And now what did you do TODAY?

[Augsburger]

Maybe you could serve on the jury for a Justin Bieber trial...so many opportunities.

[morphsci]

Cut off the end of the front bumper on the truck.

[Voltron]

Cut off the end of the front bumper on the truck.

 

On purpose?

[morphsci]

Yes. I was bored.

Plus it was rubbing on the tire from being pushed in

[Dusty Chalk]

Did you answer, loudly, "GUILTY!", to any of the questions?

Or say, "we can't stop here, this is bat country!"

 

Or tell them your favourite television show is Dexter?

[ironbut]

Wow,.. sounds like Peter does this for a living!

[acidbasement]

Just took delivery of a king-size mattress at work.  The shipping company wouldn't deliver to my house, not even to the end of my driveway, for fear of getting the tractor-trailer stuck.  I get that.

 

Now I have to find some poor schmuck to help me load this beast into my parents' pickup truck.  Thankfully, it's a small town, so I expect to have success by walking down the street and press-ganging someone.

 

Edit: one walk down Main St., and I found someone to help.  My town rawks.

Edited February 11, 2014 by acidbasement

[skullguise]

Nice, iain....where everybody knows your name.....

 

I once joked with an info-taker who registered me for jury duty.  I asked her if I would be disqualified because I supported the Death Penalty for civil cases.  She was good, replied with a straight face that it wasn't justification....then smiled about 5 seconds later.

[Dusty Chalk]

Wow,.. sounds like Peter does this for a living!

Pfff...no.

 

I have thought it through, though.

[jvlgato]

I'm always dismissed pretty quickly from juries, as well. Probably not as quickly as Al, though!

[acidbasement]

Got a flat tire on the way home with the mattress, and there seems to be no spare. Called a friend/neighbour with a truck to give me and the mattress a lift the rest of the way home, and he helped me load it into the house. Tomorrow morning I should be able to track down a spare tire from any number of neighbours' Ford trucks. I'll probably have to boost it, too, since it's supposed to be -30 overnight. This is turning into quite a production.

[HeadphoneAddict]

Well, our regular plumber called me about 7AM that Friday and had someone out by 8:30AM to cap off the burst pipe and turn the water back on.  We have a 5 yr service contract with them on plumbing and HVAC, so they didn't charge us anything to do that!  The photos that I took right after the leak helped him pinpoint the spot and cut a 1'x1' hole to work in, because the wet area got too big to know where it first happened.

 

The burst occurred about 5-feet inside the house, at the juncture of the wall and ceiling above our 60" HDTV and PS3, etc... So it could have been really bad with the ceiling coming down on top of the home theater rig, and then water eventually soaking the theater chairs, electronics, and spreading to treadmill & pool table legs. and whatever else it got to before making to the floor drain by the furnace 30 feet away.

 

Tomorrow our plumber should be here with a new outside water faucet, using the newer PEX pipe running about 10 feet into the house. The pipe is hidden behind walls and ceilings so it doesn't have an inside shut-off and drain.  If we installed a cut-off and drain in the unfinished portion of the basement it would also shut off cold water to the kitchen sink.

 

But he thinks that 10 feet of PEX between the outside faucet and the original copper pipe should keep the copper from freezing. Cost is estimated to be $289 for that. Our front yard water faucet has exposed pipes in the un-finished basement space which helps keep them warm, but I think that I'm going to ask him to install a shut off and drain as a precaution. I forgot to ask about a price.

 

Then the water restoration company came out at 11:00 AM that day, and found a good amount of water in the insulation behind the wall, extending about 4 feet to each side of the burst pipe.  There was a vapor barrier on the outside of the insulation, but the builder didn't seal it to the top of the 7.5 foot concrete wall and water got in from the top.  The ceiling was also wet for about a 10 foot length across the room, running along the joist bay at a 90 degree angle to the wall.

 

They had to remove all the drywall in one stud-bay (floor to ceiling) and then reach in about 3-4 feet in both directions and pull out an 8-feet wide swath of insulation x 9 feet tall wall. After spraying everything with antimicrobials they set up a blower to dry behind the wall and another for the ceiling, plus a huge dehumidifier. The carpet was only slightly damp for about 6-12" out from the wall, and 2 days of drying and demolition came out to be $850. The project manager didn't come out and used photos and texts to come up with a $1400 estimate at first, but I argued it down to a $1000 deposit to let the techs complete and write up the job first, so with the lower price they refunded me the $150.

 

Then I have to get a drywall guy to close it all up. I think I'll use the guy who fixed the wet drywall after the September flood. No idea of the cost for that. The plumber suggests putting a fake ventilation register (vent) in the burst-pipe area to let warm air behind the wall and ceiling, with several 1" holes in the joists on either side to let warm air travel across to the other joist bays, but that will only be warming up the PEX that he doesn't expect to freeze. He also recommended putting something on the outside to cover the faucet.

 

Because we had a $20K claim for roof replacement for hail damage in July 2012, and $6K for flooded basement in Sept 2013, our insurance broker says filing a claim before our renewal on April 26th is a bad idea if we can afford to fix it ourselves.  So, we aren't going to use insurance for what we hope will cost less than $$1700-$1800 total.

