"experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted." -randy pausch

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

who knows why, but i love this stupid house. {part 4--the end}

Rigo came and patched up the hole in the basement ceiling,
the base guys came and made the upstairs look pretty again with their trim,
and we did all of the touch up paint on the walls and the ceiling 
that Rigo had to re-drywall and texture after the flood,
brennan slept in his basement room 
for the very first time.
with no shirt.
{every night since then he's requested no shirt. says he doesn't need one anymore. not in the cold dark basement. he literally just buries himself under the covers in crisp cold bliss. he's my hottest blooded baby. always has been. chase is a close second. max on the other hand gets purple lips if the temp drops below 70 and sunny.}
...
so i woke up that saturday morning,
the day after we repainted the ceiling that Rigo had just redrywalled and retextured,
2 weeks after the dishwasher flood, with BIG plans to sit on the bed in the kids' bedroom upstairs. andrea {aka "WILSON" had ripped out the old closest, doors included, and she and sean had spent an entire saturday and a couple of hours on sunday painting the inside of it white.
it took 4 coats. 
sean was going to build a new closet for max in what used to be the boy cowboy room,
but is now fondly referred to as "the frozen room."
it's magical girl bliss, with an Olaf side for chase whenever we decide to let him sleep in there with her.
for now, we've had plenty of changes. we don't need anymore just yet.
so sean was going to install the closet, andrea was going to build the drawers, and i was going to wash the bassinet bedding, newborn clothes,
and other things like that.
it had literally been raining for 5 days straight and i was dreaming of lolly pops and rainy day nesting inside heaven for the entire day.
but when i went down to make brennan's bed, i opened the blinds and saw inches of water in the window well.
3 and 1/2 inches to be exact.
like OH MY WORD, that's going to come in through brennan's window really soon if we don't get that water out of there fast!
this is what i was thinking.
so i punched out the screen on the window,
thanking my LUCKY STARS that i had come down to make his bed,
instead of sending him to do it like i normally do {sometimes being neurotic and wanting a perfectly made bed in a basement pays off folks. yesssssss.},
and then i was thanking my LUCKY STARS AGAIN that i opened the blinds just to see how light the room is on a rainy day down there
JUST
IN THE KNICK OF TIME
to catch what would have been a THIRD FLOOD in two weeks before it happened.
thank HEAVENS we caught this one BEFORE it happened.
so when i stuck my head out into that window well i could see right away that there was a small waterfall streaming down the left side of the window well, filling up what was becoming a small aquarium for snails and spiders with rocks. 
i ran to the other window well of the basement. dry as a bone.
that was a plus.
i ran outside to see where all of the water was coming from and right away i could see it was coming from the gutter that ran underground and away from the house off of the roof.
plugged and clogged.
fully plugged and clogged,
and spilling out, overflowing, like old faithful itself.
i shoved my hand down there to see if i could swish some leaves out of the way.
no luck.
left a message for my father in law about things of this nature,
called sean to see if he was going to be home anytime soon, and did i need to send for reinforcements, because while we didn't have a crisis just yet, one was a'brewin'.
i was so glad contractor dave was still on the job with his shop vac conveniently still in our basement. phew. also his buckets, and the plastic tarp Rigo left behind came in handy great for the second day in a row, as we also used it for painting the night before:) go us.
30 minutes later sean was home, and we were sucking 2 giant shop vacs worth of water out of the window well in brennan's room. who would have known that 3 1/2 inches of water could fill two giant shop vacs worth of water?
my mother in law said she thinks our house is cursed.
and my father in law told us that he thought we were going to have to dig out the drain pipe down a foot into the grass to unplug the clog underground.
sean and i just kept looking at each other as he ran 6 buckets of water up the basement stairs to dump off the side of the house, just saying our prayers of thanks that we found this flood before it ruined our house another time.
water. i never knew it could be so rude.
3 and a half hours later sean had dug out the flower bed and into the grass,
suctioned out mud, and opened up a clogged drain pipe end that had clearly been building up with mud and leaves for who knows how long, 
slowly keeping the drain pipe from being able to bring the water run off from the roof 
away from the house. there it's been all this time,
just waiting to flood our basement window well.
it was pouring rain the entire time.
did i mention that?
it was.
thank you thank you thank you dear lord that we painted the ceiling that Rigo the drywaller patched,
so brennan could sleep in his new room, and most of all, that i wanted to make brennan's bed 
and open the blinds down in that basement that one saturday morning last weekend.
sean gibson is my hero,
and we have officially decided that we are just ready to sell the house and go back to being renters.
that's what we said at the end of all of this which was the last 4 weeks of our life.
i have never seen sean so filthy,
with mud sprayed all over his face,
soaked to the bone,
and dripping in mud literally from head to toe.
HOT i tell you. HOT.
in other news,
THIS JUST IN!
the oven is broken.
it did this a few weeks ago.
wouldn't preheat.
cause it wouldn't turn on.
dave the contractor was here that night when it happened the first time.
he's also an electrician.
he kicked it.
banged it.
shook it.
and it worked again.
so just now,
in a panic of dinner is gonna be REALLY late tonight,
i kicked it,
banged it a few times,
yelled at it.
whined at it,
shook it for good measure,
and do you know what it did?
that precious little oven turned on:)
i sighed a big sigh of relief.
thank you little oven.
thank you.
because see, there's no money left for it to break right now!
so it just can't break right now.
renting is looking really good.
anyone want to buy a cursed house?
{ok really, i'm just kidding. because who knows why, but i love this stupid house.}
{some breathing air would be great for a minute though. just saying.}
{the end}

1 comment:

Susan Anderson said...

That house is one crazy ride. Good thing you two are such a good team. I think you are going to kick its butt.

=)