June 13th, 2017
My decorating policy continues. I have to have a disaster to be able to redecorate, this has held true for 17 years as of June the first. I paid the insurance premium and as luck would have it, the tank broke on the third floor. It was 27 years old. Friday at 3 pm, as a matter of fact. the insurance, adjuster and broker, two plumbers, and a crew of construction guys, all named Robert, I kid you not, show up within hours. I threw a closet full of towels down to hold back the tide, to no avail, and create more work for myself. I learned within minutes just how to shut off the water tank.
It seems like, but in fact is not. Just PTSD inducing, a long drawn out affair. The insurance company was being accommodating to me and my guests. They insurance are ‘working with me.” Trying to keep money coming inn. Quickly and on each floor there was two or three, machines that were staggeringly deafening. Mats were taped to the floors, and measurement of the water content taken with more fancy machinery. The men, cleared out. I was left with the jet engine noise and an elderly gentleman who told me he “was a trucker” and could sleep thru anything and did. He stayed for two days. We went out to breakfast. Bless him. Thank god,dess we did as he ate the “meat only” meal, and I serve only vegetarian.
I slept, or tired to, with my head in an industrial dehumidifier for two days I had been using ear plugs to no avail. I was losing my sanity ( I know, I know)and hearing. The departure of the guest meant I could move to the country, my cousins to collapse there and sleep. The wet has cleared up, but not the dust. There was a HUGE noisy fan in the basement aimed at the floor in the dining room whipping around 125 year old dust. Did I mention the noise? They have saved the floors which was the point of the excise. There was four floors of water by the way.
Inter spaced, and since then I have had guests, the ones that allergic to say dust, are coughing and blowing thru out the night. Blaming the discomfort on the wind storm we had. In fact I have guests arriving today. (elderly types who in fact do not realize just how far they were coming, or there is a time change at the border, nor the currency exchange.) The last of them until the construction begins in earnest tomorrow.
My days are spent speaking to my insurance broker, then adjuster, plumbers, then construction guys eta tomorrow 12:30. In that order. I am hoping that some of the holes the plumber is putting in will be covered and the same holes the construction guys need and therefore the filling in of the holes paid for by insurance. I am having peace of mind plumbing installed and not covered by insurance. The after lunch start is so I can get the house cleaned up for demolition. They will take pictures of inside the walls will send them to me. The gentlemen of the construction types are still not sure how wet it is in there, occasionally I get a whiff of wet, still, so they will be digging out holes in the walls. That is when they will be taking pictures. They understood and were agreeable, to sending me the inside scoop as it were, as now you have to reveal that there has been damage done to the house when selling by sworn documents’.
We are down to, ” off” white, green or “off” white yellow, ( I seem to be the only one really “OFF” but I digress.) Paint to replace the irreplaceable vinyl wallpaper that is hanging or used to on the walls upstairs. They will only replace some of it, and therefore the debate, do we go and match the wallpaper that is left of complete the ‘fromage frais” look, hardly dry from renos done recently, completed in the living room and dining room? After or during the floors will be touched up in the bedroom, and dining room. As will the ceiling in the latter.
At the same time, I have to chase tree specialist. Why? There is a tree split in the back yard. Not necessarily from the rain storm complete with gale force winds on Friday, not to be mistaken for the wind storm on Sunday, during clean up from both, I noticed, and I stopped cleaning up once I did, after the storm, as it will be covered in saw dust. ( I got off lucky, the neighbors were stranded in their home as tree took out power, internet and cable, a huge tree coming down in the intense but brief storm, blocking the driveway.)
I am so bleary-eyed, allergic myself to dust, the hot weather is affecting Lucy, but we both plug along. (however before the hot weather we were both pretty perky.)
There is a prediction of thunderstorms this morning. BUT hung out today’s laundry just in case.
Went to hear the Governor General of Canada, David Johnson speak last night. He was promoting his book about innovation. He used to be the Rector of McGill University. Here is the serendipity for the day, He gave me my degree, June 12, 1978. (actually it was June 07, but for the sake of the story changed it when I shook his hand to last night’s date.) He remembered the Dean of the school of Social Work and a professor I had. I did not,) It was on that date, June 07 my father, (his birthday is June 13th, and would have been today, 97 years of age.) that was in a fox hole on the beaches of Normandy. Bud Glencross, in the American Army, no relation, jumped in, uninvited, while the strafing was going on, and introduced himself. I have told this story at boot camp, on the correct date, and the instructor, called to Kara Lee and said is that not your family name. We had not met, but somehow maybe related. I am or she will claim that, when I will the lotto tonight.
I will be OFF to the country cousins again, I will have limited access to internet. Do however keep those cards coming. Love to all, Linda and the indisputable Lucy P.