CRETE - A Year in Review

Well made it to Texas.....again! I seem to have been wearing out I20 the last few loads. Deliver tomorrow then it's home time for the weekend!

 

I picked up a load of empty soda cans out of Jacksonville, FL headed for Hattiesburg, MS. It picked up Tuesday, and can deliver ASAP. 584 miles right out of the gate. Phone has made it 2 days so far...

 

What phone did you get this time ? Hope it keeps going.

 

Since the other phone was still under warranty, they just replaced it with another HTC Droid Incredible 4g LTE. My Verizon contract is up in mid-June, so I hope one of these replacements will last long enough to complete my 2yr commitment so I can switch to Sprint and get a new phone cheap and get away from these refirbished warranty replacement phones.

 

HA HA It never fails! I made it to Wilmer and dropped the MT. I was excited to be headed home for some R&R. However, you know the Inspection Stations under the bridge just north of the terminal...you know the ones that are NEVER open! Well they were today. Pulled in and was told to pull over and wait. One guy in front of me and then two more were pulled in behind me. There were two officers working. The truck in front of me was finished and moved on. The truck behind me was finished and moved on. The truck behind him finished and moved on. They forgot about me! I went back to one of the officers (who by this time was pulling in more trucks) and asked if I was free to go at which point he looked at the other officer..."I thought you got him....no I thought you were going to do him" well after one hour of waiting and a very quick paper only level3 I was on my way

Sitting at home for the next four days!

 

The two preplan setup to get me to the west coast collapsed as expected. The first shipper detained me for over 6 hours so that shot my 14. It was a 680 mile trip so I really needed to knock out a few miles today but they foiled that. Now I will have to take an 8 hr break and then a 10 hr break later which will make me late for the 2200 mile run. It put me into maximum rage mode, but the shipper couldn't care less.

 

It's unfortunate more things don't work out better for you at Crete. I know all to well how many things can fall through with them. However, I think you might need to spend some time with a more Crete experienced driver whenever you get the chances. There are many boundaries you can push and many you can't. Too many for me to try and type out on here. I'm confident some of your misfortune can't be changed. However, many things you post on here could be done different. You need not get yourself in a pickle or have things going south like they once were there. You just got to fine tune your tactics a little more to get what you need. I wish you nothing but good in your journey there at Crete. Things unfortunately won't go the way you need them to many times. You just got to pick and choose some battles and flex your abilities in ways you're not aware of at this point. I'm not even sure how to word some of that but I'm sure some of the veteran drivers on here can relate to what I'm trying to type. Perfect example is this...if you need to be on the West Coast by the 12th...make it happen. I would have that load going West and I would carry it out there and be where I needed to be. Now there's a wright way, a wrong way and a CRETE WAY to do that. You got to work on figuring that out to make life at Crete a little easier for you. Some crap is just crap and you got to put up with it. Yet, many things can be bent in the direction you need them to be in your favor. Good Luck with it and feel free to pick our brain for some things from time to time. Sometimes that's the only way you'll find some of that stuff out. Hang in there and good luck getting to the wedding.

 

Being happy with where you are at makes the job a lot more rewarding

 

So true! Always look for the silver lining no matter what the situation. It's hard to find it sometimes but keep looking.

 

Either you don't know what it's like over here or it's been so long since you were here that you don't know what this system has morphed into. We have no choices here besides take it or leave. It isn't the old Crete where we could choose where we go and what we do. It's not the company that it use to be where if you had an issue you could call a supervisor or higher level management to get issues resolved...it's just take it or leave. I have talked to many drivers who feel the same way as I do that with all the changes, all the policy changes, the terminal closures that it feels like they're sprucing things up to sell. This isn't the company it used to be, even as recently as when Jdzr was here a year or so ago... Drivers here are no more that trained monkeys doing a side show act. The only difference is we can walk away.