When it rains it pours

wow.  talk about taking some time away.   I'd love to say that we took Jen's allergic reaction as a head's up for us to slow down, but that wouldn't be exactly honest.  Jen was out of action and in bed for a good two weeks between the allergy and the steroids they put her on to reduce the reaction.  Weird stuff.  We think the allergy was out of her system within the first few days but the lingering effects of the steroids stuck around far longer.

We still have no idea what caused the reaction.  Wet epoxy seems the easy culprit, but there's holes in that theory too.  For all we know, there could have been some other project going on in the shop around the same time that was completely unrelated and caused the reaction.  The good news is that she seems fine now.

While jen was sleeping it off for a few weeks i kept hitting the shop trying to push through the final stages of the trailer build.  The small things.  Things like cabinet doors and installing latches and lights and all the things that you just wish would finish themselves.  That's the problem with big projects... by the time you get to the tiny details that make it pop you're so annoyed with the project as a whole that you find yourself rushing through the parts that should likely matter the most. 

I walked away one morning and started welding up the frame of a chair i'd designed a while back just to clear my head.  Turns out I should have done that weeks ago.  The chance for the brain and creative spirit to run in a different direction actually made me want to go back and work on some of those annoying details (or at least made them seem not quite so annoying).  It didn't hurt that Jen and i had agreed months ago to show some of our creations in the ADX gallery for October's first Friday art opening.  In the back of my mind i knew i didn't want that to be an empty room with a trailer, so a few pieces of furniture on the side was good for more than just the psyche.

Just in time with jen feeling good enough to leave the house was another football game in eugene.  We loaded up once again and hit the road.  Luckily (we still don't really watch the news or have much tie to media) someone pointed out that a massive storm was coming and we packed some extra clothes and rain gear.  This thing turned out to be a few days of monsoon.  Literally.  I guess the storm was a spinoff of a typhoon hitting the coast and spun a heap of nasty weather our way.  Really good time to go sleep outdoors in a wooden box.

We parked the trailer in front of our place the night before and could hear the wind howling and rain coming down.  In the morning all looked pretty good.  Oddly the only thing that leaked was one of the two doors/windows.  The same ones we spent good money to buy just to ensure they didn't leak...  No worries.  Just a few drops inside so we dried things out and hit the road after a few minutes of playing with the kids in the trailer.

Game day was hilariously wet.  After a few hours of surprise sunshine in the afternoon the sky simply let go and dumped.  We all knew it was coming but there was no way to be prepared and certainly no way to stay dry.  All you could do was laugh at exactly how much water was coming from the sky and how despite the miserable sogginess everyone still showed up for the game to support the team.  Truly impressive stuff.

By game time it was sloppy.  Something like 4 fumbles in the first 12 carries.  I heard stories of a tuba player who fell over just trying to dump the rain out of his instrument, and many people left during the first quarter weighed down by pockets full of water.  Others had fun with it and took off their shirts to dance in the rain.  Jen and i held on as long as we could and left late in the 4th quarter.  We wanted to be solid fans, but at some point when your team is winning by 45points and you cant feel your fingers its time to go back to the trailer for a warm drink.

The trailer kept us nice and warm as the storm continued on outside and in the morning we packed up as quickly as possible to get on the road and head back for the cover of home.  Sadly, when we stopped for gas i noticed a few water marks on the trailer where water has made its way through the epoxy and varnish.  Once home i noticed that on the opposite side of the trailer the news was far worse.  One large stain from top to bottom showing where water had somehow made its way into the cavity and run down the inside of the bamboo skin.  My heart sank and i wanted to cry, but at this point all we could do was get it out of the rain and hope for it to dry.

I spent the next two days curled up in the fetal position in the corner but eventually remembered that this whole thing was an experiment...and its all part of the learning.  The trailer is drying out as we speak and we'll be sealing up those problem spots real well before our next outing.

That said...in the whole area of listening to the universe tell you what to do...the fact that our two trips out in the trailer resulted in a severe allergic reaction and an epic storm followed by water damage- we may have decided that making trailers will, in fact, not be our next day job ;)