Maverick .... from a wife's perspective

I'm back! Sorry but I was off for a few days to spend some time with my husband!!!!
Woo-Hoo!! I haven't seen him since the second week in June.

Anyway, I got to see him because it was a rainy night in Georgia. (Sorry....couldn't resist). After Redcoat spent the night at the I-20 truck stop in Alabama (which is now a brand new Pilot) he made it to the consignee 10 minutes before his appointment time which was just perfect. They unloaded his coil and then he got a dispatch to bounce to some little bitty town outside of Augusta (which I can't remember the name of) to pick up some lumber headed to a town just south of Columbus, OH (which I also can't remember the name of because it's late and my brain isn't working). This was Thursday.

When he got to the shipper, the sky opened up and the shipper wanted to load everybody in the barn so they were taking just one truck at a time. There were 4 other Mav trucks there besides Redcoat so needless to say, it took a while to get loaded. I don't think he left there until like 1500 which was WAY late. His load was some heavy lumber. It didn't take up the entire deck but still weighed over 48K. The forklift driver helped with his lumber tarp and this time it only took him an hour and a half so his tarping time is starting to get down there. He said it was easy to tarp anyway since the load was so square but he was still proud of how nice it looked and took a couple pictures of it. Thought I'd include one even though most of you would probably yawn as you've done it a hundred times.



Anyway, since he was so late getting out of Georgia, it put him way behind for his scheduled delivery. Buy the time he made it up to Charlotte, there was a conversation between him and his dispatcher about getting a new delivery time. Redcoat was not the only one in this situation. One of the other Mav drivers who loaded at the same shipper was in the same predicament. They were more or less traveling together but the other driver had even less hours left than RC. Their DM came back with a new delivery time for Monday morning as the consignee was going to be closed on Friday. They stopped at a truck stop just short of where I-40 crosses I-77 and waited for their dispatcher to let them know what he wanted them to do.

Redcoat let his dispatcher know that I was a hundred miles away near Raleigh and asked the question if he could maybe spend the weekend with me. After a little bit his dispatcher gave him permission to leave his truck at at truck stop somewhere on I-40 (not going to say where for obvious reasons) and I drove the rest of the way to pick him up.

So I've taken the last two days off to spend some quality time with my hard-working husband and I'm really grateful to Maverick for working with us in this case. RC gave me the grand tour of his truck and it is so much nicer than the one he drove for Covenant. Nice and roomy. This weekend we went down to Best Buy to get a digital box for the little analog TV that used to be in our bedroom. I took that TV out and bought a new one. Redcoat has decided to use it in his truck so now he will have a bit of mindless entertainment while on the road. We also went to Home Depot to buy a 6-foot ladder. Redcoat said he needed it to help him get up on top of the lumber loads. Not sure where in the truck he's going to put it.

I have to work tomorrow (Saturday) so Redcoat is going to wash the rig for me. It needs it. He was also going to change the air filter on the diesel engine but in all of Raleigh I couldn't find anybody with one in stock so that will have to stay on his honey-do list for the next time. We have a 400 Cummins engine on the rig and the air filter is this HUGE thing in a canister. Not something I want to tackle. My engine working days are long over.

He plans on leaving Sunday in time so he can make it up to Ohio almost to the consignee which will allow him to be there first thing Monday morning.

For the record, the plywood place in Moncure is still in business. Redcoat talked to his buddy from Charlotte that he went to orientation with and the guy picked up a load there Thursday. That is handy information to know in case Redcoat might be in a position to pick up a load there some time.

Also, Redcoat has been talking to Sewerman who is helping to keep an eye on him. It is nice to know there are folks out there that genuinely want to be helpful that you can call on if you have a question about shippers/receivers, etc. It adds a certain level of comfort knowing you have several people you can call if you have a problem or can't find a place. If you mess up and get lost, you can only get the usual directions to the shipper/consignee but that doesn't really help you if sort of don't know exactly where you are. So I'm guessing it might be helpful to talk to somebody else who has been there and can tell you what the place looks like so you can try to find it.

And that's all my news. I posted a few more pictures in my new Maverick album in case you want to check out a few more angles of Redcoat's first lumber tarp job.

Will check back on Monday to let you know how it went.