Is ADN>twitter: 256>140 (that’s obvious)& comment on abouttruckdriving.com @toddmccann podcast

DISCLAIMER:>>>
I SOMETIMES USE FOUL LANGUAGE IN MY BLOG SO IF THAT OFFENDS YOU IM REAL FUCKING SORRY. LMFAO OH…WAIT THERE GOES ANOTHER SQUIRREL. HaHa! THERE GOES MY ADD AGAIN

BUT SERIOUSLY IF THE OCCASIONAL 4 LETTER WORD DOESN’T OFFEND YOU AND YOU CAN FOLLOW ALONG WITH MY MINDLESS RAMBLINGS. PLEASE CONTINUE READING AND BE SURE TO LEAVE ME A COMMENT, SUGGESTION, CORRECTION OR INSULT DOWN BELOW IN THE COMMENTS SECTION. THANKS @driverchrismc

Allow me to start off here with my comment, in its entirety, that I wrote last night on @toddmccann ‘s latest Trucker Dump podcast on abouttruckdriving.com. I originally thought I would have to just leave a link to it in his comment section. Because I thought it would be too long winded and would cause his website to go into self destruct mode. He’d be more than a little upset with me if that happened. He worked way too long & hard on it. So please folks if you haven’t checked it out yet. I would recommend you do so Trucker Dump on abouttruckdring.com

First off let me say, before I forget as far as your reply to the 19 year old(from your feedback section). I’m not sure where you are getting that you have to be 23 to drive interstate OTR. The company that you know I drive for, as well as instruct for hires 21 year olds on a weekly basis. I’ve instructed some of them. I’d hate 2 think my company and I were illegally training drivers.

I could’ve written a whole blog instead of commenting here and I’ve even had thoughts of turning my blog into a podcast just like you did.

But here’s the reason I won’t do that( ill just leave the comment here. Perhaps you’ll read it in a future feedback session and ill have achieved the same end result). I don’t mind people hearing what I write, actually I think it would be cool! Just not in my voice. Yours or anyone else’s would be fine. You’ve met me, Todd, you know what I sound like.

Well I hate the way I speak. As a kid I took a lot of kidding(psychological abuse) because of it. I’ve just never gotten over being self conscious about the way I talk

Now enough said about that. If I can remember what I wanted to say now. Oh yes your “drivers seat phenomenon” blog/ podcast

Ill have to admit to being one of those drivers sitting in the seat you were talking about. I can tell you most of the time, when I’m in the seat, I’ve either got my iPhone in my hand(usually on twitter) or sometimes, like right now I have my iPad mini resting on the steering wheel writing this comment. After I finish this I will likely do something I don’t often do. Ill get the MBP out and work on my blog post.

And yes I’ll set it up on the steering wheel. It makes a handy little laptop stand IMO.
And yes the bright white glowing apple will be visible to anyone that passes by my truck and looks. I’m proud to let others know I got an apple MBP. Can’t say that I’ve ever had the fear of someone breaking into my truck. I’m usually in it when it’s parked unless I go in for a quick shower or to grab something to eat. I rarely eat in the restraunt anymore.

Or sometimes maybe I do look like I’m staring into space or watching people walk by or watching the guy next to me park and hope that I can trust him to do so without touching my truck or trailer. I’ve Been a “people watcher” ever since I was a kid. When I’d go to the mall on Saturday nights with my grandparents. Grandad and I would sit on a bench and watch people while my Grammy was in one of the stores.

Or maybe I’m doing my paperwork so I can get paid for the loads I deliver.

Or maybe, and I’ve never thought about it this way, till I listened to your podcast. I just maybe a tad bit clostraphobic. Being in my sleeper area with the curtain closed while I’m awake just feels wrong to me. It’s like I’m shut off from the rest of the world. Unless I’m sleeping or eating, normally the curtains open while I’m eating.

I guess basically what I’m saying is I see no good reason to be in the sleeper with the curtains closed unless I’m actually in bed sleeping.

