05 June 2017
865
R. Linda:
What are the old sayings, "my casa is your casa" and "every man's home is his castle." Yeah right on the first, the second not so much. My casa is anyone's casa if they want to help me pay for it. I tell ya, just when you think everything be in running order and going smoothly, something raises its ugly head and wham, you are knocked off your feet, or in me case, your wallet is wiped out along with your bank account.
What's the other saying? "Everything happens in threes." NOT SO, try six, seven and eights! I know you are saying, "Gabe get to the point will ya." Okay, okay, I will but let me start where every story should start the beginning. I'd like to start at the end as I know it at this moment but I be too pissed off, so okay without anymore hedging around I will get to the beginning.
It all started when I bought this house, me castle. Yup it was a castle for a short time it was, later it became "THE house," and then "the money pit" and now "the dump" I live in.
I know, I know I am not getting to the point. It be very hard to get there with so much anger built up. But here goes: It all started when the generator guy came to service the generator. He told me the oil in the outdoor generator hadn't been changed in three years! I was told it was serviced by this self same generator guy every year. Well, no, no it had not. Not only that but did the former owner (a minister by the way, a man of God) tell me that it had been hit by lightning? Well, no, no he hadn't. Well, it had! So $250.00 for servicing, oil and to be given the news me generator maybe on its last legs. That it still works be a miracle, but it does. I bit me fingernails waiting for it to fail in the middle of a blizzard, but it didn't, not yet anyway.
Okay so there was THAT. The central air guy came to clean the units. Did I know that one of the units only blows air because it hasn't been hooked up? WHAT? Yup, only the two units worked the other one well . . . not so much Gabriel. Okay that explains why those rooms never cooled off. SO we fixed that. Paid the price of $350.00 not only unit service, but electrician to come out and hook up the other unit, an extra $250.00.
We thought we were good after that, but no wait, things come in threes. The radon levels in the house were sky high and we had on the property owners disclosure statement that a radon mitigation unit was in the basement. We went looking for it and found this pipe coming out of the basement floor and thought, okay there it is. But why isn't it working? Maybe it needed a fan, some units need the fan, others are put way into the floor and they exhaust radon out, so maybe we needed the fan part to pull the radon up and out. Well, you remember me story, 14/09/16. We discovered the bogus pipe that had no exhaust and needed more than a fan, a whole system? Yeah well there was THAT, $1300 later.
That was three strikes but we weren't out quite yet in the broken-down, obsolete category. Oh no, there was the flying squirrels that the minister's wife told us about at the closing. He wasn't happy she was telling us that the big sticky sheets of fly paper in the attic were there to catch the critters. We ended up with pest control for two years trying to rid us of THAT problem. You remember me story: 31/07/16. Cost $650.00
How am I doing on the WHATS WRONG WITH GABE'S HOUSE? But I be not done yet. Yes, it gets worse. Me electric bill be sky high, it's reached the $500 range in the winter and I did not know why. I even looked into solar panels but the cost of THAT was $98,000 can you believe. "But Mr. O'Sullivan you get a $2,000 rebate from the government." Yeah that's a whole lot NOT! So that idea went the way of historical estimates.
So, the wife decided the kitchen appliances were bad. They never worked properly she said. They look bright and shiny but she suspected they were original with the house which was built in 1996. Okay, so the range hoods when turned on would sound like air planes landing in the kitchen. You needed ear savers to blot out the noise it was that bad. So we replaced those. Lucky us got two on sale, $80 bucks.
Next was the refrigerator. The dial was turned to frozen everything and still the food inside was never cold, but lukewarm. We replaced that with a French double door model that is energy efficient for a whopping $1250. Okay done right? Nah, the dishwasher decided since the range hoods and refrigerator were gone it too would give up the ghost and it did by l leaking soapy water all over the floor. SO we replaced THAT $400 bucks later.
