December 20, 2024 • 45 mins
Trey and Brian get themselves a great big convoy as they hit the road with inspirational truck driver Donya Howard.
Donya Howard is from the small town of Atlanta, Texas. She is an author, podcaster, breast cancer survivor, and motivator who has been through numerous life challenges, and has found empowerment and solace in her career as a female truck driver. Brian Phelps is an American radio personality, actor, and comedian best known for co-hosting the nationally and globally syndicated Mark & Brian Morning Show in Los Angeles for 25 years. As the co-lead of his own television series, with multiple roles in movies, and a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Phelps is also an inductee in the Radio Hall of Fame.
Trey Callaway is an American film and TV writer and producer who wrote the hit movie I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, and has produced successful TV series like CSI:NY, Supernatural, Rush Hour, Revolution, The Messengers, APB, Station 19 and 9-1-1 LONE STAR. He is also a Professor at USC.
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Donya Howard is from the small town of Atlanta, Texas. She is an author, podcaster, breast cancer survivor, and motivator who has been through numerous life challenges, and has found empowerment and solace in her career as a female truck driver. Brian Phelps is an American radio personality, actor, and comedian best known for co-hosting the nationally and globally syndicated Mark & Brian Morning Show in Los Angeles for 25 years. As the co-lead of his own television series, with multiple roles in movies, and a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Phelps is also an inductee in the Radio Hall of Fame.
Trey Callaway is an American film and TV writer and producer who wrote the hit movie I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, and has produced successful TV series like CSI:NY, Supernatural, Rush Hour, Revolution, The Messengers, APB, Station 19 and 9-1-1 LONE STAR. He is also a Professor at USC.
___________________________________
Make sure to follow us on social media at:
begoodhumanspodcast.com
instagram.com
tiktok.com
threads.net
facebook.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We got a great big con boy thinking through the night.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
We're gonna want to take.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Combo humans. Be good humans.
Speaker 4 (00:17):
Be good humans, or we will think you sucked humans,
or we will thank you suck.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
And Welcome to the Big Good Humans Podcast. We're broadcasting
live from the Vatican today and we're hoping to get
it there is Hey, Ponta Fat, don't be shot, Pata
pay Paul, you're on, You're on the lands.
Speaker 5 (00:49):
Come on.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Wow, we just got ghosted. Tonty was hanging.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
We just got ghosted by every single Catholic listener.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
We have gosh cheese. Anyway, Welcome to Good Humans Podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Yes to be very good Humans. Thank you for joining
us once again. Uh Hey, Brian, I had to actually
take an uber to the studio to what happened cars
in the shop, which is not a big deal. It'll
be it'll be fine. But honestly, I found it kind
of nice to not have to think at all about
fighting traffic to get here to our scenic studio on arrowspat. Yes,
(01:22):
and it occurs to me that the woman who drove
me thanks Prinia five stars, uh is actually part of
a unique group of good humans that we should talk
about Okay, these once you got these good humans are
the people who drive us in lifem okay, And that's
(01:43):
that's metaphorically speaking, but it's also literally physically speaking, right
because in the long journey of our lives.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Brian, longer since you started talking exactly.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
We obviously have to make a lot of stops along
the way, right of course. Uh, And so we depend
on a lot of people in that process. First it's
our parents, right because they got to drive us everywhere,
you remember, all the time in the backseat. And then
it's your friends until you get your license. But even
after you get your license, you're still relying on other people.
(02:14):
There's bus drivers, there's train engineers, there's boat captains, there's
airline pilots, and yes there is taxi and uber drivers,
God bless them. Yeah. But then there is also this
uniquely special breed the set up. These are good humans
that we depend on each and every day to get
(02:37):
us the shit we need on a daily basis. This
is the stuff that we need that fills our fridge,
that fills our cabinets, that is the stuff of our lives.
And that those good humans, my friend, are the truck drivers. Yeah,
did you know Brian that in twenty twenty two, US
truck drivers moved fifty four million tons of freight across
(03:03):
this country every single day. We're talking about fifty two
billion dollars worth of stuff.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
I know that. I didn't have an exact figure, but
I knew it was a lot.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
It's a lot lot. These truck drivers do a lot
for us, which I'm guessing, and this will mean something
to you and I I think, yeah, I'm guessing all
of those truck drivers moving all that freight are spending
a hell of a lot of time on their CB radio.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I wonder if they still use CB because I was
raised during the CB craze.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
I hope they're still using them.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
The speed limit went down to fifty five freeways and stuff,
and so they of course they used them to, you know,
check out other truckers ahead of them. But we were
very very much into the CB craze at my age.
I think it was like sixteen seventeen years old. My father,
who I've talked about is so creative and funny and curious.
He had an operation on his ankle and he was
(03:58):
driving to work and he had a ca Okay, he
had a can. Now he told me this. I just
loved him for this. He told me that night he
had a CB on and he was curious what would
happen if so he pulls over on the seventy four
freeway outside of the road, rolls down his window, hunches
down in his seat, and just sticks his cane out
of the window and turns up the CB player. I mean,
(04:22):
he said he heard the funniest shit. He just it
was a gift and he just he just wanted to
see what would happen. So, yeah, that's amazing. And there
are two things, okay that you don't know about me.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Oh, I can't wait to hear these. Do we need
to clarify, by the way, for any of the few
young people who might be listening, that it's Citizens Band radio.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
That was CBE radio, and this was the thing you
could have. There was a microphone and this radio that
would be it could be in your car. But truckers
had them definitely in the day.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
That's how they communicated, right, That's how they they It
was a tribe of tribal almost and the speak that
the talk that ling. Oh okay, all right, but two things,
two things you probably don't know about me. Okay, I'm
gonna say you don't know about me number one, And
I am not kidding. This is not a punchline, This
is not a joke. I have always been to this
(05:11):
day a fan. Love truck stop food.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
Oh yeah, love, I'm right there with you.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
We'd be on vacation. Dad, pull over to the truck
stop like Stucky spur Stucky shirts. Okay, I'm wearing a
Stucky shirt. My favorite thing is a kid at the
truck stop was the I don't know if you're familiar,
but the hot turkey sandwich.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Oh, open face, Oh open face.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Definitely warm turkey, mashed potatoes piled on top thick gravy
going down.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
I can still chaste that man somewhere in between Nebraska
and wherever in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
And the second thing, okay, and that you don't know
about me. And I don't care what you think about me,
you or our viewers and our listeners. I don't care.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Okay what I content? Yes that C W.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
McCall's Convoy is one of the greatest songs ever.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
Written ever okay written Okay. Convoy by C. W. McCall
one of the most popular novelty recordings of the nineteen seventies,
and it was all from a truck driver's perspective as
he was mobilizing a convoy of other truckers.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
It was the dark of the moon on the fifth
of June and the Jimmy Hall of Longs cab Overpete
with a reefer on in a something something something. But anyway, yeah,
it was so I do.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
It was a great song. I loved it.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
I cannot get to the end without it inspiring me
and jazzing me up. Yes, when I used to listen
to it before football games, honestly, nice me and my
buddies because that very end where he goes let them
truckers roll at ten to four and then it hits God.
Speaker 5 (06:51):
That was killer.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
By the way, this song was so popular they actually
made a movie of it.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Chris Christofferson.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Yes, and this is where I get to excitedly chime
into your story with something you don't know, which is
that years later, I got hired to write my own
movie for the man who was C. W.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
McCall.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
I didn't know that except that C. W. McCall was
a pseudonym that was not his real name. His real
name is Chip Davis. And Chip Davis if that if
that's vaguely familiar to you, that name, it's because Chip
Davis took all of the money that he made from CW.
McCall's Convoy and he basically used it to bankroll his
(07:35):
next hit music making machine, which was Mannheim Steamroller Kid
Christmas music.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
On the show.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
Yeah, so that's that's you can thank CW McCall not
just for Convoy, but also for Manheim Steamrolls. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
I've got to truckers and trucking and that kind of
way of life is kind of sprinkled throughout my childhood
well becoming an adult on the show Helo West Show.
The first part of the story I'm not going to
tell you because it's long, and but I'll share it
another time whenever it works. But the Rose Parade that
just happened, and we I do Elvis on the show,
(08:14):
and I do we deal with that a lot, having
poking fun and have a ball. We get a call
from the Rose this is after the parade and they
know that what we do with Elvis, and they go, hey, guys,
I don't know if you're interested, this is on the air,
but you know we had a float this year I
was a tribute to Gracelynn and Elvis. And we have
(08:35):
a thirty foot tall, like twenty feet wide Elvis head.
Oh good lord, that we'd like to you know, if
you guys want to do something with.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
It, sure, if if you do.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
Thinking swiftly, I'm like, here's what we do. Why don't
we just put this on a semi semi truck. Let
strap it there and then we drive it all the
way out from LA to Memphis and then pull up
up in front of Graceland and just give it to
the Elvis head to Graceland. A number of things of fun.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Could we had, sure, especially if you don't call ahead exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
We didn't. Of course they heard it. We were kind
of but we we did it. We were a trucker call.
He goes, hey, man, I got a flat bed and
I'm going that way anyway. So yeah, yeah, yeah, And
even when it was such a stupid idea. And this
is what I loved about doing this show is if
the listeners that the dumber the idea, the more they're
into it.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Yeah. I mean you even got a driver who would
go along with us, right.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Driver, and the so we said, okay, we're going to
meet you in two days. And on the freeway at
the whatever overpassed there were cars were lined up to
see the giants, waiting, waiting to say, you know, bon
voyage to us. But my favorite moment of the whole
thing was about three o'clock to thirty three o'clock in
(09:57):
the morning. Okay, we're on the road, and uh have
the CB on and I was kind of just half asleep,
and then I hear this breaker one nine. Uh, some
some bitch has got the Elvis's noggin on a flatbed.
A small pause, and then another trucker. Uh, come back,
(10:19):
I said, some some bitch has the head of the
King on a damn flatbed. And boy, the conversation suit.
