I was temporarily off-line due to slight storm damage. A branch off a
tree broke off during a relatively minor storm and put a hole in my
roof. The hole was next to my chimney (just missed the flashing), and it
allowed water to drain down the masonry three floors into the basement
where it soaked my main electrical box. The maroons who built the house
extended the chimney down to the basement, which is fine, but it only
left two feet between the garage wall and the base of the chimney, and
they thought THAT space would be perfect to supply the house with all
the wiring, phone, cable, water, and gas. I have cursed working in that
space each time I have had to squeeze in there. Let's just say I am very
happy I installed ground faults after the pole outside my house was hit
by lightning some time back. It saved my electrical circuits and some of
my stuff and probably my ass. It was dark when I went down and I simply
assumed the main circuit breaker had tripped, so I just plunged in and
flicked the switch. I saw the blue flash for hours afterwards. Not
having seen such a light display before, I reached for the little
hand-powered flashlight I leave next to the box, and while pumping
the thing, saw water flowing out of the box, and, interestingly, I was
standing in quite a large puddle. Needless to say, you never saw a
pudgy little short guy sprint outside to turn off the main power so fast
in your life. Oh, my pants were wet from the rain, ok?
It did fry the cable box, which is right under the electrical box, so
I had no internet access or cable TV for the weekend and for most of
Monday. I pulled out the emergency generator, hooked it up to my floods
and a big heater to dry out the electrical box, then I went up on the
roof. I found a three-inch hole punched through the shingles and the
plywood roofing, caused by a rather large branch from the oak tree next
to my garage. The branch was extremely heavy and hard- -it must have
been dead for some time and, after I shoved it off the roof, it sounded
like a bomb when it hit the concrete below. As I pumped my little
flashlight in the rain, inspecting the hole in my roof, I contemplated
the repairs I would have to make. I was in heaven.
You have no idea how much I enjoy working on the house, and I spent the
weekend blissfully repairing the roof, tearing out and replacing a huge
section of sheet rock from my ceiling, replacing soaked insulation,
re-plastering the ceiling, painting, and lots of other cool stuff, like
for the first time ever getting to replace a couple of circuit breakers.
I have walls of tools, two tool cabinets, and shelves of electrical
tools, and I was able to use many, many, many of them. By the time
Monday came around, the insurance guy checked out my work, the electrical
guy checked out my electrical box, the cable guy checked out my cable
box, and I was able to unplug the generator. It was sooo cool!
Oh yeah; this is a ferret list, not a house repair list. Ok, I'm getting
there. I have a split roof, and access to the tiny attic space is
through a mini door in the second floor laundry room. I have to unhook
and push the water and dryer to the door, open the mini-door, then slip
into the attic while dodging brown recluses and shingle nails. I had to
inspect the tiny attic for damage from the branch, and to see what kind
of water damage I needed to repair. I am in the process of upgrading my
insulation, but the stuff in the tiny attic was still 6 inches of blown
cellulose: dusty, but harmless. Well, not all of it was dusty because it
was soaking wet, so I was industriously scooping the crappy, wet stuff
into a large bag when I noticed the bag was moving. The first thing I
thought was I ve caught a rat, not that I ve EVER seen one in my house,
but I was sure that's what it was, so I carefully opened the bag and
looked inside. Something jumped towards my nose! Having the reactions
of someone twice my age, I jerked backwards only to impale my scalp on
the point of a shingling nail. Out of the bag bounced something, and I
fumbled for my flashlight and caught the glint of two shiny green eyes.
Just then, something else touched my leg. I deny screaming like a little
girl because they can't scream so loud. All I knew was that I was in
some demented version of the scene from Indiana Jones where all the rats
are swarming and the archaeology professor is destroying valuable and
irreplaceable artifacts while burning humans remains. Another glance
with the flashlight and I realized I had forgotten to block off the
laundry room, and at least a half-dozen ferrets, who moments before
were in the sleep of the dead, had discovered my mistake.
My God, there was no controlling them! They were bouncing and tunneling
and insulation was flying everywhere, except the wet stuff, which was
sticking everywhere. I had to crawl from rafter to rafter so I wouldn't
fall through the soaked sheetrock, so I could never catch the little
beasts. They thought it was a new game, and they would wait until I was
almost there, and then sprint off. I wasn't worried about the attic, but
I was afraid a ferret would find a hole somewhere and disappear into
space. So I started whistling and yelling treat and grabbing as fast as
I could and managed to scoop up 15 lbs of ferrets with only 10 lbs of
insulation, crab walked to the mini door and escaped. I was so paranoid
I counted the beasties twice to make sure I didn t miss anyone. I put a
few cracks in the sheetrock, but I had to replace it anyway because of
the water damage.
It gave me a great idea. I went down and bought a bag of clean, safe
blown-cellulose insulation and two tiny plastic wading pools. In one
wading pool, I cut a 4-inch circular hole and pulled dryer tubing through
it. I turned the other pool upside down, and used small spring clamps to
hold the edge together. Then, using a sharp knife, I cut out a 2-foot
circular hole in the center of the top pool, and filled the pools with
insulation. The ferrets have been obsessed with the set-up all weekend,
even sleeping in the thing.
I'll catch up on the diet questions tomorrow.
Bob C
[Posted in FML issue 4579]
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