That should about cover it. I think I’ve confirmed some of your thoughts on this subject and hopefully enlightened you on a few others

And in addition one more reason for sitting in the drivers seat that I didn’t even think of until after I had already left my comment on his website.
I’m sure this wouldn’t have occurred to him since he doesn’t share the habit. Perhaps the driver is, like me, a smoker who doesn’t normally smoke in bed. I only do this twice a day. The first one in the morning when I wake up and the last one at night before I go to sleep. All my other daily cigarettes are smoked while I’m sitting in the drivers seat. Whether I’m driving or parked at a customer or a truckstop.

Ok now that I’ve shared all that with you, just in case your not a subscriber to his blog, I wanted to make sure all of you had the chance to read my words of wisdom LMFAO

On with the blog;

Is ADN>Twitter?(if the shoe fits lace that bitch up and wear it)

Before I get started with this blog post. I feel I should give it a little introduction or more specifically let you know how it came about…

One day last week, I believe it was Thursday , as I was driving towards my 90, that’s how Prime refers to my receiver, I was driving west on I74 in Illinois fixing to have to get on I57 to get to I72. I had been thinking about writing this blog and the things I wanted to say in it, and how I would say them and why…

That was my first mistake. As I’m sure some of you other drivers know, whether or not you want to admit it. Thinking and driving, or daydreaming as its sometimes referred to. Is more distracting IMO than either texting, tweeting, posting or being on the phone.

They should probably write me a ticket for that. Instead of the HUGE fines for texting and driving. I do use Siri most of the time so I’m not actually having to type but I still have my phone in my hand. So I think I should probably invest in a good Bluetooth b4 I get in trouble.
See there I go off track again. Where was I ?

So anyway I exited onto I57 but missed the exit for I72 and had to go down to the next exit and flip around to get to where I was going.

What I had been thinking about as I was driving that day was ADN or App.net. Some of you may have heard of it already or may already be on it. Or you might be asking your self what is ADN and why I should I give two shits about it…

Well ill have to do some more research on it before I publish this blog but for now let me introduce it to you. Let you know how i came to be @driverchrismc on App.net(you can follow me there as well just like you do on twitter) and give you my first impressions. As if you care. LOL. Of course you do if you didn’t you you wouldn’t be reading this….You are still reading aren’t you?

Ok great since I haven’t lost you yet. Here goes the blog:
A few weeks ago I started noticing one of my friends on twitter mention that he was on app.net. Then another of my twitter friends got on there. So I was to say the least curious at this point. So when that first friend I mentioned retweeted someone else’s tweet that gave a link to get on this app.net. I jumped on it. Yes I admit I’m a follower. No shame here.

This is not the same tweet that I was referring to but it will get you there if your interested in going there.

@filmfreak75 Sign up and pay for App dot net on their website, or get a free account via their app:

https://t.co/Nmxp9L2t8b

Yep that’s right the basic idea behind it is a paid social network, like twitter, but not-exactly

Let me say upfront here that you can get on it for free as of this time. That’s how my 2 twitter friends got on it and that’s how I got on. I think we all know my first friend is too much of a cheapskate to pay for something like that,even though I haven’t mentioned his name.

As I said two of my twitter friends were already using it, and by their own admission they plan on using it for a different more techy or photographic purpose something altogether different than the friendly twitter conversations we have on a daily basis. I think that’s a great idea. More power to them, I say.
But here’s what I’ve got in mind as my way of using ADN in addition to twitter
Now as you all know I live on twitter and wouldn’t even think of giving it up or replacing it with ADN

But here’s what I find to be most useful to me about ADN, instead of twitters arbitrarary, or at least I thought that they pulled that 140 character limit out of the blue. I now know after a google search that it indeed makes some sence. http:/limit/www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/twitter-basics-why-140-characters-and-how-to-write-more_b1124

ADN allows your “posts” to be up to 256 characters, almost doubling the length of your “tweet” which is limited to 140.
Also they allow you to cross post your post to your twitter account. In the Netbot app I use for it that option can be found under the retweet…excuse me…I meant repost button.