If nothing else, that made my trip, that made it
exactly just larious.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Yes, you you, you gave those drivers, those truckers an
exciting evening that they probably still talk about to this day.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
Well, yes, and so listen to the CB. You get
a lot of lingo anyway. But I for fun, not
only for you, but of course Ryan our engineered and
the lovely the talented.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Sean Oh Sean, Yes, yes.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Everybody's playing this. Okay, Okay, it's a a trucker lingo
quiz wow. For instance, example H ten four means affirmative
understood that kind of guys, if you know it, yell
it out the answer. Don't be shy even if you
don't know if if your if your answer is correct,
yell it out anyway, and just taking.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
You're trying to get back to my seventies brain. Okay, okay,
some of these I didn't even know. Okay, let's go.
Let's go all right.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
Back door?
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Uh isn't that the rear of the vehicle.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Close? Yes, it's behind a truck or a trailer. It's
the rear door.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
I met your back door right right right, right right, okay, okay, okay, just.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Out of nowhere. He's where he was going with. Okay,
chicken coop and trucker lingo. Yeah, what is a chicken coop?
Speaker 1 (11:51):
A vague what'd you say? Sean driver's seat? Nope, no,
I vaguely remember this. But what does it mean?
Speaker 2 (11:59):
It means a way station.
Speaker 5 (12:02):
No.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Way stations are all over the country. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
and truckers if it's open, sometimes they were closed. They
have to pull over and way and make sure everything's
set it right? Uh, deadhead and trucker lingo is deadhead?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
Isn't that like a hippie?
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Pretty much? But no, uh, the correct answer is driving
with an empty trailer. Ohad okay, double nickel, that's fifty five.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
That's the speed limit. Yes, yes, I remember that.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Uh, thermos bottle.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
I have no idea what that is?
Speaker 2 (12:38):
A tanker truck?
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Oh that's cool sense sense yeah, yeah, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
Big road, big road, big road, No idea, the interstate
or major highway?
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Oh okay, that's obvious.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
Yeah, one of the most poetic. And I love this one.
Wall the wall and tree top tall? What does that
mean in trucker speak?
Speaker 1 (12:57):
What Ryan says? Traffic kind of?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Yeah, Ryan, all right, I'll give you a dig for that.
It's a clear road ahead.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Oh okay, okay, cash register, cash register? Oh is that
a toll tollboo? Yes, okay, okay, good, all right, we're
not doing too bad. Green stamp, Oh, well that's a
dated reference green stamp. No idea what that means?
Speaker 2 (13:24):
A log book entry indicating a rest break or sleep
green stamp? Okay, all right, kojack with a Kodak coach. Okay,
well that's going to be a cop with a camera.
Speed camera, a radar gun, absolutely, okay, Okay, just a
couple more here, pickle park, pickle park, any guesses snack station? Yeah, yeah,
(13:50):
I'm gonna give you that one rest area or truck stop,
pickle park? Okay, nice?
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Right?
Speaker 2 (13:55):
This one is a word so beautifully used in CW
bacalls convoy.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Okay, bring this.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
His line was cab overpete with the refer on. So
what does reefer mean?
Speaker 1 (14:08):
I'm gonna tell you honestly, First of all, I hadn't
thought of that lyric in years till you just recited it,
and I will tell you I never had any idea
what that meant. I still don't you will now, Okay,
refrigerated trailer. Reefer that line cab overpete with the refer on.
That's what he's driving.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
It's a cab over a Peter Built, which was a
highly sought after a semi truck.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Wow, a Peter Bilt.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Okay, my grandfather's favorite trucker joke. And boy he used
it a lot, thinking we'd never heard it before, but
it was like every month, you know, truckers never die,
they just get a new Peter built. Wow, here you go.
God bless him and Unfortunately I have met a few
of these. This next one, all right, super trucker. This
(14:59):
is a lingo in the cat truck drive world. Super trucker,
no idea, someone who boasts about their driving skills. Wow,
And my personal favorite, all right, take us home. Put
some thought into this boys, lot lizard, lot lizard, A
lot lizard. No, not sleeping in the parking lot.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Someone who parks crooked.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Not someone who parks crooked.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
A lot lizard. Yeah, it's a parking reference of some sort.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
But I a lot lizard and trucker speak is okay,
a prostitute and a truck stop.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Yes, okay, Well, apologies for that one, but that's awesome. Okay,
So now we've all learned something. Don't say we never
taught you anything on being good human.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
Educational as well as entertaining.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Yes, incredibly entertaining. And it's the perfect way to ramp
into our next guest. And and so when we come back, yeah, yeah,
we are not only going to meet a truck driver,
my friends. She is a female truck driver, and not
just a female truck driver, but an incredible female truck
driver who who's years on the road had filled her
(16:16):
with all kinds of wisdom. These are life lessons that
she not only shares with millions of followers online, but
it's also compiled in a brand new book. So buckle up,
buckle up and break or breaker, good buddy, because mercy
sakes alive. We got us a great guest coming up
right after this.
Speaker 5 (16:44):
Of a.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
Here we will take you suck.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Welcome back to be good humans. Brian tell Us, who
we're about to meet.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
Well, joining us from somewhere on the big road.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Ha ha, we just learned that to her.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
But probably miles away from her small town home in Atlanta, Texas.
Is a truly amazing woman. She's an author, She's a
motivational speaker. She's a podcaster who has been through numerous
life changes but found all kinds of personal empowerment in
her colorful career as a female trucker. Oh, Donya Howard,
(17:27):
Welcome to Bigger humans.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Welcome, Hello, Hello, how are you guys doing well?
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Good? First things?
Speaker 1 (17:34):
First?
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Where are you right now?
Speaker 5 (17:36):
I'm in Morralville? Where am I Moralville? I forgotten? Where about?
I chime so many times? Oh?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Indiana, Indiana, Indianana? All right, yeah, and.
Speaker 5 (17:48):
Now I'm headed after I leave here to North Carolina.
So let me tell you just really quickly. So the
last literally three days, I went from Arkansas to Minnesota,
Minnesota to Wisconsin, Wisconsin, the Indiana where I am now,
and tomorrow I deliver in North Carolina. So it does
get confusing after a while because you changed states and
(18:09):
tom zones so much.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Wow, amazing.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
So you've you've seen a lot of road, Donia, You've
seen a lot. Absolutely tell us. Okay, so tell us
what kind of Also, now we know where you are,
what kind of rig are you driving?
Speaker 5 (18:26):
Okay? I have a twenty twenty four Peterbilt and it
is amazing.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
A brand new peter Belt, fancy.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
Brand new. When I got it, it had sixty two
miles on it, and now it's got one hundred and
twenty six and sixty three and this is twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Oh my god, my grandpa would love you.
Speaker 5 (18:48):
I haven't even been in this truck a year.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Yet, so yeah, yeah, I try to.
Speaker 5 (18:52):
Ain't about three thousand to thirty five hundred miles a.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
Week, Donia.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And we have so many questions for you and just
we want you to have fun. And it's obvious You're
a fun soul, so we couldn't have had a better
person on the program. But let's go back to this.
In your book, The Diary of a Female Trucker, which
I'm about a third of the way through, it's awesome.
You can't put it down. I'm serious, it's really really good, y'all.
(19:18):
She's got a great sense of humor and she just
deals with stuff. But anyway, in your book, you thank
Stevens Driving Academy for their quote exceptional school and unparalleled training,
propelling me forward in my career. First of all, were
you one of the only females of your class?
Speaker 5 (19:37):
Well, believe it or not, there were a total in
my class, which they get new classes every week, okay,
or actually probably every day. But anyway, I had twenty
two in my class and there was one other female.
And not only was I that, but I was one
of the oldest in the class as well.
Speaker 2 (19:55):
I've always wondered, how long could you see truck driving
school advertisement on matchbooks, cover miss book covers all that,
but how long does it actually take? How long is
the course?
Speaker 5 (20:05):
Okay? The class that I took again was six weeks now.
That was to learn basic backup skills, how to do
your post trip and your pre trip to go over
everything before you get on the road and before you
get off the road at night. How to pass the test.
The CDL tests itself, the driving portion and then the
(20:26):
written part. So that was six weeks. After you passed
that and ag your permit, then I had to travel
with a trainer for six weeks. So he was on
the truck with me for six weeks and teaching me
how to do it actually out on the road.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Oh okay, So I'm sure you know everybody's different, but
for you, what was the toughest thing for you to do?
Speaker 1 (20:47):
For you to learn?
Speaker 2 (20:48):
What was what was the hardest thing for you?
Speaker 5 (20:51):
Hands down? Backing up, I think that's where most people
have their problems, because you know, it's just not logical.
You turn one way and your trailer goes the other.
It doesn't make any yeah, right, and so and literally,
I had a mail trainer and I don't know if
you guys know this or not, but men and women
think totally different. So they were trying to tell me
(21:13):
something and I'm like, dude, that doesn't make any sense
at all to me. He's like, you know what you're
riding because you'll figure it out when you're on the road.
And guess what, I figured it out after I got
on the road. So yeah, now back up pretty daganjet though,
but at first Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
So upon graduation, when you graduate, do you immediately start
Can you immediately start driving eighteen wheelers? Or do you
have to kind of work yourself up?
Speaker 5 (21:36):
No, So the six weeks of the training to get
your CDL six weeks with the actual trainer, he passes
you or fails you, which means you need more time
on the truck or you can get your own truck.
So once you hit that spot and he says, she's
gone through my whole list of things that she needs
to know how to do or he needs to do.
(21:57):
Now I go back to the classroom and we start
orientation for the actual job position. That last a week
and then they hand me a key to a brand
new truck.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Well, congratulations for graduating, Congratulations for being such a success
and loving obviously what you do so much.
Speaker 5 (22:15):
I tell you what, it is the absolute best job
in the world. I mean, I say, man, I wish
I would have done it when I was younger, but
then I wouldn't have my kids right. But if there
is anybody out there that is even remotely interested in driving,
first of all, contact me. I will love to talk
to you about it. And I tell you what, it's
(22:35):
just so freeing. You don't have anybody looking over your shoulder.
