December 27, 2004

December 27, 2004: waterproof.

It's been raining steadily since I woke up at 2:00. That makes today a perfect day to try out the new boot-waterproofing goo I bought yesterday, so about half an hour ago I sat down and started dabbing and spreading. I put two coats on each boot and then headed to the sink to wash the stuff off of my hands, which was when I discovered what an amazingly effective product I'd found.


  • It waterproofed my boots.
  • It waterproofed the sponge I was using to spread it (a waterproof sponge ranks among the 16 most hilarious things in my personal universe).
  • It waterproofed my left hand.
  • When I started rubbing soap and hot water around to wash, it waterproofed my right hand too.
  • It waterproofed the towel I used to dry my hands after giving up on getting unwaterproofed.

So. All of this was accomplished with maybe 1/5 of an ounce of REI brand Ultra-Seal Silicone Waterproofing Treatment. My purchase yesterday was 2 jars of the stuff at 4 ounces each, for a total of about 40 times what I just used. The question now is, what will I do with the rest?


  • Waterproof the cats.
  • Waterproof the porch rocker.
  • Waterproof the outside of my house.
  • Waterproof my books so I can read them in the shower.
  • Waterproof myself and go play in the rain.

Posted by dianna at December 27, 2004 04:03 PM
Comments

Because I forgot to waterproof last night, I had to wear my leaky old shoes instead of the new ones. My day has been a squishy one. But to make up for it, when I get home I'm going to use all 8 ounces of waterproofer on my new shoes. I'm hoping it will form a thick, clear coating. Sort of like shellac for footwear.

Posted by: Jacob at December 27, 2004 04:22 PM

Ah, excellent. You didn't need to bend your feet anyway. You'd just better get home before I use up all of the waterproofer on Bella, though.

Posted by: Dianna at December 27, 2004 04:55 PM

Or you could just return the rest since REI will take ANYTHING back.

Posted by: Chris at December 28, 2004 09:59 PM

I need to waterproof my pants and my boots and possibly my hat. Should I assume that you are happy with the effectiveness of this product?

Posted by: Erik at December 29, 2004 08:06 AM

Don't waterproof your cat! The spray bottle is the only thing holding back the feline revolution!

Posted by: Andrew at December 29, 2004 11:18 AM

Andrew: I think you mean catS. We have two of them now, remember? I've really given up on holding back the feline revolution anyway. My head will get walked on when I'm trying to go to sleep; this is inevitable given my inherent inferiority when compared to any given cat. I must accept it.

Chris: I think I will return the rest of the waterproofing goo. Since it's not raining here anymore, waterproofing random items is neither as funny nor as useful as it was on Monday... unless you need to be waterproofed?

Erik: Er... pants? The infamous basically-white khaki pants? You'll want to do extensive testing to see how the stuff soaks into fabric and whether it stays gooey, but, well, if it works I might be in the market for some waterproof pants myself. At the very least I can enthusiastically recommend it for the boots.

Posted by: Dianna at December 29, 2004 12:22 PM

ACtually, if you could go out to Bishop and waterproof a few of the boulders (I'm particularly interested in the Happy boulder and the Atari boulder), I might be able to head back and salvage my vacation.

Posted by: Chris at December 29, 2004 01:49 PM

I fail to understand why my pants are infamous, but no...not those.

Posted by: Erik at December 29, 2004 02:15 PM

I can't believe I committed the classic Internet sin of capitalizing the first TWO letters of a word.

/me bows head in shame.

Posted by: Chris at December 29, 2004 05:19 PM

since the storm is back (at least down here), i'm thinking: spread a lot of chicken wire between the tops of the telephone/streetlight poles on your way to bart; coat with waterproofing gunk; waterproof town! i'm tempted to try it on campus - waterproof the tree canopy that currently merely provides a really nice deluge filtration system.

Posted by: katie at December 30, 2004 04:46 PM
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