We thought we were home free. There was a change in the electric bill by $150 buckaroos. Well done, high five and all that rubbish. We reacted happily all too soon because this weekend, I noticed an awful smell. I thought it was the dog, but no it wasn't Frisky. I asked me Mam if she smelled what I was smelling and she said, "Oh fur sure it be doon da basement." Thanks for telling me this odour had been rising all week to the lower levels of the house. I went down there to find the furnace room flooded. For joy and there was a neon yellowish liquid in the water and it smelt suspiciously like anti-freeze. And it was anti-freeze! I was down there moping up inhaling that shite until I was starting to see things.
Seems the minister had filled the water system in the boiler with anti-freeze so he could turn the heat entirely off for the winter. He neglected to tell us THAT.
I called the furnace guy, he told me for one, the furnace was too big for the house. I didn't need a 6 coil boiler, I needed a four! So the $7,000 he first quoted me came down to $5,000. Then he said, did I know I have a gas line that is heating water in an old water tank that hasn't been used in years. No, I did not. "Well," said he, it be "manufacturing mold because it isn't being used AND it is building pressure so it could explode." Ask me if I was thrilled to hear THAT. Take a guess.
Then he turns to the wood burner and says, you are wasting oil by heating that thing even though you aren't using it, the boiler is heating the water that goes through the wood burner. For joy, does it get any better than this homeowners?
So if I seem a little angry, it is because I BE THAT. I will tell you the gas line be now OFF, and the failing boiler be no longer heating the wood burner. So me "castle" shouldn't be exploding anytime soon. Or, I don't think it will. At this point, I be sitting here waiting for . . . whats that old saying? "For the other shoe to drop." Yeah that be it.
Gabe
Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved
865
R. Linda:
What are the old sayings, "my casa is your casa" and "every man's home is his castle." Yeah right on the first, the second not so much. My casa is anyone's casa if they want to help me pay for it. I tell ya, just when you think everything be in running order and going smoothly, something raises its ugly head and wham, you are knocked off your feet, or in me case, your wallet is wiped out along with your bank account.
What's the other saying? "Everything happens in threes." NOT SO, try six, seven and eights! I know you are saying, "Gabe get to the point will ya." Okay, okay, I will but let me start where every story should start the beginning. I'd like to start at the end as I know it at this moment but I be too pissed off, so okay without anymore hedging around I will get to the beginning.
It all started when I bought this house, me castle. Yup it was a castle for a short time it was, later it became "THE house," and then "the money pit" and now "the dump" I live in.
I know, I know I am not getting to the point. It be very hard to get there with so much anger built up. But here goes: It all started when the generator guy came to service the generator. He told me the oil in the outdoor generator hadn't been changed in three years! I was told it was serviced by this self same generator guy every year. Well, no, no it had not. Not only that but did the former owner (a minister by the way, a man of God) tell me that it had been hit by lightning? Well, no, no he hadn't. Well, it had! So $250.00 for servicing, oil and to be given the news me generator maybe on its last legs. That it still works be a miracle, but it does. I bit me fingernails waiting for it to fail in the middle of a blizzard, but it didn't, not yet anyway.
Okay so there was THAT. The central air guy came to clean the units. Did I know that one of the units only blows air because it hasn't been hooked up? WHAT? Yup, only the two units worked the other one well . . . not so much Gabriel. Okay that explains why those rooms never cooled off. SO we fixed that. Paid the price of $350.00 not only unit service, but electrician to come out and hook up the other unit, an extra $250.00.
We thought we were good after that, but no wait, things come in threes. The radon levels in the house were sky high and we had on the property owners disclosure statement that a radon mitigation unit was in the basement. We went looking for it and found this pipe coming out of the basement floor and thought, okay there it is. But why isn't it working? Maybe it needed a fan, some units need the fan, others are put way into the floor and they exhaust radon out, so maybe we needed the fan part to pull the radon up and out. Well, you remember me story, 14/09/16. We discovered the bogus pipe that had no exhaust and needed more than a fan, a whole system? Yeah well there was THAT, $1300 later.
