Ain't too proud to beg

And luckily I don't have to!

The inspector showed up early (!) and deemed our insurance claim at 70% completion! Yay!!

This means they'll send us more money very soon; this also means I can breathe a big ol' sigh of relief.

Wish me luck

'Cause I'm gonna need it.

The inspector for the mortgage company is coming today to inspect our progress on the insurance claim items. Basically, we're supposed to have the inspection at 50% completion. All we know is we've blown through the first disbursement of funds, so we need more. They've basically told me that we can have more, they just have to do the inspection first. If the inspector says we are, indeed, at around 50%, we can have more. If not, then we have to write a letter and beg for it, though I've been told they're 99% sure they'll say yes to said letter of begging.

I understand why they're doing this. It's just that I hate jumping through all the hoops. It stresses me out and then I yell at people and my blood pressure skyrockets and it generally pisses me off. At any rate, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the porch ceiling that I started working on last weekend and the screen windows that need replacing will get us that much closer. The porch is halfway through and I'm starting to replace the screens this afternoon... I'm hoping that they'll see that we have all the supplies (except for the plywood that I need to borrow a truck for) and are in process with these two items-- one weekend will finish them up-- and credit us for both projects.

Then I won't have to resort to any unseemly begging.

I spoke too soon

I guess the quarter sized hail we had the other day actually did cause a little more damage. The HVAC inspector noticed some daylight coming through the roof yesterday. So I made Adam get up there and take care of it for me. I get vertigo, nausea. I can't get on and off the ladder at the top. Can't help but look down, and then it's all over for me. It's embarrassing.

But no worries-- we're supposed to be on the list to get our roof within the next week or two. The decking was plank, rather than plywood sheet, and some of the pieces that were broken by the hail have started to buckle, so whenever it happens, it needs to be soon.

And then we can get started on our new color scheme. I went to Lowe's last night and picked out, seriously, hundreds and hundreds of paint chips-- all the reds, greyish or olivey greens, and grays. I know they must hate me there, taking so many, but color corrected booths are the stupidest things I've ever seen. At any rate, I think we're now looking at a deep red with a very mid-tone gray (bordering on taupe, but more neutral) in addition to the existing white to accent the architectural features of the trim.

Can't decide much until the roof is on, but isn't it fun to dream?

Why is it so difficult?

Ugh. Apparently, the bank is going to hold our insurance money in escrow until we get the repairs done, releasing it one third at a time-- before we begin work, at 50% completion, and finally at 90% completion.

I mean, I get it-- they own more of the house than we do, and if we were scandalous thieves who took the money and let the bank foreclose, they couldn't recoup their investment. And they also claim the inspection done at each of these milestones helps protect the homeowner from ending up with shoddy work. I get it. I do. Everyone has been really nice in this whole debacle, too-- granted, it's not over yet and there's definitely time left for us to get bent over. However, everyone we've dealt with has been at the very least nice.

But it really, really sucks that we have to dip into credit to get it done (if it gets bad, I'll call and bitch and try to get more released). And it doubly sucks for someone like me, who has her own vast array of anxiety issues, that I am now left to obsess over. Like, what they mean by 50% and what happens if they don't like that we plan on replacing the garage door altogether rather than just reface it-- even though the insurance company is fine with this? And is there some way they can screw me? How long will this all take? Will they direct deposit it? Will I have to make requests for it like a trust? Or will I get a separate "credit" card for it-- one more thing to clog up my wallet and have to keep track of? When will I get the paperwork they claim they're sending...?

See why this is a problem?

Good fences make good dogs

Yeah, look. I know it's ghetto.

The dog won't stay out of the flower bed. He just keeps digging and digging and kicking dirt all over the patio, and tearing up the root system of the four o'clocks. I originally put up the wire thing you can kind of see in the back...as pups go, he's pretty responsive to boundaries, however real. But that cool, wet dirt got the better of him and he ended up in the bed once again yesterday.

I thought maybe a more substantial looking blockade would help, so I used the ends we cut off of our fencing boards. unfortunately, the little plants that are struggling to come up, are doing so right at the brick border, and I didn't want to hammer the wood into them and crush the little guys.


So I spread them apart, and now they look like jack-o-lantern teeth, and I managed to hammer my hand, which now hurts ALOT. And then I spread cayenne pepper water all over the bed and fence. We'll see how he does. The places where he's not digging are coming up like gangbusters


Meanwhile, the living room is kinda coming together. At least it looks like a place to sit and most of the boxes are out of the way. It makes me want to sit in it, and I guess that's all that matters.




Pay no attention to the shadeless lamp. It was a moving casualty.

We also finally got the insurance claim's itemized settlement statement and it's VERY detailed. We'll hire some of it out and do some of it ourselves. I'm just glad we can finally get moving on some of this crap.

Oh boy!