You know. It's so for my puppy, he looks over
my shoulder.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
A little bit.
Speaker 5 (22:42):
But other than that, you know, it is as long
as you get there on time and pick up on time.
Everything else in between is like vacation. I just I
absolutely love it. Where else can you travel like this
and get paid for it?
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Oh my god? Well that see, this is what we
want to get at the heart of because even after
you after you've done all the hard work and you've
had to learn all that it takes to drive a
big rig what you have said repeatedly in your book
in different forms and also in your podcast which we're
going to talk about, but you have said that as
a career, truck driving not only proved remarkable but also
(23:16):
dynamically altered the course of your life. So we want
to talk to you more about why you feel that way.
Speaker 5 (23:22):
Okay, well, let me tell you. As a single female
and you guys know the cost of living has gone
up tremendously, right, And so after my last divorce, I
was like, Okay, what can I do where I can
travel and get paid right. I was a flight attendant
with Delta and a gate agent with Delta for a while,
and I had gotten laid off and I love that,
(23:44):
but I just I needed to change, right. And so
my son and lawas he was fixing to go to
truck driving school, and he's like, hey, Mom, why don't
you start driving a truck? And I think this season?
I don't think he actually because I was working at
a bank making him like eleven bucks an hour. I
had no retire but I had nothing right right, and
it was like, I'm never I'm living with my parents
(24:04):
at the age of fifty, you know what I mean.
You hear jokes about that. It's like, there's no joke, man.
I need is a big change. And so I literally
got on there. I started looking like instantly for truck
driving schools and that kind of thing, and I found
the one in Mesquite, which was close, and within two
weeks I was in truck driving school. And now I
(24:26):
can financially support myself very easily. I'm actually able to
help my parents and my kids, and oh, there's just
nothing like it, and see the whole country at the
same time.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Well, yeah, so seeing the country. What's the longest run
you've ever made, don't you?
Speaker 5 (24:41):
Actually it was just the other day that you say
that is really kind of crazy. I drove from rialto
California to North Carolina, so literally all the way across
the United States from the West coast to the East coast.
And that was twenty it was twenty four hundred miles.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Okay, So along that line, what is the longest stint
you've ever done? The longest like stay awake behind the wheel,
not pulling over. What was the longest one you've ever
done in how many hours?
Speaker 5 (25:11):
Well, the law has a lot to do with that. Nowadays,
we don't have the paper logs anymore, right, so we
have an ELD is what it's called. I'll shut to
you real quick. That machine out there, a little computer.
Oh yeah, okay, And basically what it does it tells me,
as a truck driver, you have four different clocks. You
have an eight hour clock, eleven hour clock, fourteen hour clock,
(25:33):
and a seventy hour clock. And you're probably going, what
the heck?
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Yeah, So when.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
I first wake up in the morning, I have eight
hours to drive, and then we have something we call
an Obama break because he's the one that put the
law into effect. We have to take a thirty minute
break before those eight hours are up. If we take
that thirty minute break before our eight hours is up,
they let us drive an additional three hours.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
Oh so that's a total of.
Speaker 5 (25:59):
A little eleven hours. So now we've got our eight
and hour eleven. Now then to run that eleven hour clock,
we have fourteen hours to run that in So if
I need to stop and you know, have lunch, or
I see the Grand Canyon and I want to pull over,
we kind of got three hours to play with, right
that fourteen hour clock just we can't turn it off.
(26:21):
It runs constantly. So once we hit fourteen hours, we
have to be off the road, But eleven of those
hours are driving. Three hours of it is whatever we
want to do, right interesting, And then for the week,
we have seventy hours. So if I hit seventy hours
of driving in six days, you know, then I have
(26:41):
to stop and take a mandatory thirty four hour break. Cool,
And so seventy hours a week is typically what our
truck driver runs is seventy hours a week. So when
people say, man, I work forty hours a week, it's.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
Like, okay, Donia. Do you have a certain route that
you like to drive for personal reasons like the scenery?
Do you have a favorite? Uh?
Speaker 1 (27:12):
State?
Speaker 2 (27:13):
A favorite?
Speaker 5 (27:14):
There's actually a couple of places that I love to run.
First of all, I don't get to run very often,
but Utah is absolutely beautiful. If you get a chance
to drive through Utah, it is absolutely gorgeous. But my
favorite actual route to run is route forty four in
a state forty four And the reason why is because
they've got some phenomenal nostalgic truck stops on that route.
(27:39):
So you've got Hoods Truck Stop, You've got Donnie's Truck Stop.
Those are the main two. And I tell you what,
like y'all were talking about earlier, they have some awesome
truck stop food so places when you hit the top
five truck stops, which all of you guys you know
at the top five are.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I'm sure yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm sure that the usual suspect.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
Yeah, as long as they have a hot turkey sandwich,
I'm so in it.
Speaker 5 (28:06):
And that's the thing the top five, don't. That's the
thing about it. They have fast food restaurants. They've got
the Army's, the Subways, the Chesters Chicken and I'll tell
you what, you get sick of that really quick, really quick.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
Although I could go with the Arby's right now.
Speaker 5 (28:23):
Yeah, I mean you know, when you're hunger, you're hungry,
you're gonna get right yeah. Yeah, but I actually prefer
stopping and trying to find the mom and pop places
that are still around because they're really going way very fast. Yeah,
they're the ones that's gonna have the turkey sandwich with
the mashed tatus on the top.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Done you how how do you feel? Where do you?
Where do you stand on?
Speaker 5 (28:43):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Something I was annoyingly guilty of. Uh, little kids pumping
their arms in hopes of you blasting your horns.
Speaker 1 (28:52):
Oh I still do that.
Speaker 5 (28:54):
Yeah, you gotta do it if you see it. I mean,
there's think about it. I mean basically, what the rule
says now is that they really don't like for you
to use it unless it's an emergency, right because it
scares some people because it is rather loud. Uh. But yeah,
if you see a kid doing that or an adult
(29:16):
I have a lot of adults to it too.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
You've got to blow the hord.
Speaker 5 (29:20):
Let me tell you. The other day it was I'm
gonna tell you a side story really quickly, because most
people don't think about this. When you miss a turn
and an eighteen wheeler, you can't just turn around, right,
You've got to find a spot that is big enough
for you to turn around. Here the other day, I
was pulling off and there was a Love trunk stop
on side and a Flying J on the other side,
(29:42):
and I was gonna go to the Flying J because
Loves is always too crowded. And so when I pulled
off the exit ramp, there was another truck driver in
front of me doing a U turn. Now, guys, U
turns are not allowed in an eighteen wheeler because it's
extremely dangerous.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Right you turn, don't you mean flip flop?
Speaker 5 (29:59):
Yeah? Exactly exactly, And we don't use those, right, we
don't do that. So anyway, he was doing that. I
was like, what in the world is he doing? Man,
that's just crazy. Well about five seconds later I realized,
oh crap, because I was watching him, I missed the
Flying J two and we were there was no where.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Oh No, I wasn't going to do a flip flop.
Speaker 5 (30:20):
So I was like, where am I going to go?
Where am I going to go? So I turned down
this road, thinking, okay, there's got to be a place
down here, somewhere where I can go. Well, the further
I went down this road, the skinnier it got, and
the skinnier it got, and I was like, oh, brother,
this is not good.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (30:34):
So I had to back all the way up and
there was a Wendy's parking lot of Wendy's there, and
you know, Wendy's parking lots aren't extremely huge at all, no,
And so I literally was going through a Wendy's parking
lot in this eighteen wheeler.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Right, Oh my god.
Speaker 5 (30:49):
And people were I know somewhere I'm on YouTube. I
just know it's these two guys. They were like, i'd
say in mid twenties or something like that. They were
walking across and they were pointing looking at me and everything,
you know, and I'm going, yeah, just a Gorman kind
of a thing, and both of them humped there there
I have. Of course, I was holding my horns. It
(31:10):
was about an hour and a half later my company
called me and They're like, yeah, pretty good truck driving,
I'd say there, and I was like yeah, I'm like,
but if you zoom in really closely, they had a
picture of the guys going back like they were a
horn They're like, well, they weren't helping me, and I
was like, no, they weren't helping, but they sure wanted
me to horn hunt the horse.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
Well, listen, I thought, I mean, I thought, you know,
with all the miles that you cover, I thought that
writing or like podcast hosting were probably the most sedentary
jobs on the planet. But you you making these long runs,
you got to sit on your butt don here for
days and weeks at a time, even with those three
hours of those thirty four hour breaks. Like, how do
you stay fit on the road? What do you do?
Speaker 5 (31:53):
Well, that's extremely hard. But there's actually a couple of
ladies on the internet that are truck drivers as well.
They did yoga, and I actually teach us how to
do it on our you know, in our driver's seats.
How do you know, stretch and all different kinds of things.
So yoga, we do yoga on the on the thing.
And then actually, so there's a new thing out It's
(32:13):
like a vibrator board and you have those, and then
I've got another machine that lets me do weights, and
there's all kinds of things. And of course you can
always walk. The only thing that I say about walking
that step for safety purposes. Do it before it starts
getting dark, because otherwise they may consider you a lot lizard.
Oh yeah, they be careful for the women out there.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
And look, that kind of leads me into my next question. Uh,
you're obviously, uh, the most likable personality on the face
of this planet. You are funny, you are attractive, You're
an attractive woman. Has that ever been a problem at
these truck stops or rest stops. I'm sure you know
how to take care of yourself, but have has that
(32:52):
ever been a problem.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
Well, it's never actually been a problem before my I
remember when I first started and I was talking to
my train which he was a mail and I asked him.
I was like, you know, this kind of is scary
at night because sometimes you pull in at two o'clock
in the morning, right, And I was like, what do
I need to do? He goes. The main thing that
you always need to remember is walk with intention, he goes,
(33:14):
don't be looking around have yourself focused looking at your truck,
knowing where you're going, and don't be looking around. And
so that's what I've always done now. Also, I actually
had a TikTok that went viral because I was talking
about safety for other truck drivers and basically what I
do at night when I'm not at a safe place
or at a maybe a closed down truck stop, or
(33:36):
it may be at a wrist area or even on
the side of the road, I use a ratchet strap
and I ratchet from one door handle to the other
door handle, and AP put the ratchet in between so
it pulls those doors close together. So my doors want unlocked.
Because I don't know if you guys know this or not,
but trucks are kind of like tractors. They there's like
(33:57):
only three keys to all the trucks in the world.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Oh really, I didn't know that.
Speaker 5 (34:03):
Yeah, yeah, Why why is that? Well, it's I think
it's because it's kind of like the lawnmower. All lawnmowers
they're they're very close to having the same key. Why,
I don't know. It just doesn't make a whole lot
of sense.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
The twenty twenty four Peter built I'm guessing costs a
lot more than the lawnmower, so it's quite an investment there.
Speaker 5 (34:24):
Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right. But yeah, all the keys,
there's like, like I said, I think there's like three
or four keys to the you know, different brands. So
if you are ever locked your truck in, you can
always go ask another peter Bilt for their trucky.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
So oh wow, didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Huh.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
All right, we're at the portion of our show now
Donia that it's time for another round of Brian's stupid questions.
These are just questions. I don't know. They're probably all
really stupid men.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
Let's go.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Number one is do truckers still use cbs because the
train arab raised as you might have heard in our intro,
and then when the CB craze and do they do
they still use them?
Speaker 1 (35:06):
Is it still a thing? Oh look she's showing us.
Oh wow, you've given me new that's great.
Speaker 5 (35:13):
Yeah, okay, but a lot of people, a lot of
people don't have them. So I always do it because man,
they come in handy, they really really do. But some
of the truck drivers, usually from other countries, they they
don't have them.
Speaker 2 (35:27):
Are way stations still because I remember they used to be.
But are they still the bane of most truck drivers?
Speaker 5 (35:34):
Yes? Absolutely, No, I will tell you. I will tell
you this about the white stations, which is really pretty cool.
They've got them really technical, I guess you could say. Now.
So basically, it'll you'll start and not to single signs
because one thing a truck driver has to do is
read every sign that you go by. That's like programmed
in your head. Read every sign, okay, And so the
(35:57):
sign will say truckers stay in the right hand lane,
So we'll stand the right hand lane. When a weight
stations come in and it actually weighs us in that lane,
there's like it's a rollover weight. So it tells us. Oh,
like they can tell if I was empty, you know,
because I'm only thirty three thousand pounds, or if I'm
at seventy seven pounds, then they'll say, ooh, she might
(36:17):
be overweight. So then they'll ask me to come over,
and I'll get a little green light or an EX
to keep going. Okay, But yeah, if you have an X,
then you've got to go over, and you actually have
there's three different weights that we have. We've got twelve
thousand pounds in the front, thirty four hundred pounds in
the middle, and then on our backs we have thirty
four thousand pounds as well, which total eighty thousand pounds.
(36:38):
We cannot be over eighty thousand pounds, but anything in between.
If I'm like thirty six on my drive tires, then
you know I'm off. So I've got to move my
tandems back and forth to get my weight correct.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
Okay, So it's you're out there alone, it's late at night,
You're probably jacked up on a little cat fiend or something.
And what kind of music? What's your go to musical
choice when you're when you're there, I love.
Speaker 5 (37:09):
Well, honestly, I did not listen to a whole lot
of music. I'll listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Wow, okay, yeah.
Speaker 5 (37:15):
I listen to podcasts. I also have a large affiliate
marketing thing that I'm doing, and so I listen. I'll
listen to educational things. I listen to books. I go
to Audible all the time and listen to books. And
occasionally I'll flip on the radio and I just find
whatever's local, typically country music.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
Okay, all right, so that's good. So you're feeding your
brain while you're out there on making all these runs,
and and and and Look, we know that you're a mom,
we know that you're a breast cancer survivor. You are
an extraordinarily strong woman who has had I'm guessing a
hell of a lot of time to think on all
those runs, Donia. So so what are what are some
(37:55):
of the best life lessons that you think you've learned
along the way when making those runs.
Speaker 5 (38:01):
Oh, my gosh, never give up.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
That's a good one.
Speaker 5 (38:06):
You're stronger than you think you are. And let's see,
life is an adventure, so take full advantage of it.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Oh that's a good one too.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
See, that's the exact kind of wisdom that made us
want to have you on our show, Donya, And I
think what makes you such a good human is your
willingness to share those kinds of nuggets with the world
in all kinds of ways. For one thing, Donya does
have this new book called The Diary of the Female
Truck Driver, which you talked about, which is available on Amazon.
Highly recommend this. Can you tell us more about that
book and how did you write it exactly? Did you
(38:40):
dictate it from the driver's seat or how did this work.
Speaker 5 (38:44):
Actually, idea. That's really funny that you say that. I
was sitting here one day and I realized that there
were a lot of So I also talk on a
radio show every morning, right my local radio show, and
so I was talking to him, and there were these
people asking you, well, tell us a little bit more
about it. And I was doing a YouTube little channel,
(39:05):
you know, going through truck driving school and what was
going on. And I realized it was a real interest,
especially for females that really wanted to do it but
were really scared or fearful to do it because they're like, man,
I can't drive. It's like, oh, they'll teach you, you know
kind of thing. So I really started just dictating into
my phone as things were crazy happening, or if something
(39:28):
just happened before I forget it, I would start making
a note of it, right. And I started doing this
all the way through and was writing a journal and
doing it on my phone, and I was like, you
know what, I would really like to write a book.
So I started off because growing up, I never, in
my wildest dreams, thought that I would be.
Speaker 2 (39:47):
A truck driver for sure.
Speaker 5 (39:49):
I mean, that's not every little girl's dream. You know,
most of us going to be princesses or whatever, not
a truck driver. And so I started in the book
as far as how my life progressed to get me
to where I am. And let me just tell you guys,
even though you have things that happen in your past
it's not good, or my breast cancer or whatever it
(40:09):
might be, just remember that we can't get stuck there.
I don't know. There's a story in the Bible with
Lot and his wife, right, and they were trying to
get out of Sodomingamore and they were leaving, you know,
go go go, and God or the Holy Spirit was like,
just don't look back.
Speaker 2 (40:25):
Don't look back. That was the whole key.
Speaker 5 (40:26):
Don't look back, just keep going forward to where you're headed.
And what did Lot's wife do. She looked back and
she turned into a pillar of saw. And the thing
about it is sometimes we get stuck and places were
only meant to be going through. And so it's really
important to forget about the stuff. Don't use that stuff.
I mean, you can use it for an advantage, but
don't look at it as a being a victim. I
(40:48):
am thankful that I went through the breast cancer, because
now then I can testify to other females that's been
through it. I've been through a rape. I can deal
with people like that. And you know, people are put
into your life for a certain way, and this truck
driving has just changed my life completely. But I never
would have thought that I would be a truck driver
for sure and alive every second of it.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
You are so inspiring in so many ways.
Speaker 1 (41:13):
Yeah, I mean, you literally have driven through challenges that
could have stopped a lot of people in their tracks.
But man, you stay in the cab. And not only
have you written this book, she's also the host of
her own podcast by the same name, The Diary of
a Female Truck Driver. This is a total hoot to
listen to, you guys, a lot more detail about the
places that done you visits. It's also a first hand
(41:36):
account of some of those challenges, those triumphs, those unique
experiences that she's had navigating the highways in the real highways,
the metaphorical highways, and all of that stuff.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
Well, before we wrap this up, Donyete, you know what
we want and we can. We don't even have to
say it. We're just going to show you what we want.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Yeah, we go. We pumped the fist and she delivered.
Speaker 2 (42:02):
Donia took me right back to when I was eight.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
No kidding. Thank you so much for taking us on
the road with you today. You are just awesome. So
if assuming that our listeners and our viewers have fallen
in love with you the same way we have, uh,
what's the best place that they can follow you on
the socials? Where can they? Where can they? Where can
they connect with you further?
Speaker 5 (42:24):
So everything of me is going to be uh is
called Freedom on Wheels with Donia dot Com. Freedom on
Wheels with Donia. And that's got my book, that's got
my podcast, that's got everything Donya on there. And uh, yeah,
guys love you and I really appreciate everything you guys
(42:46):
have done. It's just been absolutely phenomenal.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
You are a guest goal is what you are. You
are podcast guest gold. Will you come back anymore?
Speaker 5 (42:57):
Guess let me know. I'll be glad of that.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Good good.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
We'll have you on again if if you don't mind,
we we love to talk with you some more someday.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Absolutely yes, Freedom on Wheels with Donia dot Com. We're
going to drop a link to that on our own
website as well. You have been an absolute pleasure, my friend.
Continue to drive safely in that brand new, beautiful truck
of yours, and we'll see you a little further down
the road.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
Bye, Donia.
Speaker 5 (43:19):
By guys, thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
We will take you suck.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
We are back. And you know, Palli, occasionally there's you're
lucky enough to meet someone that you just go, I
want to be that person's friend. Yeah, yeah, I mean
just you can't help but smile.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
You know when it's happening. We both kept looking at
each other like, oh God, this is so amazing.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
And I don't know if you guys saw this. It
was while she was talking, but she was. I asked
the question about the annoying kids, who would you know,
hump their arms to and she she goes, oh yeah.
We both looked at each other and mouth of the
words we're gonna use that for the clothes at the end,
We're gonna we're gonna use that. You had to, but
it did. It took me back. Man, sitting the back
of the station wagon facing the back, remember that seats
(44:16):
that would go up my brother and I Yeah, at
every every trucker coming up. Man, you had you had
to get in love her.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Amazing woman, amazing story. Uh yeah, so glad we got
to talk with her, and so glad we got to
join you guys again. Uh, keep following us on the socials.
Uh like, follow, subscribe, all of that great stuff, but
most importantly, go visit our website, Begodhumans dot com, which
is a general portal for all of this stuff. Tell
(44:41):
us about the good humans in your lives, tell us
about some pointers, quiz us on some more CB terms
we might not know.
Speaker 2 (44:48):
Well, so that's it for today's show. Be Good Humans,
and we'll see you on the flip side.
Speaker 4 (44:53):
Yeah, good humans, Be good humans.
Speaker 3 (45:00):
Be good humans, or we will thank you.
Speaker 1 (45:03):
Suck to Be Good Humans is executive produced by Brian Phelps,
Trey Callaway, and Grant Anderson, with associate producers Sean Fitzgerald
and Clementine Callaway and partnership with straw Hut Media. Please like, follow,
and subscribe, and remember be Good Humans.
We got a great big con boy thinking through the night.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
We're gonna want to take.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Combo humans. Be good humans.
Speaker 4 (00:17):
Be good humans, or we will think you sucked humans,
or we will thank you suck.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
And Welcome to the Big Good Humans Podcast. We're broadcasting
live from the Vatican today and we're hoping to get
it there is Hey, Ponta Fat, don't be shot, Pata
pay Paul, you're on, You're on the lands.
Speaker 5 (00:49):
Come on.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Wow, we just got ghosted. Tonty was hanging.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
We just got ghosted by every single Catholic listener.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
We have gosh cheese. Anyway, Welcome to Good Humans Podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Yes to be very good Humans. Thank you for joining
us once again. Uh Hey, Brian, I had to actually
take an uber to the studio to what happened cars
in the shop, which is not a big deal. It'll
be it'll be fine. But honestly, I found it kind
of nice to not have to think at all about
fighting traffic to get here to our scenic studio on arrowspat. Yes,
(01:22):
and it occurs to me that the woman who drove
me thanks Prinia five stars, uh is actually part of
a unique group of good humans that we should talk
about Okay, these once you got these good humans are
the people who drive us in lifem okay, And that's
(01:43):
that's metaphorically speaking, but it's also literally physically speaking, right
because in the long journey of our lives.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Brian, longer since you started talking exactly.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
We obviously have to make a lot of stops along
the way, right of course. Uh, And so we depend
on a lot of people in that process. First it's
our parents, right because they got to drive us everywhere,
you remember, all the time in the backseat. And then
it's your friends until you get your license. But even
after you get your license, you're still relying on other people.
(02:14):
There's bus drivers, there's train engineers, there's boat captains, there's
airline pilots, and yes there is taxi and uber drivers,
God bless them. Yeah. But then there is also this
uniquely special breed the set up. These are good humans
that we depend on each and every day to get
(02:37):
us the shit we need on a daily basis. This
is the stuff that we need that fills our fridge,
that fills our cabinets, that is the stuff of our lives.
And that those good humans, my friend, are the truck drivers. Yeah,
did you know Brian that in twenty twenty two, US
truck drivers moved fifty four million tons of freight across
(03:03):
this country every single day. We're talking about fifty two
billion dollars worth of stuff.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
I know that. I didn't have an exact figure, but
I knew it was a lot.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
It's a lot lot. These truck drivers do a lot
for us, which I'm guessing, and this will mean something
to you and I I think, yeah, I'm guessing all
of those truck drivers moving all that freight are spending
a hell of a lot of time on their CB radio.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I wonder if they still use CB because I was
raised during the CB craze.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
I hope they're still using them.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
The speed limit went down to fifty five freeways and stuff,
and so they of course they used them to, you know,
check out other truckers ahead of them. But we were
very very much into the CB craze at my age.
I think it was like sixteen seventeen years old. My father,
who I've talked about is so creative and funny and curious.
He had an operation on his ankle and he was
(03:58):
driving to work and he had a ca Okay, he
had a can. Now he told me this. I just
loved him for this. He told me that night he
had a CB on and he was curious what would
happen if so he pulls over on the seventy four
freeway outside of the road, rolls down his window, hunches
down in his seat, and just sticks his cane out
of the window and turns up the CB player. I mean,
(04:22):
he said he heard the funniest shit. He just it
was a gift and he just he just wanted to
see what would happen. So, yeah, that's amazing. And there
are two things, okay that you don't know about me.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Oh, I can't wait to hear these. Do we need
to clarify, by the way, for any of the few
young people who might be listening, that it's Citizens Band radio.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
That was CBE radio, and this was the thing you
could have. There was a microphone and this radio that
would be it could be in your car. But truckers
had them definitely in the day.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
That's how they communicated, right, That's how they they It
was a tribe of tribal almost and the speak that
the talk that ling. Oh okay, all right, but two things,
two things you probably don't know about me. Okay, I'm
gonna say you don't know about me number one, And
I am not kidding. This is not a punchline, This
is not a joke. I have always been to this
(05:11):
day a fan. Love truck stop food.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
Oh yeah, love, I'm right there with you.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
We'd be on vacation. Dad, pull over to the truck
stop like Stucky spur Stucky shirts. Okay, I'm wearing a
Stucky shirt. My favorite thing is a kid at the
truck stop was the I don't know if you're familiar,
but the hot turkey sandwich.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Oh, open face, Oh open face.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Definitely warm turkey, mashed potatoes piled on top thick gravy
going down.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
I can still chaste that man somewhere in between Nebraska
and wherever in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
And the second thing, okay, and that you don't know
about me. And I don't care what you think about me,
you or our viewers and our listeners. I don't care.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Okay what I content? Yes that C W.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
McCall's Convoy is one of the greatest songs ever.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
Written ever okay written Okay. Convoy by C. W. McCall
one of the most popular novelty recordings of the nineteen seventies,
and it was all from a truck driver's perspective as
he was mobilizing a convoy of other truckers.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
It was the dark of the moon on the fifth
of June and the Jimmy Hall of Longs cab Overpete
with a reefer on in a something something something. But anyway, yeah,
it was so I do.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
It was a great song. I loved it.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
I cannot get to the end without it inspiring me
and jazzing me up. Yes, when I used to listen
to it before football games, honestly, nice me and my
buddies because that very end where he goes let them
truckers roll at ten to four and then it hits God.
Speaker 5 (06:51):
That was killer.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
By the way, this song was so popular they actually
made a movie of it.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Chris Christofferson.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Yes, and this is where I get to excitedly chime
into your story with something you don't know, which is
that years later, I got hired to write my own
movie for the man who was C. W.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
McCall.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
I didn't know that except that C. W. McCall was
a pseudonym that was not his real name. His real
name is Chip Davis. And Chip Davis if that if
that's vaguely familiar to you, that name, it's because Chip
Davis took all of the money that he made from CW.
McCall's Convoy and he basically used it to bankroll his
(07:35):
next hit music making machine, which was Mannheim Steamroller Kid
Christmas music.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
On the show.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
Yeah, so that's that's you can thank CW McCall not
just for Convoy, but also for Manheim Steamrolls. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
I've got to truckers and trucking and that kind of
way of life is kind of sprinkled throughout my childhood
well becoming an adult on the show Helo West Show.
The first part of the story I'm not going to
tell you because it's long, and but I'll share it
another time whenever it works. But the Rose Parade that
just happened, and we I do Elvis on the show,
(08:14):
and I do we deal with that a lot, having
poking fun and have a ball. We get a call
from the Rose this is after the parade and they
know that what we do with Elvis, and they go, hey, guys,
I don't know if you're interested, this is on the air,
but you know we had a float this year I
was a tribute to Gracelynn and Elvis. And we have
(08:35):
a thirty foot tall, like twenty feet wide Elvis head.
Oh good lord, that we'd like to you know, if
you guys want to do something with.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
It, sure, if if you do.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
Thinking swiftly, I'm like, here's what we do. Why don't
we just put this on a semi semi truck. Let
strap it there and then we drive it all the
way out from LA to Memphis and then pull up
up in front of Graceland and just give it to
the Elvis head to Graceland. A number of things of fun.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Could we had, sure, especially if you don't call ahead exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
We didn't. Of course they heard it. We were kind
of but we we did it. We were a trucker call.
He goes, hey, man, I got a flat bed and
I'm going that way anyway. So yeah, yeah, yeah, And
even when it was such a stupid idea. And this
is what I loved about doing this show is if
the listeners that the dumber the idea, the more they're
into it.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Yeah. I mean you even got a driver who would
go along with us, right.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Driver, and the so we said, okay, we're going to
meet you in two days. And on the freeway at
the whatever overpassed there were cars were lined up to
see the giants, waiting, waiting to say, you know, bon
voyage to us. But my favorite moment of the whole
thing was about three o'clock to thirty three o'clock in
(09:57):
the morning. Okay, we're on the road, and uh have
the CB on and I was kind of just half asleep,
and then I hear this breaker one nine. Uh, some
some bitch has got the Elvis's noggin on a flatbed.
A small pause, and then another trucker. Uh, come back,
(10:19):
I said, some some bitch has the head of the
King on a damn flatbed. And boy, the conversation suit.
If nothing else, that made my trip, that made it
exactly just larious.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Yes, you you, you gave those drivers, those truckers an
exciting evening that they probably still talk about to this day.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
Well, yes, and so listen to the CB. You get
a lot of lingo anyway. But I for fun, not
only for you, but of course Ryan our engineered and
the lovely the talented.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Sean Oh Sean, Yes, yes.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Everybody's playing this. Okay, Okay, it's a a trucker lingo
quiz wow. For instance, example H ten four means affirmative
understood that kind of guys, if you know it, yell
it out the answer. Don't be shy even if you
don't know if if your if your answer is correct,
yell it out anyway, and just taking.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
You're trying to get back to my seventies brain. Okay, okay,
some of these I didn't even know. Okay, let's go.
Let's go all right.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
Back door?
