A Series of Unfortunate Events
So when I woke up on Friday morning I used the upstairs bathroom and then took Tulip for her morning constitutional. When we returned 45 minutes later, I found that water was pouring out of the built-in fire alarm in the kitchen ceiling. Dashing upstairs, I found that the part of the toilet that says "ok, the tank is full, the water can turn off now" had broken, and that vast quantities of (thankfully clean) water had poured out of the tank on to the bathroom floor. From there it made its way through the floor and came out in the kitchen. Fantastic. Thankfully, the last time the plumber came out he replaced the shut-off valve for the toilet, so I was able to turn it off without shutting off the water for the entire house.
I plopped a bowl under the fire alarm, mopped up all the water in both the bathroom and the kitchen, threw the now soaked bathmats in the washing machine and then proceeded with my morning. When I returned from court and lunch, everything seemed fine. I changed out of my suit and went to work.
When I got home, things were manifestly not fine. My house has an integrated burglar/fire alarm system because the prior owner ran a recording studio out the basement and had tens of thousands of dollars of gear in the house. I don't have a password for it, and it's never been monitored, so its sole impact on my life is that I don't have to check fire alarm batteries and the doors make beeping noises when they open and close. No big deal. However, the alarm was now going off, and although I could hit 'off' on the keypad to buy a five minute respite, without a password I couldn't actually disable it. I assume this was triggered by the water pouring through the fire alarm in the kitchen. I have no idea how long it had been doing that; all I know is that it wasn't happening at lunch and it was when I got home that night. Based on how relieved Tulip was to see me, I suspect it had been happening all afternoon.
Fortunately, the phone # for the people who installed it is on the box in the basement, and even though I don't have an account for them they were happy to tell me how to turn off the power. I no longer have door chimes, which isn't a problem, but I also don't have fire alarms, so either I need to pay the exorbitant fees to have the company come out and fix the system, or I need to install fire alarms throughout the house.
On the bright side, I may have some extra money to get the alarm system fixed. I had saved up a bunch of money to try to get air conditioning installed in my house. I knew that wasn't going to be trivial because I have radiant heat and no ducts, but internet research indicated that depending on the exact system the amount would be high but manageable. Given the miserable humidity last summer, I figured it would be worth it. Regrettably, the first estimate has come back and it is roughly 2.5 times the amount I was willing to pay. To put this in perspective, it's substantially more than I put down on the house in the first place. I'm waiting for two more estimates, but I'm not hopeful. For that kind of money I could take Tulip to doggy daycare every single day for over two full years, at full price no less. No thanks. Maybe one day when I'm rich.
I can also spend some money getting my awning replaced. The one over my back door (which I never ever use) was busted at some point in the winter when a tree branch fell on it. The tree branch in question belongs to my neighbors in the blue house, who I have never even seen, let alone met. I have no idea when in the winter this happened; I saw it last week while I was clearing some weeds out of that area. Fantastic. In a similar vein, I've got some ill looking branches on my trees that should come down soon as they overhang things that might break. I hadn't done that yet because based on similar work my coworkers had done it's going to be gonzo expensive. On the other hand, next time I might not be as lucky when something falls to earth.
Why'd I want a house again? Oh well. One thing at a time; the plumber comes on Monday morning.
I plopped a bowl under the fire alarm, mopped up all the water in both the bathroom and the kitchen, threw the now soaked bathmats in the washing machine and then proceeded with my morning. When I returned from court and lunch, everything seemed fine. I changed out of my suit and went to work.
When I got home, things were manifestly not fine. My house has an integrated burglar/fire alarm system because the prior owner ran a recording studio out the basement and had tens of thousands of dollars of gear in the house. I don't have a password for it, and it's never been monitored, so its sole impact on my life is that I don't have to check fire alarm batteries and the doors make beeping noises when they open and close. No big deal. However, the alarm was now going off, and although I could hit 'off' on the keypad to buy a five minute respite, without a password I couldn't actually disable it. I assume this was triggered by the water pouring through the fire alarm in the kitchen. I have no idea how long it had been doing that; all I know is that it wasn't happening at lunch and it was when I got home that night. Based on how relieved Tulip was to see me, I suspect it had been happening all afternoon.
Fortunately, the phone # for the people who installed it is on the box in the basement, and even though I don't have an account for them they were happy to tell me how to turn off the power. I no longer have door chimes, which isn't a problem, but I also don't have fire alarms, so either I need to pay the exorbitant fees to have the company come out and fix the system, or I need to install fire alarms throughout the house.
On the bright side, I may have some extra money to get the alarm system fixed. I had saved up a bunch of money to try to get air conditioning installed in my house. I knew that wasn't going to be trivial because I have radiant heat and no ducts, but internet research indicated that depending on the exact system the amount would be high but manageable. Given the miserable humidity last summer, I figured it would be worth it. Regrettably, the first estimate has come back and it is roughly 2.5 times the amount I was willing to pay. To put this in perspective, it's substantially more than I put down on the house in the first place. I'm waiting for two more estimates, but I'm not hopeful. For that kind of money I could take Tulip to doggy daycare every single day for over two full years, at full price no less. No thanks. Maybe one day when I'm rich.
I can also spend some money getting my awning replaced. The one over my back door (which I never ever use) was busted at some point in the winter when a tree branch fell on it. The tree branch in question belongs to my neighbors in the blue house, who I have never even seen, let alone met. I have no idea when in the winter this happened; I saw it last week while I was clearing some weeds out of that area. Fantastic. In a similar vein, I've got some ill looking branches on my trees that should come down soon as they overhang things that might break. I hadn't done that yet because based on similar work my coworkers had done it's going to be gonzo expensive. On the other hand, next time I might not be as lucky when something falls to earth.
Why'd I want a house again? Oh well. One thing at a time; the plumber comes on Monday morning.