First Friday in Coshocton finally rolled around, and it turned out to be the most... exciting First Friday I've ever attended. After an excruciatingly boring day at work, I managed to leave a little early. It had been threatening of rain all day, but so far, nothing had happened, and I was hoping that it would just remain cloudy. Half-an-hour later, I made it to Coshocton, located the gallery I was planning to set up shop in front of, and began unloading. Normally, I set up in the court square, which is where all the action is. A couple other ladies were setting up there too, and because of the threat of rain, they let me set up with them under a canopy someone had loaned them. For about an hour, I sat there, doodling and makes notes of my observations of the typical Coshoctonian (not even going to get into that). I happened to look behind me and was a bit surprised to see thick, black nimbostratus clouds on the horizon. I ignored them at first, but upon checking again about 15 minutes later, I noticed they had gotten much closer. The owner of the gallery (The Blue Bean), suggested we bring our stuff inside. The others did just that, but I waited a few more minutes. When it started to sprinkle, I figured I'd better do the same. I had gotten most of my stuff in (all the important stuff), and I was just turning around to go back out, only to see that a massive sweep of wind had literally smashed into everything, flinging the canopy over and blowing everything I still had outside off the table. A heavy downpour of rain accompanied this, and I flew back outside, grabbing my stuff and doing a combination of tossing stuff in my car and hauling stuff inside. Only one person, a total stranger, bothered to help me, and by the time I had gotten everything, I was drenched. The metal-framed canopy was destroyed, as were all our plans. Fortunately, I managed to save most of my stuff, only losing my business cards and some paper bags. We stayed inside the gallery, and I was surprised to find that the owner had hired an opera singer to perform. I was cold, wet, and extremely hungry since I had hardly eaten anything that day, but I stayed and listened to her performance (she was very good, by the way), snacking on hors d'oeuvres and wine.