Homestead in the Hills of NC....................

                       I wake up Sunday Morning and shuffle out into the kitchen where I make some coffee and grab a cup. Once the pot stops dripping I pour a cup of joe and head out into the living room, where I recieved my daily orders of what has to be done. Before I even finished the first cup sandpaper was jammed into my hands and off to the shop I marched. David was out in the yard setting up tables for me to sand on as Jo will be in the shop spraying airbrush real flames on a sport bike. My job is to sand down the guide coat and not leave any sandpaper marks. This will be a wet sanding job and was taught how to use all the pieces of equipment. I sat and sanded all morining and well into the afternoon when Jo told me to go get something to eat. We all went into gether and had BBQ from yesterday. I can tell ya right now my arms are tired. Jo meanwhile was laying out the pattern of how the owner wanted the flames to go. He was very specific of what was and where the placement of the flames should be.
                        Lunch was finished and cleaned up so I strolled out to the yard to start sanding the second half of the parts that were in my pile. Jo had David respraying them with guide coat so I'm guessing at this point that my sanding wasn't up to par. Ok, so what did I do wrong and where did it go wrong? David gave me a quick lesson of how to tell when your sanding too hard and leaving scratches behind. "Don't worry its all fixable". Now when your working with the parts like this ya gotta clean your hands and get off all dirt and grease or you will contaminate the final paint and within a few months it will all buble and/or peel. I of course didn't want this to happen. So Upon request I went into the house and washed and scrubbed with Dawn once more. I put my I pod buds in with a paper towel and pushed play. I wanted to jam along and have a good time while I was busting my ass. Jo mean while took the metal she had been working on in to the paint booth. There she will spray a couple of coats of clear and tacty cloth them, then when dry we will be sanding them so they can be buffed and resprayed with clear.
                 The bright sunshine disappeared quickly and soon the sky was filled with heavy grey clouds shooting out lighting and thunder, so everything was brought into the shop. Once set up inside I resumed sanding and sanding and still more sanding. The rain continued well into the evening hours and when it lightened up Jo proclaimed we should all hit the time clock. I came in went right to bed. Dam I was tired. The area was hit with a huge amount of rain and that thick red mud of the mountains covered just about everything and even had a little mud slide at the garage area. The mud was slick and sticky, and I tried to set everything out slipping and sliding the whole way. It would be another day of sanding for me. Part stands were brought out side because Jo wanted natural light to spray blue pearl on a bike she was working on. She believes natural sunshine is the best way to match the colors the owner picked. While she was spraying those parts blue I took the shop dog out for a walk. He is a big scary German Shepard but will I had something he wanted so he tolerated me taking out side his borders. He and I walked to the old fish camp and around the creek over the bridge and back. By then the grey clouds rolled in and the fresh painted parts were rushed in to the shop to keep them from needing major repair work. It continued to rain the rest of the night. Once again I went in about 9:30 pm and passed right out.
            Monday Morning came and well I got sandpaper shoved in my hand even before the morning fog passed. Back to the shed to sand. The area was expecting rain, mixed cloud cover, some winds, not good weather for painting at all. Jo worked on airbrush designs that day and well I freaking sanded away. Dudes I want to tell you when ya gotta have art on every piece of your ultra, give the folks time to get the job done. It takes for ever to properly sand and entire ultra. So far I've been working on them for three days. David came around to see how it was going and gave me a few tips to make the process faster for me. I was sanding as if the parts were delecated flowers ready to break at any moment. He came some ideas about cross hatching and such that sped up my sanding a great deal. See the idea is that the primer sanded looks like liquid glass it just flows like water. If there is one scratch or imperfection of the sheet metal when Jo goes to paint it will stick out like a sore thumb espically if spraying metalics or pearl which this bike will be getting metalics. Just when I thought my arms would fall off the sanding jobs came to an end, and I was asked to jocky parts around. That way jo could go to the paint booth and start spraying clear on another bike, and bring the ones in the booth out for very light sand and buff. This one was awesome. It was orange not my favorite, but orange with shades of brown and tan dragon like creatures as artwork. When the parts were jocked around it was back to sanding til dark.