If your post is too long for twitter. It will be appropriately shortened and a link added to your complete original post. Now I know there are other alternatives to get around the 140 tweet limit. I’ve even used some of them myself. TMI.me is one option, twitlonger is another. I really never liked either one personally. Although they do serve the purpose. Another option if you’re interested is a twitter app I used to use occasionally called “Tweetcaster”. That app automatically splits a long tweet into two parts not exceeding the 140 character limit. But I was disappointed. It sometimes tweeted them backwards or retweeted your old tweets the next time you open the app.

So basically that’s all I want is to not be kept in a strangle hold by that 140 character limit. From now on when I have more to say than 140 characters. Ill simply post it on ADN and then repost or actually cross post it to my twitter account.

So y’all are more than welcome to follow me @driverchrismc on ADN, after all to borrow a phrase from @darkstaff I am an Attention whore. So just like on twitter the more followers I have the more content I will be. However since like I said most of my posts on ADN will be cross posted to @driverchrismc on twitter. It’s not absolutely necessary that you follow me on ADN as long as your follow me on twitter you’ll be seeing retweets of what I’ve posted there.

In addition I have since found out that my initial fascination with ADNs 256 character limit. It’s not all good, there do seem to be some limitations. First of all you have to either recieve an invitation from a paid subscriber or get the app.net app on your iphone. https://join.app.net/I havent a clue if its available on android. Maybe one of you robot phone users will read this and find out. If you do please let me know in the comments section. If you are on a free account like I am, you are limited to 40 people you can follow. So I’m guessing here that your number of followers will be limited as well. I can’t prove that yet because at this time I only have one follower.
Here’s a link if you’d like more information on a free app.net account    limitations link

Well that’s about all I can think of to say here. I’m sure you were all ready and waiting for me to conclude this thing. So until next time. Be safe out there drivers.

https://posts.app.net/5988006

TTTR 03.20.2012

Your gonna love this first part i know i do
Ok folks here we go it’s Friday afternoon. Im on the way down to Nogales from Albuquerque to pickup our next load in the morning. I was thinking while I was driving. So then I stopped. Cause well I had to stop at a rest area and I hear tell that it is now illegal for us truck drivers to text while driving. I can only assume that would apply to twitter as well.

Anyway I was going to put all this on twitter. But then I thought. Wait. This is way more than 140 characters and you would all have to read your timelines backwards. So I put it here.

I was gonna start by saying EXCUSE ME MAY I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE NO don’t worry this is not the lyric to a slim shady(Eminem) song. So if you are over the age of 25. Please keep reading. I promise your safe. Well my next tweet would have been. Thank you that’s better. Now that I have your attention I wanted to let you know that I’ve started work on next weeks blog already. Mainly because I’m getting older and have early Alzheimer’s or as I like to call it CRS. if you don’t know what that means. Send me a DM and I’ll spell it out for you.
Like I said I was driving and thinking of ideas for the blog and what usually happens is if I wait a week to write it down I’ll forget my brilliant ideas.
I was going to tweet that I was going to give you a rare inside glimpse of next weeks blog
I wanted to let y’all know that it would include what I like to call my list of UNusual suspects. Confused? Don’t be. Let me explain. If I may ramble on. Gotta be careful here I’m becoming a little bit too much like Todd ‘long winded’ McCann LMFAO
Anyway my list That’s my blanket way of referring to people on twitter, friends, publications, organizations or anyone who as helped me with this blog. They are names that I @mention on a regular basis. They all either RT my tweets. Mention my blog, post a link on their Facebook page, or website, or post my photos. I was going to let you know that I was adding a couple new names to the list. That list is pretty much anyone that strokes my ego and that’s a pretty big job. Believe me I’m one of the most egotistical arrogant bastards you’ll ever meet. I’m number one and i know it. People in four wheelers tell me everyday that’s a truck drivers joke.

But then I thought. No I can’t do that. Surely I will offend someone’s delicate sensibilitys because they come after someone else. Or they’ll think their special because their listed first. So no list. Well now wait a minute. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. I can list them alphabetically. Let’s face it the alphabet has always been the same 26 letters in exactly the same order and is often the basis for creating lists
I was also going to tweet that next weeks blog was going to be a little more me and a little more snarky than usual
Oh and one more thing. Thanks Steve.
That inside glimpse I promised you
I’m pretty sure you just read it haha

So anyway. Wait for it. Wait for it. Saturday Sunday Monday ok now it’s Tuesday and you can read my blog. And it goes a little something like this.

