the problem with wood stain.

Everyone at some point during their life will probably use wood stain. And I have yet to find a way to stain wood without pissing someone off. It's the gad'damn fumes that I loathe, and I can't find any way around it.

I'm working on a kinda-secret project. Not a hugely secret project, but a project that I don't want to advertise all over the internets none-the-less, just in case the recipient of said secret project stumbles upon it and figures out it's for them. You get me?

So, that being said, this not-so-secret project begins with wood: Wood that I had to stain. Now unfortunately, our region has been stuck in a sneaky death spiral of being more humid than the Amazon. And then it's really hot, then not so hot. Pretty much the perfect atmosphere for these assholes - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ->

When I go outside, I have to slater myself in DEET just to avoid one bite. If I don't, I get about 20 of them which turn into bright, puffy, itchy welts. So I decided to stain the box in the garage yesterday. But the fumes were bad, and I knew that boyfriend future husband might return from his outing and want to do stuff in the garage. So.. I moved the stained box outside in the backyard to dry. This is where I encountered problem #2: It's too f***ing humid for any shit to dry outside. I left it outside for THREE HOURS and it was still as damp as it was when I stained it. I got three mosquito bites just by going outside to check on it. Fail.

So now I had a bigger problem: Where do I put this mother f***ing box? I can't leave it in the garage and piss off Lou. I can't leave it in the basement, because it will smell up the whole house and piss us both off. So that left me with quarantining my office/art space. I shut the air vent, turned on window fan so it blew outside, and shoved a towel underneath the closed door... It still didn't f***ing work. Which makes me feel like an asshole.

How the hell do you paint or stain anything, ANYTHING when conditions aren't friggin' perfect outside? Well, I found this article which might be able to help me in the future. Here are some thoughts from an article on EHow.com.


1. Open all the windows. (This wouldn't have worked in our Amazonian humidity, and potential threat of mosquito intrusion.)
2. Turn on fans. (I did that. Sorry number two.)
3. Light an odorless candle. (AH HA! That I didn't do... sounds plausible.)
4. Put crushed charcoal in a bucket with wet paper towels. (Ah, charcoal. Didn't think of that, probably because we don't have any charcoal lying around.)
5. Put a bowl of white vinegar in the room. (.. white vinegar? Alrighty. I'll try that. But how do I get the vinegar smell out of the carpet, when I accidentally kick it across the room when I forgot it was there in the first place?)