I am sitting here behind the wheel of the rig, parked in the holding area, at beautiful Bandimere Speedway in Denver. We are currently waiting for NHRA to determine where they are going to park all of the competitors. When that is decided, they will send Buggy, the man in charge of parking, to direct us to our assigned parking spot. I figured while I was waiting it would be a good time to write a quick blog.

Well, Monday was my birthday, and before leaving Bristol for our 1,448-mile trek across the country, Toni gave me my birthday presents. One of my presents was a brand new state of the art CB radio. Now you know I have been driving this rig way too long when I am really excited about getting a CB radio for my birthday. It has all of the bells and whistles so I can sound just like a professional transportation engineer (truck driver). Just to make sure it was in good working order, I had to try to talk to every truck driver whether they were east or west bound and get a “Bear” report.

We were making great time and soon met up with Beaver and Eric in Justin Humphrey’s rig, then the three of us rolled west. I had been counting my “trouble free miles” when I heard Jason talking to Beaver about something on his tire. Jason couldn’t quite make out what was wrong -- it just appeared something was sticking to the rear tire. Well, when Beaver pulled beside me so I could take a look at it, I could see it was a bubble on the side of his rear trailer tire and I knew what was about to happen next. Of course we were out in the middle of Missouri with no truck stops or repair shops for miles. Luckily, Toni had an Exit Guide, which showed a small tire shop about 10 miles ahead so we slowed down and carefully made our way to the exit.

The tire shop was old and no one was working, but we did find a phone number on the door and within 20 minutes we had a tire guy there. In the meantime, we helped Beaver and Eric get their spare out of their box and within an hour we were back on the road.

Well, the rest of the trip was uneventful -- that’s always a good thing -- and I got to talk on my new CB radio all the way here. I think my traveling companions got tired of talking to me because when they got close to Denver they told me they had to pull off to get their rigs washed and told me that they would see me later. What’s that all about? Since it was still early – only about 7 p.m., and we didn’t want to sit around the truck wash waiting in line, we went to the track, parked in the holding area and proceeded to give our trusty race rig a much-needed bath.

Hey, Al just got back from the airport with Jamie and I just got the word that NHRA is ready to park us. I love it when a plan comes together. Wish us luck on the rest of the Eastern/Western Swing and I’ll write again soon. Gotta go!

Jim