That was three strikes but we weren't out quite yet in the broken-down, obsolete category. Oh no, there was the flying squirrels that the minister's wife told us about at the closing. He wasn't happy she was telling us that the big sticky sheets of fly paper in the attic were there to catch the critters. We ended up with pest control for two years trying to rid us of THAT problem. You remember me story: 31/07/16. Cost $650.00
How am I doing on the WHATS WRONG WITH GABE'S HOUSE? But I be not done yet. Yes, it gets worse. Me electric bill be sky high, it's reached the $500 range in the winter and I did not know why. I even looked into solar panels but the cost of THAT was $98,000 can you believe. "But Mr. O'Sullivan you get a $2,000 rebate from the government." Yeah that's a whole lot NOT! So that idea went the way of historical estimates.
So, the wife decided the kitchen appliances were bad. They never worked properly she said. They look bright and shiny but she suspected they were original with the house which was built in 1996. Okay, so the range hoods when turned on would sound like air planes landing in the kitchen. You needed ear savers to blot out the noise it was that bad. So we replaced those. Lucky us got two on sale, $80 bucks.
Next was the refrigerator. The dial was turned to frozen everything and still the food inside was never cold, but lukewarm. We replaced that with a French double door model that is energy efficient for a whopping $1250. Okay done right? Nah, the dishwasher decided since the range hoods and refrigerator were gone it too would give up the ghost and it did by l leaking soapy water all over the floor. SO we replaced THAT $400 bucks later.
We thought we were home free. There was a change in the electric bill by $150 buckaroos. Well done, high five and all that rubbish. We reacted happily all too soon because this weekend, I noticed an awful smell. I thought it was the dog, but no it wasn't Frisky. I asked me Mam if she smelled what I was smelling and she said, "Oh fur sure it be doon da basement." Thanks for telling me this odour had been rising all week to the lower levels of the house. I went down there to find the furnace room flooded. For joy and there was a neon yellowish liquid in the water and it smelt suspiciously like anti-freeze. And it was anti-freeze! I was down there moping up inhaling that shite until I was starting to see things.
Seems the minister had filled the water system in the boiler with anti-freeze so he could turn the heat entirely off for the winter. He neglected to tell us THAT.
I called the furnace guy, he told me for one, the furnace was too big for the house. I didn't need a 6 coil boiler, I needed a four! So the $7,000 he first quoted me came down to $5,000. Then he said, did I know I have a gas line that is heating water in an old water tank that hasn't been used in years. No, I did not. "Well," said he, it be "manufacturing mold because it isn't being used AND it is building pressure so it could explode." Ask me if I was thrilled to hear THAT. Take a guess.
Then he turns to the wood burner and says, you are wasting oil by heating that thing even though you aren't using it, the boiler is heating the water that goes through the wood burner. For joy, does it get any better than this homeowners?
So if I seem a little angry, it is because I BE THAT. I will tell you the gas line be now OFF, and the failing boiler be no longer heating the wood burner. So me "castle" shouldn't be exploding anytime soon. Or, I don't think it will. At this point, I be sitting here waiting for . . . whats that old saying? "For the other shoe to drop." Yeah that be it.
Gabe
Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved
9 comments:
sounds about right gabe. i think all castles are costly lol
I have a lot of catching up to do. You make me not want to buy a home. I should stick to condo living? Maybe the association fee is worth it LOL
When it rains it pours and it is also said after the rain comes the rainbow. Let's hope for the latter.
Yeah I be sure the new owners will appreciate it. 😢
Oh no. Don't say that. You've done all the work now so you have to stay there. What else could go wrong?????
Oh let me give you the list: full house generator, water system including well going dry, replacing ovens, painting the house, and the biggie a new roof.
In for a penny in for a pound. You might as well go the whole hog now. Just think about it. Done and bloody dusted.,,,,,for good!!!!
You footing the bill?
No lol. I just hooked up to city water, have to paint the house also and replace wood floor. I feel your pain.
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