Audible.com offers a free 128 MB Creative MuVo mp3 player with a 12-month subscription or $100 off many AudibleReady products, including the Apple iPod.
You’re working out there on the road, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be entertained at the same time. Fill up those hours – driving and downtime – with some high-tech in-cab entertainment.
A Good Listen
Unlike most in-cab entertainment that requires you to be parked, audiobooks can keep you amused while driving. Audible.com offers a new way to listen to them and save a little money and space in the cab. With a compatible mp3 player and subscription to Audible.com ($21.95 for two books a month, if you sign up for a year), you will have access to 23,000 downloadable audiobook titles and digital radio programs, magazines and newspapers, including products from Random House Audio, Simon & Schuster and TimeWarner AudioBooks. Audible.com offers a free 128 MB Creative MuVo mp3 player with a 12-month subscription or $100 off many AudibleReady products, including the Apple iPod.
You can also load any CD audiobooks already in your collection onto the player. Try the Truckers News audiobook review program (see page 50) to add more titles to your collection.
Satellite TV
You can still catch all your favorite shows while out on the road – and your partner in the sleeper can enjoy some entertainment while you drive – with the new in-motion TracVision L3 antenna from KVH Industries. With its integrated Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) technology, the self-contained TracVision L3 senses the vehicle’s motion as it is driving and adjusts to identify, acquire and track satellite signals from a range of DirecTV and DVB-compatible satellite TV services. The 14.5-by-32-inch antenna sells for around $2,000. The TracVision S2, designed for use when parked only, sells for around $1,000. Check out www.kvh.com to search for dealers in your area.
Movies for Truckers
There are more trucking movies out there than Smokey and the Bandit. Try these less well-known films with trucker heroes:
- Black Dog (1998), stars Patrick Swayze as an ex-con who takes a job driving a truck cross country. What he doesn’t know is that the truck is filled with illegal weapons and now he must fight to survive and save his family.
- Over the Top (1987), stars Sylvester Stallone as Lincoln Hawk, a trucker who hits the road with his estranged son for some father/son quality time. After a rocky start, Lincoln wins the boy’s love through the art of Las Vegas championship arm-wrestling.
- Convoy (1978), starring Kris Kristofferson, is about a mile-long convoy of protesting truckers driving along the Arizona highway toward the Mexican border.
- Breaker, Breaker! (1977), stars Chuck Norris as an Alaskan trucker and former karate champ returning to Texas to rescue his brother, who is involved in a scam with corrupt cops.
- Duel (1971), starring Dennis Weaver and directed by Steven Spielberg, is about a businessman in a rented car pitted against a diesel truck that seems determined to run him down.
- Flatbed Annie and Sweetiepie: Lady Truckers (1979), stars Annie Potts and Kim Darby as two women truckers battling to keep their rigs away from the repo man and hijackers.
- Thieves’ Highway (1949), starring Richard Conte and Valentina Cortese, is a portrait of independent truckers trying to beat the odds against a crooked produce wholesaler.
- They Drive By Night (1940), stars George Raft and Humphrey Bogart as truck-driving brothers struggling to make ends meet in the face of corrupt businessmen and intense competition.
All these movies can be found on DVD at Amazon.com or www.virtualtruckroute.com.
Got a favorite time-saving or life-improving device you’d like to recommend to your fellow drivers? Send your ideas to Kristin Walters at [email protected] or 3200 Rice Mine Rd. NE, Tuscaloosa, AL 35406.
