Those of you (well, BOTH of you : ) who were reading this blog three years ago might remember that we bought a trailer from a neighbor, with intentions of using it to haul all of our camping gear up into the mountains with us.


                                    
          
As it turned out, that didn't work so well, because we couldn't get clear title to the trailer - there wasn't a title, and there was no record of it actually being PURCHASED...

But we still used it, on and off, and kept doing that until Floyd borrowed it to move to his last house, after which the trailer was "kaput", and since then it's been in the side yard, full of rocks and completely unusable - in fact, it couldn't even be driven around anymore.

The problem with a broken trailer is that you can't use it, and you can't even take it to the dump, because you can't drive it anywhere. So it's just been sitting there while I've been thinking of alternative ways of getting it to the dump; the best that I could come up with was borrowing a neighbor's even bigger trailer, and putting my trailer inside of his.

Then I realized that I could take my trailer apart - that it could be broken down into two half trailers, because it had a hinge right above the axle. I though - hey, I can break this down, and then put it into my neighbor's TRUCK and take it to the dump.
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So I took the toolbox out to the side yard, and started to break the trailer down into two halves...and then realized that there was no reason that I couldn't just keep going, and break the trailer down into its constituent parts...and I further realized that, if I did this, then I could put the trailer into my own trash can, A LITTLE AT A TIME, just like the Count of Monte Cristo smuggled the dirt from his tunnel-digging out of his prison cell by putting it into his slop bucket.

And, if I did this, then I could avoid a trip to the dump; furthermore, I could avoid paying the dump company (who also happens to be the garbage company) EXTRA money for allowing me the privilege of driving to the dump and tossing the trailer; the garbage company would simply be taking the trailer away, piece by piece, and I've already paid for that.

So now the trailer is in little bitty pieces:

                           

...and we're putting a few pieces into our trash dumpster, every Monday and Thursday, and letting the garbage man do my dumping for me.

Now, I did a little math, and I realized that, given my labor rates at my gob,  the time that I took breaking this trailer down would be worth a lot more than the cost of going to the dump; however, it was actually FUN taking the trailer apart. I really got in touch with my inner nine-year-old; I had wrenches, and I had spare time, so I completely decomposed something: )

And some of these parts I will keep - the plywood and 1/4s will be useful at some point, I'm sure. And the wheels - there's GOT to be a good use for those wheels. And the hardware - I won't run out of 9/16ths bolts anytime before the Second Coming.

Meanwhile, every time I take out the garbage, I toss in a little bit of the pile - I reckon this is the real meaning of the term "trailer trash" :)