05 June 2017
Story #865
R. Linda:
What are the old sayings, "me 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 eight! I know you are saying, "Gabe, get to the point, will ya." 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 any more 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. Then, 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 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. Also, 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, I coughed up $250.00 for servicing, and oil, and to be given the news, the generator may be 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. The price was $350.00, not only for the unit service but also for the electrician to come out and hook up the other unit, which was an extra $250.00.
We thought we were good after that, but wait, things come in threes. The radon levels in the house were sky-high, and we had on the property owner's disclosure statement that a radon mitigation unit was in the basement. We looked for it and found this pipe coming out of the basement floor and thought, okay, there it is. But why isn't it working? It may need a fan; some units need the fan, others are put way into the floor, and they exhaust radon out through the roof, so we may need 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 finished yet in the broken-down, obsolete category. Oh no, there were the flying squirrels that the minister's wife told us about at the closing. He wasn't happy; she told 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. Do you remember my 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 was sky-high; it 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 it? "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 terrible. They never worked properly, she said. They looked bright and shiny, but she suspected they were original to the house, which was built in 1996. Okay, so when the range hoods were turned on, the sound was like airplanes landing in the kitchen. You needed earplugs to blot out the noise; it was that bad. So we replaced those. Lucky us, we got two on sale for $80 bucks.
Next was the refrigerator. The dial was turned to freeze everything, but 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 that since the range hoods and refrigerator were gone, it too would give up the ghost, and it did by 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 I noticed an awful smell this weekend. I thought it was the dog, but no, it wasn't Frisky. I asked 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, 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.
It seems the minister had filled the boiler's water system with anti-freeze so he could turn the heat off for the winter, but he neglected to tell us that.
I called the furnace guy, and 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 asked if I knew I had a gas line heating water in an old tank that hadn't been used in years. No, I did not. "Well," said he, it be "manufacturing mould 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?
So, if I seem a little angry, it is because I AM. I will tell you the gas line is now off, and the failing boiler is no longer heating the wood burner. So my "castle" shouldn't be exploding anytime soon—or I don't think it will. At this point, I am sitting here waiting for . . . What's that old saying? "For the other shoe to drop." Yeah, that's it.
Gabe
Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved
Story #865
R. Linda:
What are the old sayings, "me 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 eight! I know you are saying, "Gabe, get to the point, will ya." 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 any more 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. Then, 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 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. Also, 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, I coughed up $250.00 for servicing, and oil, and to be given the news, the generator may be 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. The price was $350.00, not only for the unit service but also for the electrician to come out and hook up the other unit, which was an extra $250.00.
We thought we were good after that, but wait, things come in threes. The radon levels in the house were sky-high, and we had on the property owner's disclosure statement that a radon mitigation unit was in the basement. We looked for it and found this pipe coming out of the basement floor and thought, okay, there it is. But why isn't it working? It may need a fan; some units need the fan, others are put way into the floor, and they exhaust radon out through the roof, so we may need 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 finished yet in the broken-down, obsolete category. Oh no, there were the flying squirrels that the minister's wife told us about at the closing. He wasn't happy; she told 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. Do you remember my 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 was sky-high; it 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 it? "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 terrible. They never worked properly, she said. They looked bright and shiny, but she suspected they were original to the house, which was built in 1996. Okay, so when the range hoods were turned on, the sound was like airplanes landing in the kitchen. You needed earplugs to blot out the noise; it was that bad. So we replaced those. Lucky us, we got two on sale for $80 bucks.
Next was the refrigerator. The dial was turned to freeze everything, but 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 that since the range hoods and refrigerator were gone, it too would give up the ghost, and it did by 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 I noticed an awful smell this weekend. I thought it was the dog, but no, it wasn't Frisky. I asked 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, 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.
It seems the minister had filled the boiler's water system with anti-freeze so he could turn the heat off for the winter, but he neglected to tell us that.
I called the furnace guy, and 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 asked if I knew I had a gas line heating water in an old tank that hadn't been used in years. No, I did not. "Well," said he, it be "manufacturing mould 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?
So, if I seem a little angry, it is because I AM. I will tell you the gas line is now off, and the failing boiler is no longer heating the wood burner. So my "castle" shouldn't be exploding anytime soon—or I don't think it will. At this point, I am sitting here waiting for . . . What's that old saying? "For the other shoe to drop." Yeah, that's it.
Gabe
Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved