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Uh isn't that the rear of the vehicle.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Close? Yes, it's behind a truck or a trailer. It's
the rear door.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
I met your back door right right right, right right, okay, okay, okay, just.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Out of nowhere. He's where he was going with. Okay,
chicken coop and trucker lingo. Yeah, what is a chicken coop?
Speaker 1 (11:51):
A vague what'd you say? Sean driver's seat? Nope, no,
I vaguely remember this. But what does it mean?
Speaker 2 (11:59):
It means a way station.
Speaker 5 (12:02):
No.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Way stations are all over the country. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
and truckers if it's open, sometimes they were closed. They
have to pull over and way and make sure everything's
set it right? Uh, deadhead and trucker lingo is deadhead?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
Isn't that like a hippie?
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Pretty much? But no, uh, the correct answer is driving
with an empty trailer. Ohad okay, double nickel, that's fifty five.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
That's the speed limit. Yes, yes, I remember that.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Uh, thermos bottle.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
I have no idea what that is?
Speaker 2 (12:38):
A tanker truck?
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Oh that's cool sense sense yeah, yeah, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
Big road, big road, big road, No idea, the interstate
or major highway?
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Oh okay, that's obvious.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
Yeah, one of the most poetic. And I love this one.
Wall the wall and tree top tall? What does that
mean in trucker speak?
Speaker 1 (12:57):
What Ryan says? Traffic kind of?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Yeah, Ryan, all right, I'll give you a dig for that.
It's a clear road ahead.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Oh okay, okay, cash register, cash register? Oh is that
a toll tollboo? Yes, okay, okay, good, all right, we're
not doing too bad. Green stamp, Oh, well that's a
dated reference green stamp. No idea what that means?
Speaker 2 (13:24):
A log book entry indicating a rest break or sleep
green stamp? Okay, all right, kojack with a Kodak coach. Okay,
well that's going to be a cop with a camera.
Speed camera, a radar gun, absolutely, okay, Okay, just a
couple more here, pickle park, pickle park, any guesses snack station? Yeah, yeah,
(13:50):
I'm gonna give you that one rest area or truck stop,
pickle park? Okay, nice?
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Right?
Speaker 2 (13:55):
This one is a word so beautifully used in CW
bacalls convoy.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Okay, bring this.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
His line was cab overpete with the refer on. So
what does reefer mean?
Speaker 1 (14:08):
I'm gonna tell you honestly, First of all, I hadn't
thought of that lyric in years till you just recited it,
and I will tell you I never had any idea
what that meant. I still don't you will now, Okay,
refrigerated trailer. Reefer that line cab overpete with the refer on.
That's what he's driving.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
It's a cab over a Peter Built, which was a
highly sought after a semi truck.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Wow, a Peter Bilt.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Okay, my grandfather's favorite trucker joke. And boy he used
it a lot, thinking we'd never heard it before, but
it was like every month, you know, truckers never die,
they just get a new Peter built. Wow, here you go.
God bless him and Unfortunately I have met a few
of these. This next one, all right, super trucker. This
(14:59):
is a lingo in the cat truck drive world. Super trucker,
no idea, someone who boasts about their driving skills. Wow,
And my personal favorite, all right, take us home. Put
some thought into this boys, lot lizard, lot lizard, A
lot lizard. No, not sleeping in the parking lot.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Someone who parks crooked.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Not someone who parks crooked.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
A lot lizard. Yeah, it's a parking reference of some sort.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
But I a lot lizard and trucker speak is okay,
a prostitute and a truck stop.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Yes, okay, Well, apologies for that one, but that's awesome. Okay,
So now we've all learned something. Don't say we never
taught you anything on being good human.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
Educational as well as entertaining.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Yes, incredibly entertaining. And it's the perfect way to ramp
into our next guest. And and so when we come back, yeah, yeah,
we are not only going to meet a truck driver,
my friends. She is a female truck driver, and not
just a female truck driver, but an incredible female truck
driver who who's years on the road had filled her
(16:16):
with all kinds of wisdom. These are life lessons that
she not only shares with millions of followers online, but
it's also compiled in a brand new book. So buckle up,
buckle up and break or breaker, good buddy, because mercy
sakes alive. We got us a great guest coming up
right after this.
Speaker 5 (16:44):
Of a.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
Here we will take you suck.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Welcome back to be good humans. Brian tell Us, who
we're about to meet.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
Well, joining us from somewhere on the big road.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Ha ha, we just learned that to her.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
But probably miles away from her small town home in Atlanta, Texas.
Is a truly amazing woman. She's an author, She's a
motivational speaker. She's a podcaster who has been through numerous
life changes but found all kinds of personal empowerment in
her colorful career as a female trucker. Oh, Donya Howard,
(17:27):
Welcome to Bigger humans.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Welcome, Hello, Hello, how are you guys doing well?
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Good? First things?
Speaker 1 (17:34):
First?
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Where are you right now?
Speaker 5 (17:36):
I'm in Morralville? Where am I Moralville? I forgotten? Where about?
I chime so many times? Oh?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Indiana, Indiana, Indianana? All right, yeah, and.
Speaker 5 (17:48):
Now I'm headed after I leave here to North Carolina.
So let me tell you just really quickly. So the
last literally three days, I went from Arkansas to Minnesota,
Minnesota to Wisconsin, Wisconsin, the Indiana where I am now,
and tomorrow I deliver in North Carolina. So it does
get confusing after a while because you changed states and
(18:09):
tom zones so much.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Wow, amazing.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
So you've you've seen a lot of road, Donia, You've
seen a lot. Absolutely tell us. Okay, so tell us
what kind of Also, now we know where you are,
what kind of rig are you driving?
Speaker 5 (18:26):
Okay? I have a twenty twenty four Peterbilt and it
is amazing.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
A brand new peter Belt, fancy.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
Brand new. When I got it, it had sixty two
miles on it, and now it's got one hundred and
twenty six and sixty three and this is twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Oh my god, my grandpa would love you.
Speaker 5 (18:48):
I haven't even been in this truck a year.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Yet, so yeah, yeah, I try to.
Speaker 5 (18:52):
Ain't about three thousand to thirty five hundred miles a.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
Week, Donia.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And we have so many questions for you and just
we want you to have fun. And it's obvious You're
a fun soul, so we couldn't have had a better
person on the program. But let's go back to this.
In your book, The Diary of a Female Trucker, which
I'm about a third of the way through, it's awesome.
You can't put it down. I'm serious, it's really really good, y'all.
(19:18):
She's got a great sense of humor and she just
deals with stuff. But anyway, in your book, you thank
Stevens Driving Academy for their quote exceptional school and unparalleled training,
propelling me forward in my career. First of all, were
you one of the only females of your class?
Speaker 5 (19:37):
Well, believe it or not, there were a total in
my class, which they get new classes every week, okay,
or actually probably every day. But anyway, I had twenty
two in my class and there was one other female.
And not only was I that, but I was one
of the oldest in the class as well.
Speaker 2 (19:55):
I've always wondered, how long could you see truck driving
school advertisement on matchbooks, cover miss book covers all that,
but how long does it actually take? How long is
the course?
Speaker 5 (20:05):
Okay? The class that I took again was six weeks now.
That was to learn basic backup skills, how to do
your post trip and your pre trip to go over
everything before you get on the road and before you
get off the road at night. How to pass the test.
The CDL tests itself, the driving portion and then the
(20:26):
written part. So that was six weeks. After you passed
that and ag your permit, then I had to travel
with a trainer for six weeks. So he was on
the truck with me for six weeks and teaching me
how to do it actually out on the road.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Oh okay, So I'm sure you know everybody's different, but
for you, what was the toughest thing for you to do?
Speaker 1 (20:47):
For you to learn?
Speaker 2 (20:48):
What was what was the hardest thing for you?
Speaker 5 (20:51):
Hands down? Backing up, I think that's where most people
have their problems, because you know, it's just not logical.
You turn one way and your trailer goes the other.
It doesn't make any yeah, right, and so and literally,
I had a mail trainer and I don't know if
you guys know this or not, but men and women
think totally different. So they were trying to tell me
(21:13):
something and I'm like, dude, that doesn't make any sense
at all to me. He's like, you know what you're
riding because you'll figure it out when you're on the road.
And guess what, I figured it out after I got
on the road. So yeah, now back up pretty daganjet though,
but at first Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
So upon graduation, when you graduate, do you immediately start
Can you immediately start driving eighteen wheelers? Or do you
have to kind of work yourself up?
Speaker 5 (21:36):
No, So the six weeks of the training to get
your CDL six weeks with the actual trainer, he passes
you or fails you, which means you need more time
on the truck or you can get your own truck.
So once you hit that spot and he says, she's
gone through my whole list of things that she needs
to know how to do or he needs to do.
(21:57):
Now I go back to the classroom and we start
orientation for the actual job position. That last a week
and then they hand me a key to a brand
new truck.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Well, congratulations for graduating, Congratulations for being such a success
and loving obviously what you do so much.
Speaker 5 (22:15):
I tell you what, it is the absolute best job
in the world. I mean, I say, man, I wish
I would have done it when I was younger, but
then I wouldn't have my kids right. But if there
is anybody out there that is even remotely interested in driving,
first of all, contact me. I will love to talk
to you about it. And I tell you what, it's
(22:35):
just so freeing. You don't have anybody looking over your shoulder.
You know. It's so for my puppy, he looks over
my shoulder.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
A little bit.
Speaker 5 (22:42):
But other than that, you know, it is as long
as you get there on time and pick up on time.
Everything else in between is like vacation. I just I
absolutely love it. Where else can you travel like this
and get paid for it?
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Oh my god? Well that see, this is what we
want to get at the heart of because even after
you after you've done all the hard work and you've
had to learn all that it takes to drive a
big rig what you have said repeatedly in your book
in different forms and also in your podcast which we're
going to talk about, but you have said that as
a career, truck driving not only proved remarkable but also
(23:16):
dynamically altered the course of your life. So we want
to talk to you more about why you feel that way.
