CRETE - A Year in Review

Not surprising. What shop?

I haven't posted much because I have been run ragged. Not really an amazing amount of miles but a lot of middle of the night scheduling, then running out of battery power so frying in the heat waiting to get back some of my 70. I'm taking my vacation in August when I will submit my applications to switch companies.

The main problem I've had recently is all fake delivery appointment info. I've been given qcomm appointment like 3am and then the next day 8am. But after arriving at the customer I find out is was all BS and I could pickup or deliver any time. I called dispatch and they said "sometimes we give you a shortened window to increase productivity". I've been running up to 5 minutes of maxing out my 70 and then praying to find parking, so their games have not been helpful.

 

I hate that! It's my biggest complaint with Crete. I mean why on earth would you give an appt. of 0100 to 0100 at Kelloggs in Lewisville, TX when you know it's an all day drop. How in God's name is that "increasing productivity"? I know of a few in dispatch who think it's a dumb idea as well. Sometimes I will ask if the appt. times are real time or Crete time.

 

That ^ is especially irritating when the "appointment time" would absolutely screw you for parking. This is precisely why truck driving experience should be one of the minimum qualifications of a truck dispatch position.

 

So, what a day.

It started well, at least. Then a couple idiots dove into my lane in front of me and jammed on the brakes as a light was changing. I had intended to stop and was already slowing down, but they significantly decreased my stopping space, forcing me to stand on the brakes. Got it stopped without hitting anyone, then *BOOM!* Felt like I got rear ended...'cept there was nobody behind me.

Did I mention I'm carrying paper rolls?

So, a block ahead sat a J. Pulled in, scaled, got the scale ticket. 12200 / 46080 / 19560. Tandems in the California hole. Newer trailer.

####. #### #### #### #### #### ####. And did I mention ####?!

Just got done with being re-loaded at the shipper...twice. The first time, they re-loaded me too nose heavy. (2,000 over on the drives, again, in the California hole.)

But sure enough...when I opened the doors the first time, all the rolls were sitting up in the nose.

Oy.

 

As cheaply and defect prone as these trailers are made, you're fortunate they weren't sitting next to you in the passenger seat. I've never been confident of those little rubber mats ability of holding a 3-4000+ lb roll of paper in place

 

I delivered my load of flour from the caves yesterday. The load took me across I-68 W/42,000 Lbs. I swear, whatever they -fixed- on my truck has killed whatever power I use to have. It never rocked my trucking world, but wow, I think an Amish family in a single horse power buggy could out pull me. I get to my receiver outside Hagerstown, and it's a drop/hook. Drop my trailer in the inbound drop lot, then go down the street to the empty lot, and my trailer they assigned isn't there, but there are others...so I do like the last driver did, and pick one. I have permanently removed "giving a crap" off both my 'things to do' list and my 'bucket' list. I wait a bit(since the last software update, my q/comm has gotten extremely sluggish). I get an offer, pickup over closer to Baltimore (Daltile) going to a 2stop ending near Boston for tomorrow. Now technically I would have had enough hours to get to the final, but since I had ran most of todays hours out delivering the flour load, that means using. most of tomorrows hours getting 2 deliveries made, leaving me no time to find a place to park deep in the heart of Coryland. So I said no, not enough hours. Cory said both stops would take the load up to 1600 and asked if I could do the load safe and legally... I just said Nope, that's why I put a 'n'. They then put me in a load of Church and Dwight out of York going up near Syracuse. Coryland, and especially Cory are the last people/places they should send a driver who's patience is so short that too many bugs hitting my windshield whizzes me off...but to purgatory I go.

 

Columbus and Indy. Indy was quick but didn't fix issue. Columbus was SLOW and took 5 days and didn't fix issue.

 

I experienced one of the best reasons to have e-log today. On my way to deliver near Syracuse, the NYDOT were set up in the rest area. I followed the leader watching each truck ahead of me present their log book...when it was my turn, he took a quick glance at the HUT sticker as I approached, then as I slowed to almost a stop, his eyes glanced at my door where the e-log sticker was...and waved me on by.

 

when my A/M was working me towards a shop last week, he asked if Indy would've been better...I told him that I wouldn't allow Indy to wash my dirty windshield. After they replaced my working fuel pump with a leaking one, then, when putting my truck back together they forgot to tighten the bolts on my air cleaner and my steering shaft where it splines onto the gearbox...and blamed me for not using enough fuel additive for my heater problem (which only made it work worse when I did as the said to do)...he understood. Columbus, although slow as molasses in January, has generally done decent work...or at least haven't screwed up more than they've fixed.

I am a bit p/o'd at K/C. When he did my B service, he took off my good 1 piece -constant contact expensive windshield wiper, and replaced it with one of the company cheapo's. I guess I'm gona have to buy another one and keep this one for my next visit to the shop.

 

Yea SS, I always buy my own wiper blades as well. Defiantly an item where you get what you pay for. No fault of the companies IMO, as they buy so many in bulk but the $1 special blades just don't cut it in the real world.