Welcome back friends, followers,enemies. I don’t really care who you are as long as your reading my blog
I’ll start off this week by thanking @challengemagwho tweeted last week that I had a sweet trucking blog. That was seconded by @todaystruckingthank you as well as @HTDTruckingjobsAndrea tweeted This was great! thank you!
And to all those who Retweeted or read and commented on my blog THANKS!!!

Anyway here’s that list I promised you earlier @alanqbristol, @BTDTruckingJobs, @ChallengeMag, @darksaff. I could’ve used Eric’s real name. Wouldn’t have changed the order of the list. @hnldriver,@HTDTruckingJobs,@lifeotr, @raysunshine77, @tachoblog,@toddmccann
We met @toddmccann last Wednesday evening 4 a tweet up at the flyin hook in Amarillo TX
We had a good meal at Denny’s
Good conversation I thought but according to todd it was “interesting. Three people with their faces buried in their iPhones “HaHa! My wife @tammymcfadden thinks he’s funny. Funny HaHa! Not funny queer>;;;;;;;;>;;;;;;;;said in my best Billy Bob Thornton voice.

Anyway now I know the best kept secret on twitter. He drives for…….???

You won’t here it from me. Especially not you Eric @darkstaff
I had to swear an oath in blood not to tell you he’s with JB H…
Oops!

No really he’s not. He has a good reason for not revealing his company.
So as a man of my word. I won’t reveal my friends secret.

As you might have guessed we discussed twitter over dinner. Who woulda guessed that LMFAO
I also asked @toddmccann if I was doing something wrong. I remarked that I could no longer post more than one picture at a time on twitter. He agreed it was maddening and support couldn’t give him a good answer as to why.
UPDATE. @Toddmccann figured it out Sunday morning and sent me an email. All we had 2 do was change our settings in #tweetbot to use an image upload service other than twitter or twitpic. I’m using img.ly. And it works hallelujah.
I now return you to your regularly scheduled blog.

Oddly enough we hardly talked about trucking at all-strange 4 a table with 3 truck drivers
We talked about all sorts of different things. Like other twitter friends we had in common, vampire movies, light sabers, being geeks rather than nerds, the new iPad and the list goes on

In particular the new 3rd generation iPad. Will Todd get an iPad? Will the evil overlord,that’s Todd’s wife in case y’all been livin under a rock and didn’t know, get a new iPad. I really can’t say. But as for me I can say I’m startin 2 warm up 2 the idea. Especially now that I found out the Verizon 4g model have a 4g hotspot at no extra charge. It will of course count towards your data limit. so really it’s not free it just doesn’t cost you any extra

That option is particularly appealing to me since my 4g Mifi is about as unreliable as I don’t know what. I think my old 3G Mifi worked better sometimes or maybe I’m just using that as an excuse to get a new iPad. Either way. That’s my story n I’m stickin to it. LMFAO

But no folks I won’t stand in line on launch day to get one, I’ll wait at least a week or till my birthday on the 24th. I’ll be 41. I wasn’t going to announce that but @tammymcfadden already put me on blast on twitter

But anyway enough of me On with the #truckertuesday twitter recap. If I’m not careful here I’ll end up bein as long winded as you know who JK LMFAO

Good news for truckers as U.S. Senate passes highway bill http://t.co/cb8LNa8z via The Vindicator

by ChallengeMag at 3/15/12 12:47 PM

(Source: http://twitter.com/ChallengeMag/status/180364663291252736)

Rob W (@hnldriver)
3/15/12 12:24 AM
I’ve just updated my site: thetrucker.yolasite.com

Didn’t know he had a site but we all do now

New iPad confirmed to sport 1GB of RAM and 1 GHz CPU: Tinhte, the Vietnamese tech blog who got its hands of the … http://t.co/lqJsicMs

by iPhone_News at 3/13/12 1:30 PM

(Source: http://twitter.com/iPhone_News/status/179620462907764737)