Speaker 5 (23:22):
Okay, well, let me tell you. As a single female
and you guys know the cost of living has gone
up tremendously, right, And so after my last divorce, I
was like, Okay, what can I do where I can
travel and get paid right. I was a flight attendant
with Delta and a gate agent with Delta for a while,
and I had gotten laid off and I love that,
(23:44):
but I just I needed to change, right. And so
my son and lawas he was fixing to go to
truck driving school, and he's like, hey, Mom, why don't
you start driving a truck? And I think this season?
I don't think he actually because I was working at
a bank making him like eleven bucks an hour. I
had no retire but I had nothing right right, and
it was like, I'm never I'm living with my parents
(24:04):
at the age of fifty, you know what I mean.
You hear jokes about that. It's like, there's no joke, man.
I need is a big change. And so I literally
got on there. I started looking like instantly for truck
driving schools and that kind of thing, and I found
the one in Mesquite, which was close, and within two
weeks I was in truck driving school. And now I
(24:26):
can financially support myself very easily. I'm actually able to
help my parents and my kids, and oh, there's just
nothing like it, and see the whole country at the
same time.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Well, yeah, so seeing the country. What's the longest run
you've ever made, don't you?
Speaker 5 (24:41):
Actually it was just the other day that you say
that is really kind of crazy. I drove from rialto
California to North Carolina, so literally all the way across
the United States from the West coast to the East coast.
And that was twenty it was twenty four hundred miles.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Okay, So along that line, what is the longest stint
you've ever done? The longest like stay awake behind the wheel,
not pulling over. What was the longest one you've ever
done in how many hours?
Speaker 5 (25:11):
Well, the law has a lot to do with that. Nowadays,
we don't have the paper logs anymore, right, so we
have an ELD is what it's called. I'll shut to
you real quick. That machine out there, a little computer.
Oh yeah, okay, And basically what it does it tells me,
as a truck driver, you have four different clocks. You
have an eight hour clock, eleven hour clock, fourteen hour clock,
(25:33):
and a seventy hour clock. And you're probably going, what
the heck?
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Yeah, So when.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
I first wake up in the morning, I have eight
hours to drive, and then we have something we call
an Obama break because he's the one that put the
law into effect. We have to take a thirty minute
break before those eight hours are up. If we take
that thirty minute break before our eight hours is up,
they let us drive an additional three hours.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
Oh so that's a total of.
Speaker 5 (25:59):
A little eleven hours. So now we've got our eight
and hour eleven. Now then to run that eleven hour clock,
we have fourteen hours to run that in So if
I need to stop and you know, have lunch, or
I see the Grand Canyon and I want to pull over,
we kind of got three hours to play with, right
that fourteen hour clock just we can't turn it off.
(26:21):
It runs constantly. So once we hit fourteen hours, we
have to be off the road, But eleven of those
hours are driving. Three hours of it is whatever we
want to do, right interesting, And then for the week,
we have seventy hours. So if I hit seventy hours
of driving in six days, you know, then I have
(26:41):
to stop and take a mandatory thirty four hour break. Cool,
And so seventy hours a week is typically what our
truck driver runs is seventy hours a week. So when
people say, man, I work forty hours a week, it's.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
Like, okay, Donia. Do you have a certain route that
you like to drive for personal reasons like the scenery?
Do you have a favorite? Uh?
Speaker 1 (27:12):
State?
Speaker 2 (27:13):
A favorite?
Speaker 5 (27:14):
There's actually a couple of places that I love to run.
First of all, I don't get to run very often,
but Utah is absolutely beautiful. If you get a chance
to drive through Utah, it is absolutely gorgeous. But my
favorite actual route to run is route forty four in
a state forty four And the reason why is because
they've got some phenomenal nostalgic truck stops on that route.
(27:39):
So you've got Hoods Truck Stop, You've got Donnie's Truck Stop.
Those are the main two. And I tell you what,
like y'all were talking about earlier, they have some awesome
truck stop food so places when you hit the top
five truck stops, which all of you guys you know
at the top five are.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I'm sure yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm sure that the usual suspect.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
Yeah, as long as they have a hot turkey sandwich,
I'm so in it.
Speaker 5 (28:06):
And that's the thing the top five, don't. That's the
thing about it. They have fast food restaurants. They've got
the Army's, the Subways, the Chesters Chicken and I'll tell
you what, you get sick of that really quick, really quick.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
Although I could go with the Arby's right now.
Speaker 5 (28:23):
Yeah, I mean you know, when you're hunger, you're hungry,
you're gonna get right yeah. Yeah, but I actually prefer
stopping and trying to find the mom and pop places
that are still around because they're really going way very fast. Yeah,
they're the ones that's gonna have the turkey sandwich with
the mashed tatus on the top.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Done you how how do you feel? Where do you?
Where do you stand on?
Speaker 5 (28:43):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Something I was annoyingly guilty of. Uh, little kids pumping
their arms in hopes of you blasting your horns.
Speaker 1 (28:52):
Oh I still do that.
Speaker 5 (28:54):
Yeah, you gotta do it if you see it. I mean,
there's think about it. I mean basically, what the rule
says now is that they really don't like for you
to use it unless it's an emergency, right because it
scares some people because it is rather loud. Uh. But yeah,
if you see a kid doing that or an adult
(29:16):
I have a lot of adults to it too.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
You've got to blow the hord.
Speaker 5 (29:20):
Let me tell you. The other day it was I'm
gonna tell you a side story really quickly, because most
people don't think about this. When you miss a turn
and an eighteen wheeler, you can't just turn around, right,
You've got to find a spot that is big enough
for you to turn around. Here the other day, I
was pulling off and there was a Love trunk stop
on side and a Flying J on the other side,
(29:42):
and I was gonna go to the Flying J because
Loves is always too crowded. And so when I pulled
off the exit ramp, there was another truck driver in
front of me doing a U turn. Now, guys, U
turns are not allowed in an eighteen wheeler because it's
extremely dangerous.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Right you turn, don't you mean flip flop?
Speaker 5 (29:59):
Yeah? Exactly exactly, And we don't use those, right, we
don't do that. So anyway, he was doing that. I
was like, what in the world is he doing? Man,
that's just crazy. Well about five seconds later I realized,
oh crap, because I was watching him, I missed the
Flying J two and we were there was no where.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Oh No, I wasn't going to do a flip flop.
Speaker 5 (30:20):
So I was like, where am I going to go?
Where am I going to go? So I turned down
this road, thinking, okay, there's got to be a place
down here, somewhere where I can go. Well, the further
I went down this road, the skinnier it got, and
the skinnier it got, and I was like, oh, brother,
this is not good.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (30:34):
So I had to back all the way up and
there was a Wendy's parking lot of Wendy's there, and
you know, Wendy's parking lots aren't extremely huge at all, no,
And so I literally was going through a Wendy's parking
lot in this eighteen wheeler.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Right, Oh my god.
Speaker 5 (30:49):
And people were I know somewhere I'm on YouTube. I
just know it's these two guys. They were like, i'd
say in mid twenties or something like that. They were
walking across and they were pointing looking at me and everything,
you know, and I'm going, yeah, just a Gorman kind
of a thing, and both of them humped there there
I have. Of course, I was holding my horns. It
(31:10):
was about an hour and a half later my company
called me and They're like, yeah, pretty good truck driving,
I'd say there, and I was like yeah, I'm like,
but if you zoom in really closely, they had a
picture of the guys going back like they were a
horn They're like, well, they weren't helping me, and I
was like, no, they weren't helping, but they sure wanted
me to horn hunt the horse.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
Well, listen, I thought, I mean, I thought, you know,
with all the miles that you cover, I thought that
writing or like podcast hosting were probably the most sedentary
jobs on the planet. But you you making these long runs,
you got to sit on your butt don here for
days and weeks at a time, even with those three
hours of those thirty four hour breaks. Like, how do
you stay fit on the road? What do you do?
Speaker 5 (31:53):
Well, that's extremely hard. But there's actually a couple of
ladies on the internet that are truck drivers as well.
They did yoga, and I actually teach us how to
do it on our you know, in our driver's seats.
How do you know, stretch and all different kinds of things.
So yoga, we do yoga on the on the thing.
And then actually, so there's a new thing out It's
(32:13):
like a vibrator board and you have those, and then
I've got another machine that lets me do weights, and
there's all kinds of things. And of course you can
always walk. The only thing that I say about walking
that step for safety purposes. Do it before it starts
getting dark, because otherwise they may consider you a lot lizard.
Oh yeah, they be careful for the women out there.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
And look, that kind of leads me into my next question. Uh,
you're obviously, uh, the most likable personality on the face
of this planet. You are funny, you are attractive, You're
an attractive woman. Has that ever been a problem at
these truck stops or rest stops. I'm sure you know
how to take care of yourself, but have has that
(32:52):
ever been a problem.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
Well, it's never actually been a problem before my I
remember when I first started and I was talking to
my train which he was a mail and I asked him.
I was like, you know, this kind of is scary
at night because sometimes you pull in at two o'clock
in the morning, right, And I was like, what do
I need to do? He goes. The main thing that
you always need to remember is walk with intention, he goes,
(33:14):
don't be looking around have yourself focused looking at your truck,
knowing where you're going, and don't be looking around. And
so that's what I've always done now. Also, I actually
had a TikTok that went viral because I was talking
about safety for other truck drivers and basically what I
do at night when I'm not at a safe place
or at a maybe a closed down truck stop, or
(33:36):
it may be at a wrist area or even on
the side of the road, I use a ratchet strap
and I ratchet from one door handle to the other
door handle, and AP put the ratchet in between so
it pulls those doors close together. So my doors want unlocked.
Because I don't know if you guys know this or not,
but trucks are kind of like tractors. They there's like
(33:57):
only three keys to all the trucks in the world.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Oh really, I didn't know that.
Speaker 5 (34:03):
Yeah, yeah, Why why is that? Well, it's I think
it's because it's kind of like the lawnmower. All lawnmowers
they're they're very close to having the same key. Why,
I don't know. It just doesn't make a whole lot
of sense.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
The twenty twenty four Peter built I'm guessing costs a
lot more than the lawnmower, so it's quite an investment there.
