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Saturday 21 February 2015

KEEPING IT REAL BY FRIZZY LIZZY


Hi dear friends and followers, today is Frizzy Lizzy day, take five, relax and have a great read.


KEEPING IT REAL BY FRIZZY LIZZY

It's about half-way through that wonderful season that we call winter. The first day of astronomical spring is about 30 days away and it feels like that's an eternity. I have had enough snow and cold, thank you, and I am ready for warmer weather.

Years ago, when I was with my second ex, Frank, we had a 27-foot travel trailer that we kept on a beautifully manicured site at a well-kept campground. It had only annual renters and it was something to see.

Everyone took diligent care of their trailers and motorhomes and Frank was no exception. I took care of everything inside of the trailer and he handled the outside.

Now the trailer was mainly white with green trim. The roof was flat and it had some paint on it to seal the tiny little cracks and it was silver. For as nicely as that trailer was kept there were black streaks on the side and Frank did not like them.

Every spring he would get a scrub brush on the end of a stick and a bucket of soapy water and scrub the outside of the trailer to get those black marks off, and get them off he did. But they were back in a few weeks and he would fume over it.

So one day he got it in his mind to go up on top of the trailer and wash the roof because that had to be the source of the black marks.

He had never been on the roof of a trailer before but that did not stop him. He got a ladder and he took the hose, a bucket of sudsy water, and the scrub brush, and up to the roof he went. He was accustomed to being on the roof of a house so the roof of a trailer was no big deal to him.

Except for one thing: the roof of a trailer is not made like the roof of a building. The roof of a building is a sheet of wood or metal that supports the shingles or other roofing material. In order to keep the weight down, the roof of a travel trailer is just a series of ribs with sheets of aluminum roofing fastened to them, their seams sealed with caulking. Such a roof in not made to support the weight of a man. But Frank did not know that. He was up there like he was on the roof of a house.

He did not move three feet from where he came onto the roof before he put his hand on a seam and then put his weight on his hand. His hand went right through that seam and opened a hole that was at least three feet long! Being a rather observant individual, Frank quickly figured out what happened and why and he got down of that roof as fast as he could without causing more damage.

He figured that he had done enough damage already, so when he went back upon the roof to inspect the hole in it, he took a board up with him to place across the ribs and keep his weight off the roof. Smart man, that Frank.

I asked him what it looked like up there and he told me. I asked him if he had a fix for it and when he told me that he wasn't sure, I suggested that he go to the camp store and ask Roger, the clerk and resident know-it-all, for ideas.

Frank saw Roger and returned with a roll of tape that was 4 inches wide and stick on one side. He said that Roger told him to apply it in the hot sun because it would form a good bond with the rest of the roof and plug the hole. Sounded fine to me. And up Frank goes to put the tape on the roof.

He came back down the ladder and we had a nice lunch. After a few hours of brilliant May sunshine on the patched roof, Frank took the hose and flooded the roof and there were no leaks! I thought to myself that I was very fortunate to be around two quick-witted men like Frank and Roger.

Until the rains came. Later that afternoon we got a cloudburst. The rain came down in sheets and buckets and the wind blew like it was leaving town! And the roof leaked all into the kitchen of our nice, clean travel trailer! We had water coming down the wall and over the mirror behind the countertop like it was Niagara Falls!

Frank knew that he had to stop the leak somehow so he went across the lane to our neighbor, Clifford, who was having a few drinks with his wife before supper. He knocked on the screen door and said to Clifford, "I have some news and some good news. The good news is that the rockfish are running. The bad news is that they're running in my kitchen!"

Clifford almost choked on his beer and laughed heartily, as did Frank. Frank asked Clifford if he had a tarpaulin that we could borrow. He did. It was big enough to cover the entire trailer. And in the rain Frank put that tarpaulin over the camper and the leak stopped for that night.

The next day he went into town and bought some roofing tar to plug the hole. Really, nothing ever worked because that trailer leaked for as long as we had it after that, and that was a good 7 years.

As for the black marks, we learned that they are caused by the normal decomposition of the asphalt used in trailer roofing and all we should ever do is to wash it off the sides of the trailer.

Thank you very much again, dear friends, for visiting my blog. Please share your thoughts with us, if you will. have a great Week.

ڰۣIn Loving Light from the Fairy Ladyڰۣ


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