"Like its politicians and its wars, society has the teenagers it deserves." - J.B. Priestley

Well, this isn't good:
I finished the trailer this afternoon. Hooked it up to the car and pulled it out to the driveway for pics and propped the hatch lid up, and five seconds later the hatch CAME OFF!! The slight breeze was just enough to separate the hing.
This is a special waterproof aluminum hinge that doesn't have a pin like most hinges. Instead, the two pieces have a curl where they meet so that one interlocks with the other. At first I thought the hinge had broken but quickly realized the two sections had separated; the interlocking came undone.
I *think* the problem is at the other end. I got this hinge from the place where I bought the plans and a few other specialized aluminum molding pieces. I noticed that the hinge didn't seem to match the instructions. For example, one wing of the hinge is wider than the other. Should that go up or down? No comment in the otherwise extremely thorough directions. Odd.
I've got a call into the business, but there's a story there that I'll recount sometime soon. For now, I suspect that the man who wrote the plans, and who died about a year ago, used a different hinge than the one I was sent, thus the difference between the part and the directions.
There's no point putting this hinge back together. There's some kind of design issue. But I found a site that sells stainless steel piano hinges designed for marine use that I think I can adapt for this purpose. It won't go under the skin like the current one but I think I can come up with a way to make it 99.9% waterproof.
That will have to wait until business hours Monday so I can call this firm and ask some questions.
Accordingly, the plan for writing a post with pics of the completed trailer will have to wait.

Well, this isn't good (cont'd):
I needed shorter stainless steel screws for part of the assembly process than I could find at Home Depot or Lowe's. So Wednesday I put in what they had and used cut-off disks in my Dremel to cut the ends off flush. That threw off what can best be described as a cloud of stainless steel dust, some of which got into my left eye.
The pain persisted, so this morning I went to the dr. who does my annual eye exams.
I now know more about my cornea than I want to.
It's scratched. He said it's not unlike scraping your elbow on the pavement. Only your skin heals by scabbing over and then regenerating bottom out. Your cornea regenerates from the outside in as the (I can't remember what it's called) covers over the scratch and then fills it in. My scratches are deep enough that what normally takes 24-48 hours is going to take longer.
In the meantime there's the risk of that scratch getting infected. So I have an Rx antibiotic ointment that I put on my lower eyelid that goes into those scratches as I blink.
It's pretty uncomfortable (the scratches, not the ointment, which actually lubricates and helps the irritation). He said if it's not better by Tuesday I'm to come back in.
He will take this little tool and (hang on!) grind down the edges of the scratches, smoothing them out so they can fill in more easily. WHAT???
If there's a God in heaven I will be pain free by Tuesday. If I'm not, I might be anyway. I cannot imagine how I sit in a chair while some guy comes at me with what he said is the same drill bit dentists use. It will take two rolls of duct tape to hold me in that chair.

Peyton Manning will be in Phoenix tomorrow, meeting with the Cards. We're apparently on his short list of three teams. Miami and Denver are the other two. We haven't had a good QB since Warner retired. I don't know if Manning would work but the current lineup isn't.

Today is Steve's birthday and Sunday is Josh's. So I've been thinking about back in the day, when they were boys at home.
I think my golden years were the stretch when they were about 4 until 13 or so. I don't think I showed it as much as I felt it, but I really enjoyed dad-dom. It's a little like employment; it's not supposed to be fun (parents who think it is usually turn out dysfunctional narcissists) but if you're lucky there are times when it is. And it was.
I enjoyed working with them on school work. I remember getting down on the floor with Steve, spreading out pennies, dimes and dollars to learn the ones, tens and 100's columns in numbers.
I enjoyed our summer camping trips, pitching our tents and heading off for the Oregon beach, or free factory tours (they don't allow that anymore!) or going through historical homes in the nearest coastal town.
I enjoyed the silly things we did. OK, I did. We'd go to the grocery store and wait while Pam went in to pick up some things. But once she was in the store I'd move the car to a new spot, one that allowed us to watch her when she came out and couldn't find us. I fixed up a pants leg with a tennis shoe at the end that hung out of the closed trunk lid of our HUGE '59 Olds. We enjoyed watching reactions.
They rag on me now for some of that stuff. Like going to the Ballard locks every time we were in Seattle at the turn-around point for those summer camping trips. But guess what they do now when they're in Seattle!

OK, I'm going to go stuff ointment in my eye. I am going to do everything right between now and Tuesday.