A Tribute to California Truck Drivers & Their Language

By C. MacDonald

I admire most California truck drivers—how they maneuver big rigs around sharp corners, how they stay in their lanes, how they back into loading docks and how they make their way through gridlocked, urban cities to deliver (or pick up) their loads on time.

They are an amazing, talented and valued group that everyone in the state and country rely on. My wife's cousin is a trucker. Over the years, I've talked to him and several other men and women, who make their living traveling over all kinds of roads—in snow, through sandstorms and pot-holed streets throughout the day and night.

I've always been fascinated with their colorful language, which I've jotted down. Chances are that many of you have never heard some of these terms.

They've told me a "chicken coop" is a weigh station; a "skateboard" is a flatbed trailer; an "aviator" is a speeding driver; a "crotch rocket" is a motorcycle; a "squirt gun" is a firetruck; an "alligator" is a piece of tire on the road; "wiggle wagons" are two or three trailers; a "dragon fly" is a truck with no power; a "cement mixer" is a truck with a noisy engine; a "cowboy" is a reckless driver; a "yardstick" is a mile marker; a "granny lane" is a slow lane; a "cash register" is a toll booth; a "dog" is a truck with not much power; "donuts" are truck tires; "dusting" is driving with wheels on the road shoulder; a "kidney-buster" is a hard-riding truck" and "smoke him" is passing another vehicle; a "black eye" is when a headlight is out; "bundled out" is a maximum capacity load; a "stagecoach" is a tour bus; "skins" are tires; a "pigtail" is the electrical connection from trailer to tractor, and a "mud duck" is a weak radio signal. "10-4. over and out!"

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