You read that correctly, parking can be sexy. Now, I’m not talking that boring old pulling into a spot parking, but parallel parking. Swinging a 83′ beast into a 90′ spot without going over the lines (point deduction) and not having to pull up to reset (point deduction) is sexy as hell.

This is what it looks like when you one shot parallel parking on both the drivers side and the blind side. What happens after this is your trainer makes you do it again two more times each side and, when you nail them yet again, gets disgusted at you for wasting his time (but you can see the pride in his eyes).

The last two days have been alley dock practice and that’s a whole different beast. I have my reference points on my truck set so now it’s just a matter of repetition until I have that muscle memory set.

One thing I’m ready for is to be off the practice trucks and on to an automatic. My knee is pretty swollen and sore today from all of the clutch work I’m using. It takes, in my guesstimating, between 30-50 lbs of pressure to fully depress the clutch and disengage the drive train. Over the last week, that’s a lot of use one knee has gotten. Today, since it was a short day is also all about ice and ibuprofen.

Last night we had a company Christmas party and it was amazing, if not a bit nerve wracking due to being in a room with over a hundred people I don’t know. The open bar helped a bit.

For a trucking company the owner spared no expense in showing his employees his appreciation. I missed taking a shot of the main course because….it was surf and turf and delicious and needed to get in my belly.

My test is officially set for Tuesday. That gives me two more days to perfect all of my backing skills and get some in town drive time under my belt. After being here for three weeks, saying that I’m ready to leave is an understatement.