 

We were lucky enough to save up an emergency fund and pay off enough debt to have the cash flow we need to pay for 2 kids in college. Despite the fact that I've been coughing up 1-3x a day blood since Sunday, God has blessed us in many ways - with just enough money (always need more) and just enough health to keep going.

 

 

Edited February 12, 2014 by HeadphoneAddict

[HeadphoneAddict]

Got a flat tire on the way home with the mattress, and there seems to be no spare. Called a friend/neighbour with a truck to give me and the mattress a lift the rest of the way home, and he helped me load it into the house. Tomorrow morning I should be able to track down a spare tire from any number of neighbours' Ford trucks. I'll probably have to boost it, too, since it's supposed to be -30 overnight. This is turning into quite a production.

 

That sucks.

 

Last summer my neighbor had just bought a used pickup truck, and when they prepared to come to our garage sale to haul away some left-overs we found that a tire was flat. Since they were doing us a favor, my son and I changed the tire for them, in the burning hot sun with metal too hot to touch, only to find out that the spare was also flat.

 

Fortunately there was no puncture, it was just an old spare that was never used so the air pressure got low. So our air pump was able to put it into drivable condition. The good news was that they also had the opportunity to discover that they had a jack but no tire iron, before they were out on the road with a flat.

[acidbasement]

That sounds nasty, Larry (the house stuff), but good job on getting it sorted out.

 

With the help of a friend and the spare tire from his Ford truck, I managed to get the truck home this morning.  We're expecting 4-6" of snow tonight, and high winds, so I'm glad that's done.

[swt61]

I'm always dismissed pretty quickly from juries, as well. Probably not as quickly as Al, though!

 

That's probably more due to your frequent reckless driving, and lack of respect for small town law enforcement, who risk their lives to keep Mike's neighborhood safe.

Edited February 13, 2014 by swt61

[Absorbine_Sr]

That's probably more due to your frequent reckless driving, and lack of respect for small town law enforcement, who risk their lives to keep Mike's neighborhood safe.

LOL!!

[jvlgato]

You forgot to roll down your windows to jeer, cuss me out, and give me the Monee cheer.

[crappyjones123]

Julie's younger one asked me to be her valentine a couple of days ago so yesterday I dressed up nice and went to pick her up from her school with flowers and a balloon. Initially she was a bit embarrassed but when she realized they were for her she had the biggest smile in the world and went around parading to her friends showing off. Two of the counsellor at the after school care started crying.

Picked up the older one on the way home and started preparing their favorite dinner when I get a call from my roommate asking how far from the apartment I was. He had managed to lock himself out. I was an hour and 15 minutes away. The girls had planned to take me to a movie and give me presents afterwards but I ran out in a hurry thinking if I went and opened the door for him I might be able to make it back for the end of the movie and spend the rest of the evening with the girls. With my luck, I got stuck behind three different accidents on the turnpike and it took me 4.5 hours to get back up to them. By then they were all super angry and asleep and on top of it all, I was not welcome to stay the night so had to drive back yet another time. Took i95 back avoiding the accidents and got stuck behind another 2 on the way home. I need to study today so hopefully I can make it up to them on Sunday. 'twas a shitty day.

Edited February 15, 2014 by crappyjones123

[skullguise]

Aw, man, the best intentions gone bad.  It's too bad when you try to do nice things and you get bitten for it.  Hopefully they will see that in the long run.....good luck with studying, and good luck on Sunday.

[Torpedo]

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Sorry for your shitty day, cj

[Hopstretch]

No offense but that's a pretty big red bitch flag from the girls, too.

[crappyjones123]

Perhaps but they are 9 and 13 and the world revolves around them and they don't understand that my roommate couldn't wait outside the apartment until after the movie was over. I guess he could have but I figured if I just went home and unlocked the door soon, then I would get back to them faster. Traffic didn't help my cause. I should have just paid the lock smith the $200 he was asking to go over and let my roommate in but it seemed like he was taking advantage of me at the time - I didn't like it and I let my pride get the better of me. But really...$200 to open a freaking room? He is obviously not celebrating the day if he is sitting at work taking calls so not like I am pulling him out of dinner. Bleh lesson learned. Next time don't fight supply and demand. 

 

PS. I might have also forgotten to give my gf her presents before I ran off so sure forgiveness would have been nicer but I wasn't exactly perfect in the situation. 

PPS. Showing up with flowers for everyone has the follow result on girls. All is happy again.  

Edited February 15, 2014 by crappyjones123

[skullguise]

Women...so fickle....

 

But great to see the smiles.....

[aardvark baguette]

just got a call on my home phone from some genius with an Indian accent.  From the Windows Technical Department.  Something about my computer...

 

 

LOL

[Augsburger]

Obviously a scam since the legit tech support never make calls only takes calls from irate consumers with computers frozen because of the newest Windows update. Amazing how many people would fall for that. Did you play along to see if they were trying to get you to download a Trojan?  Maybe ask them to email you a picture of themselves to prove they are the "real Windows Technical Department".