Why do I always seem to end up in this aluminum, hot-box in the hottest months of the year paneling my horse trailer?  Maturity and experience-in-planning, I guess.

The perks are that the heat and humidity make the cedar smell really nice.  It easily over-rides the excessive equine & goat urine smell that usually permeates everything inside the trailer.

Maybe with enough research I can find some sinus or aromatherapy perks to sunbaked-enhanced-livestock-pee-pee smell……………….I can easily verify the iron-clad fact that it does immediately & thoroughly clear the sinuses……………….usually by excessive leakage and crying through burning tear-ducts and forced open-mouth-breathing with accompanying/occassonal dry-heaves……………….I know the horse/goat-heady odor is from previously saturated, rubber stall mats that are on the floors and line the walls.  I’ve GOT to figure out how to deodorize them………………more necessary research is needed…………………I’m confident it will come down to something with baking soda, vinegar, or Clorox……………………and blow torches…………….or maybe Breakstone sour cream?………………

Humidity always brings out odors.  We can wring the water out of the air right now with our bare hands.  The drier winter months will smell better.  EVERYTHING is damp now even without it raining.  But my Aunt up in Ohio said it is the same up there too.  I need to constantly drag around a battery-operated, sump-pump……………………..Sedona is looking pretty good to me right about now.

But back to the trailer up-grade…………………it’s been progressing for years.  The cedar panels are really pretty though.  I’ve got them up on the ceiling as well as on the walls.  I put the ones with the prettiest wood-grain right above where my head will be when I am sleeping up in the nose-part of the gooseneck………………which happens to be the size of a queen-sized mattress……………….and (by the way) all of the paneled areas are NOT accessible to non-potty-trained, hooved friends.

Last summer I was doing the paneling solo.  I found that appropriately tall 2″ x 4″ boards worked really well as the necessary “extra” sets of hands I needed to keep things in place before I screwed the panels up permanently into the aluminum ribs.  PLUS I found a really good use for all of those extra, spare socks that inevitably show up in the laundry.

I used them over the tops of the 2″ x 4″s—so that the boards wouldn’t scratch the cedar wood……………….aren’t I such a thrifty home-maker/handyman/carpenter?  I do constantly drill-in-fear though because I’m panicked that I’ll drill holes in the aluminum exterior and leave permanent skylights &/or kazoo-blow-holes in the sides.  Just add a couple of oboe-reeds and I could have my horse trailer play a tune while we drive down the road…………………!

I want to add a retractable awning on the side of the trailer.  Ooh! Maybe I can get a pink & green-striped one, a la Miami-Cubano-esque-limited-palette?!

That way “we” (Simone, Esther & myself) can have cocktail-hour(s) out of the sun while reclining in our chaise longues (which would have to be the same Miami-Cubano color-scheme along with being embroidered with our individual names like director’s chairs)………………………….I’m also going to get a power-inverter to use with my truck’s batteries so that I can run kitchen appliances (like blenders & ice crushers)——————-got my drift yet?…………………….there’s a pattern developing here.

There’s also this doo-dah that I can have put up on the top of the trailer that is officially used as a place to strap down extra hay bales………………..BUT…………………(along with the ladder down the side of the trailer that comes with it)………………..wouldn’t it be a fun-little viewing platform as an added, cocktail-consumption-location?…………………….well I think so.

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Here’s a little aside story AND it’s true!———another equine-friend of mine—–(we will call her Ingeborg)—–DID use her trailer’s top-side/hay-storage accessory for (of all things) hay-storage………………….and then she pulled her rig onto the Interstate and motored on down the road……………………….when she arrived at her destination………………………..all of her hay bales were missing……………….I kid you not…………………….they had all disappeared—–every single one of them………………………?

Where DID they go?!!!

Probably some very tall/hungry/feral & fast Mustangs.

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I am working on a pulley-system with an attached tray.  It could be used to bring up our glasses and cucumber sandwiches and sunblock, so that we can have both hands free to climb up the ladder with safety & deftness.

……………………….I really haven’t worked out yet how we are getting back down safely (and without a modicum of wobbling………………….post-Cosmopolitans and Chicken Wine that is)…………………………maybe something to do with zip-lines, safety-harnesses and our riding helmets…………………….

Oh wait……………………..guess what I just discovered with a little bit of on-line searching……………………..there IS an apparatus out there that IS motorized and it’s primary use is to lift hay bales up the side of the trailer for storage on the top of the hay-storage-thingie…………………..but why couldn’t it also be used to deposit Esther, Simone and myself back onto terra firma after cocktail hour?

See why I am campaigning for the Fourth Field with our Hunt Club?

Forget riding………………………………………we could just leave the horses at home, drive to our local Winn-Dixie grocery store parking lot and park and watch the shoppers go in and out while we nibble on hors d’oeuvres and sip champagne out of our fluted, blue-stemmed DollarTree glasses.

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++++++++++In the past my husband introduced me to a wonderful British series called “Ab Fab” (a must see)………………………I’m not sure who I identify with more———“Edina” or “Patsy”…………………or a combination thereof++++++++++