IT IS RAINING WHY IS IT RAINING
Jul. 23rd, 2008 01:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7I finally got the freaking tent down.
I put it up when we got back into town on Saturday, to see how it would hold up to rain. It obligingly began to rain immediately. Hurrah, it holds up well! I sat in it and watched the rain patter, and it didn't leak. Yay! It was great.
It is canvas, so it gets soaked through and must be left to dry before it can be dismantled, I knew that, and also when wet it weighs like a zillion pounds, so I wasn't touching it.
But then it rained Sunday too.
And Monday.
And Tuesday.
It got to the point that I could time it out-- four hours of intermittent sun and clouds, and it will be dry. It gets wet from dew and can't be taken down until the sun has traveled from the peak to the foot of the tent. Etc. Etc.
And it would always rain sometime in the midst of this process. Twice, it rained just after I had gone out and checked and ascertained that another half-hour to an hour of standing would have it dry enough.
I wasn't worried. I have to pack it up to take it on Saturday/Sunday, but I wasn't worried. See, IT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO RAIN TODAY. Or tomorrow. Or tomorrow! I figured, no matter how soaked it got during yesterday's TORRENTIAL DOWNPOUR, it would have plenty of time to dry.
I also planned on doing laundry today. I hang clothes to dry on the line, if it is above freezing and not actively precipitating, because you can save a bazillion dollars' worth of electricity/gas if you line-dry your laundry-- plus it smells nice without the awful petrochemical-based artificial fragrances you get in dryer sheets. No static, and as a bonus it reduces the wear and tear on clothing. Z has black t-shirts from the year we met that are still black, because I took over doing the laundry and don't put t-shirts through the dryer, usually. And things that are meant to be white-- if I know I won't be able to get all the clothes on the line, I'll make sure that I at least get the whites out there, because the sun does a much better job than chemical bleaches.
(Socks and towels I do often put in the dryer-- but I'll do several loads, line-dry everything, and then when the socks or towels come out of the last load, I'll put them all into the dryer at once, for only about ten minutes, then line-dry them the rest of the way. If it's really hot and sunny, especially if it's dry and breezy too, I'll just line-dry them. It's the slow drying that makes them stiff and crunchy.)
But despite my disgruntlement at the weather, I am feeling a bit triumphant-- I spotted the dark clouds to the west, and went out and took down almost all of the laundry (which was dry! Yes!) and took the tent down, and just as I was taking down the last few items, the rain started pattering down.
It's thundering heavily, and the wind smells strongly of rain, but it has paused at just a smattering of raindrops here. We may have escaped the downpour. I don't know. But either way, I have triumphed.
In other news, I wrote up a tutorial on how I do my hair, with the braids sewn to my head. I posted it to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
longhair, but I think the style could work for anyone with hair long enough to braid, so I'm pimping my tutorial here too. It's vaguely Renn-y, but I actually figured out how to do it expressly for putting my hair up to do roller derby, so it's a very helmet-friendly hairstyle, though you'll have to keep in mind that to go under a helmet you're going to have to do smaller braids and spread them as flat against your head as possible. Fewer braids are bulkier. I've done the style with one and with two, and like two best, but if I get bored I may try it with three or four. (If you have shorter hair, do more braids, and then you can tuck the ends under the beginnings of the next braid if they're not long enough to wrap around your head and tuck back under themselves-- I think your hair has to be pretty long to get it all the way around.)
Anyhow: Hair-Taping Tutorial here.
I put it up when we got back into town on Saturday, to see how it would hold up to rain. It obligingly began to rain immediately. Hurrah, it holds up well! I sat in it and watched the rain patter, and it didn't leak. Yay! It was great.
It is canvas, so it gets soaked through and must be left to dry before it can be dismantled, I knew that, and also when wet it weighs like a zillion pounds, so I wasn't touching it.
But then it rained Sunday too.
And Monday.
And Tuesday.
It got to the point that I could time it out-- four hours of intermittent sun and clouds, and it will be dry. It gets wet from dew and can't be taken down until the sun has traveled from the peak to the foot of the tent. Etc. Etc.
And it would always rain sometime in the midst of this process. Twice, it rained just after I had gone out and checked and ascertained that another half-hour to an hour of standing would have it dry enough.
I wasn't worried. I have to pack it up to take it on Saturday/Sunday, but I wasn't worried. See, IT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO RAIN TODAY. Or tomorrow. Or tomorrow! I figured, no matter how soaked it got during yesterday's TORRENTIAL DOWNPOUR, it would have plenty of time to dry.
I also planned on doing laundry today. I hang clothes to dry on the line, if it is above freezing and not actively precipitating, because you can save a bazillion dollars' worth of electricity/gas if you line-dry your laundry-- plus it smells nice without the awful petrochemical-based artificial fragrances you get in dryer sheets. No static, and as a bonus it reduces the wear and tear on clothing. Z has black t-shirts from the year we met that are still black, because I took over doing the laundry and don't put t-shirts through the dryer, usually. And things that are meant to be white-- if I know I won't be able to get all the clothes on the line, I'll make sure that I at least get the whites out there, because the sun does a much better job than chemical bleaches.
(Socks and towels I do often put in the dryer-- but I'll do several loads, line-dry everything, and then when the socks or towels come out of the last load, I'll put them all into the dryer at once, for only about ten minutes, then line-dry them the rest of the way. If it's really hot and sunny, especially if it's dry and breezy too, I'll just line-dry them. It's the slow drying that makes them stiff and crunchy.)
But despite my disgruntlement at the weather, I am feeling a bit triumphant-- I spotted the dark clouds to the west, and went out and took down almost all of the laundry (which was dry! Yes!) and took the tent down, and just as I was taking down the last few items, the rain started pattering down.
It's thundering heavily, and the wind smells strongly of rain, but it has paused at just a smattering of raindrops here. We may have escaped the downpour. I don't know. But either way, I have triumphed.
In other news, I wrote up a tutorial on how I do my hair, with the braids sewn to my head. I posted it to
longhair, but I think the style could work for anyone with hair long enough to braid, so I'm pimping my tutorial here too. It's vaguely Renn-y, but I actually figured out how to do it expressly for putting my hair up to do roller derby, so it's a very helmet-friendly hairstyle, though you'll have to keep in mind that to go under a helmet you're going to have to do smaller braids and spread them as flat against your head as possible. Fewer braids are bulkier. I've done the style with one and with two, and like two best, but if I get bored I may try it with three or four. (If you have shorter hair, do more braids, and then you can tuck the ends under the beginnings of the next braid if they're not long enough to wrap around your head and tuck back under themselves-- I think your hair has to be pretty long to get it all the way around.)Anyhow: Hair-Taping Tutorial here.
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no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 08:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 09:59 pm (UTC)But my super-not-Middle-Ages tent is so small and light that I can hang it over my shower curtain soaking wet and it will dry by morning. Even if I don't hang it up til midnight.