             The sun rose on a Tuesday morning and I was all prepared to sand, somewhere deep down I think I was sanding in my sleep or may have had a sanding nightmare. LOL, I had only a few parts left then I would be done the ultra. However CrazyHorse realized that she didn't have enough of the clear coat to spray on a blue pearl she was working on and it was too late to get a delivery so I was sent on a mission to go get something called DX 2011. I got the directions and hopped into David's truck a rolling beater of a Jeep. Directions in hand, reading glass at the end of my nose I headed off to Charolette to Keystone Automotive. Keystone was a big place and I was rather surprised at the hussle and bussle of the place. Once in the office I announced that, "I was sent by the penguin, and I'm on a mission from God." Though I could tell they wanted to laugh the counter man said, "who are you picking up for?" "CrazyHorsePaiting" I said. I had to wait a few moments for them to get the order together meanwhile I was babbling with the other folks waiting for stuff. For some reason a few of the dudes in there all agreed that I needed to take my stand up act on the road. "Really?? It's not anything planed its totally spur of the moment stuff." I said, they both shook their heads and agreed that's the reason. Ok, I've been called a funny girl and "one of them funny girls" if ya get my meaning but never been told to take my show on the road before. I checked the order and paided for the product and jumped into the old jeep and headed out Charlotte. It felt like I was gone for hours, 2 to be exact. When I got back, the skies again grey prevented futher work for matching colors, and the drizzle wasn't helping either so I took the guard dog for a stroll to the old fish camp.
              Another night I crashed as soon as the work was done. Wendays morning came and back to sanding the last of the parts, thank goodness for that. The blue pearl was sprayed, and in a couple of hours the green metalic will be getting sprayed, as half the real flame art work was done. When I finished sanding I cleaned the parts set them up on the spray stands and the colors were applied. When they dried we took them up to the spray booth for clear. Again the afternoon rains came which was fine cause I got to go visit with Jimmy and see what he did with my old sportster. Oh man folks what a great bike builder can do with a sportster is amazing! He's know to build and sell, but this bike he wants to keep and I can tell you why its one bad ass ridged bobber. It rides like a dream too real sharp looking bike. Well, evening set in so it was off to see Chase play baseball. Chase is an interesting charatcter and definatley marched to the beat of his own drum. I was so gratteful to get a break from sanding, my arms were feeling like rubber however I learned even more about custom painting. During all the hours of sanding I asked all kinds of stupid questions about spraying paint and air brushing and of course sanding. Jo reminded me though sanding isn't glamorus its the important part of the job. If done badly the paint will look like crap, but when done well the paint looks great so don't think you didn't do anything important. I had a few drinks with David and his brother then went to bed that night. Tomorrow am I will leave. I've got business to attend to.
                 I packed up and did a load of laundry and was given on job to do that was to take "Zoey" to the vets. Jo was concerned about her vaccines and being pregnat. I didn't think "Zoey" was unless they saw her tye with another dog. I thought it was a false pregancy, and in 30 days we would be able to tell, see at day 45 ya can see spine development and 50 there's skull and spinal development, and by then if there are puppies the doc will be able to feel them. I took "Zoey" in any way. The hardest thing is being a Vet tech in another hospital. They don't know me from adam and tend to have an attitude when ya say anything about being a Vet Tech so usually I won't say a word. The Doc came in really very arrogant man gave me latin babble so I gave it back to him. He just looked at me a little bit and I said, " I'm just the driver today, the owner is worried about her girl here, and I'm a CVT", "oh that explains it" said the Doc. His attitude changed and he then spoke with me like he was speaking to an employee. I really don't care much for Doc's that like to talk over there patients and clients heads, so I got to put him in his place a wee bit. I drove "Zoey" back loaded up the bike, opened the garage and found the red mud just everywhere and it attacked my perfectly clean white walls. Do you know what it takes to clean white walls? Really I had to kind of dig her out to get her going. I said my good byes and left for points south and hopefully drier,
           I would post pictures of the work I did and the different paint jobs here in progress but I was asked not to do so because the owners have the right to see the bike first, and show off their paint ideas to the public first. so below is an example of CrazyHorsePainting's work. have a great one! "T"