The Simpson Blog

You don't have to be a plumbing expert to know that water (and waste) flows downhill. You don't have to be a plumber to know that if the main sewage pipe that's supposed to take water out of your house is actually sloped downward into your house, you might be in for trouble. I'll just let that sit here for a bit. We made it through the weekend without any new and expensive surprises around the house. Of course, Monday brings the workers back, and the workers keep finding new things. The nice folks at the basement waterproofing company finished up the back and side of the house on Friday. Looks bare, but decent: New window wells. Swale! Now they're on to the front of the house, where the agenda includes demolishing Amanda's new garden and busting up the front stairs and front porch. Well well well, it turns out the front porch has a lot of concrete in it, so it was going to take an extra half-day of labour to break it up instead of just haul it

The previous blog post offered a few highlights of things going from bad to worse with our house. Things went from worse to worser and snowballed in a hurry. As detailed last time, our summer-long, occasionally frustrating reno approached completion with the laying of carpet. A rainstorm that night soaked the new carpet. We pick up the story from that point. So, after the big rainstorm, I went about making sure all our eavestroughs and downspouts were attended to. I cleaned them all out, bought a new extender to replace a broken one, and generally made a mess of myself hosing out a completely clogged double-bend-joint downspout. Two pieces of advice: Don't just shove your hand into the downspout hole, because sheet metal screws are very sharp, and if you're going to blast a garden hose on "JET" into a completely blocked hole, don't have your face next to it. Just a few days later, another thunderstorm. Easily one of the biggest I'd seen in years. Not o

Maybe I should subtitle this blog "Adversity, Resilience and Gratitude," because I feel like I keep posting the same pattern over and over again: - something really difficult happens - instead of asking "why me?" or "why us?" I shelve my feelings and just get on with stuff - I express gratitude to the wonderful people who've stepped forward to help The latest episode happened yesterday. Actually, there was enough happening to triple the length of this post, but let's keep it tight. Amanda's dream is to re-do the kitchen. The actual dream is to re-do *a* kitchen, but our kitchen is dysfunctional and nothing but frustrating and ugly, so our kitchen is a good pick. We tossed out a budget when we bought the house and told the kitchen company what it was. Friday he presented us with a beautiful kitchen design, and only about 40% over the budget we'd given him. Turns out his quote is for the cabinets and counter top only, not the demo