The disconnect from the Contractor set.

(started -7/19) I had mentioned I got the roof done. The gutters will be done this week so basically what I set out to do last October is now finally complete but again it’s only the first step in a series of projects I need to undertake to renovate the house.

Funny thing is though, I was working from home while the guys were fixing the roof and I got a phone call.

The phone call was from that company I mentioned in an earlier post where the guy drove up in a nice new truck and then told me that they didn’t do any itemized estimates. This woman was following up and asking me if I was still interested in having the work done.

Really, I supressed a laugh.

It’s not as if I’m ecstatic about the idiots I did finally go with but still, them calling me after the fact nosing around for the job did give me some small sense of satisfaction.

Once more I told another person I won’t do business with a company or a party that won’t give me a detailed estimate of what things cost before they do work with me or I sign a contract with them. Signing a contract without knowing exactly what you’re paying for is a recipe for disaster.

Somehow though...

So, last year I took the plunge and finally got the roof done on this house I live in. It was already too late. I mean I let it go way, way longer than it should have been but the thing was I had spent so many years struggling.

 

If I’m honest about it, maybe I wasn’t struggling initially. The thing was the ‘oughts’ were full of a lot of personal turmoil... the Ex left which I can’t say I was especially happy about although I dealt with it extremely well. When she left the thing that was tethering me was that I felt responsible for the geezer who was winding down and sure enough he had a major heart attack within two years.

 

That developed into another struggle and mess to clean up because NOTHING was in order and it took some incredible deft machinations to preserve anything in the way of assets and of course I had an absent half-sibling who suddenly saw dollar signs to deal with as well.

After that was all over a year and a half later I was spent and a year after that the cat died.

I worked, but this was right around the time the Great Recession hit and things got real, real tight. I had to double dip into any equity I had and lived frugally but it wasn’t fun and the whole time I was looking for something of a fulltime gig.

In the middle of all that, a few years on I had a major health crisis.

So, were talking a barrage, a series of waves and when I finally did get a staff gig, I decided to start taking care of all the things I had been putting off. My teeth, the house... and I finally managed to do the research get things in order and get the roof done.

By then though things had gotten really, really bad. I mean to the point that there were several parts of the house where I kept plastic trash cans to catch all the water that would come down in each storm that would pass. I can remember coming home form work one day and seeing a whole section of ceiling having collapsed from the water damage.

But, I got it done.

Thing was... they didn’t do a complete job and they actually damaged my driveway in the process.

So, two years later some things are unresolved but for the most part I've got a new roof. I’m happy on that front at least but I still have unresolved things I have to deal with including some unresolved issues re performance by the contractors but it’s better than it was so for that I’m thankful.