It doesn't matter if you've spent decades in the industry, nor how good you are or how hard you try, you'll never be able to sidestep some of the bizarre and utterly random snafus that will befall you. In fact, you'll never even see most of them coming.

I was reminded of this a while back when I had a supervisor out on the road overseeing the setup of one of my client's displays. I had traveled with this supervisor, named Martin, and the exhibit on many occasions to ensure its installation went off without a hitch. So I had no problem handing over the reins to him.

The client was exhibiting at a pharmaceutical show with a 40-by-40-foot display that featured three huge, white banners hung from the ceiling in the shape of a triangle, and several seating areas with white furniture. All the white surfaces created a stylish simplicity that was very attractive, especially at a pharmaceutical show where white is often the color of choice. The banners, which were each 25 feet long and 6 feet deep, were emblazoned with the name of one of the drugs made by the company and were hung at a 45-degree angle to the floor so the wording was easy to see. From their position 20 feet above the booth, the banners created a bright, bold message that could be viewed from halfway across the show hall.

But on the second day of setup when the fabric banners were hung, Martin called with a vexing issue. Not long after the banners went up, he started noticing purple splotches marring the white fabric. The carpet had some too, though it was thankfully mostly covered with Visqueen at the time.

Scanning skyward, Martin spotted a bird in the rafters, and it didn't take long for him to realize that the purple splotches were bird droppings from a creature with a curious diet. Our banners, it seemed, had created the perfect target, and their slanted orientation gave the little fella a huge target to zero in on.

I know that birds often end up in the halls thanks to the prolonged opening of gigantic loading-dock doors. I've abstractly wondered at times how show management gets them out, because I've never noticed any once the show actually opens.

Considering it an unlucky fluke, we decided that Martin needed to go to show services for help dealing with the mess. Workers there were apologetic and happy to oblige with the use of a cherry picker to get up to the banners and spot clean them.

The next morning, however, a new batch of purple splotches was sprinkled across our booth, and the situation went from mildly comical to not funny at all. Martin scanned the rafters overhead again, still only ever seeing one bird. But this looked more like the work of a flock with an appetite for berries and a grudge against us, so we needed a solution fast.

Martin cleaned up any droppings within reach and notified the show services desk personnel that they might as well park the cherry picker at our booth. Then he headed for The Home Depot to pick up Magic Erasers and enough tarps to cover our white chairs and sofas, which were crafted with a microfiber that was unlikely to survive additional bird attacks.

It was the last day of installation, and we pondered how we were going to get through a three-day show if this continued. We also speculated where the flock was that had to be doing this, and wondered why we seemed to be the only ones under fire. Martin took a survey of surrounding exhibitors and found that, indeed, we were the only ones having bird poop problems. Though there was some duct work and other ceiling components partially obscuring his view, Martin said there didn't appear to be anything particularly special about the rafters above our exhibit. So it seemed we were just lucky, then, that the hangout spot for the feathered intruders happened to be right above our stark-white space.

The staff for the general contractor was exemplary in trying to help us, meeting Martin the following morning before the show doors opened to once again scrub the banners. The tarps had worked perfectly to protect the furniture, and the Visqueen, which had not yet been removed from the floor, kept the beautiful carpet unmarred beneath it.

Unfortunately, the plastic sheeting atop the carpet had to come up once the show started, leaving that entire surface vulnerable to the onslaught. On the bright side, however, the color was a muted taupe, which did a good job of disguising any new stains. Even so, Martin had to spend far more time cleaning up animal excrement than he probably ever imagined he would be doing in his glamorous life in the exhibit world.

Each morning of the show, it was the same story – Martin and the show services staff would scrub the booth from top to bottom, and Martin would peer skyward wondering why we were the chosen ones, and why venue management hadn't brought in sharpshooters. Just kidding – snipers with scopes might have been a bit extreme, though probably not if you'd asked Martin by the show's third day.

Thankfully, the general contractor never charged us for any of that work using the lift, though I imagine it had a conversation with venue management about the show hall's bird issue. As for Martin and I, we knew there was nothing we could have done to avoid the situation except maybe bring a falcon to hunt small birds. Well, either that or hire a rowdy kid with a pocket slingshot. The reality is that there are times in this industry that you have no control, when you just need to make sure you have a good sense of humor – and sometimes a good stain stick – to get you through the day.