Camera+ 3 is Out and Here is the Gigantic Change List: Camera+ 3 is out a day earlier than expected, and the lis… http://t.co/dDSnTjar

by iPhone_News at 3/13/12 1:30 PM
I LOVE THIS APP THINK @darkstaff and @toddmccann would both agree with me
(Source: http://twitter.com/iPhone_News/status/179620480309919744)
As a matter of fact Eric@darkstaff tweeted us this link:
RT @iOSPhotoApps: “Camera+ Goes To 3.0” http://t.co/iIStlyql #Camera+ #iphoneography <;;;;;;;<;;;;;;;Sweet. #fb

by darkstaff at 3/13/12 10:01 AM

(Source: http://twitter.com/darkstaff/status/179567949206659072)

Speaking of #camera+. I found out, while waiting on my wife in the ER, by googling yours truly @driverchrismc that all of the #camera+ photos I’ve shared on twitter are available on http://campl.us/user/DriverChrisMc. Pretty cool. It made a website for me I didn’t know I had!!!

Andrea also let us know on twitter>;;;;;;;>;;;;;;; Here are some apps for your phone that can help on the road http://t.co/i9EwIsmr Food, gas, audio books, & speed traps!

by HTDTruckingJobs at 3/13/12 10:56 AM Thanks Andrea

(Source: http://twitter.com/HTDTruckingJobs/status/179581596389736448)

Oh BTW let me go back to tooting my own horn 4 a minute. My wife and I are slated to be driver profiled in the may edition of Challenge Magazine as I was informed in the following email
Hi Chris,

We’re hoping to have you as the driver profile for the May issue of Challenge Magazine. Do you have any high-resolution photos of your wife and you with your truck? If you could send a couple, that would be great. It’s always nice for the art department to have some choices.

Thanks again for being one of our driver profiles!
Amanda

Amanda Jakl
Assistant Editor
Social Media Manager

Well that’s all I can come up with for now,as I sit here at the flying hook in Albuquerque
And my Mifi signal isn’t the greatest here, kinda frustrating for what should be 4g!

So anyway where was I in my story oh yeah. B4 we left for California and Todd got on his way 2 Houston. I decided to take a picture of us in front of his truck. Just in case y’all were still wondering who he drives for.

As usual this blog was written on my ipad2 using info gathered on twitter. Please leave your comments below. Till next week. Be Safe Drivers.

TTTR 03.13.2012

Welcome back friends. I’ll start off this weeks edition by letting u know I’ve officially named this blog now it’s TTTR. Thats trucker Tuesday twitter recap.
It will be published weekly, or as often as I get around to it.

I would like to thank Challenge Magazine @challengemag
Last week they tweeted about my blog “We love his writing style! Check it out.”

And on that point I also received word from them this morning that they are going to feature my wife and I in their driver profile in may. Very excited! Be sure and pick up the latest issue at any Pilot or Flying J

I wanted to pass along a friendly word of warning to all my fellow truckers OTR. I was informed last week by our companies safety director that the state of Indiana DOT does 35000 inspections annually! Compared to 5000 in the rest of the states. That’s 7 times the national average. They are to say the least ‘aggressive’

They are, by their own admission, more interested in radar than creepers. In other words they are more interested in our safe driving than they are performing inspections to look for mechanical problems.

They are looking at us for violations such as speeding, following too close, improper lane change etc.

Their also NOT a probable cause state according to my safety director. Meaning they can just pull us over because they want to.

So let’s be careful when driving thru Indiana. If we drive safely,like we should anyway as Proffesional drivers. We shouldn’t have any problems.

Apple held a keynote last Wednesday to announce the highly anticipated ipad3, although they are not calling it ‘3’ it’s simply ‘the new iPad’. Leave it to apple to do something unexpected. Lol

Check it out the new iPad It has quite an impressive list of features.
Although it wasn’t, as I was hoping for, smaller(guess I got spoiled on the first android tablet I had by Samsung). It is worth getting. Most notably is the improved retina display and of course the fact that its 4G LTE capable! If your on verizon like I am. They have announced that it’s 4G hotspot will be FREE. That’s good news right!.?

Ok enough of me lets get down to the TTTR for this week.