The claims adjuster called yesterday and told me he had some extra time and was able to come by early. I wasn't able to leave work, so Adam handled it. The guy couldn't do an estimate on the spot-- too much to figure up-- and it's gonna be a lot, I think. New roof on house and garage, new carport, new wood clapboard on the garage, new ceilings in at least 2 rooms, new insulation, new love seat, paint on ceilings and garage and 2 sides of the house, new gas street light, new screens on part of the house, maybe a new heat pump (to replace our new heat pump) depending on what the experts say when they see it...the list goes on much further than that. No telling what the depreciation will be, but the majority of these things need to be taken care of, so we'll see most of that money in the end. Fingers crossed we can get on a roofers list sometime soon; with most of the decking needing to be replaced, there's gonna be a lot of people who won't even want to talk to us...

Anyway, the kiddo had an after school event yesterday, so I killed some time in Target while I waited to get her. A couple of hours there is a very bad thing. The dollar section has gardening stuff, so I got a couple of little planters and new gloves-- and a headband so I can look pretty whilst I work in the mud. Then I picked up necessary things like toilet paper and aluminum foil...and then I meandered into the patio/gardening/seasonal section. Lo and behold, there hung a hammock for $30!! I really don't even have that kind of money to spend, but I've never seen such a deal, so of course I bought it and I'll let you know how it goes; it was too dark to hang it, and it probably will be again tonight by the time we get home.

There was, however, time to pick our little strawberry, and we all had a taste. I forgot how much better homegrown strawberries are. My grandfather grew them, and in one or two bumper crop years, I sold them at the farmers market. Nothing beats strawberry shortcake that you don't have to sweeten.

At any rate, I'm excited-- lots going on, these days. Plans to get the backsplash up this weekend, then there's the used book sale at the library, and the hippies have started their outdoor movie showings, so things are finally picking up around the house and around town. Just have to keep moving on the important things, or it'll be feet up in the hammock for me!

Fingers crossed

Touch wood, lucky penny, shooting star, 11:11...I don't want to take any chances.

After almost one full week of drying out, tomorrow's forecast calls for rain-- possible severe thunderstorms. We've done some temporary patching to the roof, so I'm hoping for less rain on the inside of the house this time around.

The insurance people say that our interior damage puts us higher on the list, but there's still no telling when they'll get to us.

So no walking under ladders, guys-- I already had a black cat cross my path today...

(Just got a call saying it could be 4 weeks before anyone gets out to our house. Ugh. Any suggestions for making a big ugly hole in the ceiling look pretty? Lace? Dried flowers? Hole treatments? Help a girl out.)

One step forward, two steps back

I guess I should say that in the grand scheme of things, we were very, very lucky. Adam and I took a walk around the neighborhood the other day and looked at all the pretty houses. One of these beautiful red brick bungalows was destroyed by not one, but TWO trees falling on the house, while there were 6 children inside-- and no one was hurt. I'd say things could be worse. As my dad's friend always said, "You could be on fire."

I knew that we were supposed to get rain, but I didn't think much of it and I thought it was coming in late. So I stayed in Fayetteville to have dinner with some girlfriends. Adam called and said that I might want to stay there while the storm passed because it was really something else-- in fact, he and the cat were hanging out in the interior hallway in case of a tornado.

Now, Adam's not a worrier, or a Chicken Little. But growing up, we had tornado warnings 4 times a week this time of year. You become a little oblivious, and I just chalked it up to Adam having not lived in those conditions. But he insisted that I call and check on my mom, just in case.

My sister answered the phone and sounded like she was having a stroke-- because these had just started coming down:


You got it. Golfball-sized hail. Adam saved these in the freezer. What a guy, huh? No, seriously! I was excited to see them!

Anyway, it started dripping then gushing out of the AC vents and light fixtures in the living room and the kiddo's room and he had started sounding so worn out and miserable. So I drove down during a "lull" in the storm-- a lull I wouldn't drive in under any other circumstances. On the way, they started reporting impassable flooding on ALL of the surrounding main streets of my house. I had to drive about 30 minutes out of the way, and turn around in driveways and take the most back asswards route possible. But I got there.

I did the next round of bucket changing and floor mopping. Imagine this with about 5 more buckets:


Then I got about an hour and a half of sleep before we heard something fall. Thinking the light fixtures had filled with water and dropped, we got up to check things out and found that...


Four square feet of ceiling had fallen! and now that there's SO MUCH SPACE for water to exit, the buckets, which all had holes by the way, weren't enough. We couldn't dry towels fast enough. And after all the work on the floors, we are damned if this water is gonna ruin them.

Anyway, I didn't really sleep last night. In addition to the ceiling, the kiddo's room will need its ceiling replaced. Adam saw some straight up HOLES in the roof from the hail so it will likely need replacing; it knocked out both garage windows and one car windshield was cracked. In fact, it removed one light of a casement window and set it unharmed about 5 feet away. weird. Knocked paint off the garage. Both couches are soak, soak, soaked. It's a busy time at work, and I hate being gone, but I really don't want to leave this until I've talked to the insurance girl-- and of course her line is busy...

The flooding's gone down, the rain has stopped, and I'm allowed to get some sleep now, but I can't. Guess I'll commit to a few cups of coffee.

Here's some pics of the damage:








Not damage, per se, but a whole frikin lot of leaves to rake. That's all leaves you see there. I so thought I was done with those.