50 Shades of Grey

No, this is in no way about that book (which Amazon keeps emailing me about, but I have not read nor to I own).

I've had a three or four day streak of sunny warm days. It had started to make me uncomfortable. You know when you have that pre-sunburn feeling all the time and feel like a ball park wiener just about to split it's skin?
Well if you spent less time lounging around in the sun soaking up that vitamin D, you wouldn't have that problem, now would you?
True, condescending italics voice. True.
Also, now I really want a ball park frank. 


Well, the streak has broken. It's grey and rainy/threatening to rain  all day. Perfect day to get som non riding related jobs done, right? So what's first on that list?
Get Shavings.
Ok... Off to the sawmill I go, tarp on hand. I payed for my truckload for shavings and pulled along back for the big front end loader to fill 'er up. I had my tarp secured to the front of the bed, then pulled up over the cab so that I could just pull it over the back, tie it down and drive merrily away with my truck load of shavings.

It was all going according to plan... Until the driver started to dump the shavings.

The rain had stopped, and the wind had picked up.
That blasted wind.

It ripped my tarp off of my review mirrors, where I had secured it for just this issue, and sent it flailing towards the bed of the truck. Fortunatly the front end loader stopped my wayward tarp with a yard of sawdust. There was no force in the world - short of shoveling out my truck- that was going to liberate that tarp so that I could cover my load and head on home. I signaled the driver to finish loading my truck...then headed back to the supply/hardware store to purchase myself another tarp.

Anyone here care to guess how difficult it is to secure a new tarp to a truck bed literally over flowing wth sawdust all in gale force winds?
I got sawdust into crevices I didn't even know I had while cursing my binder twin, lack of a knife, and the wind.

The bright spot is that a gentleman came up to me as I finished securing my load (while muttering under my breath) and chatted me up for a while. When he gave me his number, I figured he was hitting on me until he parted with the remark "I have a dump truck and could quote you a price to move that sawdust for you, six yards at a time".

And you know what, I think I will call him... before I commit accidental suicide by tarp.

My load made it home ok, and I got it half way unloaded before I had to sprint off to work (redneck style with loards weighing doen that damn tarp and half a load of sawdust in the back).

I made it half way to work when I started to notice a burning smell.... Then I got to use my new favorite curse:
Oh for fucks sake, what could possibly be going wrong now?!?!?!
Stop the car, get out and check for a problem. There are faint curls of smoke coming from my drivers side wheel well. Well, that can't be good. Off to the shop it is!


Dropped my truck (and sawdust) off at the shop down the street from my office... Evidently my calipers for my breaks were worn enough that they were literally smoking.

I want my sunshine back.