@tachoblog posts pictures weekly in what they call their View from the cab. Last Fridays post bit.ly/Akuigq included photos from yours truly As well as an awesome shot of a cloud that looks like a UFO from the movie Independence Day. It was taken by my wife Tammy I was so impressed that I had to send it to them for her. There were also pictures from our friend Eric who is back with us now after taking his break from the socials. He says you need that once in awhile. LMFAO @darkstaff as he is known to us on twitter also shared with us these spectacular night shots flic.kr/p/bp6LQo
flic.kr/p/bC1CnX
flic.kr/p/bp6DDw
and “the imprisoned moon” https://twitter.com/darkstaff/status/177712970292404224

There was no new blog post from my friend @todd mccann. But he did mention to us on twitter that he recently did an interview with job shadow.com. He was very informative, and by that I mean long winded as usual LMFAO. Give it a read folks

Wanted to say welcome and thanks to my new followers. I hope you’ll consider subscribing to this blog as well. Andrea@HTD @raysunshine77 and Randy Nose who according to Tachoblog is leaving us for another line of work. Like they said Randy good luck

Well that’s all for this week. As always please feel free to leave me your comments. Hope you’ll come back next week

All info for this blog was gathered on twitter and was written in its entirety on my ipad2
Any material not my own has been credited to its respective owner

Till next week Be safe drivers. Chris McFadden

parting shot clouds after sunset from I80 eastbound in PA

TTR 03.06.2012

OK folks here we go first off let me start by explaining the title TTR. Now get your minds out of the gutter folks.TT It’s not a bodily function nor is it 2 parts of the female anatomy. It could stand 4 trucker trash but that may or may not apply to some of us. As far as the R well even I’m undecided. So therefore I just went with the initials TTR. Kinda like the classic rock band CCR. But there the R stood for revival. That sounds too religious to me. And if you’ve read my blog “Hippocracy on high”. You already know I’m anything but religious.

So this is what I came up with TTR. We are all familiar with the #truckertuesday on twitter. So since today is Tuesday I thought I’d start with that. Now as for the R. As I said I’m undecided. It could be reblog,retweet. Since this blog will contain both. It could mean remix nah scratch that this isn’t a song and I’m no DJ. Incidentally remix is also what Walmart calls the trucks that deliver basically everything on the grocery side of their store that doesn’t require temperature control. I know that cause I used 2 work there and unload them. But now I sometimes get to deliver them haha!

So what is it. Well I’ll leave it up to you to decide. To each his own

The direction I’ve decided to try for this blog is not an original idea. The web is full of people reblogging other peoples blogs. Twitter is overloaded with retweets and pics reposted. But it all works together for the greater good I think.

So anyway I thought if people like@Tachoblogcould get tribemembers,myself included, to send them photos to repost every week in what they call “View from the cab”#VFTC. And idownloadblog etc can repost others blogs or repost their links

So could I So here goes nothin:

We start with a new blog post from one of my twitter followers @toddmccann
This was as he said his first attempt to show us his more artsy side. I suggested to him that a pictures worth a thousand words and maybe this would keep him from being so dang long winded. However he assures me that plot will fail. A trucker visits carhengeis that blog post. Good short read with an accompanying video

@gypsyhooker also has a blogMy flavor of crazy
Todd also tweeted that mike the driverhas a blog as well

Admittedly I’ve not had time to read either of those yet but just trying to help spread the word

Now let’s get to the photo portion shall we….

My first inclination would be to include some of the works of@darkstaff
But he has been on a self imposed break from the socials. So not much to include from him as of late. But you can check out all his stuff on his about me page

I took this photo earlierand edited with my camera+ app on my iphone4s. It was taken at the second westbound rest area on I40 in California

@leftlanetruker shared this picturewith us on twitter

And my wife@tammy McFaddentook this awesome shot while she was driving this morning she said the cloud looked like a UFO
And here is her picture again with some of my
camera+ editing

So now just to wrap this up and make everything clear. The content contained in this blog has been credited to their respective owners.

The content in this blog was collected using Tweetbot on my iPhone. And this blog in its entirety was composed on my ipad2

Let me know what y’all think. And maybe I’ll continue with this format if it is well received