Speaker 5 (34:24):
Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right. But yeah, all the keys,
there's like, like I said, I think there's like three
or four keys to the you know, different brands. So
if you are ever locked your truck in, you can
always go ask another peter Bilt for their trucky.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
So oh wow, didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Huh.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
All right, we're at the portion of our show now
Donia that it's time for another round of Brian's stupid questions.
These are just questions. I don't know. They're probably all
really stupid men.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
Let's go.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Number one is do truckers still use cbs because the
train arab raised as you might have heard in our intro,
and then when the CB craze and do they do
they still use them?
Speaker 1 (35:06):
Is it still a thing? Oh look she's showing us.
Oh wow, you've given me new that's great.
Speaker 5 (35:13):
Yeah, okay, but a lot of people, a lot of
people don't have them. So I always do it because man,
they come in handy, they really really do. But some
of the truck drivers, usually from other countries, they they
don't have them.
Speaker 2 (35:27):
Are way stations still because I remember they used to be.
But are they still the bane of most truck drivers?
Speaker 5 (35:34):
Yes? Absolutely, No, I will tell you. I will tell
you this about the white stations, which is really pretty cool.
They've got them really technical, I guess you could say. Now.
So basically, it'll you'll start and not to single signs
because one thing a truck driver has to do is
read every sign that you go by. That's like programmed
in your head. Read every sign, okay, And so the
(35:57):
sign will say truckers stay in the right hand lane,
So we'll stand the right hand lane. When a weight
stations come in and it actually weighs us in that lane,
there's like it's a rollover weight. So it tells us. Oh,
like they can tell if I was empty, you know,
because I'm only thirty three thousand pounds, or if I'm
at seventy seven pounds, then they'll say, ooh, she might
(36:17):
be overweight. So then they'll ask me to come over,
and I'll get a little green light or an EX
to keep going. Okay, But yeah, if you have an X,
then you've got to go over, and you actually have
there's three different weights that we have. We've got twelve
thousand pounds in the front, thirty four hundred pounds in
the middle, and then on our backs we have thirty
four thousand pounds as well, which total eighty thousand pounds.
(36:38):
We cannot be over eighty thousand pounds, but anything in between.
If I'm like thirty six on my drive tires, then
you know I'm off. So I've got to move my
tandems back and forth to get my weight correct.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
Okay, So it's you're out there alone, it's late at night,
You're probably jacked up on a little cat fiend or something.
And what kind of music? What's your go to musical
choice when you're when you're there, I love.
Speaker 5 (37:09):
Well, honestly, I did not listen to a whole lot
of music. I'll listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Wow, okay, yeah.
Speaker 5 (37:15):
I listen to podcasts. I also have a large affiliate
marketing thing that I'm doing, and so I listen. I'll
listen to educational things. I listen to books. I go
to Audible all the time and listen to books. And
occasionally I'll flip on the radio and I just find
whatever's local, typically country music.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
Okay, all right, so that's good. So you're feeding your
brain while you're out there on making all these runs,
and and and and Look, we know that you're a mom,
we know that you're a breast cancer survivor. You are
an extraordinarily strong woman who has had I'm guessing a
hell of a lot of time to think on all
those runs, Donia. So so what are what are some
(37:55):
of the best life lessons that you think you've learned
along the way when making those runs.
Speaker 5 (38:01):
Oh, my gosh, never give up.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
That's a good one.
Speaker 5 (38:06):
You're stronger than you think you are. And let's see,
life is an adventure, so take full advantage of it.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Oh that's a good one too.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
See, that's the exact kind of wisdom that made us
want to have you on our show, Donya, And I
think what makes you such a good human is your
willingness to share those kinds of nuggets with the world
in all kinds of ways. For one thing, Donya does
have this new book called The Diary of the Female
Truck Driver, which you talked about, which is available on Amazon.
Highly recommend this. Can you tell us more about that
book and how did you write it exactly? Did you
(38:40):
dictate it from the driver's seat or how did this work.
Speaker 5 (38:44):
Actually, idea. That's really funny that you say that. I
was sitting here one day and I realized that there
were a lot of So I also talk on a
radio show every morning, right my local radio show, and
so I was talking to him, and there were these
people asking you, well, tell us a little bit more
about it. And I was doing a YouTube little channel,
(39:05):
you know, going through truck driving school and what was
going on. And I realized it was a real interest,
especially for females that really wanted to do it but
were really scared or fearful to do it because they're like, man,
I can't drive. It's like, oh, they'll teach you, you know
kind of thing. So I really started just dictating into
my phone as things were crazy happening, or if something
(39:28):
just happened before I forget it, I would start making
a note of it, right. And I started doing this
all the way through and was writing a journal and
doing it on my phone, and I was like, you
know what, I would really like to write a book.
So I started off because growing up, I never, in
my wildest dreams, thought that I would be.
Speaker 2 (39:47):
A truck driver for sure.
Speaker 5 (39:49):
I mean, that's not every little girl's dream. You know,
most of us going to be princesses or whatever, not
a truck driver. And so I started in the book
as far as how my life progressed to get me
to where I am. And let me just tell you guys,
even though you have things that happen in your past
it's not good, or my breast cancer or whatever it
(40:09):
might be, just remember that we can't get stuck there.
I don't know. There's a story in the Bible with
Lot and his wife, right, and they were trying to
get out of Sodomingamore and they were leaving, you know,
go go go, and God or the Holy Spirit was like,
just don't look back.
Speaker 2 (40:25):
Don't look back. That was the whole key.
Speaker 5 (40:26):
Don't look back, just keep going forward to where you're headed.
And what did Lot's wife do. She looked back and
she turned into a pillar of saw. And the thing
about it is sometimes we get stuck and places were
only meant to be going through. And so it's really
important to forget about the stuff. Don't use that stuff.
I mean, you can use it for an advantage, but
don't look at it as a being a victim. I
(40:48):
am thankful that I went through the breast cancer, because
now then I can testify to other females that's been
through it. I've been through a rape. I can deal
with people like that. And you know, people are put
into your life for a certain way, and this truck
driving has just changed my life completely. But I never
would have thought that I would be a truck driver
for sure and alive every second of it.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
You are so inspiring in so many ways.
Speaker 1 (41:13):
Yeah, I mean, you literally have driven through challenges that
could have stopped a lot of people in their tracks.
But man, you stay in the cab. And not only
have you written this book, she's also the host of
her own podcast by the same name, The Diary of
a Female Truck Driver. This is a total hoot to
listen to, you guys, a lot more detail about the
places that done you visits. It's also a first hand
(41:36):
account of some of those challenges, those triumphs, those unique
experiences that she's had navigating the highways in the real highways,
the metaphorical highways, and all of that stuff.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
Well, before we wrap this up, Donyete, you know what
we want and we can. We don't even have to
say it. We're just going to show you what we want.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Yeah, we go. We pumped the fist and she delivered.
Speaker 2 (42:02):
Donia took me right back to when I was eight.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
No kidding. Thank you so much for taking us on
the road with you today. You are just awesome. So
if assuming that our listeners and our viewers have fallen
in love with you the same way we have, uh,
what's the best place that they can follow you on
the socials? Where can they? Where can they? Where can
they connect with you further?
Speaker 5 (42:24):
So everything of me is going to be uh is
called Freedom on Wheels with Donia dot Com. Freedom on
Wheels with Donia. And that's got my book, that's got
my podcast, that's got everything Donya on there. And uh, yeah,
guys love you and I really appreciate everything you guys
(42:46):
have done. It's just been absolutely phenomenal.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
You are a guest goal is what you are. You
are podcast guest gold. Will you come back anymore?
Speaker 5 (42:57):
Guess let me know. I'll be glad of that.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Good good.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
We'll have you on again if if you don't mind,
we we love to talk with you some more someday.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Absolutely yes, Freedom on Wheels with Donia dot Com. We're
going to drop a link to that on our own
website as well. You have been an absolute pleasure, my friend.
Continue to drive safely in that brand new, beautiful truck
of yours, and we'll see you a little further down
the road.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
Bye, Donia.
Speaker 5 (43:19):
By guys, thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
We will take you suck.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
We are back. And you know, Palli, occasionally there's you're
lucky enough to meet someone that you just go, I
want to be that person's friend. Yeah, yeah, I mean
just you can't help but smile.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
You know when it's happening. We both kept looking at
each other like, oh God, this is so amazing.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
And I don't know if you guys saw this. It
was while she was talking, but she was. I asked
the question about the annoying kids, who would you know,
hump their arms to and she she goes, oh yeah.
We both looked at each other and mouth of the
words we're gonna use that for the clothes at the end,
We're gonna we're gonna use that. You had to, but
it did. It took me back. Man, sitting the back
of the station wagon facing the back, remember that seats
(44:16):
that would go up my brother and I Yeah, at
every every trucker coming up. Man, you had you had
to get in love her.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Amazing woman, amazing story. Uh yeah, so glad we got
to talk with her, and so glad we got to
join you guys again. Uh, keep following us on the socials.
Uh like, follow, subscribe, all of that great stuff, but
most importantly, go visit our website, Begodhumans dot com, which
is a general portal for all of this stuff. Tell
(44:41):
us about the good humans in your lives, tell us
about some pointers, quiz us on some more CB terms
we might not know.
Speaker 2 (44:48):
Well, so that's it for today's show. Be Good Humans,
and we'll see you on the flip side.
Speaker 4 (44:53):
Yeah, good humans, Be good humans.
Speaker 3 (45:00):
Be good humans, or we will thank you.
Speaker 1 (45:03):
Suck to Be Good Humans is executive produced by Brian Phelps,
Trey Callaway, and Grant Anderson, with associate producers Sean Fitzgerald
and Clementine Callaway and partnership with straw Hut Media. Please like, follow,
and subscribe, and remember be Good Humans.
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