Working together...

You may already know this: before we retired, Joan and I worked together for over 30 years.  We built a business... oh, it was my name on the front of the building (Stephanie and I have a running joke about that - "Whose name is on the front of the building?  Oh, it's MINE?  Then, I guess you will do it my way... blah, blah, blah..."), but we worked together as a team - Joan doing the scheduling and running the office, me in the camera room.  We worked together on production.  When we made the change to digital, we both retouched, worked up orders, and printed.  Joan did almost all of the proofing, I worked up and printed wall prints.  A team.

Since we retired, we have done some "fun summer jobs."  Joan likes these.  Truth be told, if I was dead set against them, we wouldn't be doing them.  We look out for each other.  We go into every new situation with the understanding that if either of us isn't happy, it's time to move on.

When we're cruising on our boat, I'm usually the helmsman, she is the navigator.  I plan the routing, she makes sure we're following the plan.  She looks for things in the cruising guides, we decide together what to do and where to go.  it works that same way when we're RVing.  But, always as a team.  And when it's time to clean things up, I usually do the outside work, she does the inside.

A team.

We pulled the HitchHiker out of storage on Monday, but couldn't start cleaning her up until today, due to water restrictions.  And, this is as grubby as I've seen the Love Shack after some time in storage.  Joan said, "As dirty as that is, I'll help you with the outside."

Sounds good.  We're a team.

I have "a system" when I'm going to clean and wax the RV or the boat.  With almost 3 decades at this, I'm pretty comfortable with my routine.  I start at the highest point of the vehicle/vessel, and do whatever cleaning is necessary, working my way down.  I clean things a section at a time, kinda like "eating an elephant: one bite at a time."  I wet a section down, get my bucket with soapy water, scrub that section, then rinse the section; I can see right away if I've missed anything, and I can get that taken care of.  When the entire vehicle/vessel is clean (that may take a whole day), I start working on the "stubborn areas"... on the boat, that may be tannin stains along the waterline.  Recently, the HitchHiker has developed dark streaks along the front and rear caps... not just dirt or grub, these streaks seem to be stained right into the gelcoat.  That means going after it with more than just soap and water... some hull cleaner with muriatic acid is my plan.  I tried some "black streak remover" made for RVs - the stains laughed at it.

My goal: Get the roof of the 5th wheel cleaned with soap and water, then go after it with a rubber roof conditioner.  If you get any of the conditioner on the sides of the RV (and you always do - water runs downhill), you are supposed to clean that right away.  So, cleaning the whole RV is part of the day's goal.  Then, go after those streaks, and flush that area with a lot of fresh water.  Yep, if I could get that much done today, I would be a happy boy.  Tired, but happy.

We have "our team," and I had a plan: let me get the roof done, then we'll work together on the end caps and the sides.  Oh, but I need some help getting the cleaning stuff up on the roof.  That started out as planned... but, Joan is not content to watch work being done at a high level (as in: on top of the coach).  She asked, "Do we have another hose?"

"If you'll let me get to the conditioning part of the roof, you can have the hose."  Really, I would have been better off running to Wal-Mart to get another hose.  By the time I was done with the roof - in the sun and the heat - I was tired and sore.  I suggested: "I'll scrub the sides of the coach with the soapy water, you rinse."

Let me digress: when we were teenagers, we could have fun going to the car wash.  But, I usually cleaned the outside while she worked on the inside.  A team.  Working together.  But, not at the same task.

In the first 5 minutes of working together on the outside of the coach, I was soaking wet... it seems that any place I stood turned out to be downwind from where Joan stood with the hose.  "Could you get more of the water on the side of the RV, and less on me?"  From my soaking wet perspective, that seemed like a reasonable request.  She decided to work on the area under the 5th wheel portion of the coach... while I was still working on the front cap.  Seems that she was downwind from where I was working with the hose.

She got a little wet.  We were both wearing long sleeve white shirts to keep us from getting sunburned.  Only one of us looks good in a wet white shirt, and I am here to tell you that it was the wrong one on this task.  It would have been funny... if the humidity wasn't 187% to go with the temperatures that were approaching 90º.  Nothing about the wet felt good.  My system of clean a little, rinse, keep moving pretty much fell apart.  Working together, we were able to complete the task in only a little less than twice as long as it would have taken solo.  I could have mentioned this fact, but there was a definite concern about having a soapy scrub brush shoved in the only area where that damn sun wasn't shining.

With the entire coach washed down, my entire body and all my clothes washed down, and every bone in my body, including my hair, hurting... well, I was about done.  What about "my goal"??  Seriously, you and the horse you rode in on can kiss my goal... or, something like that.  Alright, dammit, I'll work on the streaks.

Back up to the roof so I could start using the hull cleaner from the very top of the front cap (about 13' high).  We're a freakin' team: I'll use this stuff that will eat the skin off my fingers while you wet me down again with the hose!  Well, that wasn't exactly the plan, but rubber gloves helped with the hand skin.  With the top of the front cap streak free, I climbed off the roof and went up the ladder positioned by the front of the coach.  More hull cleaner, more rinsing... trying hard to keep the run-off water off anything important.  Since I couldn't get any wetter, I decided to handle my own hose... oh, get your mind out of the gutter!  Decades of cleaning RVs and boats, and I have never gotten this wet... not even when I have been IN the damn water while scrubbing the bottom.

The streaks were stubborn.  A second application of the acid based stuff took off 95% of the streaks.  Joan said, "You don't want to wax that until those streaks are completely gone."  Yep.  A team.  I'm standing on a ladder, soaked to the skin, scrubbing with a vile substance, I've scrubbed so hard I no longer have fingerprints, and she is telling me it ain't working.  'Cause that's what a team does.  Wisely, she went to work on the back cap while I was dripping in the front.

With the last bit of strength I had, I carried the ladder to the rear of the RV to work on those streaks.  More acid, more flushing, more climbing up and down the ladder, with my wet shorts trying to work their way off my hips... I understand why they don't want to stay up: it's my ass.  I have no ass, because I have been working my ass off trying to get this stupid RV clean.  Seriously, I am thinking we could sell this "as is," and buy something that is already clean.  A team would understand that this is an acceptable way of dealing with being this wet, tired and sore.

A mere 30 minutes later (and I'm pretty sure I said, "I have another 5 minutes in me, and then I'm done," at the start of that 30 minutes), I stepped back to look at the Love Shack... "Damn, she looks good!"

Nice teamwork!

The front and rear caps look like a matte finish because the hull cleaner took off any bit of shine, but a couple coats of wax and some buffing, and it will be looking pretty again.  Tomorrow.  Maybe.

A soak in the jacuzzi tub and a fistful of ibuprofen helped.  Sometimes, I guess, wet is a good thing.

Tomorrow, I start waxing.  If I am able to get out of bed.  Joan asked, "Are you going to need help with the wax?"... because we are a team.

"No, Dear, I can do that on my own."

"Good."

'Cause, we are, you know, a team.  ;)

Oh, crap... it looks like rain!