Big red trucks, instructors with 3 millions road miles, big screen LCD monitors, LOTS of videos - heh. My primary instructor used to drive the double Decker buses in London...and he drove HazMat Tank here in the USA. Today the class 'next to mine' (they are a couple few weeks ahead of us) went to test for CDL today and ... whadayya know .. they ALL failed!!!! Yep, they all failed. And in fact, two of the three of them didn't even make it off the skill's pad for the OTR section of the test. Sigh. I have heard my instructor say they are hoping that MY class will be the first to have all the students pass the CDL tests the FIRST time we try, ok, whatever. I have never even been IN a truck before...ever. But I am feeling confident.....my first few days in the Big Red Truck (with a ten speed manual transmission) will be telling. More later...oh, my site is back up, steve2.net..ok bye.

"Paul's Boutique" - Beastie Boys 1988-89

Wow, I guess I am a little slow, I took me all these years to really tune into this album. Only recently have I had an understanding of what it means to use samples in the making of an acoustic artwork. Anyhow I am listening to it now, over and over again, in an effort to really get at the artistry of this fine piece of werk.

Here is a lyrical analysis with sample notes:
http://beastieboysannotated.com/paul.htm#HighPlainsDrifter

Here is the Wicki entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul%27s_Boutique

The Job: Funny!

More Cleveland Bands for Consideration

I am listening to Cleveland Bands this morning while I work to Organize My Life Into More Managable Piles. (Pssst: I am adding links to music over there =>) I like The Very Knees, hmmmmm, and I went there from the Dreadful Yawns, and then over to Hobo Monk. The Yawns are mellow groovy, the Afternoon Naps sound cutesy. Maybe I need to go out and hear more Cleveland bands? LIke, in an effort to join one as bass player?? After all, I HAVE a bass and I can PLAY IT too - so there it is then.

Very Cool Music: William Orbit

I have been looking at the 'it' list over at Wimpyplayer just diggin' round there for what I think of as the coolest music webs and they have this link to William Orbit - here is the wiki link for more - really a great little site, tight and fast, informative and to the point, great photos, with really kickin free tunes (this guy produced Madonna and Pink among others).

My Cellphone Camera is Broken!! BooHoo!!!

All of the photos I have posted in this blog and in my website have been taken with my 2mega pixel cell phone camera and I really don't think anything can be done with a malfunctioning camera cell phone, I had it explained to me once that a cellphone will slowly 'cook' its Operating System with it's own emission of microwaves - sounds plausible. So, does that mean my cell phone is slowly cooking my brain? Will my brain eventually break down due to microwave exposure?? Scary.

Tarp money? What TARP money??

The gov gave (or loaned I am not clear on that detail) 45 BILLION dollars in taxpayers TARP money to CitiGroup (C) not to awfully long ago and, look, today the stock is below 5 bucks a share and dropping as the bank appears to be on the verge of breaking up. Hmmmm, so is that what the 700 BILLION bucks in TARP money is supposed to do, disappear into the deep dark recesses of failing banks, maybe never to be seen again?? I understood it was meant to loosen up the lending/credit markets....so when does that part of the deal kick in?? What's really going on here, did the taxpaying public just let 45 BILLION bucks disappear into a toilet? Damn.

Oh my it's Jessica Lea Mayfield .... all around

Jessica Lea Mayfield continues her efforts at World Domination in category Acoustic Guitar Slinger Songwriter .... and she may yet succeed beyond anyones wildest imagination, who knows. Here she is in a very keen video taken somewhere nice in Amersterdam gee, neato. And check out the sound of that guitar pickup, good huh, I like her sparkly eye makeup. Sigh :)

popcorn

The Detroit Theatre in Lakewood Ohio is now a First Run movie house, maybe you didn't know that. Thankfully, Yes Man is leaving by this Friday to be replaced by something for girlies. Hmmmm, more later.