Lovely weather for fish

I am not one to complain too much here, but I have to vent about two things, both of which are beyond my control...one of them is computer problems and the other is weather.

Our computer crashed a while ago, and we are doing our best to get back our email contacts list. I had saved so many important documents regarding orders and so on in that file, that I am super-ticked that I have to go and find phone numbers and do so much stuff in a round about way. Just one more reason to get an external hard drive so that doesn't ever happen again. Believe me, it is a major pain.

And oh yes, the weather. For late summer it hasn't been too bad around here, except for unexpected deluges and wind surges that blow your borrowed craft tent to the ground at a sales event. Picture the scenario: It is early morning with typical rodeo background music...roosters, goats, horses, all creating a very 'country' mood for what looks like a pleasant start to a fun weekend. The tent is in a prime accessible location with the rodeo activities just a hundred yards behind. There are gentle ponies giving rides to little children and Molly (our bichon) is taking in all this with great interest. After two hours of set up we finally have all the items displayed on our three tables and have hung the hanging fish, roosters, boots, and all the other bell pulls strategically from the tent frame. On one table, I have placed about fifteen handmade books, many that I especially crafted for this event. The people are very interested in all the creations, and I have set up a little "observation" area, where people can see me demonstrate how I do some of the work.

It is lunch time and friend husband goes to the concession to get some nourishment. Within five minutes, a squall blows down all my T-posts (with neckwear) and all the books are getting pelted with rain. I quickly cover them with large plastic sheets (JUST INCASE!!) and wait out the downpour. The table cloth is soaked, so we move that table inside and do damage control on the cloth. When hubby gets back, we savour our lunch, look at the sky and decide that the major weather has passed.

The sun is shining, I watched one rodeo event and I've chatted with customers who were very interested in the construciton of my items, and all is well. Unfortunately, some of the rain that fell about two hours earlier has collected in the "canopy" of the tent, unbeknownst to us. We thought we had removed it all. Another storm appears to be brewing, so we begin covering the items again, but alas, we are too late. A sudden gust of wind sends all the accumulated water from the tent top onto my table where the books are, and they are soaked. I am in tears. The wind is really blowing and it begins to rain really hard, the tent pegs are coming loose and the tent is collapsing all around.

We frantically gather our stuff and throw it into the car. We disassemble the tent. We are soaked to the bone. And cold. And miserable.

We decided to call it quits, as the forecast was for more of the same weather for the rest of the weekend. Fortunately, we sold enough items to cover the cost of the weekend's booth fees etc., but lost out on the opportunity to enjoy the rest of the rodeo. And yes, several of the books pages were warped beyond repair when the tent roof water dumped on them. I will be able to salvage the covers and re-bind them, but all the time it takes to make them cannot be regained. It is a good thing that polymer clay is not affected by water, so the other items like jewellery, buttons and wall hangings came out unscathed.

I have accepted all this and gotten over it. What I can't get over is the man who was walking by and laughing at our misfortune. Some people, huh?