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Driving a Big Truck or How I Became A Professional Tourist by Steve Richards
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Rated "G" by the Author.
A short excerpt from "Everything You Will Ever Need to Know to Start Driving a Big Truck or How I Became a Professional Tourist.
-If you pay attention it is astounding what you can observe. Not long ago, I ran head on into a tornado in the middle of Kansas. While not everyone would want this, I will say it was probably the most exhilarating moment I have ever had while driving. -I was on a two way, two lane highway out in the middle of nowhere when I observed this large funnel cloud drop right out of the sky. While it certainly raises your blood pressure a bit and may even rattle the nerves, I was never in any way in fear of my safety. I had the weather station on the radio, and the emergency voice came on and said, "Go immediately to your tornado shelter! Go immediately to your tornado shelter! Go immediately to your tornado shelter!" On and on it went. However, as I was already in my tornado shelter, there was nothing further for me to do. -I could not turn my 71 feet of tractor trailer around. So, I had the option of either pulling over on the side of the road, or I could keep going and hope to outrun it. No matter what I did, it just kept getting closer and closer. I began to think I was a tornado magnet. -I pulled over in back of a couple other local trucks, grabbed my camera, and hopped out onto the highway. The two drivers ran up to me and yelled in terror, "What do we do? What do we do?" Thinking quickly I held up my camera and said, "Here, take my picture in front of this thing." To my amazement these guys would not touch my happy little Nikon, and instead ran scurrilously down the highway to escape the oncoming peril and certain devastation.
