Another Oops!!

BIG RED GETS A HITCH
Following the failure of our old hitch in the accident, we decided to upgrade. $3000 later, we had one of the most sophisticated 5th wheel hitches on the market installed in Big Red. “Why so much?” you ask? Because it is capable of hauling 20K pounds of trailer, (the gross weight of our RV is 15K), has both hydraulic and air bag shock absorbers, and weighs about 300 lbs. This bad boy will be the last part of our rig to fail.

SONNY’S HOMECOMING
About mid-June we received a phone call from the Sunnybrook factory that Sonny was all better. We made plans to depart Crownsville for a three-day road trip to Indiana to pick him up. Within three months after the accident it was a joy to see our Sonny good as new. Not only did they repair the accident damage, but remember that tree Jay ran into in January? They fixed that too!! The previous owners had a tire blow out which had torn up some of the underbody insulation which was also repaired. Jay did most of the driving since Chris was a little gun shy having been at the wheel during the accident. The cushioning of the trailer’s reaction to bumps and dips in the road by the hitch air bags was worth every penny we paid for it.

JAY WAS DRIVING THIS TIME
Our ecstasy of having Sonny home was short-lived. Two-days after we arrived home, Jay ran some errands. While pulling out of a parking lot Big Red was broadsided by a young woman who was driving a very small car too fast. Her driving inexperience resulted in panic and she steered right into him. Words cannot describe our devastation. Although Big Red was drivable, the left front wheel was canted and we had to get him to a repair facility ASAP. The repair projection was two weeks and we figured we could handle driving a rental car for that long.

About mid-July the shop called us and said that all the originally appraised repairs were done but during their extensive test drive they found another problem. The frame was bent. The majority of the impact was on the left front wheel with very little body damage. The area on the frame, where the suspension components attach, was bent. It was also the location where a frame machine would connect in order to bend it back into shape. Our hearts sank as we knew when a frame is bent the vehicle is totaled. Our beloved Big Red, which had taken over a month to locate and a trip to Florida to retrieve, was going to be scrapped?!?!?!?!

Not so fast!!! We were told that they now have the capability to replace frames!!! Yippeeeeee!!!!! The projection time for the repair was an additional two to three weeks. The frame had to be ordered from a supplier in Detroit and shipped to the repair shop which took at least a week. Then they had to unbolt the entire body, engine, suspension and anything else that was attached to the frame, slide out the old one, slide in the new one and reattach the truck: A truly labor-intensive task. See photos, which the shop staff took, of the process at this link. www.imagesbychristine.com/gallery/Big_Red_new_frame

The repair shop begins the disassembly.

Three weeks turned into more than a month and Murphy reared his ugly head again. The truck repairs were completed but the shop could not install the hitch. The RV repair shop they hired to do the task kept the truck in their cue an additional two weeks before completing the installation. A final test drive revealed the need to replace bearings on the right front wheel and finally Big Red was ready to come home.

Meanwhile we’d been driving an iridescent blue PT Cruiser rental car – which Jay hated. He did not look forward to extending his association with it not only once but twice, but had no choice. We had possession of Big Red on August 31st - almost 8 weeks after the accident. Chris was so excited, she actually gave Big Red a hug. With a sigh of relief, we could now complete the final stages of our Odyssey departure.

Summer Vacation???

Not a moment of our “summer vacation” was spent not working on the house or our new Big Red truck. Including weekends, from the day we arrived home in early April, after our accident in NC, until the day we left the driveway on September 8th, we:

- spackled and sanded over 250 nail holes, inside and out
- patched 20 sq ft of concrete on the driveway
- power washed entire outside of house, patio, front walk and portion of driveway
- removed over 300 stick-on, glow-in-the-dark stars from Kevin’s bedroom ceiling
- primed and painted over 1600 sq ft of walls and trim inside and outside
- removed old caulk and recaulked a tub and separate stall shower
- etched and applied two coats of paint to 500 sq feet of concrete floor
- installed a new light fixture
- replaced the kitchen and a bathroom floor
- removed, painted and reinstalled bathroom vanity and shelving unit
- removed, painted and reinstalled doors to different bathroom vanity and lower kitchen cabinets
- removed and reinstalled base and wall cabinets in basement to enable painting the wall behind them
- steam cleaned 350 sq ft of carpet
- sanded and applied 3 coats of polyurethane to 130 sq ft of hardwood flooring
- steel-wooled and wiped down shower stall walls three times and applied two coats of epoxy paint to same
- mounted stair well handrail
- installed carpet runner on full flight of stairs
- repaired front door threshold
- replaced water system expansion tank
- transplanted over 90 plants
- weeded entire yard and survived multiple bee stings
- fertilized entire yard 3 times
- packed up and moved the entire contents of the house into a storage unit and the RV

For your enjoyment, the following are stories of some of our experiences above.

GALAXIES GALORE
When Chris’ son, Kevin, was a young boy he received a gift of several hundred glow-in-the-dark stick-on stars, planets and galaxies, which he promptly stuck all over his bedroom ceiling and fan blades. More than 10 years later, we were tasked with removing them prior to repainting his room. Now, one would think that scraping them off with the swipe of a putty knife would work. Nay, nay!! These little puppies had to be removed one at a time. Jay pried them up with a razor blade scraper, peeled them off the scraper with his fingers, then held them in his hand until a sufficient number had been accumulated to warrant a ladder descent and a trip to the trash can. To add to the difficulty, due to Jay’s bifocals, he had to hold his head waaaayyyyy back to keep the ceiling in focus so that he could find them. The almost pure white stickers blended into the white ceiling and after a while stickers and ceiling blurred together requiring numerous and shortly spaced breaks. A night time quality check was required before slinging paint. Visualize this if you dare. Jay, in his all together and armed with a flashlight, entered the barren room devoid of window coverings, and discovered to his amazement, multiple galaxies still clinging to the ceiling. This bizarre ritual was repeated three consecutive nights before all celestial bodies were removed. We felt that photos of Jay would not be well received so, omitted them.


BEE STINGS

Most of our front yard is carpeted with a dense periwinkle ground cover which is shaded by magnificent, tall oak trees. The abundant squirrel population hoards most of the hundreds of acorns the trees shed each year, but escapees do germinate and take up residence in the periwinkle. One of Chris’ annual gardening tasks is to weed out the baby oak trees. This is no small task as even an 8” tall plant can have a tap root equal to its height, requiring considerable digging with a trowel to remove and minimize disturbing the surrounding plants. Given the number of baby trees this summer, she decided to use a chemical brush killer to hasten the process. Enlisting Jay’s help, she waded through the periwinkle cutting off the tops of the Oaks then, with an eye-dropper, Jay would apply a few drops of the herbicide to the freshly cut “trunk”, thus minimizing the broadcasting of toxic chemicals over a large area. Aside from the occasional weeding foray, the periwinkle is undisturbed by foot traffic. Unbeknownst to Chris and Jay, bees had constructed two ground hives. Do you have any idea how territorial bees can be when one unwittingly disturbs their abode? Multiple bee stings later, we located their hives and thereafter gave them a wide berth. Some baby oaks survived to live another year.

FLOOR FOLLY

Due to a mold infestation years ago, we removed the old carpeting in the basement leaving it bare concrete. Before renting the house, we felt compelled to put some type of covering on it but most remedies seemed too expensive or too labor intensive. Paint seemed to be the most practical solution. However, unlike walls, you don’t just prime, then paint. Concrete requires etching. It’s like using sandpaper on bare wood. Muriatic acid is the etcher of choice but the fumes are capable of asphyxiation and since there was only a stairwell to provide air circulation we sought another solution. Home Despot, (sorry, Depot), to the rescue; or so we thought. We gleefully found a concrete cleaner/etcher, that we were told, did not have the deadly fumes of Muriatic acid.

We decided to do only 2/3 of the total floor area to begin as we needed to access other areas of the basement. Taking the standard precautions of covering all skin surfaces with rubber boots, long pants, long-sleeved shirts, goggles, gloves, respirators and plastic poncho (for Chris) we set to work mixing the solution, and scrubbing the floor with a stiff-bristled brush as directed. After the allotted etching time, we began to rinse off the chemical. We rinsed and we rinsed and we rinsed and rinsed again. At first we just brought the hose downstairs to dilute the mixture and suck it all up with the wet vacuum. But, each time we thought we had disposed of the chemical, more bubbles would appear in the damp concrete. That’s right, bubbles. Remember the product was a “cleaner”/etcher. Like Tim the Tool Man, we decided we needed “More power!!!”. So, down came the power washer. Two hours later, we gave up. What bubbles remained embedded in the floor would remain with the house forever. Needless to say we resorted to the Muriatic Acid for the remainder of the project which was finished in less than 1/3 of the time. Sometimes the old ways are still the best ways.

Chris, almost completely covered in protective garb with scrub brush and vacuum in hand.

Clear plastic was taped around the baseboard and up the walls to protect them from chemical and water spray.